horrified crowds of _Asisinati_, of black storms of newspaper items, of
censuring gossip the world over, would have come between me and that
purple pigeon smothered in rice which Maria had promised me! The pope
himself would have known me individually out of the cloud of his
subjects, and have frowned upon my image. And how it would have been
whispered behind me to the end of my days, "That is the lady who broke
the great bell of St. Francis"! But I had not broken it, and it still
hangs sound and strong, to send its melancholy sweet music out to meet
the centuries as they roll in storm and sunshine over the eastern
mountains. Let us be thankful for the evils which might have happened
and did not.

I cannot resist the temptation to relate a little incident concerning
this same learned Professor Cristofani, it struck me as so quaint. He
is a poor man--literature, and even teaching, do not pay very well in
Italian paesi--and he has a family. Cheaply as servants may be
employed, he could not afford one, and his wife was not very well. Last
summer the _Alpinisti_ visited Asisi, and some of the principal
members, having an introduction to him, wished to visit him. Their stay
in Asisi was short, and, being sunrise-and-mountain-top people, they
made their call at six o'clock in the morning on their way to the top
of Mount Asio, from which Asisi takes its name, and, I may here add,
the correct spelling of its name, which I have followed. A servant from
the Leone Hotel showed the visitors to the house, and very stupidly
knocked at the kitchen-door. A loud "_Avanti!_" from within answered
the knock. The door was opened by the guide, revealing a tableau. The
professor, with his shirt-sleeves rolled up and an apron tied on, was
earnestly kneading a mass of dough preparatory to sending it to the
baker's oven, where everybody bakes their bread, and his pretty blonde
young daughter was making coffee at the kitchen fire.