We had for years desired to make a pilgrimage to Assisi, and now, across the lovely valley the sight of the little white town clinging to Monte Subasio, veiled by grey and purple vapour, was a daily reminder of our wish. Some places stamp themselves into the heart, and while life lasts the longing to revisit them increases, till realisation quenches desire. A visit to such a haunt of delightful memories as Assisi requires time, so we waited till a few days could be spared.

It was very early morning when we drove down from Perugia along the Assisi road, a road bordered by the silver and gold of olive-groves and vineyards. Fragrant, dewy freshness lay on everything; even when the sun rose higher, and blazed fiercely down on us, we had become so absorbed by the surrounding scenery and its associations that we did not seem to feel the brilliant heat.

Now and then, between the leafy trees on our right, we had glimpses of yellow Tiber on its way to Rome. Francis Bernardone must also have enjoyed these glimpses as he walked to and from Assisi with some favourite disciple, perhaps along this very road.

St. Francis did a far greater work for his contemporaries than any reformer of the later Renaissance period. He did not attack popes and bishops, or find fault with everything and everybody who differed from his special ideas: he used the most powerful means by which to influence mankind,—he lived the life he preached. He had been accustomed to luxury and every form of self-pleasing,—he gave up all to follow the way of the Cross, from love to his Saviour. In that brutal and licentious age, the beginning of the thirteenth century, his example seems to have been irresistible. The life of poverty, obedience, and chastity enjoined by his rule sounded utter folly when first proclaimed to the multitude; but it says something in favour of those times that, when the first outcry ceased, and his fellow-citizens witnessed the harmony that existed between his life and his teaching, he was left comparatively unmolested, and his work was not materially interfered with. Though he died at forty-four, he lived long enough to see his Order recognised by Holy Church and by secular potentates, and to know that its widely spread communities were firmly established wherever they had planted themselves.

It may be said of St. Bernard and St. Dominick, that they also practised all they preached, but one feature peculiar to St. Francis is not chronicled of those other revivalists,—his idea of life was a very happy one. In the century that followed, Boccaccio did not teach joy as a duty one whit more strenuously than the Poverello did, although the two men's ideas of the source of joy were so opposite.

One remembers the recorded talk about joy, of that which fails to make, and of that which is the true root of happiness, between Francis and Fra Leone,—a talk which continued for two miles, while the master and his disciple walked out from Perugia to Assisi.

At last Fra Leo, called by Francis "the little sheep of God," cried out: "Father, tell me, I pray thee, wherein can perfect happiness be found?"

Whereupon Francis made his well-known answer, recorded in the eighth chapter of I Fioretti ("The Little Flowers of St. Francis").

As we drove along we remembered that the hills looking down on us, now varied by exquisite cloud-shadows, had listened to cheerful lays, improvised in the ProvenÇal tongue by Francis as he trudged along this road. He did not have his hymns rendered into Italian verse, so that they might be understood by the people, until he needed them to help his teachings; his sympathy with human nature taught him the power of music in creating fervent devotion.

Reading the Fioretti, one learns that, in spite of the severe rule he followed, Francis enjoyed his life; there must have been a singular power of fascination in the man, who could always, wherever he went, change sorrow into joy. He rejoiced in the beauty of nature, and went singing along the dusty way, between the olive-trees and the grape-laden vines, which then, as now, probably bordered the road on either hand; he rejoiced in every trial laid on him, as a fresh offering he could make to his God.

Francis sang till the birds came fluttering round him to share his gladness, mingling their songs with his. At Bevagna, a place south of Spello, he preached his famous sermon to these winged disciples, and bade the swallows cease their disturbing twitter.

He loved all dumb creatures, and strove to care for them, calling them his brothers and sisters; at Gubbio he tamed a wolf, till then the terror of the place. Once, meeting a peasant who had an armful of wild turtle-doves, he took them from the man, lest they should be killed or ill-treated, and, bringing them home to La Portioncula, he caused little nests to be made for the gentle birds, bade them live peacefully, and increase and multiply according to the will of God.

As we drove along the lovely valley, filled now with golden light varied by purple shadow, its glorious background of hills in every delicate shade of blue, with spaces between, an opal gauze in the sunshine, and villages nestling beside the tree-shaded Tiber, we saw, hard by, the grey-peaked bridge, so ancient looking, that Francis may one time or another have gone singing across it; and we felt that such a mind could not have lived amid so much beauty without becoming interpenetrated by it.

He is so entirely incorporated with Assisi and its surroundings, that one cannot describe the old town without now and again referring to the timeworn tale, so beautifully told by Monsieur Paul Sabatier.

Our two hours' drive between vines and olive-trees backed by grand purple hills had been lovely. The grapes were almost ripe, pale gold in colour, thickly hanging from tender green garlands, which stretched from one tree to another and linked them together. In some fields long-horned oxen were ploughing the stiff lumpy land between the vines; here and there golden stalks of maize lay on the rich brown soil. The sun-touched summits of Subasio and his brethren looked like radiant clouds; the pure invigorating air was delightful.

As one nears Assisi, the two salient points in the view are, on the left, high up the mountain side, the great convent of San Francesco, with its double churches; on the right, at the foot of the ascent to the town, is seen the dome of Santa Maria degli Angeli.

The body of this church was built in the sixteenth century over the original chapel, the Portioncula, in which St. Francis and his disciples worshipped, and in which Santa Chiara and so many others took the vows of the Order, and devoted themselves to lead lives of poverty, chastity, and obedience.

Huge Subasio had been in front of us all the way, but we could now distinguish clearly the long stretch of white houses clinging midway to the side of the mountain; and above the houses, the campaniles and spires of Assisi, while towering high over the road, supported by a double row of lofty arches, are the convent, and the two churches of San Francesco.

In a picture it would be difficult to give an adequate idea of the approach to Assisi,—certainly word-painting cannot describe it. Probably the thrill caused by the associations and surroundings of the town intensifies the charm.

The varied colour of the hills on either side of us had become more exquisite. Now we had in full view the scene described by Dante as the birthplace of San Francesco, for the town seems a part of the

For miles round, this building of San Francesco makes a striking landmark, and as long as it stands it bears witness to the strange and beautiful story of the youth who gave up all that seemed to make life worth living, to save not only his own soul, but those of others.

There was no tardy justice in the recognition given to his holy life, and the benefits worked by his discipline. In 1228, two years after his death, Francesco Bernardone was canonised by Pope Gregory IX.—the tried friend who knew the life as well as the work of El Poverello—as St. Francis of Assisi was called, and the building of the Lower Church was begun.

Before the century ended this church and the upper one had become a great centre of art-workers; in a sense, we may look on Francis of Assisi as a source of inspiration to both Giotto and Dante; they were all three originators and purifiers.

Dante's description in the Paradiso, or rather the story which he makes St. Thomas Aquinas relate concerning Saint Francis, shows that a lapse of centuries has not in any way altered the high esteem in which he was held less than a century after his death. Dante was born only thirty-nine years later; and as he certainly visited Assisi, he must have been well acquainted with all the details of the saint's history. It may have been in his exultation at the triumphs achieved by his friend Giotto's frescoes at Assisi that the poet writes, after mentioning Cimabue, "And now the cry is Giotto's."

Our driver stopped at the foot of the hill, and told us we had better begin our pilgrimage at the church of Santa Maria degli Angeli. We had, however, planned to begin the wonderful story at its first chapter, and to visit the saint's birthplace, also the scene of his final renunciation of the world. So we bade honest Checco drive us on to the Hotel Subasio beside the hill, where we dismissed our carriage, and looked at the room allotted to us.

We then climbed the bit of ascent, and feasted our eyes on the outside of the churches of San Francesco.