and yellow in the Autumn, when they came to the Eternal City, the
center of the world then as now. The saintly General Francis
Borgia, busy as he was with the cares of the widespread Society,
found time to welcome the three travelers, and to hear Stanislaus'
wonderful story in full.

And this time there was no hesitation or delay. Stanislaus entered
his name in the book containing the register of the novices, on
October 25, 1567. Three days later he received his cassock and
entered at once upon his noviceship.

There were so many novices in Rome then that no single house of the
Jesuits there could hold them all. So they were scattered through
three houses, each one spending a part of his two years' noviceship
successively in each house. Stanislaus went first to the Professed
House, then called Santa Maria della Strada, and afterward the site
of the famous Gesu, one of the notable churches of Rome. From there
he passed in time to the Roman College, then to the Noviciate proper
at Sant' Andrea.

The Society of Jesus was then in its early youth, in the midst of
that first brilliant charge against the ranks of heresy without, and
against the huge sluggish inertia so striking within the Church itself.

He was fellow-novice with Claude Acquaviva, son of the Duke of Atri,
and afterwards one of the greatest Generals of the Society, which he
ruled for thirty years. With him were also Claude's nephew, Rudolph
Acquaviva, who died a martyr; Torres, a great theologian; Prando,
the first philosopher at the University of Bologna; Fabio de' Fabii,
who traced his descent from the great Roman family of that name; the