CHAPTER VII

_Capo d’Arno_ 113

_Hints for the Traveler_ 133

_Index_ 143

ILLUSTRATIONS

PAGE

_St Francis by della Robbia (La Verna)_ _frontispiece_

_Chiesa Maggiore, La Verna_ 3

_Bibbiena Marketplace_ 14

_Situation of La Verna_ 34

_Vine Cultivation (Casentino)_ 36

_Entrance to La Verna_ 43

_Camaldoli (Casentino)_ 53

_Courtyard of Camaldoli_ 73

_Landmark of Camaldoli_ 76

_Castle of Poppi (Casentino)_ 91

_Courtyard of Castle, Poppi_ 99

_Statue of Count Guido, Castle of Poppi_ 109

_Arms of the Guidi_ 112

_Church of Romena (Casentino)_ 114

_Castel San Niccolo_ 123

_Map_ _at the end of the Volume_

THROUGH THE CASENTINO

“col cavallo di San Francesco”

I

_The Casentino_

“Li ruscelletti, che de’ verdi colli

Del Casentin discendon giuso in Arno,

Facendi i lor canali e freddi e molli

Sempre mi stanno innanzi....”

(_Inf._ 30, 65 ff.)

The Casentino is the name given to the upper valley of the Arno, where

the river, rising in numerous streams on the slopes of the Falterona,

flows southwards for about forty miles before it swings round in its

course and runs north-westwards in the direction of Florence. The

district, to use the words of a modern Italian writer, is “formed by

nature in the shape of a basket”--those oval flower-baskets we see

carried about the streets of Florence--“with its lowest part green with

meadows, fields and vineyards, and encircled and, so to say, closed in

by lofty mountains.” It is a district rich in memories of Dante and

other associations. The halo of early Christian life, the gloom and

splendour of feudal times, and the glow of the Renaissance, all linger

here. And many beauties of nature, many feasts of the imagination here

await the traveller who foregoes for a time the hasty temper of the

tourist.

It was late one afternoon in April when we left the train at Bibbiena,

and, shouldering our knapsacks, wended our way up from the station to

the town. We were well in the land of the ancient Etruscans, that

mysterious and visionary people whose fleet swept the Tyrrhenian Sea at

a time when the greatness of Rome was not. Like other Etruscan cities,

Bibbiena lies on the summit of a hill, and many examples of Etruscan art

industry have been discovered in its neighbourhood.

It had been cold and cheerless in the noisy Italian train rattling up

from Arezzo. A dull, stormy sky gave a desolate aspect to the irregular

country and cast a shadow over the rugged mountains. But as we climbed

the hill of Bibbiena our spirits rose. Side valleys opening up in

different directions revealed winding roads and castle-crowned

elevations; Poppi, with its soaring tower, stood up in bold outline; the

higher mountains, many of them snow-capped, seemed to unite in one bold,

forcible sweep. Which of these heights sheltered Camaldoli,

[Illustration: CHIESA MAGGIORE, LA VERNA]

with its reminiscences of St Romuald?--which the retreat of La Verna,

with its thoughts of St Francis? Our anticipations were in no way damped

when we found ourselves half an hour later sitting in the little

dining-room of the Albergo Amorosi. Certainly the chief merit of the

broth was its warmth,--the pigeon was not drawn, though it was

tender,--and the cheese could never have suggested the difference

between this commodity and chalk. But the delicious fried artichokes,

and the assurance of mine host that to-morrow he could procure anything

we pleased, went far to restoring our confidence. It was Easter Sunday,

visitors could hardly have been expected at this late hour. Besides, the

bedrooms and general appurtenances of the place were unexceptionable. So

we made the best of our meal, examined the visitors’ book with

deliberate curiosity, and then we sat down by the window and watched the

fading light of day across a bit of old-fashioned garden, with its

blossoming almond tree, the tender green of the budding fig, and the

rusty black of a row of cypresses between us and the distant mountains.

Looking back to the time when the Casentino as such emerges from the

dimness of the unrecorded past, we find obscurity hanging over this

district longer than over adjacent parts of Tuscany. The circle of its

enclosing mountains gave the Casentino a remoteness, which qualified

its fate in the past as it adds a special colour to its life of to-day.

The period of Etruscan independence and the period of Roman rule have

left few obvious traces; it is of the times following the barbarian

invasion that the district chiefly speaks. When men are thrown into new

surroundings, new qualities come into play. There is something

fascinating in analysing the influence which race has had upon race, and

the results of bringing peoples of different degrees of culture into

juxtaposition. All that survived of Roman culture and learning after the

advent of the barbarians was to be found in the towns. The German

invaders on the banks of the Arno, as on those of the Rhine, were

impatient of the restraints of mutual dependence--they avoided life in

cities. Once in possession of new lands, the leaders of the conquering

host divided, each leader sought a centre of authority for himself, and

the lesser military chiefs strove to equal the autonomy of the greater.

Solitary and as reserved towards compeers as the eagle, these men made

their homes by preference on rocky heights, which nature protected

against surprise, and which the art of defence succeeded in rendering

almost impregnable.

History chronicled at least four distinct barbarian descents into

Northern Italy in the fifth and sixth centuries. Different races and

different branches of the same race ousted one another from possession

of the land. When the tumult of contrary tides subsided, the Langobards

held the sway, which they retained for over two hundred years. The

Langobard’s spirit is that of the hunter--it lives to this day in the

architectural decorations of North Italian churches, where the bristling

boar and the leashed hound, the fierce wolf and the rampant lion, the

flying deer and the hungry bird, with nondescript monsters of various

kinds, do service in ornamenting façades, supporting columns and

relieving capitals.

We know little concerning the settling of Langobard chiefs in the

Casentino, but the district, with its fruitful upland tracts, its rocky

elevations and wooded side valleys, had great attractions for the

invaders, since it favoured the mode of life they held dear. When

authentic records begin, many strongholds of the district were in the

hands of men who were Langobards by descent, and who became progenitors

of some of the most distinguished families of Tuscany. Among these the

Guidi claim special attention. For the history of this family decided

the history of the Casentino for over four hundred years. No family

attained a power at all equalled by theirs, no family so deeply

impressed the mind of Dante, and none is so frequently mentioned in the

Divine Comedy.

It was against the further advance of the Langobards that the Pope in

the eighth century called upon the loyal Franks to interfere in behalf

of the temporal estates of the Church. Once again the fertile plains of

Italy were overrun by Germans, but in this case by Germans who had

grasped the idea of a centralised system of government. Before the unity

of the Franks the scattered and divided nobles of Italy were as chaff

before the wind. The greater number of her dukes, counts and barons

recognised Frankish over-lordship, and in due course became feudatories

to the Empire. This relation eventually secured to the Emperor his

staunchest allies against the growing Italian communes--it in no way

debarred the Italian nobles from living as independent chiefs, warring

against one another as personal hatred, jealousy and private revenge

prompted. The distinguishing qualities of these men--they may well be

called virtues--were audacity, enterprise and a boundless self-reliance.

But they were qualities unseparated as yet from the revolting contempt

for life and limb of a rough barbarian age, a contempt that found

expression in wanton stabbing, poisoning and mutilation as a convenient

mode of retaliation on enemies.

But a safeguard necessary to the very existence of these men now lay in

their recognition of the claims of the Church. The Pope, as a temporal

ruler, might be defied; as a spiritual ruler, who had hosts untold at

his command, he was a power and a strength to be respected. Turbulent

barons, whose play often ended in bloodshed, began to defer to the

priest and to patronise the monk. The ascent to the stronghold was

flanked by a chapel, and monastic colonies were invited to settle in the

most fruitful districts.

There can be no doubt that the men who, thus prompted, accepted Mother

Church, accepted her from purely utilitarian motives. But Mother Church

was apparently content to dwell with them on the terms proposed, for she

blessed them with many blessings. Exactly those dynasties prospered

whose piety is borne out by the numerous endowments which they made.

Certainly these were made on conditions which left a loophole for

interference on the part of those who made them. But the greater

prevails over the lesser, whatever terms the lesser may make. The Church

entered into the alliance in obedience to a call from the barons, but in

course of time she shook herself free from their control.

The history of the Casentino illustrates the sequence of these changes.

Few rocky heights but are crowned by the ruins of a stronghold, few

upland expanses but preserve the remembrance of an ancient monastery.

The word _badia_, the ancient term for monastery, survives in a number

of local names, such as Badia a Tega, Badia a Prataglia. These

monasteries went through stormy experiences towards the close of the

tenth century, and all owing to the high-handed manner in which their

patrons dealt with them. The Church was defiled by iniquity of traffic.

On the one side laymen sold Church property and privileges, simony in

the wider sense of the word. On the other, ecclesiastics themselves

traded in benefices, simony in its narrower sense.

One of the important movements set on foot to oppose this evil is

associated with the name of St Romuald, and through him with the

Casentino, where the monastery of Camaldoli most directly embodied and

most religiously preserved the spirit of one of Christianity’s most

zealous champions. Camaldoli in the course of centuries has attracted

visitors of many tempers from many countries. In Dante’s estimation

Romuald was so important a person that he pictured him in Paradise as

one of the chosen two whom St Benedict pointed out to him by name.

Among those whom the fame of Romuald brought to the Casentino was St

Francis of Assisi. On his journey he passed La Verna, that solitary

mountain height in the Apennines which appeared to him as a chosen spot

for meditation. Many visitors come to see La Verna in the Casentino who

come there to see nothing else, especially of late years, since a less

prejudiced view of the saints has helped to restore the importance of St

Francis on a wider basis than that of a purely devotional interest.

But not only the votaries of St Francis find a shrine at which to pay

homage in the Casentino. Since the publication of the _Voyages

Dantesques_ by Ampère, every student of Dante longs to wander among

these hills, for here the poet stayed at different periods of his life,

and here his admirers are especially able to appreciate those occasional

references to the beauties of nature, which are as manna in the

wilderness among the terrible descriptions of Hell and Purgatory. In the

Casentino Dante fought in his youth, hither he came in his manhood to

stay with the Counts Guidi when Florence had closed her gates to him.

And again the revived study of Dante’s works during the Renaissance was

directly associated with the Casentino. Cristofero Landini, who first

published a commentary on Dante, was from there; and Bandini, who wrote

a famous work on the revival of learning in Italy, describes this

revival in connection with Landini, and prefaces his work by an account

of the numerous distinguished men to whom the Casentino gave birth.

Thus on the very point of entering the Casentino were we made to pause

and call to remembrance some of those periods which associated the

district with so much that is worthy of recollection. If knowledge be

the wing wherewith we fly to heaven, it is also the key wherewith to

unlock the treasures of this earth. And it seemed the more needful to

recall the distinguishing features of the past as the different periods

gained in importance when seen on a wider historical background. But

discursiveness too has its limits. Wisely were the words spoken, “a time

to break down and a time to build up.” It so happened that we had each

brought a copy of Dante, though books are not a pleasant burden on a

walking tour. But the trouble of carrying them was well repaid by the

enjoyment we derived from studying them during the evening hours while

in the land in which we were so frequently reminded of the poet.

II

_Bibbiena and Cardinal Bibbiena_

“Bibbiena ‘che una terra è sopr’ Arno molto amena.”

(Berni: _Orlando Innamorato_, 3, 7, 1.)

The town of Bibbiena boasts of no special architecture and of no great

works of art, but it has all the characteristic charm of a Tuscan hill

city. Looked at from without, the remains of its great walls and the

substructure of its buildings suggest line upon line of successive ages

of builders; within, there are the usual open spaces and narrow streets,

with sudden changes from dazzling sunlight to dim coolness. Apparently

the town has not spread since it was dismantled at the beginning of the

sixteenth century; its limits are still marked by the remains of its

walls. And, as in all walled cities, its buildings, churches, palaces,

dwelling-houses and store-houses stand shoulder to shoulder, the more

important buildings stretching to greater height and overlooking the

less important ones.

On ordinary days the town was quiet enough. Few people were seen abroad

and the noise of a vehicle was an event. But inside the houses

[Illustration: BIBBIENA MARKET-PLACE]

various trades were plied. The main streets of the place were lined with

vaulted cavernous shops, the doors of which were thrown open, and in the

deep, shady recesses men were busy at work. As usual in hill cities,

blacksmiths’ shops were numerous, and the owners of all seemed well

employed. And as one passed along the street--those narrow, stony

Italian streets--one’s attention was arrested by the sound of

hammering. Presently the hammering ceased, the bellows stirred up a rush

of sparks, and for a moment a ruddy light fell on the bending cyclopean

figures at work, or perhaps on the bellows themselves, a panting monster

couchant on the hearth. From the braziers’ shops sounded the din of the

strokes falling on the metal. These shops too were numerous, and their

roofs could hardly be seen for the number of large-bellied copper water

pots hanging there. The roof too of the shop of smoked wares was almost

invisible from rows upon rows of suspended sausages and hams, each

tightly confined in a close network of string. There was the weaver’s

workshop, from which sounded the regular thud of the beam thrown back on

the woof, and there was the wheelwright’s, with its smell of stored

timber and its floor strewn with crisp shavings as they were taken off

by the plane. The greengrocer’s store was but a poor one as yet; there

were lumps of boiled spinage and bunches of young artichokes, no other

green-meats, but there were lemons, oranges, nuts and dried figs in

plenty. There was the drug store too, with its clean, cool, deserted

look. The apothecary and a friend were sitting down to a game of cards

one day when we passed, and looked up in surprise as we entered in the

hope of coming upon some pots of Savona ware--a desire for which was

strong in the new-fledged M.D. Then there was the barber’s shop, with

its nimble master, who could be seen operating on a customer, and the

small window with panes of glass behind which the watchmaker sat bending

over his work.

On market-days the town assumed a look of greater liveliness.

Two-wheeled country carts came toiling up the hill. They were left on

the terrace below or on one side of the market-place, and their inmates

stood about in groups with the men of the town who had stopped work for

the day. A number of stalls were set up on the market-place and wares of

many kinds were displayed. There were stalls of butchers’ meat, loaded

with the tiniest of lambkins, a sorry sight; there were stalls with a

show of ribbons and laces, all of the cheapest; stalls with bales of

homespun; stalls with hats and caps of felt. And on the ground brown and

yellow and red earthenware was heaped up or spread about, jars and

platters, and pots and pans, in the plainest of forms but most

decorative in colour.

On such a day selling extended down the side streets. And the vendor of

cheap literature was seen suspending tracts and booklets in rows by

means of bits of string, while the hawker of cheap jewellery took

advantage of a projecting window-ledge to set out his little trays. The

display of outlandish wares invariably causes one’s money to burn, and

one of us was tempted to buy a silver finger-ring with a crucified

Christ--a pattern peculiar to Tuscany, I believe--while the other, from

a mass of twopenny romances and stories of the saints, picked out the

romance of Pia dei Tolomei, the story of a faithful wife’s cruel

treatment and violent death. This was she, unforgotten in popular

literature as it seemed, who started up before Dante in Purgatory and

prayed him to recall her memory on earth.

But it was at night, when the dark of the evening filled the streets

with gloom, when the last carts had rattled down the steep streets and

were speeding away along the white country roads in the darkness, when

men passed along the walls like shadows, and silence had laid her hold

on the concerns of this world, that fancy began to stir and breathe more

freely, and stepped forth to take her pleasure with the figures of the

past.

One evening I had stayed in the Franciscan church looking at the

altar-pieces of the Della Robbias, the Nativity and the Deposition--the

latter a gift to the church from Cardinal Bibbiena--till the twilight

drove me out and I went to walk on the terrace of the town, which

commanded a view of the panorama of the hills. There had been a

thunderstorm, and heavy rain-clouds hung over the Apennines. Their

lower slopes were shrouded in mist, but spanned from side to side by a

rainbow. Towards the south the skyline above the valley of the Arno was

piled with masses upon masses of clouds. Further yet, towards the west,

the sun had just set behind a rocky height, but its reflection was

caught by the white vapour that filled the undulating plain and extended

upwards into the numerous branching valleys beneath the snow-capped

heights of the Pratomagno, revealing line upon line of rocky crag and

sloping hillside. It was a sight that stirred emotion and roused the

imagination. And wandering back through the dark, solitary streets, I

seemed to see some of the figures of the shadowy past, whose mortal

remains long ago had fallen to dust and decay, nay, for aught we knew,

had gone to build up new forms of life again and again under the

transforming agency of time.

Had they not all walked and talked here, the Etruscan potter, cunning of

hand, worthy forerunner of the Tuscan painter of the Quattrocento?--The

Roman centurion, proud of a system of government which embraced the

known world, never equalled before, never since?--The Langobard

hunter--the soft-treading monk--the sister of charity--had they not all

walked and talked in sight of the surrounding hills? And had not these

streets seen some of those feuds between commune and commune, very

thorns in the eyes of Italian liberty in the fourteenth and fifteenth

centuries, when the hope of national unification was shattered, and that

for centuries to come, by the rise of the _condottieri_, those upstart

rulers, spoilt children of fortune, to whom Italian history owes some of

its most sombre and also some of its brightest pages? There is no

English equivalent for the word _condottiere_, the thing and the term

for it are unknown outside Italy. For in Italy alone a combination of

peculiar circumstances made it possible for men, who were gifted with

unlimited determination, to watch their opportunity inside the separate

townships and to snatch at the reins of independent government by the

help of mercenary troops, a tool, dangerous in itself, which they

handled with consummate ability.

The development of communal life in the cities of northern Italy had

been early. But placed between Emperor and Pope the citizens of

different towns split into factions; some preferred allegiance to an

Emperor who was on the other side of the Alps, others, more national in

feeling, sided with the Pope. But when the respective authority of Pope

and Emperor became a matter of dispute, and each sought to support his

claims by introducing foreign armies into Italy, all alike were thrown

off their balance.

Under these circumstances the joint action of citizens was

inconceivable, much more the joint action of different cities, to the

common end of national consolidation. Worn out by party conflicts,

townships at last succumbed to the high-handed government of a military

leader who brought security if nothing else, and the Republican

Government of city after city fell a prey to men whose attitude recalled

that of the tyrants of classical antiquity. For among the _condottieri_

also there were men famous for their misdeeds, yet whose despotism was

relieved by a trait of grandeur. Among them also there were men who held

the prosperity of their subjects dear at heart and who made their courts

into centres of learning and polite intercourse. A stormy period was

followed by comparative quiet, and the arts of peace found their best

patrons among parvenu princes.

The town of Bibbiena had experienced her share of these vicissitudes.

Subject at one time to the Prince Bishop of Arezzo, the town was

besieged and appropriated by the Republic of Florence, snatched back by

members of the powerful Tarlati family, and reconquered by Florence

thirty years later. For its vicinity to Florence, combined with its

comparative remoteness, made Bibbiena a dangerous neighbour in times of

warfare. This was especially the case after the expulsion from Florence

of the Medici in 1494, when Piero, the eldest son and successor of

Lorenzo the Magnificent, with his brothers and others, sought the help

of Venice. An army of Venetians invaded the Casentino, and made Bibbiena

its headquarters. The Florentines, having secured the help of the Sforza

of Milan, in their turn invaded the Casentino, laying siege to Bibbiena,

and the Venetian army was caught as in a trap. Bibbiena fell, and all

possibility of her harbouring the enemies of Florence in the future was

removed by the entire demolition of her town walls.

The Medici escaped. Piero, whom his father designated as the “fool,”

threw himself into the arms of the Borgia and perished a few years

later; Giovanni, Lorenzo’s “clever” son, who was a cardinal at the age

of thirteen, and afterwards Pope Leo X., left Italy to seek solace by

travelling in Germany, Flanders and France; and the third brother, the

spirited and gifted Giuliano, called by his father the “good,” a few

years later was staying at the Court of Urbino, together with the

devoted friend of the family, Bernardo Divizio, afterwards Cardinal

Bibbiena.

And these streets had seen him often, in obscure youth and again in the

pride of successful manhood, Bernardo Divizio, surnamed Bibbiena, true

representative of the spirit of the late Italian Renaissance, with its

boundless faith in its own wisdom. Author of that most spirited and

most licentious comedy, the _Calandra_, _maître-de-plaisir_ at the court

of Leo X., patron of Rafael, self-conscious, versatile, handsome, with

glowing eye and scornful lip, he lives in the portrait which Rafael

painted of him. Count Baldassare Castiglione, in his famous analysis of

the _Perfect Courtier_, introduced Bibbiena as the man of mirth and wit.

Paolo Giovio, the historian, to whose facile pen posterity owes so many

biographies, says much in praise of him. Bembo addressed to him some of

his most pleasing letters, and all accounts corroborate the impression

produced by Bibbiena’s writings as they lie before us, and by the man’s

portrait as it hangs in the Pitti, painted by one of the greatest

artists the world has known.

Bernardo Divizio was of an obscure family of Bibbiena. The story that

the Divizi had changed their name from Tarlati is an obvious invention,

and the boy, at the age of nine, was sent to Florence, where his brother

was secretary to Lorenzo the Magnificent. He was an able letter-writer

at seventeen, and was the constant companion of Lorenzo’s son Giovanni,

his junior by five years. The two young men rivalled each other in

studying literature and the classics, but apparently there was never a

cloud between them. Before the Medici went into exile Bibbiena acted as

their envoy, and a letter of his addressed to Piero throws a curious

side-light on the kind of love-adventure in which these young men found

diversion. At a later period Bibbiena acted as secretary to Giovanni,

advocating his cause at the Papal Court with Julius II. Later still he

joined Giuliano at the Court of Urbino, which had become the

rallying-place of many men of distinction.

For the Montefeltre of Urbino, _condottieri_ by origin, belonged to

those princes who set before them a high degree of excellence. Duke

Federigo, whose boast it was never to have lost a battle, acted as

patron to the translators and commentators on the Greek classics; he

collected a library at Urbino and built a magnificent palace there.

There is something pathetic in the fact that Federigo’s son Guidobaldo,

himself a confirmed invalid, presided in person over the games by which

the young men perfected their physical training. For athletic exercises,

no less than culture and good breeding, were the object of attention at

Urbino, where the best aspirations of the age, intellectual, artistic

and social, found protection. Bramante, who designed St Peter’s at Rome,

was from Urbino. Rafael was born here, and he always retained an

affection for the home of his childhood, which he frequently visited.

Several of his earlier pictures, including Christ on the Mount of

Olives, were painted for Duke Guidobaldo. Guidobaldo’s wife, Elisabetta,

was a Gonzaga of Mantua, a family of origin and ambitions similar to

those of the Montefeltre at Urbino. And when her delicate husband had

retired to rest, the Duchess, with the witty Lady Emilia Pia,

entertained the company in her apartments, where social accomplishments

and literary talents were fully displayed.

It was at these reunions that the discussions took place which Count

Castiglione has immortalised in the _Cortegiano_, a book famous in its

time, which has been translated into English more than once under the

title, _The Courtier, or the Perfect Gentleman and Gentlewoman_. A

number of distinguished visitors are represented as being assembled in

the rooms of the Duchess, and among them are the names of several whose

fame has descended through other channels. Here Count Lodovico Canossa

spoke of the courtier’s outward bearing and behaviour, pursuing the

questions into such byeways as, How far self-praise was commendable,

and, How negligence could be affected without becoming unpleasant. When

he had spoken Bibbiena was called upon to analyse how far facetiousness

was compatible with good breeding, and he illustrated his argument by

witticisms, _bon-mots_, and accounts of practical jokes in endless

variety, a collection which forms a valuable addition to our knowledge

of the _facetiæ_ of the Renaissance. Bibbiena’s plea for fun was founded

on the observation, I do not know if originally due to him, to

Castiglione, or to some older writer, that man is the only living being

capable of laughter. The company fully appreciated his jokes and the way

he told them. To us, many of them seem rather out of date. One wonders

that men of culture should have cared for humour that was so broad, and

especially, that they should have thought fit to enlarge on it in the

presence of ladies. Not that the stories in themselves have any of the

offensiveness of those tales with which Boccaccio’s company amused

themselves a century and a half earlier. On the contrary, Bibbiena

maintained that in good society no pleasantry was acceptable which

detracted from a woman’s honour, a remark which led up to the discussion

of the perfect lady and of the nature of love. Giuliano de’ Medici, a

known champion of women, espoused their cause in a spirit which cannot

fail to delight all women who read the work. In the animated discussion

which followed, Octaviano Fregoso, afterwards doge of Genoa, Bembo,

Aretino and the Lady Emilia Pia all took part.

To judge from the Cortegiano, Bibbiena was not only handsome, but he was

renowned for taking pride in his good looks, and in an age of

self-consciousness he appeared as most self-conscious. The sentiments

which he aroused and the impression which he made were ever present to

his mind. And his self-consciousness was matched by his self-assurance.

He apparently loved to give the conversation a personal turn, and to

carry off feigned criticism of himself in a spirit of banter. When Count

Lodovico insisted on beauty of feature as necessary to the perfect

courtier, the conversation took an undesired turn. But Bibbiena recalled

it and restored good-humour by drawing attention to himself. “As for

grace and beauty of feature,” he said, appealing to Lodovico, “I know I

have my share, the reason, as you know, why so many ladies fall in love

with me, but as for beauty of person I am somewhat in doubt, especially

regarding my legs, which are not as well shaped as I would have them....

Explain more particularly what you mean by beauty of person that I may

be freed from suspense and my mind set at rest.”

Bibbiena not only entertained the company at Urbino with talk. His great

triumph there was the performance, in 1508, of the _Calandra_, one of

the earliest comedies in Italian prose. It called forth acclamations of

delight among contemporaries; two generations later its flagrant

indecencies had relegated it to oblivion. A full description of the

performance was forwarded to Count Lodovico Canossa by Count

Castiglione, who, judging from the tone of his letter, had a hand in the

_mise-en-scène_. The curious part about this is its striving for

realism. There is the downright realism of a street with palaces and an

octagonal church, a town-wall and fortifications, partly decorated in

stucco, for the comedy, and the affected realism of would-be classical

figures and accessories for the interludes. And this a hundred years

before improvised hoardings did service at the first representations of

Shakespeare, or a hundred and fifty years before Inigo Jones designed

elaborate sceneries for the representation of masques in England.

The _Calandra_ itself was composed on the model of the _Menechmi_ of

Plautus, and is not without likeness to the _Comedy of Errors_. But in

this case the two persons whose likeness gives rise to laughable

mistakes are twins, brother and sister, neither of whom is aware of the

other’s presence in the same town. The brother sometimes dresses up as a

woman to gain access to his mistress, the sister sometimes wears men’s

clothes to avoid detection. In the prologue the spectators are called

upon to decide for themselves who is on the stage, brother or sister, a

mystifying _quid pro quo_ which apparently was a source of endless

discussion and amusement to the perplexed audience. A vulgar husband,

who is said to be drawn from life, and a witty go-between, are the most

individual characters. A necromancer is introduced and is credited with

transforming men into women, and this gives an opportunity for

ridiculing the current belief in magic.

The play was in five acts. At the close of each act came an interlude,

by which the classical taste of the age was gratified. There was Jason

ploughing the field with imitation bulls which snorted real fire; he

sowed dragons’ teeth, which presently started up into men who fell to

performing a morisc or morris-dance. At the close of the second act

Venus appeared in a chariot drawn by cupids, who bore flaming torches;

they set free a number of gallants, who likewise performed a dance. Then

came Neptune seated on a car, surrounded by sea monsters, the account of

whose dance recalls the displays of a modern Christmas pantomime. Later

on Juno appeared surrounded by a bevy of birds--peacocks, eagles,

ostriches, parrots--all so entertaining in their antics that Castiglione

knows no limit to his praise of them. The entire interludes were acted

by children, whose freshness and want of affectation were felt a welcome

change from the conventionality of the professional actors. The

performance closed with an epilogue, in which Cupid spoke of love as the

guiding power of life, and enlarged on the blessings of peace as

opposed to the terrors of war.

The success of the performance was such that six years later (1514),

when Giovanni de’ Medici had become Pope Leo X., and Bibbiena had been

made cardinal by him, the play was repeated at Rome in the Papal Court

for the entertainment of Isabella d’Este, Countess of Mantua. The Pope

was persuaded by his cardinal to be present, and again no trouble was

spared to secure a look of reality to the stage. Its decoration was

entrusted to Perruzzi, who was studying architecture at Rome under

Bramante, and whose marvellous talent for perspective equalled his fame

as an architect. It was he who designed and built the Farnesina, the

ceiling of which Rafael decorated with the history of Cupid and Psyche.

The name of Cardinal Bibbiena is indissolubly connected with the

pontificate of Leo X., a period of which contemporaries spoke as the

Golden Age restored. Giovio has left a most enthusiastic description of

the life at Rome at the time. Art and learning, which had received new

impulses, thanks to the determined policy of Julius II., found as

liberal a patron in Leo. Bramante was at work raising the walls of St

Peter’s, Michael Angelo was painting the Sistine Chapel, Rafael was

devoting his energies to the Stanze and the Loggie of the Vatican. And

at the same time Sadoleto, the famous Latinist, and his friend Bembo,

distinguished alike as historian and art-connoisseur, were attached to

the Papal Court in the capacity of secretaries. Pope Leo was surrounded

by a circle of men of merit, and in this circle Cardinal Bibbiena played

no subordinate part. His advice, we are told, was worth having in

serious and in frivolous matters; and, judging from letters extant, he

inspired Bembo with warm feelings of affection. We are told that his

ready wit made it easy for him at any time to divert Leo, and in the

matter of art his tastes fell in with those of his patron. It was for

Cardinal Bibbiena that Rafael painted a small chamber in the Vatican

Palace which is still known as the Cardinal’s bathroom. It was designed

in the style of the antique wall-paintings which had been discovered in

the _thermæ_ at Rome. Small scenes were introduced among arabesques on

the walls, and the subjects of these scenes were chosen by the Cardinal

and recall the interludes of the _Calandra_. On each picture Cupid was

depicted, driving sometimes birds, sometimes butterflies or other

insects, to show the power of love over the animal world. Cardinal

Bibbiena had taken a great fancy to Rafael; he persuaded him to become

engaged to his niece Maria Antonia. The painter found he could not

refuse though his affections were elsewhere. But he deferred the

marriage from year to year, and his premature death cut off the

possibility of the alliance.

Thanks to the efforts of the men whom Leo assembled about him, Rome

enjoyed a time of undisturbed prosperity--a time of which all who care

for buildings and books think with admiration and approval--a time when,

once again in the history of mankind, all the elements of culture of

which the age seemed capable were developed to their fullest and

completest extent. And this while northern Europe, full of anger and

discontent, was preparing to meet the coming storm, while travellers

returned from Italy chiefly impressed by her vices, while England was

waxing wroth at the thought of Papal extravagance, and Germany welcomed

the charge that the Pope was a monstrosity with acclamation.

But, nevertheless, none but a northern European, sick at heart at the

losses inflicted on his country by the Reformation, could look upon the

men who made the greatness of this period at Rome as whited sepulchres.

For they have all come down to us, drawn from life by Rafael--Pope

Julius and Pope Leo, Count Castiglione and Cardinal Bibbiena, and

Inghirami, the secretary of Julius, who likened his patron to the

Neptune of Virgil, who rose above the waves and the storm was hushed.

Excepting the portrait of Count Castiglione, which is at Paris, all

these portraits are at present in the Pitti. And were it not that famous

pictures disappear in an unaccountable manner, we should be in

possession also of that of the spirited Giuliano de’ Medici, for there

seems no reason to doubt the information that Rafael painted it.

It is said that Pope Leo owed his election greatly to the able policy of

Cardinal Bibbiena; it is said also that, as Leo was troubled with an

internal complaint, the cardinal laid his plans for becoming Pope in his

turn. If this plan ever existed it was cut short by death. Cardinal

Bibbiena died suddenly towards the close of 1520, a few months after

Rafael and a few months before Leo.

The palace of the Divizi still stands at Bibbiena adjoining the

Franciscan church. The abilities which secured the Cardinal and his

brother the goodwill of the Medici, reappeared in the next generation in

Angelo Divizio Bibbiena, who became secretary to Cosimo I., first Duke

of Florence. After him the Divizi seem to have fallen back into

obscurity. Their palace at Bibbiena is now owned by members of a

different family.

III

_La Verna and St Francis_

“Nel crudo sassa infra Tevere ed Arno

Da Cristo prese l’ultimo sigillo

Che le sue membra du’ anni portarno.”

(_Par._ 11, 106 ff.)

Our first expedition from Bibbiena was to La Verna, ever memorable

through its associations with St Francis of Assisi. Here in the depth of

mountain solitude, when the thought of regenerating mankind was strong

within him, St Francis found the spot of his heart’s desire. Hither he

came some ten years later, broken by disappointment and broken in

health, but strong in the joy that comes from bearing all things

patiently in the consciousness of a pure heart. And here, as the legend

tells us, he was quite transformed into Jesus by love and compassion and

received the impress of the most holy stigmata.

The retreat of La Verna lies at a distance of about eight miles from

Bibbiena, 3720 feet above sea-level, on a plateau that forms a ledge, as

it were, on the southern slope of the precipitous Penna. The road from

Bibbiena

[Illustration: SITUATION OF LA VERNA]

across the mountains into the valley of the Tiber skirts the Penna,

which stands isolated, massive, and beetle-browed, among the loftier but

less commanding heights of the Apennines. It is the “rough rock between

the Tiber and the Arno,” as Dante has called it, a rock which commands a

prospect without bounds. For the mountains of Tuscany, the plains of

Romagna, and the rugged uplands of Umbria are all within sight, fading

away in the blue distance that embraces the Tyrrhenian sea on one side

and the Adriatic on the other. Quite apart from its historical

associations, the spot, with its lofty beeches and pines, has many

attractions; the near distance and the far outlook are both equally

beautiful.

It was on a warm, sunny morning that we descended the hill of Bibbiena.

Beyond the church of the Madonna del Sasso, the road mounted a ridge,

and then descended and crossed the river Corsalone. Then began the

steep, steady ascent of the Apennines. It was a beautiful day. The

heights were lost in the morning haze, the air was laden with the vague

perfume of spring growth. There is an Italian proverb which says that

April calls up the flowers and May rejoices in their colours. As it was,

the sun all around was at work softening sheath and leaf and bud. The

hedge-rows were veiled in tenderest green, while here and there they

were white with the flaky blossoms of the blackthorn. Violets,

primroses, celandine and dark blue bell-hyacinths shone among the

verdure of the roadside. Down by the river the fields were green with

corn and waving herbage; further up the brown earth sloping away from

the road was planted with trees, their trunks wedded to the stems of the

vine. In these parts the vines are trained up pollard trees, over the

stunted tops of which their branches are spread. These branches are then

tightly wound round each other, two and two, tied together and their

ends turned downwards. As we passed along, men were training and binding

the vine, singing snatches of a song that ended with a minor cadence.

From the hanging ends of the vine the shining sap was dropping,

recalling the Italian simile of _piangere a vite tagliata_.

[Illustration: VINE CULTIVATION (CASENTINO)]

In our progress we passed several roadside shrines, but we found them

despoiled of their original contents. We afterwards found that all the

open-air shrines of the Casentino have been dealt with in the same

manner. In some a rude print or a small china figure has been

substituted for the older object of reverence; oftener the niche is

empty and the structure is falling to ruin.

For several miles our road was through land that had been brought under

cultivation. Then it ascended through a wood, and beyond this we

reached the uneven grassland of the mountains. The genial warmth of the

lowland and the unchecked influence of spring were left behind. The

grass on the hillocks was green, but in the hollows it was brown and

sodden, as though the numerous patches of snow had only just shrunk away

from it. Only here and there, close to the edge of the snow, purple

crocuses were bursting through the soft mould of the rifts in the

greensward. The silence of mountain solitude reigned undisturbed except

for the sound of trickling, dripping water.

The plateau, at the end of which the convent of La Verna stands, is

visible from afar. It was between one and two in the afternoon when we

left the main road and soon afterwards reached the little inn that

stands on the confines of the monastic property. Within its walls, at

the foot of the rock, which is here almost perpendicular, a small chapel

commemorates the spot where St Francis and his companions paused to rest

before scaling the height. “And immediately flocks of birds came from

all parts,” the legend tells us, “and with singing and beating of their

wings they showed the greatest joy and gladness, and surrounded St

Francis in such a manner that some perched on his head, some on his

shoulders, some on his arms and some on his legs, and some around his

feet. His companions marvelled, but St Francis, all joyful in his

spirit, said to them--I see that it is pleasing to our Lord that we live

in this solitary mountain, since so much joy is shown at our arrival by

our little sisters and brothers, the birds.”

This incident in the legend of the saint illustrates one of the most

lovable traits in his character--the sense of religious fellowship which

united him to whatever claimed his attention in nature. The beasts of

the earth, and the birds of the air, fire and water, the wind, the sun,

the moon and the clouds--he felt the impress of the divine spirit in

every one of them. In the happiest and in the most trying hours of his

life he was ever ready to recognise the beneficence of the divine

purpose in everything around him. It was this attitude of mind which

enabled him not to shrink when the red-hot iron was drawn across his

temple in the hope of saving his eye-sight. It was this attitude of mind

which inspired him to compose the _Canticle of the Sun_, a hymn which in

its simple framing and passionate utterances bears the stamp of the

religious fervour of a new era.

The personality and influence of St Francis have great attractions under

whatever aspect they be viewed. He is the representative of a new

development of Christianity--of the period when the bearings of

Christian teaching on the concerns of daily and domestic life were first

realised, and when the masses of the laity ceased to look upon

Christianity as a cult, and began to feel it as a living faith by which

conduct could be regulated. It is in this sense that Ruskin, speaking of

St Francis, says that it was he who taught men how to behave. By example

chiefly. For the bearing of the man who would be guided solely by

Christian love and charity had an irresistible charm for those who saw

him, and the tidings of his influence, carried beyond the confines of

his district by enthusiastic followers, acted as the breath by which

latent emotional cravings were everywhere fanned into ardent devotion to

the needs of suffering mankind.

To his companions the _Poverello_ of Assisi appeared as the true

representative of the Lord’s anointed, and it was owing to this that the

movement which he inaugurated had so great an influence on life, on

literature and on art. The measure of the man is not easy to recover.

His companions never tired of drawing parallels between him and Jesus of

Nazareth, and, as in the case of Jesus, a number of miracles wrought by

him were introduced into the descriptions of his life, which throw

darkness rather than light on his personality. But the influence of the

man may well appear miraculous, considering how instantaneous and

far-reaching was the impression which he produced--an impression to

which history offers few parallels. This influence is so marvellous that

the historian who would show it in the light of cause and effect must

needs have a firm hold on the sequence of events that led up to it, and

on the prevalent attitude of mind in the different strata of society

that prepared it.

The influence of the Franciscan movement on literature and art has been

made the subject of a number of interesting inquiries. Ozanam was the

first to analyse it in its bearings on Italian poetry. The _Canticle of

the Sun_ (_Laudes Creaturarum_) by St Francis, is among the earliest

poems in the vernacular, and it led to the composition of numerous poems

and hymns. Apparently St Francis in early days himself sang the songs of

the troubadours, and among his first converts was a troubadour who was

afterwards known as Fra Pacifico. Hence an element in the religious

poems of the Franciscans which reflects the poet’s delight in nature and

the beggar’s freedom from care. Many celebrated hymns were written by

Franciscans, among them the _Dies Irae_, first sung by Thomas of Celano,

and the _Stabat Mater Dolorosa_ written by Jacopone of Todi, a famous

and prolific poet. As a companion to the _Stabat Mater Dolorosa_, the

Hymn of the Virgin at the Cross, Jacopone afterwards wrote the _Stabat

Mater Speciosa_, the Hymn of the Virgin at the cradle; the keynote of

the one is sorrow, the keynote of the other is joy.

The study of Ozanam on the influence of the Franciscans on Italian

literature might be extended to other countries. Some of the earliest

and most beautiful writings in Middle English were the outcome of

Franciscan influence. Wherever the friars gained a foothold they

succeeded in identifying themselves with popular and national interests,

and the Christianity which they preached was as a light by which the

common realities of life appeared more beautiful and more worthy of

praise in sermon and song.

In regard to art, Ruskin long ago drew attention to the spirit which the

friars infused into painting; his keen sense of beauty and his desire

for religious exaltation were soothed by no art so well as by that of

the Quattrocento. In Italian painting the friars inaugurated a new era.

Since the days when Byzantine artists had decorated churches and chapels

with mosaics, practically no attempt had been made to represent

incidents of Biblical history and saint legend in church. The friars

were the first to favour the idea of having the stories of religion set

forth on a large scale in effective and inexpensive frescoes. And

compared to the artists of the Byzantine School, these painters were

animated by the health-giving breath of a new kind of realism. To the

Byzantine, as interpreted by his work, dispassionateness appeared as an

adjunct of holiness in the saint. The fresco painter, on the contrary,

did not hesitate in animating the saints with passion, which appears as

additional strength, since it is passion brought well under control.

The Franciscan churches of Italy have recently been made the subject of

an inquiry by Thode, who enters also into the incidents of the saint’s

life which were there represented. In the choice of these incidents the

painters were apparently guided by the early accounts of the saint’s

life, but there is considerable diversity in the scenes which they chose

for representation and combined together into a series. The early

accounts of St Francis include a life written by Thomas of Celano

between 1228 and 1229, which was afterwards re-written; a life written

by three of the companions of St Francis, which was finished in 1246;

and a life in which St Francis’s great follower, Bonaventura, combined

all that had previously been written of the saint. It was completed in

the year 1260.

But the development of the legend of St Francis did not stop here. The

_Little Flowers of St Francis_, which were put into writing in the

course of the fourteenth century, describe such incidents in the life of

the saint as appealed to popular fancy, set down in a popular form. The

thread of historical truth in this book is of the slenderest, and the

incidents

[Illustration: ENTRANCE TO LA VERNA]

as they stand cannot claim to have happened. And yet the _Little

Flowers_, in their bluntness and simplicity, have all the charm of an

unreflective and uncritical belief in the beauty of the new teaching.

They give a true picture of humble life in mediæval Italy and show us

the early Franciscans in the light in which they saw themselves. The

book was widely read, and the first part, which dealt with St Francis

among his followers, was amplified by accounts of the mad and saintly

freaks of Fra Ginepro, and of the steadfastness with which Fra Egidio

kept to his resolve of living by the labour of his hands. The influence

of the _Poverello_ of Assisi was, in fact, felt by the highest and the

lowest alike. While current fables made popular heroes of him and his

followers, Giotto at Assisi represented the decisive incidents of his

life in a series of paintings, which have been likened to an epic, and

Dante devoted an entire canto of the _Paradiso_ to his praise. In the

_Paradiso_ the praise of St Francis is sung by St Thomas Aquinas, the

greatest of the followers of St Dominic, while the praise of St Dominic

is sung by St Bonaventura, the most influential of Franciscans, a proof

of the bond which united the two orders in Dante’s mind. The jealousy

which afterwards estranged them was never as pronounced in Italy as

north of the Alps. In many churches the figures of St Francis and St

Dominic still stand side by side. And Andrea della Robbia, in a most

charming relief in the Piazza Santa Maria Novella at Florence, gave

expression to the affection of the two orders by representing their

founders embracing as they meet.

And how shall we picture him in the flesh, the man who was so close to

the best side of the religion and the morality of his age? In the year

1222 St Francis, attracted by the thought of St Benedict, went to stay

at the ancient monastery at Subiaco, and here, in memory of his visit,

his portrait was painted on the wall of a chapel which was completed

before 1228. On this picture St Francis is represented without the

stigmata and without a halo. He wears the penitent’s rough garb with a

cord round his waist, and he is designated simply as Frater Franciscus.

The _Poverello_ is seen full face. His figure is slim, his hair and

beard are crisp and fair, his face is long and thin. In spite of a

certain awkwardness, due no doubt to the painter, he has an appearance

of refinement and delicacy well in keeping with the stock from which he

had sprung. His large eyes and parted lips suggest the enthusiast; his

thin neck and slender hands belong to a physique which might well

contract phthisis. There are other early pictures of St Francis. But the

great painters who set forth his life’s history do not appear to have

been directly influenced by them. Thode has shown how, in some parts of

Italy, a bearded type of the saint is traditional, in others a beardless

type. Sometimes he was painted dark, sometimes fair, sometimes comely in

figure, sometimes emaciated. Even Giotto, judging by the two series of

pictures he painted, the one at Assisi, the other in the church of Santa

Croce in Florence, had before him different ideal types of the saint.

Were it not for the ravages of time, the convent at La Verna would

possess one of the early cycles of pictures representing the story of St

Francis. A chapel was erected in 1264 on the spot where St Francis

received the most holy stigmata, and Taddeo Gaddi, the godson and pupil

of Giotto, was summoned to decorate it. No trace of the work remains.

Taddeo’s stay at La Verna was however productive of other results. A

youth from the neighbouring Pratovecchio, Jacopo Landini, was sent to

work under him, and he afterwards went to Florence and gained

considerable renown as Jacopo del Casentino. In later life he returned

to his native district, where some paintings of his are extant. Vasari

includes an account of him in his _Lives of the Painters_, and he tells

us that it was due to Jacopo that the painters of Florence first

combined together in a guild (_compania e fraternita_) in 1350.

As it stands at present the retreat of La Verna is distinguished chiefly

by the large number of its altar-pieces in glazed terra cotta by the

della Robbias. Except in the museum at Florence there are nowhere so

many fine examples of their work to be found together. They are gifts

for the most part from distinguished Florentine families. They include a

large altar-piece, on which the Virgin is seen handing her girdle to St

Thomas; a Transfiguration, on a large scale, with the figures of the

twelve Apostles standing below in beautiful grouping and the most

varied expression. There is a Nativity with the figures of St Francis

and St Anthony of Padua behind the Virgin and St Joseph, and an

Annunciation; both of these are of exquisite grace. All these

altar-pieces and other single figures, such as St Francis, are in the

usual style of blue and white. I find them variously attributed to Luca

and to Andrea della Robbia. In the gallery on the way to the chapel

there is a large Pietà in polychrome. The most beautiful, however, of

all is a large altar-piece of the Crucifixion, the sole decoration of

the Chapel of the Stigmata.

Slowly we ascended the steep path which led up to the convent. We passed

under an archway and found ourselves before the entrance to the main

church. The site of La Verna was granted to St Francis by Count Orlando

of Chiusi in the year 1213; it was the only gift of a site ever accepted

by the saint, who held himself betrothed to poverty. Probably a small

church was erected under his direction; but when the fame spread of his

having here received the impress of the stigmata, a special interest

attached to the site. Pope Alexander IV. took the “Mons Alvernus” under

his protection; in 1260 a church was consecrated in the presence of

Bonaventura and six bishops; and a few years later the Chapel of the

Stigmata was built through the munificence of Count Simone of

Battifolle. The chief church is now a large one; it was begun in 1348,

but it was not completed till some time in the fifteenth century, when

the whole settlement of La Verna, the “Seraphicus Mons,” as it was

called, had passed under the protectorate of the Signory of Florence.

The churches at La Verna form part of a vast mass of buildings. We were

told that the convent affords accommodation for five hundred friars. As

we were about to enter the main church we met some of them walking in a

procession, two and two. They had been celebrating service in church,

and now they walked down the gallery to conclude it in the chapel,

chanting as they went along. We afterwards met them again coming out.

There were forty of them, vigorous men for the most part, wearing the

rough brown frock and cord, with sandals on their bare feet. It was

difficult to tell at a glance from what class they were drawn; certainly

not from the higher and more refined. They greatly differed as to age,

and the older men had the better appearance. On the whole they were not

dignified in bearing, and in person did not look as clean as they might

have done.

We spent a long time in church, looking at the altar-piece and reading

what the guide-book to the Casentino of Beni had to say of La Verna.

This is the only guide-book to the district as far as I know. It was our

constant companion, but we found that it required close and repeated

reading, for it is a queer jumble of all kinds of information. We then

wandered along the gallery which bridges the abyss between the

settlement and the isolated bit of rock on which stands the Chapel of

the Stigmata. With its dark panelling and its one large altar-piece this

chapel is a true place of rest. Its large della Robbia represents the

Crucifixion, with the figures of the Virgin, St John the Baptist, St

Jerome and St Francis standing and kneeling below. This association of

saints of later date with the characters of Scripture comes at first as

a shock to the historical mind; to the Middle Ages it appeared natural.

St Anthony of Padua, in a vision, saw the child Christ sitting on his

prayer-book. St Bernard, in a vision, saw the Virgin standing before

him. When these scenes came to be represented in art they assumed the

form of real incidents. And by a further development, St Francis and

other holy men and women of the Middle Ages were pictured in

contemplation of the Nativity, the Crucifixion and other decisive

moments in Biblical history as though they had been present at them in

the flesh.

There were other sights to be seen at La Verna: the rocky chasm where

St Francis hurled aside the devil, and the Luoghi Santi, a number of

grottoes and rock-hewn chambers where the saint once lived. Visitors

from all parts of the world come to La Verna, and on Sundays they say

there are crowds of country people all eager for the sights. For myself,

I was content with what I had seen and glad to rest in the convent,

where an old friar gave us wine and water to drink. He chatted about the

convent and about himself. How long had he stayed there--forty years?

Yes, quite that. Fifty? Quite likely, it came to much the same thing. I

had recently been reading the _Life of St Francis_ by Sabatier, a

charming writer, who makes the joyful side of the saint’s nature very

real. The old friar remembered his stay at La Verna, but he would not

say much about him.

Then we sat outside under the huge beeches, as yet bare of foliage,

listening to the birds, which seemed as numerous and as tuneful as they

were seven hundred years ago. With the sun shining brilliantly we

started homewards to Bibbiena. The ascent of the Penna, and a walk over

to Chiusi, which lay below in a streak of blue mist, are expeditions I

should wish to make if I ever again visit the district.

IV

_Camaldoli and St Romuald_

“Qui è Romualdo

Qui son’ li frati miei che dentro il chiostro

Fermar li piedi e tennero il cuor saldo.”

(_Par._ 22, 49 ff.)

A day’s walking and we were removed to a very different atmosphere, and

to associations widely separated from those connected with the high

retreat of La Verna. A wide gulf divides the temper of a man like St

Francis from that of a St Romuald. Both are accepted saints of the

Church, but while the one taught men how to be guided by love through

the example of his own gentleness and forbearance, the other

emphatically denounced those who interpreted the religious life

differently from himself. St Francis is the gentle soul of the

thirteenth century, that yields that it may conquer; St Romuald is the

rough-and-ready champion of the tenth century, ever ready to start up in

defence of Mother Church.

Camaldoli is a pearl among the many pearls of the Casentino. I have seen

it in spring-time only; the Italians tell you that it is even more

beautiful in summer, when its shady chestnut groves and dark pine

forest give a sense of restored energy and renewed vigour to those who

come here from the arid plains of Tuscany and the blinding heat of the

streets of Florence. Camaldoli may be conveniently reached by a good

driving road or by paths from the east or the west. We decided on

striking into the former of these two paths, and on a genial day we bid

adieu to Bibbiena, descending first and then mounting with the driving

road which afterwards followed an even ridge for several miles.

The views from this ridge were extensive and varied. In the distance the

panorama of the hills was slowly unfolding. Nearer at hand our attention

was caught now by a peach-tree with its purple blossoms, then by a

cherry-tree, its downy white branches swaying with the breeze. We passed

several country-houses, always somewhat removed from the road and always

flanked by a group of dark cypresses, which sometimes extended into an

avenue down the slope of the hill. These old country-houses of Tuscany

consist of a dwelling-house and a farm, which sometimes stand a little

way apart, the dwelling-house marked by a look of greater trimness and

reserve; sometimes they are brought closer together with an increased

look of orderliness to the one and of homeliness to the other. Both

houses are built of stone,

[Illustration: CAMALDOLI (CASENTINO)]

usually two storeys high. And both are covered with red rough-tiled

roofs that lie flat and broad over the entire dwelling and project on

all sides into wide eaves.

We passed through Camprena, a _posto_ which also had its peculiarity.

The houses neither fronted the street nor stood at right angles to it, a

want of arrangement not accounted for by any apparent irregularity of

the ground. Such an Italian village has none of the neat clustering of

its English or German namesake. There is no village church standing

aloof to watch over the entrance and exit from life of suffering

humanity; no village green with ancient oak suggesting a living

protection to rights and liberties; no well-appointed inn betokening the

love of an evening’s good cheer. The houses have come together anyhow,

and few are the attempts made to brighten a portico or a window with a

row of flower-pots. Sometimes the house itself is washed over with pink

or yellow, but there is never a scrap of flower-garden to add a bright

spot of colour to its surroundings.

Further along the road lay Soci, a place which went through stormy

experiences in the early Middle Ages. Remains of its own castle walls

and remains of the castles of Gressa and Marciano, which frown from

heights above and beyond it, recall the times when might made havoc

with right. At one time the Prince Bishop of Arezzo owned the place and

made it over to the monks of Camaldoli. But, apparently on account of

its insecurity, they parted with it to one of the Counts Guidi in

exchange for rights of ownership at Bagno on the further side of the

Apennines. However, the Guidi did not long remain in possession of the

castle; they lost it to their enemies, the Tarlati of Pietramala.

Soci is now a growing centre of industry, and boasts of several

factories. The high chimney of one of these figures is the attractive

feature on the local picture post card. The thought often arises in

these days at what a terrible cost to itself mankind is securing greater

cheapness in goods--raising the standard of comfort, as economists put

it; the thought was brought home in this outlying district. For the men

and women we met in other parts of the district were robust in health

and decently, if poorly, clad; the children were chubby, well-fed and

full of buoyancy. But in places like Soci a blight seemed to have fallen

on mankind. Men and women, girls and boys, all had the same look of

mixed listlessness and craving, and the children were pale and

neglected. No doubt here, as elsewhere, the people who flocked to the

factories were impatient of the restraints and the penury of home; they

escaped from the toil of home, but they did so at the cost of the

home’s regularity of habit. Stranded in a strange place, bound by no

responsibilities but those they chose to recognise, these men and women

soon fell into irregular ways and formed illicit connections, with a

consequent loss of physique to themselves and a deterioration of the

race in a couple of generations.

Beyond Soci the mountains began to draw closer together. The road

followed the river Archiano, which flowed in a narrower bed and assumed

the character of a torrent. Only the land that was near the river was

brought under cultivation. The slopes above were covered with a thin

scrub of stunted oaks bearing only the sere foliage of last year’s

growth. These mountains were chiefly of a brown mud-rock that had

crumbled away along the water-courses, or else, undermined by them, had

fallen in masses of soft earth, forming the gentler slopes. Side-valleys

opened and closed as we passed onwards. The characteristics of the plain

were disappearing more and more. We were entering the region of the

Apennines.

At one point of the road we were doubtful if we should leave the valley,

and seeing a man under a hay-stack munching bread and cheese we

consulted him. But his look was interested, and he was so positive that

the diverging path not being ours, we should never reach Camaldoli

unless we consented to his guidance, that we became equally positive the

map should be our only guide. We cut short further parleying by saying

that we could but return if we missed the way altogether. Of this there

was no chance. A short distance further and we sighted Serravalle,

towering high on a steep eminence that fronted all quarters. On one side

it commanded the bend in the road that led onwards across the Apennines

into Romagna; on the other it stood well above a dip in the hills, and

overlooked the side-valley down which the Fosso of Camaldoli flowed to

join the Archiano. The mountain streams throughout the Casentino are

spoken of as _fossi_, though not generally so designated on the map--a

peculiar use of the word which suggests affinity to the northern _fos_

rather than to the Latin _fossa_. In sight of Serravalle we sat for a

while and feasted on our usual lunch of bread, eggs and wine. After that

we followed the stream for a time, and then, parting company with it, we

began the ascent up the steep winding slope.

On a clear day such as this, the steeper the ascent the more striking

the observation how the nearer mountains sink into insignificance before

the higher ranges that rise on the skyline beyond. Under the dome of

blue, with its few sailing clouds, the air was of absolute transparency,

and every detail of the level we had left, every detail of the level to

which we were attaining, stood out in shining clearness. Each special

portion of the world above, below, around had its distinguishing

feature, from the flock of sheep grazing by the stream below to the man

carrying stakes up the opposite slope, and to the dark birds hanging

over Serravalle. But the observing faculty soon wearied with watching

for new impressions. With the brighter sunshine, the keener air and the

more fragrant vegetation of the height, a dreamy consciousness took

possession of the mind--a consciousness of being nearer heaven--heaven,

a fictitious limitation of space indeed, but a limitation the thought of

which brought one’s own concerns into an amended relation to those of

the world generally. After all, it is by drawing imaginary circles that

the mind attains to a conception of relative size. The greater the

height, the wider the outlook; the stronger the consciousness of the

world we possess not, the clearer the conception of that part of the

world which we have made our own.

Higher up patches of snow lay here and there on the shady side of the

path. The shrubs and plants became stunted and nipped, with the

exception of the flowering giant spurge that stood up from the stony

ground vigorous and brilliantly decorative. We passed a cluster of

dwellings, built of rock and founded on rock, grey and weather-worn,

quite Alpine in character, where the necessities of life are wrung from

nature in a close hand-to-hand fight. For a long time our path was rocky

and uneven and lay between thorny undergrowth. Then it led down at a

gentle gradient and drew nearer to the bed of the Fosso. Within a few

minutes’ walk the character of the surroundings entirely changed. From a

stony wilderness we had passed into an enchanted grove. The slopes lost

their steepness, and the ground lost its bareness. We walked under high

chestnuts along a moss-grown path that was soft to the tread, and then

over a carpet of verdure bright with spring flowers, which recalled the

emerald meadow dotted with shining flowers over which angels lead

mortals to heaven in the painting of Fra Angelico. It was late in the

afternoon, and the slanting sun-rays made golden lights on the trunks of

the trees and set aglow the patches of primroses. The call of the cuckoo

sounded at intervals, and there was the distant warbling of many

woodland birds. One wished for the path to lengthen out indefinitely;

all too soon the massive settlement of Camaldoli, set against a forest

of pines, closed in the head of the valley.

There is a graceful legend concerning a monk (I forget his name) who was

one day tempted to stray from the path of life; he was sore perplexed

in his mind by the words of the Psalmist, “A thousand years in God’s

sight are but as yesterday.” How could time, that uniform flow

“unaffected by the speed or the motion of material things,” be robbed of

the conception of its length? How could time ever cease to exist to one

who was endowed with consciousness?

To the monk, as to many another, failing to see was failing to believe.

With a heavy heart he wandered forth into the convent garden carrying

his problem with him. _Quod erat demonstrandum_: would a greater

intercede in his behalf? Time slipped by unawares. It was late at night

when he regained the convent gate, but those who opened in answer to his

call knew him not. His talk, his appearance, his manner were strange to

them, and yet there was that in him which commanded attention--he was

like as well as unlike. They admitted him, and after a while the memory

of an old, old story came to one of the monks who listened to him--how

long ago a member of the fraternity had been troubled in his mind and

had wandered forth and never returned, but it had always been believed

by some that he was still among the living. After much seeking his name

was found in an old convent register. It was the name of the monk who

had returned after a thousand years. Then they saw him as one of

themselves. The miracle was accomplished. And the monk understood that

eternities which are the products of human conception hold good for man

only. God’s eternities may be different. It is said that a short time

afterwards he passed away from life in peace.

And would it be very different if that monk had been one of the

companions of St Romuald here at Camaldoli, nay not quite a thousand,

just nine hundred years ago? If he came back now would he know these

surroundings for those he had left? Would he feel it the same world as

it was then, ruled by the same ideas--that a simple life is conducive to

elevation of mind, and that the air of the heights and the pure water of

undefiled springs make the body strong to withstand evil? And would they

too know him as one of themselves, those venerable monks, bent with age

and dignified in bearing, who were approaching the monastery along the

upper road as we neared it along the lower? Their woollen robes of many

folds were white, such as Romuald in his dream beheld his companions

wearing, when, like Jacob, he saw a ladder set up on the earth and

reaching up to heaven, and his monks were the angels ascending and

descending on it. These men had drawn their hoods over their heads, and

over them they wore large, wide-brimmed Tuscan straw hats. They were

neatly stockinged and shoed, and most of them had flowing beards and a

complexion that reminded one of the delicate tints of crumpled

rose-leaves. To us they were figures of a distant past, and it was

wonderful to think that if one of the old monks of Romuald’s time were

to come among them, the great difference in them would be the first

thing to strike him.

The monastic settlement of Camaldoli consisted of a monastery placed

near a famous spring, Fonte Buona, and of a hermitage, the Eremo, which

was situated further up among the mountains. One of the reasons of

Romuald’s success lay in his refounding hermit life on a new basis--it

is one mark of a genius to turn existing tendencies to new and

profitable account. In the monastery all were made welcome; to the

hermitage those were promoted whose temper proved their fitness for a

solitary life. At the present time only a small wing of the monastery

was inhabited by the monks, who rented it from the Government, the vast

conglomerate of buildings having been turned into a hotel. But the

hermitage up among the mountains was still entirely occupied by them. Up

there lived those who were able to endure the privations of hermit life;

up there they remained till, weakened by old age, they came down to the

monastery to be tended in sickness, and after death their mortal remains

were carried back to the Eremo to be buried in the ancient

burial-ground.

The account of the life of St Romuald, which was written by St Peter

Damian, who belonged to the following generation, gives curious glimpses

of the attitude of men’s minds in a far-distant past. It is never easy

to transport one’s self to the moral and ethical standard of another

age, for the actions of the men who then stirred up the emotions and

aroused enthusiasm can be very differently interpreted; in one aspect

they are heroes, in another they are faddists. It is in this respect

with Romuald as with the holy man of another age, Diogenes the Cynic.

Looked at from one point of view, the courage with which Diogenes acted

up to his convictions, the cheerfulness with which he bore the hardships

of slavery, and the simplicity of life which he affected, bear the stamp

of grandeur. Looked at from another side, he is a man of oddities and

eccentricities. Prompted in a like direction, Romuald launched forth

against misdeeds, discarded every comfort, and commanded respect from

the most powerful. But his behaviour also appears absurd if we fix our

minds on the way he courted dirt, weakened himself by fasting, and wore

himself out by imaginary conflicts with the devil. And there are other

points of similarity between the cynic of classical antiquity and the

saint of early Christianity. The cynic called himself a citizen of the

world, and the word cosmopolitan is held to be his invention; while the

saint exaggerated the power of his efforts so vastly that “he looked

forward to the time when the whole world would be transformed into a

hermitage, and the mass of the nations united in one monastic order.”

Both men were praised for their undisturbed serenity under tribulation,

and both in unabated vigour reached the extreme limits of old age.

Let us look more closely into the account of Romuald’s life, an account

written by a great man and telling of a great man is surely worth

analysis. Romuald was a native of Ravenna, and was born early in the

tenth century of a noble family. As a youth he was witness to how his

father killed a relative; and he went to St Apollinare in Classe, to

expiate the crime by forty days’ penance. The church of St Apollinare is

little changed from what it was then, and visitors to Ravenna will

recall with delight the simple proportions of the roomy basilica, and

its brilliant mosaics, with St Apollinare preaching with his flock of

sheep around him. A monk of the church proposed that Romuald should join

the fraternity, and the young man agreed to do so, after spending a

night in church, when St Apollinare himself appeared as the monk had

foretold--a proof, as Romuald declared and as Peter Damian believed,

that the saint really lay buried here. But Romuald’s innate spirit of

restlessness and want of consideration for the shortcomings of others

cut short his stay after three years’ noviciate. The monks would lie in

bed when it was time to be in church singing, and Romuald, finding the

church closed, sang in the dormitory. The monks decided to rid

themselves of the inconvenient enthusiast by throwing him out of the

window. Romuald, however, escaped to the woods, and there he found a

companion to his heart’s desire in the unlearned but ardent Marinus.

This holy hermit chanted through the entire psalter every day; he would

repeat twenty verses under one tree, twenty under the next, and so on

till his task was accomplished. Romuald joined him in his exercises, and

mistakes in his performance were punished by a blow on the ear from the

hermit’s staff. When his hearing became impaired in consequence, he

turned his other ear for castigation, and his stern master was touched.

On three days of the week the two hermits lived on a bit of bread and a

handful of beans; on the other four, crushed corn, _pulmentum_,

constituted their food. Their conduct was evidently considered

unexceptionable, and in 978 when, in consequence of an insurrection in

Venice, Count Petro Orseolo, who had headed it, was advised to seek

refuge in a convent, Romuald and Marinus were among those chosen to

escort him to a monastery near Perpignan in the south of France. There

they resumed the old life, and were credited with great holiness.

Romuald’s fame increased owing to incidents such as this. A lord of the

neighbourhood, _impeto barbarico_, stole a cow from a peasant. The

peasant begged Romuald to ask for the cow, but the lord laughed his

request to scorn; the cow was roasted for the feast. However, the holy

man’s interference was not wasted. When the lord came to eat of the cow,

a bit of meat stuck in his throat and he died a wretched death. No

wonder that the people of the neighbourhood, when they heard that

Romuald was about to leave for Italy, as they could not retain him,

decided to kill him so as at least to secure his corpse. It was a time

when relics, especially on the further side of the Alps, commanded a

high price in the market. Kings and emperors gave gold and jewels in

exchange for them, ecclesiastics of the higher grades did not hesitate

from stealing where they could not procure them otherwise. And the

relics did not lose by being transferred; on the contrary, their

wonder-working properties if anything increased. Romuald, however, was

apprised of the country folk’s intention, and knew how to meet it. He

rapidly shaved his head, and when they came, intending to kill him, they

found him eating immoderately. This was contrary to all accepted ideas

of saintliness; they thought he had gone mad and went away. The holy

man was left to depart in peace for Italy, where he found a new work

awaiting him. His father was about to leave the convent he had entered.

This had to be prevented. Romuald fastened his father’s feet in stocks,

loaded him with chains and whipped him till the old man’s senses

returned. Romuald’s career as a reformer now began, but, as his

biographer says, “the zeal was so great that glowed in this man’s breast

that he was never satisfied with what he had accomplished, and ever

turned to new undertakings.”

Thus we find him at one time dwelling in a solitary cell in the marshes,

where, like St Guthlac in the fens of Lincolnshire, he was endlessly

worried through the lawless agency of bad spirits. After that, thanks to

the protection of Ugo, margrave of Tuscany, he collected about him a

number of monks at Bagno, in Romagna. But he so incensed them by sending

money to the relief of a distant monastery which had been consumed by

fire that he had to flee before their rage. Some years later, Romuald

became for a time abbot at St Apollinare in Classe, where he had stayed

in his youth. The Emperor Otto III., when he crossed the Alps in 996,

heard that this monastery was going to ruin, and he persuaded Romuald to

reform the monks. The influence which Romuald exerted on the melancholy

young emperor is full of interesting particulars. Otto went on a

pilgrimage on foot from Monte Gargano to Rome, and he spent some time

with the hermit Nilus, who was working for the reform of religious life

in southern Italy along lines similar to those Romuald was following in

the north. Finally, Otto spent forty days as a penitent in the convent

at Ravenna, and was almost persuaded by Romuald to become a monk.

Romuald’s stay as abbot at Classe was not, however, of long duration. He

soon came and laid his crozier at the emperor’s feet; an abbot’s life

was not what he desired. His zeal had taken another direction. He was

fired by the thought of restoring hermit life on the model of what had

existed in Egypt, and he travelled about from place to place collecting

together wandering monks, the _gyrovagi_, whom St Benedict had denounced

as evil. He arranged that they should dwell together, and join in the

observance of certain rules.

This restoration of monastic life was part of a wider scheme. Reference

has been made to the growth of simony, both among laymen and

ecclesiastics. The evil had assumed such proportions towards the close

of the tenth century that the prestige of the Church was seriously

jeopardised. It was a critical epoch, and all depended on exposing the

cause of the evil and on stirring men’s consciences with regard to it.

Romuald came forward and openly declared that simony was the most

damnable heresy, and that no one who had entered the Church for money

could hope for salvation unless he gave up his benefice and became a

layman. Peter Damian was of opinion that, while no one acted directly in

compliance with this request, the stir which Romuald made was great.

More than once he was in danger of his life, and the experiences through

which he went are full of interesting particulars. At one time he lived

for seven years as a hermit, and came back, his body shrivelled,

weather-stained and of the colour of a newt. But his cutting himself off

from the society of his fellows apparently led to many conversions. At

another time he was fired by the wish to take a part in evangelising

Hungary. Among the monks he had come across was a son of the Prince of

Hungary. But it was not to be. When Romuald and his companions had gone

some way on their journey, sickness overtook them, and sickness returned

to the party whenever it attempted to proceed. There was nothing left to

do but give up the undertaking and return to Italy.

Romuald’s fame was at its height when the Emperor Heinrich II. crossed

the Alps in 1022. So much was he moved by Romuald that he expressed the

wish that his soul were in the saint’s body. Romuald’s appearance at the

time was peculiar. Hoary, unkempt and unwashed, he came to court wearing

a dirty, shaggy skin. The Germans crowded round in the hope of snatching

a few hairs from it, which they wished to preserve as relics.

Romuald first came to Camaldoli about the year 1018. It has been

affirmed and denied that the site of the monastery was a gift to him

from a certain Count Maldolo, and that the name Camaldoli represents the

words _Casa Malduli_. The saint never stayed here long, and he died away

from here in his hermit’s cell at Val de Castro in 1027. But the routine

of life at Camaldoli was held to represent his aspirations, and

Camaldoli gave its name to all the monasteries which Romuald had

founded. These were never numerous. The order did not spread much beyond

Italy and the south of France. But within these limits it exerted

considerable influence.

And thus attended by thoughts of the enthusiast who laid the foundations

of this vast establishment so many hundreds of years ago, we entered the

building by a long arched stone passage, which led up from the garden

without to the courtyard within. This courtyard is said to date from the

tenth century; I have rarely seen one more impressive through the stern

simplicity and perfect balance of its proportions. It is built

throughout of the same grey stone, and there is little attempt at

ornamentation. Pillars with slightly swelled shafts and simple capitals

support round arches which extend round the four sides of a paved court.

In the centre of this court stands a fountain with an unceasing flow of

water. Passages, staircases and narrow corridors lead off in different

directions. Surely there could be nothing more suited to the solitary

side of one’s nature than to sit on one of the huge logs of wood that

lay on one side of the court, listening to the flow of the water and

watching the clouds that floated across the opening above. Now and again

there was the sound of voices and of footsteps coming and going in the

far distance. A man carried faggots across the court, a woman came to

wash lettuces at the fountain--living figures that moved in the round of

duty and seemed to emphasise the old-world solitude of the place. There

is no greater solitude than an open-air solitude from which the life of

nature is excluded. And within these walls there was no sign of animal

or vegetable life--nothing to remind one of the stirring of the sap or

the beating of a pulse, except that of which one was conscious of in

one’s self.

That night we had the vast hotel of Camaldoli to ourselves. In the

springtime there are few visitors. We ate and slept in some rooms off

the

[Illustration: COURTYARD OF CAMALDOLI]

ancient courtyard. We wandered into the roomy church. One of the old

monks had died that afternoon, and prayers were being offered for his

salvation. We met the bier as it was carried out from the church.

Like other monasteries, Camaldoli has experienced many vicissitudes in

times of war and in times of peace. Throughout the Middle Ages it

remained a famous goal for pilgrimages, and its woodland air and

mountain freshness made it a favourite health resort. The converts to

the order were at first devoted to outdoor pursuits--the hermits in

their little gardens tended plants that were used for making drugs, and

the monks were devoted to the culture of the forests. Later, they

contracted a taste for learning, and a famous library was collected,

chiefly by Ambrogio Traversari, who took an important place in the early

Italian Renaissance. Of this intellectual life no trace remains. The

books were scattered at the beginning of this century. Some are at

Poppi, others are at Florence, and the love of letters is dead. But with

the older achievements time has dealt more sparingly. A pharmacy still

makes part of the settlement, and the surrounding forest retains the

fame of being one of the finest in Europe. When the Government

appropriated Camaldoli, the traditions of the monks regarding the

cultivation of the trees were carried on, and Vallombrosa, the

monastery on the further side of the Pratomagno, was turned into a

school of forestry. All the forests throughout the district were placed

under its care, and thus the great fir trees, the _abete_ of Camaldoli,

its chestnut groves, and its beech and oak forests have preserved some

of their old grandeur.

[Illustration: LANDMARK OF CAMALDOLI]

V

_In the Apennines_

... “appiè del Casentino

Traversa un’ acqua c’ha nome l’Archiano

Che sovra l’Ermo nasce in Appennino.”

(_Purg._ 5, 96 ff.)

Early on the following morning we left the monastery of Camaldoli for

the hermitage. It was a beautiful walk of about three miles, along a

steep, paved path through the ancient pine forest. The air was cold but

the sun was bright, and the trees emitted a strong resinous fragrance. I

have never walked under trees more stalwart in stature, the stem of each

straight, smooth and rounded as a shaft, with branches loaded with

hanging verdure jutting out in grander sweeps.

At one point of the road three large wooden crosses marked the limit

which the hermits formerly from their side were not allowed to cross;

from this side no woman was allowed to penetrate beyond them. But the

story goes that a princess of the house of Medici, dressed in man’s

clothing, once braved the restriction. She visited the hermitage, with

no further consequences, however, but that, having satisfied her

curiosity, she went and confessed to the Pope, and he bid her give money

to build an additional cell in expiation of her crime, which, to this

day, is designated by the armorial balls, the _palle_, of the Medici

family.

The paved path mostly followed the course of the Fosso of Camaldoli

which rises above the Eremo. Dante apparently looked upon this stream

not as a tributary of the Archiano, but as the Archiano itself, for he

lets Buonconte in Purgatory speak of the Archiano as “taking its rise

above the hermitage.” The river came down between moss-grown rocks,

carrying with it a stream of mountain fragrance, and the path which

followed it ended on a wide grass-grown space, at one end of which stood

the hermitage. And up here, in the midst of the forest, at an elevation

of 3700 feet above sea level, and in a climate which these thin-skinned

southerners talked of as cold and rough in the extreme, stood the

twenty-four little stone cells of the hermitage, each inside the walled

enclosure of its garden. Here in the depth of mountain solitude, cut off

from intercourse with the world, and restricted in their intercourse

with each other, the hermits of Camaldoli lived the same life of

seclusion and solitude which St Romuald considered the surest way of

attaining to happiness and heaven. Here they lived, dwelling alone,

eating alone and working alone, with the conceptions of time and space

obliterated as far as disregard of the ordinary interests of life will

obliterate them, with no hope or expectation of change, a life in which

time can mend and mar nothing.

We were told that all the cells were tenanted except the original cell

of St Romuald, which is always kept standing empty. All the cells are

constructed on the same plan. Each consists of a small house divided

into two rooms opening out of each other, with an additional recess in

which stands the bed. The windows and the door open on a small garden,

which is surrounded by walls so as to close in the view. Each hermit

attends to his own garden, in which he grows herbs and vegetables. The

cooking for the whole settlement is done in an outhouse, and the food is

brought round and handed in to each of the cells. Seven times in the

twenty-four hours the hermits wander forth and assemble in church to

pray together; otherwise they are alone.

We were shown over the church by a white-robed monk, who readily talked

of the smaller interests of life--of the severity of the winter, the

daily routine, and the relics and pictures of the different chapels. But

he did not respond when I expressed regret at the severance of

intercourse between the different existing settlements of the Order of

Camaldoli, a severance which is inevitably leading to the collapse of

the whole organisation. It may be part of these men’s attitude of mind,

or it may be a self-imposed limitation, that any allusion to change is

met by cheerful and unquestioning acceptance of things as they are. Is

it that the future of their order has become a matter of indifference to

them, or is it that a tacit agreement among them prevents them from

discussing their own affairs with outsiders? The monk also showed us

over the cell of St Romuald, which is unchanged, they say, except that

the piety of a later age has covered the inside of its rough walls with

panelling. On occasions this cell has been offered to distinguished

visitors. It was so offered to St Francis, but he felt the honour too

great to accept.

Many visitors in the course of centuries have visited this hermitage.

Popes, emperors, men of piety and men of learning have prayed in its

chapel. And up here in the shade of these huge pines those conversations

took place which the learned Cristofero Landini has described, when some

of the ablest scholars of the Early Italian Renaissance stayed here

together in the summer of 1468, and whiled away several days in learned

philosophical discussion.

The _Conversations of Camaldoli_ are remarkable chiefly for their

learned interest, but their setting is attractive, as they enable us to

realise the friendly relations of some of the most distinguished men of

the Medicean circle--men to whom the revival of learning and modern

scholarship owes a debt of gratitude. For these conversations take us

back to the time when the Republic of Florence, following the example of

the Republic of Venice, had become the home of several learned Greeks.

The spirit of a new era was stirring in every department of human

knowledge, and those who studied the works of Plato and of his

expositors at first hand and with some thoroughness, showed a renewed

interest in Virgil and Horace, Dante and Petrarch. The Greek writers

were translated into Latin, and many of them in a Latin garb first saw

the daylight of print. But the works of Latin and Italian authors

likewise engrossed attention, and Italian itself once more was looked

upon as a language capable of expressing the great thoughts of great

men.