"A Remarkable Book"
SAN CELESTINO
BY JOHN AYSCOUGH
Author of "MAROTZ," "DROMINA," etc.
In form, it is almost exactly like a novel with frequent conversations, and going, in minor matters at least, far beyond the record of history. The narrative opens with Petruccio as a child in the home of his parents, who belong to the minor nobility of the Abruzzi. It follows his career at Salerno, where he attended the University as a lonely figure making few friends. Afterwards he became a hermit and the story tells how disciples gathered round him, beginning with two worldly young men who had known him at Salerno. The Order of the Celestines thus founded grew in numbers and importance through fifty quiet years, when the call to the Papacy came. From this point, Mr. Ayscough's chronicle moves swiftly and dramatically—the poor simple old man dragged weeping from his hermit's cave and borne to the triumph from which he shrank in horror,—the miserable weeks in Rome, touching examples of his simplicity and guilelessness. Then the peace which came with the renunciation, and his last days passed quite happily as a captive in a prison cell.