The monks on their arrival at Monte Casino would naturally display the same evidence, by which they themselves had been convinced; and the appearance of the cloth, when put into the fire and taken out of it, is described exactly as it would be in fact, supposing it to have been made of amiantus.
Montfaucon, in his Travels in Italy (p. 381. English ed. 8vo.), describes a splendid service book, which was written A. D. 1072 by Leo at the expense of brother John of Marsicana, and presented by John to the Monastery of Monte Casino, where it was exhibited to Montfaucon as one of the most valuable and curious monuments. An illumination in this book represents a monk kneeling before St. Benedict, the patron and founder of the institution, and holding in his hands a cloth, on which St. Benedict is placing his left foot. Montfaucon gives an engraving from this picture: he supposes the cloth to be a monk’s cowl, and conjectures that it was thus used in admitting novices. This explanation is evidently a most unsatisfactory one, nothing being produced to render it even probable. We believe the cloth to be that the history of which has just now been given, and that the design of the artist was to represent a monk wiping the feet of St. Benedict with the same cloth with which Jesus wiped the feet of his disciples.
This supposition will appear the more probable if we attend to the date of the MS. (A. D. 1072) and the persons, by whom and at whose expense it was written. “Brother John of Marsicana” appears to have been at this time advanced in years, wealthy, and highly respected, since we are informed, that in the year 1055, when Peter was chosen Abbot of the Monastery, some of the brotherhood wished to choose John, although he, foreseeing that the choice would be likely to fall on him, had obstinately sworn on the altar, that he would never undertake the office. John was at this time provost of Capua[566]. Seventeen years afterwards he went to the expense of providing the service-book seen by Montfaucon. He employed as his scribe one of the fraternity, who was his junior and from the same city with himself. For there can be scarcely a doubt, but that Leo, who wrote the MS., was the same who was the author of the Chronicon. The author of the Chronicon, at the commencement of his history, calls himself “Frater Leo, cognomine Marsicanus[567]”. He was made Bishop of Ostia A. D. 1101, so that we may suppose him to have been twenty or thirty years of age, when the MS. was made. Of his aptitude for such an employment we cannot doubt, when we consider his future labors as Librarian and author of the Chronicle. But if these facts be evident, it is equally manifest, that these two accomplished Benedictines could not have expressed their veneration towards their founder in any way better suited to their ideas and belief than by exhibiting in the manner described that relic, WHICH WAS SOLEMNLY DISPLAYED ONCE A YEAR WITH BURNING CANDLES AND ATTENDING ACOLYTHES TO THE ADMIRING AND ADORING CROWD OF DEVOTEES.
[566] Dominum Johannem, cognomine Marsicanum, qui tunc Capuæ erat præpositus, &c.—Leonis Ostientis Chronicon Casinense, L. ii. c. 92.
[567] Marsicana (civitas) was in Marsica, the territory of the ancient Marsi.
On inquiry it is found that this relic exists no longer at Monte Casino, although the original copy of the Chronicon of Leo Ostiensis is still preserved in the Library[568]. It appears that the relic has long been lost, since there is no mention either of it, or of the casket which contained it in the “Descrizione Istorica del Monastero di Monte Casino, Napoli, 1775.”
[568] Excursions in the Abruzzi, by the Hon. Keppel Craven, vol. i. p. 54.
A large glove of this substance is in the Hunterian Museum at Glasgow. An English traveller states that he has lately seen at Parma a table-cloth, made of Amiantus from Corsica, for the use of the ex-Empress Maria Louisa, who resided there after the fall of Napoleon.
In modern times cloth of asbestos is scarcely made. Indeed it is not probable that this material will ever be obtained in much abundance, or that it will cease to be a rarity except in the places of its production. It is never seen in Great Britain, or on the continent, save in the cabinets of the curious.
The annexed Map ([Plate VII.]) is designed to indicate the divisions of the Ancient World as determined by the Raw Materials principally produced and employed in them for weaving.