"Here she gave her vest to Jesus Christ in the shape of a poor man, who afterwards robed her with an invisible robe whereby she never again suffered cold. "Here Jesus Christ appeared to her surrounded by light, as she was wishing to descend by this place and go back to her house; and when straightway she fell to the ground thereat, He opened her breast and put there His own heart, saying, 'Lo, most dear daughter mine, even as the other day I took from thee thy heart, so now do I give thee Mine own, by the which shall thou ever live.' "While she was leaning in ecstasy against this pilaster, a candle that was there alight, in honour of some saints, fell upon the veils of her head and entirely burnt itself out upon them, without doing any harm or making any mark. "While her confessor, Frate Raimondo, was celebrating Mass at the altar of the holy Apostles Peter and Paul, she remained at the foot of this chapel and desired to be fed with the Holy Communion; but because it was late, and the confessor knew not that she was there, she stayed there patiently; then did Jesus Christ in person communicate her with part of the Host consecrated at that Mass, and the confessor, not finding it, remained much afflicted until it was revealed to him by her." To many of us these things may seem mere priestly legends, and we may find, even in Catherine's more solemn revelations, but little to meet our daily needs. Assuredly, few would maintain that Christ actually appeared, objectively, to His servant--that she walked with Him in aught save the spirit--that He spoke words to her otherwise than in her own heart. Yet, who shall set limits to the potential ascents of the human spirit when held so slightly by its _mortal velo_, when so little encumbered or shadowed by the _nube di sua mortalità_ as was that of Caterina Benincasa? In those mystical suprasensible regions--during that half hour in which there is silence in Heaven--Catherine was a voyager alone, a sure wanderer in fields where our footsteps to-day cannot tread even in imagination. Let us adapt to ourselves the word of Frate Raimondo: "We are in the valley, and we presume to judge concerning what is on the summit of the Mountain." CHAPTER VIII _The Last Days of the Republic_ Fabio di Pandolfo Petrucci had been expelled from Siena in September 1524, by a temporary alliance of all factions in the State. Of the three chief leaders in the revolution, Giovanni Martinozzi belonged to the Monte de' Nove, Giovanni Battista Piccolomini to the Gentiluomini, while Mario Bandini was a grandson of Andrea Todeschini Piccolomini and therefore associated to the Monte del Popolo. Mario, who was a young man of about twenty-three, was at the head of the _Libertini_, an association of the most ardent republicans in Siena, who had sworn relentless and perpetual enmity to all who should attempt anything against the liberties of the Republic.