building is not now as it was when Milton lived here, having been
rebuilt within a short time. I found no one there, and satisfied my
curiosity by climbing over the wall and looking in at the windows. A
little chapel stands in a cleft of the rock below, to mark the
miraculous escape of St. John Gualberto, founder of the monastery. Being
one day very closely pursued by the Devil, he took shelter under the
rock, which immediately became soft and admitted him into it, while the
fiend, unable to stop, was precipitated over the steep. All this is
related in a Latin inscription, and we saw a large hollow in the rock
near, which must have been intended for the imprint left by his sacred
person.

One of the monks told us another legend, concerning a little chapel
which stands alone on a wild part of the mountain, above a rough pile of
crags, called the "Peak of the Devil." "In the time of San Giovanni
Gualberto, the holy founder of our order," said he, "there was a young
man, of a noble family in Florence, who was so moved by the words of the
saintly father, that he forsook the world, wherein he had lived with
great luxury and dissipation, and became monk. But, after a time, being
young and tempted again by the pleasures he had renounced, he put off
the sacred garments. The holy San Giovanni warned him of the terrible
danger in which he stood, and at length the wicked young man returned.
It was not a great while, however, before he became dissatisfied, and in
spite all holy counsel, did the same thing again. But behold what
happened! As he was walking along the peak where the chapel stands,
thinking nothing of his great crime, the devil sprang suddenly from
behind a rock, and catching the young man in his arms, before he could
escape, carried him with a dreadful noise and a great red flame and
smoke over the precipice, so that he was never afterwards seen."

The church attached to the monastery is small, but very solemn and
venerable. I went several times to muse in its still, gloomy aisle, and
hear the murmuring chant of the Monks, who went through their exercises
in some of the chapels. At one time I saw them all, in long black
cassocks, march in solemn order to the chapel of St. John Gualberto,
where they sang a deep chant, which to me had something awful and
sepulchral in it. Behind the high altar I saw their black, carved chairs
of polished oak, with ponderous gilded foliants lying on the rails
before them. The attendant