We must also remember that Portiuncula had neither archives nor library. It was a chapel ten paces long, with a few huts gathered around it. The Order was ten years old before it had seen any other than a single book: a New Testament. The Brothers did not even keep this one. Francis, having nothing else, gave it to a poor woman who asked for alms, and when Pietro di Catania, his vicar, expressed his surprise at this prodigality: "Has she not given her two sons to the Order?" replied the master[30] quickly. FOOTNOTES: [1] Collected first by Wadding (Antwerp, 1623, 4to), they have been published many times since then, particularly by De la Haye (Paris, 1641, f^o). These two editions having become scarce, were republished--in a very unsatisfactory manner--by the Abbe Horoy: _S. Francisci Assisiatis opera omnia_ (Paris, 1880, 4to). For want of a more exact edition, that of Father Bernardo da Fivizzano is the most useful: _Opuscoli di S. Francesco d'Assisi_, 1 vol., 12mo, pp. 564, Florence, 1880. The Latin text is accompanied by an Italian translation. [2] "_Die Briefe, die unter seinem Namen gehen, moegen theilweise aecht sein. Aber sie tragen kaum etwas zur naeheren Kenntniss bei und koennen daher fast ganz ausser Acht bleiben_." Mueller, _Die Anfaenge des Minoritenordens_, Freiburg, 1 vol., 8vo, 1885, p. 3. [3] Pieces have been often attributed to St. Francis which do not belong to him; but those are unintentional errors and made without purpose. The desire for literary exactness is relatively of recent date, and it was easier for those who were ignorant of the author of certain Franciscan writings to attribute them to St. Francis than to admit their ignorance or to make deep researches. [4] For example, the first Rule; probably also a few canticles; a letter to the Brothers in France, Eccl., 6; another to the Brothers in Bologna: "_Praedixerat per litteram in qua fuit plurimum latinum_," Eccl., ib.; a letter to Antony of Padua, other than the one we have, since on the witness of Celano it was addressed: _Fratri Antonio episcopo meo_ (2 Cel., 3, 99); certain letters to St. Clara: "_Scripsit Clarae et sororibus ad consolationem litteram in qua dabat benedictionem suam et absolvebat_," etc. _Conform._, f^o. 185a, 1; cf. _Test. B. Clarae_. A. SS., Augusti, t. ii., p. 767: "_Plura scripta tradidit nobis, ne post mortem suam declinaremus a paupertate_;" certain letters to Cardinal Ugolini, 3 Soc., 67.