They are the work of a carver named Albert de Brule, of whose life I have been able to discover nothing.

Since before studying them it is well to know something of the Saint's career, I tell the story here, from _The Golden Legend_, but not all the incidents which the artist fixed upon are to be found in that biography.
Benedict as a child was sent to Rome to be educated, but he preferred the desert.

Hither his nurse accompanied him, and his first token of signal holiness was his answered prayer that a pitcher which she had broken might be made whole again.

Leaving his nurse, he associated with a hermit who lived in a pit to which food was lowered by a rope.

Near by dwelt a priest, who one day made a great meal for himself, but before he could eat it he received a supernatural intimation that Benedict was hungry in a pit, and he therefore took his dinner to him and they ate it together.