; in February, as is most right, fishing in the
Serchio; in March, wisely pruning his trees; in April, sowing his seed;
in May, plucking the spring flowers; in June, cutting the corn; in July,
beating it out with the flail--the flail that is used to-day in every
country place in Tuscany; in August, plucking the fruits; in September,
treading the wine-press; in October, storing the wine; in November,
ploughing; and in December, for the festa killing a pig. Over the door
to the left is the earliest work, as it is said, of Nicolo Pisano, and
beneath it an Adoration of the Magi, in which some have found the hand
of Giovanni, his son; while above the great door itself Our Lord is in
glory, with the Twelve Apostles beneath, and Madonna herself in the
midst. Not far away, to the north beside the church, the rosy Campanile
towers over Lucca, calling city and country too, to pray at dawn and at
noon and at evening.

Within, the church is of a great and simple beauty; in the form of a
Latin cross, divided into three naves by columns supporting round
arches, over which the triforium passes across the transepts, lighted by
beautiful Gothic windows: the glass is certainly dreadful, but far away
in the choir the windows are filled still with the work of the old
masters.

The most beautiful and the most wonderful treasure that the church
holds, that Lucca itself can boast of, is the great tomb in the north
transept, carved to hold for ever the beautiful Ilaria del Caretto, the
wife of Paolo Guinigi, whose tower still blossoms in the spring, since
she has sat there. It is the everlasting work of Jacopo della Quercia,
the Sienese. On her bed of marble the young Ilaria lies, like a lily
fallen on a rock of marble, and in her face is the sweet gravity of all
the springs that have gone by, and in her hand the melody of all the
songs that have been sung; her mouth seems about to speak some lovely
affirmation, and her body is a tower of ivory. Can you wonder that the
sun lingers here softly, softly, as it steps westward, or that night
creeps over her, kissing her from head to foot slowly like a lover? Who
was the vandal who robbed so great and noble a thing as this of the
relief of dancing children which was found in the Bargello in 1829, and
returned here only in 1887?

It is, however, the work of another man, a Lucchese too, that fills the
Duomo and Lucca itself with a sort, of lyric sweetness in the delicate
and almost fragile sculptur