round the church, the feeling of expectation increased, and the hours of waiting seemed long to the crowd and to us, when about four o'clock the dense mass of people in front of the church divided. A procession of priests in yellow copes filed out of the Basilica, one among them carrying the autograph benediction of St. Francis (see p. 210), and went to the little chapel near the Chiesa Nuova built over the stable where the saint is said to have been born. Here the holy relic is raised for the faithful to venerate, and the procession returns to San Francesco. It is a small but important ceremony, the prelude to the granting of the indulgence. We had reached the chapel before the procession, through side streets, but soon returned to the lower church for the crowd was intolerable, and we had been warned that once the blessing had been given a mad rush might be made to reach San Francesco and that sometimes people were trampled under foot. Out of the burning heat we entered the cool dark church where Umbrian peasants had already taken their places, as spectators, but not as actors in the feast. Seated on low benches against the wall they formed wondrous groups of colour, like clumps of cyclamen and primroses we have seen flowering in a wood upon an Italian roadside. The gates across the church had been shut, and were guarded by gendarmes; we had arrived too late. But presently Fra Luigi appeared at the gate of St. Martin's chapel, and hurriedly we followed him down the dark, narrow passage leading to the sacristy; we had only just time to run across the church and take our places outside the chapel of St. Mary Magdalen, when the great crowd surged into the church. The excitement became intense, and the pilgrims who had followed in the procession as docile as lambs now could restrain themselves no longer, and hustled the priests forward, pressing them against the iron gates in their efforts to approach the altar. There was a moment of tension as the whole of the iron screen bent beneath the weight of the crowd when the gendarmes half opened the gate to allow the priests to pass through. With the relic swaying above their heads, they slipped in from among the pilgrims, who, finding the gates once more barred against them, began to moan and shout with deafening fury. The organ pealed forth mad music, the incense rose in clouds around the altar, and eager faces peered through the gates, which were battered with angry fists as the people pushed against each other so that the whole crowd rocked from side to side. Through it all stood the quiet figure of the priest, raising the relic high above the heads of the people whose voices were for the moment hushed, as the words of benediction were pronounced. Rapidly crossing the church, followed by his attendants, he entered the sacristy and shut the door, while four gendarmes stationed themselves at the corners of the altar to prevent people from mounting the steps, and others went to unbar the gates.