SS. Apostoli, lasting for more than two hours. At its close the
celebrant was handed a plate on which were the sacred flints, and these
he struck with a steel in view of the congregation, thus igniting a
taper. The candle, in an ancient copper porta fuoco surmounted by a
dove, was then lighted, and the procession of priests started off for
the cathedral with their precious flame, escorted by a civic guard
and various standard bearers. Their route was the Piazza del Limbo,
along the Borgo SS. Apostoli to the Via Por S. Maria and through
the Vacchereccia to the Piazza della Signoria, the Via Condotta, the
Via del Proconsolo, to the Duomo, through whose central doors they
passed, depositing the sacred burden at the high altar. I should add
that anyone on the route in charge of a street shrine had the right
to stop the procession in order to take a light from it; while at
SS. Apostoli women congregated with tapers and lanterns in the hope
of getting these kindled from the sacred flame, in order to wash
their babies or cook their food in water heated with the fire.

Meanwhile at seven o'clock the four oxen, which are kept in the
Cascine all the year round and do no other work, had been harnessed to
the car and had drawn it to the Piazza del Duomo, which was reached
about nine. The oxen were then tethered by the Pisano doors of the
Baptistery until needed again.

After some haggling on the night before, I had secured a seat on a
balcony facing Ghiberti's first Baptistery doors, for eleven lire, and
to this place I went at half-past ten. The piazza was then filling up,
and at a quarter to eleven the trams running between the Cathedral and
the Baptistery were stopped. In this space was the car. The present
one, which dates from 1622, is more like a catafalque, and unless one
sees it in motion, with the massive white oxen pulling it, one cannot