rench.

"That is Francis Bernardone," one neighbour would say to another,
nodding his head, for Francis could sing, not only in his native
Italian, but also in French.

"He lives like a prince; yet he is but the son of a cloth
merchant,--rich though the merchant be."

So the neighbours, we are told, were always grumbling about Francis,
the wild spendthrift. For young Francis dressed in silk and always in
the latest fashion; he threw his pocket-money about with a free hand.
He loved beautiful things. He was very sensitive. He would ride a long
way round to avoid seeing the dreadful face of a poor leper, and would
hold his nose in his cloak as he passed the place where the lepers
lived.

He was handsome in face, gallant in bearing, idle and careless; a
jolly companion, with beautiful courtly manners. His dark chestnut
hair curled over his smooth, rather small forehead. His black
twinkling eyes looked out under level brows; his nose was straight and
finely shaped.

When he laughed he showed even, white, closely set teeth between
thin and sensitive lips. He wore a short, black beard. His arms were
shortish; his fingers long and sensitive. He was lightly built; his
skin was delicate.

He was witty, and his voice when he spoke was powerful and sonorous,
yet sweet-toned and very clear.

For him to be the son of a merchant seemed to the gossips of Assisi
all wrong--as though a grey goose had hatched out a gorgeous peacock.

The song of the revellers passed down the street and died away. The
little city of Assisi slept in quietness on the slopes of the Apennine
Mountains under the dark clear sky.

A few nights later, however, no song of any revellers was heard.
Francis Bernardone was very ill with a fever. For week after week his
mother nursed him; and each night hardly believed that her son would
live to see the light of the next morning. When at last the fever left
him, he was so feeble that for weeks he could not rise from his bed.
Gradually, however, he got better: as he did so the thing that he
desired most of all in the world was to see the lovely country around
Assisi;--the mountains, the Umbrian Plain beneath, the blue skies, the
dainty flowers.

At last one day, with aching limbs and in great feebleness, he crept
out of doors. There were the great Apennine Mountains on the side of
which his city of Assisi was built. There were the grand rocky peaks
pointing to the intense blue sky. There was the steep stre