At about this period of Catherine's life—to return to the series of her penances and mortifications—she wholly abandoned the use of animal food. At fifteen she left off wine. At twenty she gave up bread, living only on uncooked vegetables. She used to sleep but one quarter of an hour in the twenty-four; always flogged herself till the blood streamed from her three times a day; and lived three years without speaking. She wore a chain of iron round her body, which gradually eat its way into her flesh. And finally, she remained wholly without food for many years. This Father Raymond declares to have been the case within his own knowledge, and adds with much triumph, "that we know from Scripture that Moses fasted twice during a space of forty days, and Elias once, and that our Saviour accomplished the same, as the Gospel tells us: but a fast of many years has not hitherto been known." Passing from the Saint's achievements in this kind, we find her equally distancing all competitors in the matter of personal and familiar communication and conversation with the Deity. She began to have visions at six years old. Returning home one day about that time, through the streets of Siena, she saw in the sky _immediately over the Dominican's church_ a throne, with Christ sitting on it dressed in Papal robes, accompanied by St. Paul, St. Peter, and St. John. At a later period, Christ appeared to her daily as soon as she retired to her cell, as she informed Father Raymond, for the purpose of teaching her the doctrines of religion, which, said she to her confessor, "no man or woman ever taught me, but only our Lord Jesus Christ himself, sometimes by means of inspiration, and sometimes by means of a clear bodily appearance, manifest to the bodily senses, and talking with me, as I now talk with you." Again, a little farther on in her career, we read that "the Lord appeared to Catherine very frequently, and remained with her longer than he had been wont to do, and sometimes brought with him his most glorious mother, sometimes St. Dominic, and sometimes both of them: but mostly he came alone and talked with her, as a friend with a most intimate friend; in such sort, that, as she herself secretly and blushingly confessed to me, the Lord and she frequently recited the Psalms together, walking up and down the chamber, as two monks or priests are wont to recite the service. Oh, marvel! Oh, astonishment! Oh, manifestation of divine familiarity unheard of in our times!" exclaims the biographer: as he truly well might!