egular lines, and as distinct in character as a line of men and
women would have been. On the building opposite our window was an
inscription telling that Metastasio had lived there--on another a date,
1419.

In 1419, when they piled the stones of that wall, Christopher Columbus
was not born, yet the basilica of St. Francis had been built more than
one hundred and fifty years; and on such a June day as this the
Asisinati leaned from their windows to see a Corpus Domini procession
come up the street, just as they were now doing. It came through the
fragrant silence and clear shadow like a vision. I could not restrain
an exclamation of surprise and delight, for I had not dreamed of
anything so beautiful. The procession would have been striking
anywhere, but shut in as it was between the soft gray of the opposite
stone houses, with the green-sprinkled street beneath and the glorious
blue above, it was as wonderful as if, looking down into clear deeps of
water, one should see the passing of some pageant of an enchanted city
buried deep in the crystalline waves centuries ago. There was nothing
here but the procession, leisurely occupying the whole street, treading
out faint odors without raising a particle of dust. The crowd that in
other places always obscures and spoils such a display here followed on
behind. The leisureliness of an Italian religious procession is
something delicious, as well as the way they have of forming hollow
squares and leaving the middle of the street sacred to the grander
dignities.

The members of the different societies wore long robes of red, blue or
of gray trimmed with red, and had small three-cornered pieces of the
material of the robe suspended by a string at the back of the neck, to
be drawn up over the head if necessary. The arms of the societies were
embroidered on the breast or shoulder, and each one had its great
painted banner of Madonna or saint and a magnificent crucifix with a
veil as rich as gold, silver, silk and embroidery could make it. There
were the white _camicie_ half covering the brown robes of long-bearded,
bare-ankled Cappuccini, and sheets of silver and gold in the vestments
of the other clergy.

Presently the canopy borne over the Host appeared, with the
incense-bearers walking backward before it and swinging out faint
clouds of smoke: the voices of the choir grew audible, singing the
_Pange lingua_, and everybody knelt. In a few minutes all was over.

There was a