The sun was setting when we left the monastery and walked through the streets, now silent and deserted, where Francis in his gay youth wandered with boon companions, singing not hymns but love-songs. A small boy came and walked with us, and, unbidden, acted as our guide. Here was the Duomo, he said, and here the Church of Santa Chiara; and, when we were on the road without the city gate, Ecco! below, Santa Maria degli Angeli! For from where we stood we looked down upon the huge church rising from the plain, where even now there are scarcely more houses than in the days when Franciscans, coming from far and near to hold counsel with their founder, built their straw huts upon it. Our self-appointed guide was a bright little fellow, and never once begged like the other children who followed us. So when he showed us the road to Foligno where we must ride on the morrow, J. gave him a sou. At the door of the Albergo he said he must go home, but not to supper; he never had any. He asked at what time we should leave in the morning, when he would like to come and say good-by. Felice notte—"a happy night"—were his last words as he turned away.
VIRGIL'S COUNTRY.
"If we have such ill speed at our first setting out, what may we expect betwixt this and our journey's end!"
The next morning, with a select company of ragged boys, our young guide arrived in time to see us start. When I came out he nodded in a friendly way, as if to an old acquaintance, to the wonder and admiration of the other youngsters. The waiter, his glasses on, came to the gate with us. Two monks standing there asked how far we were going on our velocipede. "To Rome?" they cried. "Why, then, here are two pilgrims and two priests!" Our guide and his friend ran down the mountain-side after us until we gave the former another sou, when they at once disappeared. It seemed a little ungrateful; but I did not give him much thought, for just then J. bade me back-pedal with all my might. The machine went very fast, despite my hard work, and to my surprise J. suddenly steered into a stone-pile by the roadside. "The brake is broken!" was his explanation as we slowly upset.
Fortunately, however, the upright connecting the band of the brake with the handle had only slipped out of place, and though we could not fix it in again securely, J. could still manage to use it. This, so far as we could see, was the one defect in our tricycle, but defect it was. A nut on the end of the upright would have prevented such an accident. But this is one of the minor particulars in which tricycle-makers—and we have tried many—are careless. We had the rest of the coast without interruption. Half-way down, our little friend and his followers ran out from under the olives; he had taken a short cut that he might see us again.
From Assisi to Terni was a long day's ride by towns and villages, through fair valleys and over rough mountains. From the foot of the mountain at Assisi, past Monte Subasio, which, bare and rocky, towered above the lower olive-covered hills, the road was level until we rode by Spello with its old Roman gateway and ruined amphitheatre. But the hill here was not steep, and then again there came a level stretch into Foligno, the first lowland town to which we had come since we left Poggibonsi, and which, with its mass of roofs and lofty dome rising high above the city walls, looked little like the Foligno in Raphael's picture. Already in our short ride—for it is but ten miles from Assisi to Foligno—we noticed a great difference in the people. It was not only that many of the women wore bodices and long earrings, and turned their handkerchiefs up on top of their heads, but they, and the men as well, were less polite and more stupid than the Tuscans or Umbrians about Perugia.
Few spoke to us, and one woman to whom we said good-morning was so startled that she thanked us in return, as if unused to such civilities. For all J.'s shouts of a destra—to the right—and Eccomi! they would not make room for us; and now in Foligno one woman, in her stupidity or obstinacy, walked directly in front of the machine, and when the little wheel caught her dress, through no fault of ours, cried "Accidente voi!"—the voi, instead of le, being a far greater insult than the wishing us an accident. Then she walked on, cursing in loud voice, down the street, by the little stream that runs through the centre of the town, and into the market-place where Saint Francis, in mistaken obedience to words heard in ecstasy, sold the cloth he had taken from his father that he might have money to rebuild the church of San Damiano.
Even the beasts we met were stupid as the people. At our coming, horses, donkeys, and oxen tried to run. We therefore looked for at least a skirmish when, beyond Foligno, a regiment of cavalry in marching order advanced upon us. But the soldiers stood our charge bravely. Only the officer was routed and retreated into the gutter. Then, forgetting military discipline, he turned his back upon his men to see us ride.