After many unsuccessful attempts to discover the coffin of the saint, he had come to the conclusion that it must have been stolen by the Lombards, when they were besieging the city in 755. S. Cæcilia, however, told him in a vision where her grave was; and hurrying to the catacombs of the Appian Way he at last discovered her crypt and coffin, together with those of fourteen Popes, from Zephyrinus to Melchiades. It is only fair to say that the discoveries made in this very crypt, between 1850 and 1853, confirm the account of Paschal in its minutest details. The first half of the ninth century thus marks the final abandonment of the catacombs, and the cessation of divine worship in their historical crypts. In later times we find little or no mention of them in Church annals. When we read of Nicholas I. (858-867) and of Paschal II. (1099-1118) visiting the cemeteries, we must believe that their visits were to the basilicas erected over the catacombs, and to their special crypts, not to the catacombs themselves. In the chronicle of the monastery of S. Michael ad Mosam we read of a pilgrim of the eleventh century who obtained relics of saints "from the keeper of a certain cemetery, in which lamps are always burning." He refers to the basilica of S. Valentine and the small hypogæum attached to it (discovered in 1887), not to catacombs in the true sense of the word. The very last account referring directly to them dates from the time of Pope Nicholas I. (858-867) who is said to have restored the crypt of Mark on the Via Ardeatina, and of Felix, Abdon, and Sennen on the Via Portuensis. At this time also the visits of pilgrims, to whose itineraries, or guidebooks, we are indebted for so much knowledge of the topography of suburban cemeteries, come to an end. The best itineraries are those of Einsiedeln, Salzburg, Wurzburg, and William of Malmesbury; and the list of the oils from the lamps burning before the tombs of martyrs, which were collected by John, abbot of Monza, at the request of queen Theodolinda. The pilgrims left many records of their visits scratched on the walls of the sanctuaries; and to these _graffiti_ also we are indebted for much information, since they contain formulas of devotion addressed to the saint of the place. They are very interesting in their simplicity of thought and diction, as are generally the memoirs of early pilgrims and pilgrimages. I shall mention one, discovered not many years ago in the cemetery of Mustiola at Chiusi. It is a plain tombstone, inscribed with the words:-- HIC · POSITUS · EST · PEREGRINUS · CICONIAS · CUIUS · NOMEN · DEUS · SCIT