Chapter 7

... "Je donnerais pour ce caveau toutes les églises de Rome."—H. Taine.Voyages en Italie. Pérouse et Assisi.

The Chapel of St. Martin[82]

The best masters of Tuscany having, by the beginning of the thirteenth century, covered most of the walls of San Francesco with choice work, it now remained for Siena to send artists to complete their loveliness by effigies of calmly sweet Madonnas and saints whose gentle beauty seemed rightly fitted for their Umbrian surroundings.

The first to come, probably very few years after Giotto had left, was Simone Martini, "the most lovable," Mr Berenson calls him, "of all the artists before the Renaissance."[83]He married Giovanna Memmi, a Sienese, whose brother Lippo Memmi often helped him in minor works; this may account for the confusion between the two, and why he is so often called by his brother-in-law's surname. One ofthe artist's claims to immortality, the highest, according to Vasari who was not partial to the Sienese, was the praise he won from Petrarch for the portraits he painted on more than one occasion of Madonna Laura. Simone's talents were sung by the "love-devoted" Tuscan poet who calls him "mio Simon," and in one perfect sonnet tells how he must surely have been in paradise and seen the loveliness of Madonna Laura, as he has drawn her features with such fidelity that all on earth must perforce acknowledge her beauty.

The Chapel of St. Martin at Assisi is filled with such faces as Petrarch describes. It possesses, too, all the varied colour of a garden, only a garden not inhabited by earthly mortals, but by gentle knights and fairy kings wearing wonderful crowns of beaten gold, with cherubs' heads, flowers and moons upon their surface, and women who hold their lilies with caressing fingers. All gives way before his sense of the beautiful, the ornate and the charming, so that he creates a world apart of saints and angels with a feeling of remoteness about them which is one of the most striking features of his art. He loved all that was joyous; he depicted no tragic scenes; his saints have already won their crowns in heaven, his kings are conquerors, and around a death-bed the angels sing. He may sometimes fail as a story-teller, and his compositions do not always give the same sense of perfection as those of other stronger artists, but his very faults are lovable, and all can be forgiven for the exquisite finish of his paintings, which, in their brilliant colouring, are like a piece of old embroidery where design and hues have been woven in by patient fingers. "To convey his feeling for beauty and grace and splendour," says Mr Berenson, "Simone possessed means more than sufficient. He was a master of colour as few have been before him or after him. He had a feeling for linealways remarkable, and once, at least, attaining to a degree of perfection not to be surpassed. He understood decorative effects as a great musician understands his instruments."[84]

It is a little difficult to find out where Simone begins his legend of St. Martin, as he seems to have fitted in the different scenes just where he could, thinking, as was only right, more of the effect of decoration than of the sequence of the story. The two frescoes on the left wall refer to the well-known act of charity, when St. Martin, a young Lombard soldier serving in the army of the Emperor Constantine in Gaul, met, on a bitter winter's day, a beggar outside the gates of Amiens, and having nothing but the clothes he wore divided his cloak with the poor man. It is not one of Simone's pleasing compositions; far better is the next where Christ appears to the saint in a dream, wearing the cloak he had given in charity and saying to the angels who surround him: "Know ye who hath thus arrayed me? My servant Martin, though yet unbaptised, hath done this." The face of the young saint is very calm and palely outlined against his golden aureole as he lies asleep, clasping his throat gently with one hand. With what patience has Simone drawn the open-work of the sheets, the pattern on the counterpane, the curtain about the bed; no detail has been passed over. And who can forget his angels, the profile of one, the thick waving hair of another, and the grand pose of the standing figure, a little behind Christ, whose head is poised so stately upon a well-moulded neck.

THE KNIGHTHOOD OF ST. MARTIN BY SIMONE MARTINITHE KNIGHTHOOD OF ST. MARTIN BY SIMONE MARTINI(D. Anderson—photo)]

THE KNIGHTHOOD OF ST. MARTIN BY SIMONE MARTINI

(D. Anderson—photo)]

Exactly opposite are two scenes belonging to the early times of the saint's life when he was yet a soldier. In one the Emperor Constantine is givinghim his sword, while an attendant buckles on the spurs of knighthood; here also, as in most of the frescoes, we pick out single figures to dwell on, such as the youth with a falcon on his wrist, whose profile is clearly outlined yet tender, with that pale red-golden tinge over the face by which Simone always charms us. Remarkable for grace and motion is the man playing on the mandoline, with a sad dreamy face, who seems to sway to the sounds of his own music; whilst almost comic is the player on the double pipes, with his curious headgear and tartan cloak.

The next scene is divided by a rocky ridge, behind which is seen the army of the Gauls, who, by the way, have Assisan lions on their shields. St. Martin, after refusing to accept his share of the donations to the soldiers, declares his intention of leaving the army to become a priest, and when accused of cowardice by the Emperor, he offers to go forth and meet the enemy without sword or shield. Simone pictures him as he steps forth upon the perilous enterprise, holding the cross and pointing to the sky, as he refuses the helmet held out to him by the Emperor. Next day, says the legend, the Gauls laid down their arms, having submitted to the word of St. Martin who was then allowed to quit the world for the religious life.

On the opposite wall, above the apparition of Christ with the cloak, we see St. Martin no longer in soldier's garb, but as the holy Bishop of Tours. The saint has fallen into a reverie whilst saying mass, and in vain a priest tries to rouse him by laying a hand upon his shoulder for his eyes remain closed, and the kneeling priest waits patiently with the book of the Gospels upon his knee. Simone never surpassed the dignity, the religious feeling, the quiet repose and ease expressed in the figure of St. Martin; while he has kept the scene as simple as one of Giotto's frescoes, thusmaking it the most perfect among these compositions. To the left is a much ruined picture of the restoration of a child to life through the prayers of the saint, who was preaching at Chartres. Among a crowd of people one figure, with a Florentine headgear such as Andrea del Castagno paints, stands clearly out; below a small child can be discerned stretching out little hands towards the kneeling bishop.

Above this again, almost too high to be clearly seen, is the death of St. Hilary of Poitiers, at which St. Martin assisted. One of the mourners has a mantle of turquoise blue, a beautiful piece of colour like the sky seen through the arches of the Gothic windows.

On the other wall, over the fresco where St. Martin receives knighthood, is recorded the legend of how "as he went to the church on a certain day, meeting a poor man naked, he gave him his inner robe, and covered himself as he best might with his cope. And the archdeacon, indignant, offering him a short and narrow vestment, he received it humbly, and went up to celebrate mass. And a globe of fire appeared above his head, and when he elevated the host, his arms being exposed by the shortness of the sleeves, they were miraculously covered with chains of gold and silver, suspended on them by angels."[85]

The next picture, which is very ruined, represents the visit of St. Martin to the Emperor Valentinian, who, because he had rudely kept his seat in his presence, suddenly found it to be on fire, and, as the legend says, "he burnt that part of his body upon which he sat, whereupon, being compelled to rise, contrite and ashamed, he embraced Martin, and granted all that he required of him."

Above this is the death of St. Martin, with a gracefulflight of angels hovering over the bier singing as they prepare to carry his soul to heaven. Very fine is the fresco in the lunette of the entrance, where Cardinal Gentile, in his franciscan habit, is kneeling before the saint who bends forward to raise him from so humble a position. But in the single figures of saints, in the arch of this chapel, standing like guardian deities within their Gothic niches, Simone rivals greater artists in grace and strange beauty. In honour of the franciscan donor the chief franciscan saints are depicted beside two others of universal fame. St. Francis and St. Anthony of Padua, and below them St. Catherine of Alexandria and St. Mary Magdalen; on the other side, St. Louis, King of France and St. Louis, Bishop of Toulouse, and below them St. Clare and St. Elisabeth of Hungary. Nowhere has St. Clare received so true an interpretation of her gentle saintliness as in this painting by Simone, and he has surpassed his other works in the exquisite drawing of the hand which holds her habit to one side. It would seem as though in these saints he had attained the limits of his power of expressing types of pure beauty, were it not for the half figures in the embrasures of the window of such finish and subtle charm as to haunt us like some strain of long remembered music. There is a bishop in a cope of creamy white with gold embroidery, a hermit with a long brown beard, and saints who calmly pray with clasped hands. The broad white band of pale shadowed fur is low enough to show the graceful line of the neck of the young saint in the left hand window, his hair tinged with pale red and his face so fair as to seem a shadow upon the wall, coming and going in the play of light.

So enthralling is the study of the frescoes that it is possible to leave the chapel without noticing the stained-glass windows, perhaps the loveliest in the churchwhere all are lovely. They seem to belong to the same epoch as the paintings, and in one or two instances a figure may have been inspired by them, such as the angels with sword and shield who resemble Simone's angels in the upper part of the fresco of St. Martin's death. Cardinal Gentile was in all probability the donor of these as well as of the chapel, for he is represented in the central window kneeling before St. Martin, who is in full episcopals. These windows are dazzling; there are warriors in red and green, saints standing against circles of cream-tinted leaves, St. Jerome in magenta-coloured vestments harmonising strangely with the crimson of his cardinal's hat; and St. Anthony of Padua in violet shaded with paler lights as on the petals of a Florentine iris. A saint in white is placed against a scarlet background, another in pale china blue against a sky of deep Madonna blue, and all these colours lie side by side like masses of jewels of every shade.

On leaving we find to the left of the papal throne a small chapel ornamented only by a window which has an apostle standing in a plain Gothic niche, the ruby red and tawny yellow of his mantle making a brilliant patch of colour in this dark corner of the church. The head is modern, but the figure, the circular pattern beneath, and the right half of the window with five medallions, are, according to Herr Thode, the oldest pieces of coloured glass in the lower church.

Just above the papal throne is a handsomely worked ambo in red marble and mosaic, forming a kind of pulpit from which many illustrious people have preached, among them St. Bonaventure and St. Bernardine of Siena. In the recess a Florentine artist of the fourteenth century has painted the Coronation of the Virgin, a fresco worthy of its beautiful setting; and there is a crucifixion andscenes from the martyrdom of St. Stanislaus of Poland by a follower of Pietro Lorenzetti, pupil of Simone Martini. St. Stanislaus was canonised in 1253 when Innocent IV, came to consecrate the Basilica, and upon this occasion a miracle took place which redounds to the honour of the saint. While Cardinal de Conti (afterwards Alexander IV,) was preaching, one of the capitals of a pillar above the pulpit fell upon the head of a woman in the congregation, and thinking she was dead, as she had sunk down without a groan, her neighbours covered her over with a cloak "so as not to disturb the solemnity of the occasion." But to their amazement when the sermon ended the woman rose up and gave thanks to St. Stanislaus, for the blow, far from doing her harm, had cured her of headaches to which she had been subject. The legend would long since have been forgotten, were it not that the capital which fell on that memorable day is still suspended by chains in the opposite corner of the nave, and often puzzles the visitor who does not know its history.

Below the pulpit is a slab of red marble let into the wall with these simple words inscribed: "Hic jacet Jacoba sancta nobilisque romana," by which the Assisans commemorated the burial place of Madonna Giacoma da Settesoli the friend of St. Francis, who after his death lived at Assisi and followed the rule of the Third order until she died in 1239 (see p.114).

Left Transept.—To Pietro Lorenzetti was given the work of decorating these walls with scenes from the Passion, and so far as completing the rich colour of the church be succeeded. But when studied as separate compositions they betray the weakness of an artist who, as Mr. Berenson remarks, "carries Duccio's themes to the utmost pitch of frantic feeling." Great prominence is given to the subjectof the crucifixion where the vehement actions of the figures rather than the nobility of the types are pre-eminent. It may be of interest to some that the man on the white horse is said to be Gualtieri, Duke of Athens, the tyrant of Florence, whose arms Vasari says he discovered in the fresco which he describes as the work of Pietro Cavallini.

A curious composition is that on the opposite wall where the disciples sit in awkward attitudes and the servants in the kitchen are seen cleaning the dishes while a dog hastily licks up the scraps. It would be difficult to know this represented a religious scene were it not for the large aureoles of the apostles. Nor has Pietro succeeded in giving solemnity to the scene of the Stigmata, where the strained position of St. Francis and the agitated movement of the Seraph partake of the general characteristics of these frescoes. But in his Madonna, St. Francis and St. John the Evangelist, below the crucifixion, Pietro Lorenzetti gives his very best and their faces we remember together with the saints of Simone Martini. Referring to this fresco M. Berenson says: "At Assisi, in a fresco by Pietro, of such relief and such enamel as to seem contrived of ivory and gold rather than painted, the Madonna holds back heart-broken tears as she looks fixedly at her child, who, Babe though he is, addresses her earnestly; but she remains unconsoled."[86]

Chapel of S. Giovanni Battista.[87]—Another lovely work by Pietro Lorenzetti is the triptych over the altar, the Madonna, St. Francis and St. John the Baptist, but here the action of the child leaning towardsthe Virgin and holding the end of her veil, is more caressing and suggestive of babyhood. Above are small heads of angels like those Pietro places in medallions round the frescoes in the south transept. This, and the panel picture over the altar in the opposite chapel, complete the works of the Sienese school in Assisi. The Umbrian school is represented by a large and unsympathetic picture by Lo Spagna (dated 1526), which is however considered by local admirers of the painter to be his masterpiece. It is a relief to turn from his yellow-eyed saints and hard colouring to the windows of this chapel which are remarkable for their harmony and depth of tone.[88]The figures of the central window date from the second half of the thirteenth century, those of the left window are at least two centuries later.

The Sacristies.—These open out of St. Giovanni's Chapel. Both are ornamented with handsomely carved cupboards of the sixteenth century where the friars store their vestments and costly lace, and which once were full of gold and silver vessels amassed during many centuries. But often during mediæval times of warfare the friars had to stand aside and see the sacristies sacked by the Perugians, or even the Assisans, when they must have envied the peace of mind of the first franciscans who, possessing nothing, could have no fear of robbers.[89]

Devoted as the citizens were to the memory of St. Francis they do not seem to have hesitated, when in want of money, to help themselves liberally to the things in his church. At one time when the Baglioni were besieging Assisi, her despot Jacopo Fiumi gathered the citizens about him, and in an eloquent harangue called upon them to rob the church at once before the enemy had entered the gates, lest the treasure should fall into the hands of the Perugians. So the sacristies were rifled, and with the proceeds Jacopo Fiumi rebuilt the walls and the palaces which had fallen to ruin during the incessant fighting of past years. The next plunderers were the soldiers of Napoleon, and it is a marvel that so many things still remain. A cupboard in the inner sacristy contains a beautiful cross of rock-crystal ornamented with miniatures in blue enamel brought by St. Bonaventure as a gift from St. Louis of France; there is also the second rule of St. Francis which was sanctioned by Honorius III. Even more precious is a small and crumpled piece of parchment, with a blessing written in the big child-like writing of St. Francis, which he gave to Brother Leo at La Vernia after he had received the Stigmata. On one side he wrote part of the Laudes Creatoris, upon the other the biblical blessing:

"Benedicat tibi Dominus et custodiat te:Ostendat faciem suam tibi et misereatur tui:Convertat vultum suam ad te et de tibi pacem":

"Benedicat tibi Dominus et custodiat te:

Ostendat faciem suam tibi et misereatur tui:

Convertat vultum suam ad te et de tibi pacem":

and then below:

"Dominus benedicat te, Frate Leo."

Instead of the Latin, the saint signs with the Thau cross, which is of the shape of the mediæval gallows, and may have been yet another way of showing hishumility by humbling himself even to the level of malefactors. Many pages have been written about this relic; the line by Brother Leo in explanation below the signature of St. Francis:

"Simili modo fecit istud signum Thau cum capite manu sua,"

has puzzled many people, but in a pamphlet by Mr Montgomery Carmichael[90]it has received a plausible translation. He thinks thatcum capiterefers to the small knob at the top of the Thau, by which St. Francis meant to represent a malefactor's head; the line would read thus: "in like manner with his own hand he made a cross with a head," and not "with his own head," as some believe. Mr Carmichael thinks the curious mound out of which the cross rises is a rough drawing of La Vernia. Above the benediction, in neatly formed letters, Brother Leo has written a short account of the sojourn at the Sacred Mount and of the Vision of the Seraph. This relic has been mentioned in the archives of the convent since 1348, and is always carried in procession at the commencement of the feast of the "Perdono" on July 31st.

Almost more honoured by the faithful is the "Sacred Veil of the most Holy Virgin," which can only be exposed to the public in the presence of the Bishop of Assisi, and is shown in times of pilgrimage when the sacristy and church are full of men and women waiting for their turn to kiss the holy relic.

The picture over the door, painted by Giunta Pisano (?) is always pointed out as a portrait of St. Francis, but as the painter's first visit to Assisi was in 1230 he can only have seen the body of the saint borne to its last resting-place in the Basilica, and even that is doubtful when we remember withwhat secrecy the burial was performed. Here the face is pointed and emaciated, with a curious look in the eyes as though Giunta had desired to record his blindness. The figure is surrounded by small scenes from the miracles of St. Francis, performed during his lifetime and at his tomb in San Giorgio. But though in the so-called portraits of the saint, the artists think more of representing him as the symbol of asceticism and sanctity than of aiming at giving a true likeness, both this picture and a fresco painted in 1216 at Subiaco when the saint stayed there on his way to Spain, are not very dissimilar from the graphic description left us by Celano. He tells us that St. Francis "was rather below the middle stature with a small round head and a long pinched face, a full but narrow forehead and candid black eyes of medium size, his hair likewise was black; the brows were straight, the nose well-proportioned, thin and straight, the ears erect but small, and the temples flat; his speech was kindly, yet ardent and incisive; his voice powerful, sweet, clear and sonorous; his teeth were regular, white and set close; his lips thin and mobile, his beard was black and scant, his neck thin, his shoulders square; the arms were short, the hands small with long fingers and almond-shaped nails, his legs were thin, his feet small, his skin delicate, and he was very thin...."

BIRD'S EYE VIEW OF THE BASILICA AND CONVENT OF SAN FRANCESCO, FROM A DRAWING MADE IN 1820BIRD'S EYE VIEW OF THE BASILICA AND CONVENT OF SAN FRANCESCO, FROM A DRAWING MADE IN 1820

BIRD'S EYE VIEW OF THE BASILICA AND CONVENT OF SAN FRANCESCO, FROM A DRAWING MADE IN 1820

Right Transept.[91]—On the walls between the Chapels of the Sacramento and of St. Maria Maddalena, Simone Martini has left some of his loveliest work in the half figures of franciscan saints he places near the Madonna. These are St. Francis, St. Louis of Toulouse, St. Elizabeth of Hungary, St. Clare clothed in the habitof her order, always to be recognised when painted by Simone by her heavy plaits of hair, St. Anthony of Padua with the lily, St. Louis of France with a crown offleur-de-lis, and upon the right of the Virgin, a noble saint who may be Helen the mother of King Louis, as she too holds a sceptre with the lily of France on the top. Never had saints so majestic a queen as Simone's Madonna. The subdued greens and tawny reds of their mantles and their auburn hair look most beautiful against the gold ground which shines with dull light about them. Each of their aureoles bears a different pattern in raisedgesso; a garland of flowers, a circle of human heads, suns, a tracery of roses and ivy, or yet again another of oak leaves. After Giotto's Allegories and the frescoes in San Martino, these saints are by far the loveliest things in San Francesco, and as they look towards us, ethereal, like a faint moon on a misty night, they seem the very incarnation of mediæval faith. Dante created women such as Matilda, who sings to him in Purgatory as she is picking flowers on a woodland river's edge, and Simone paints them and conveys their spirit in the faces of St. Clare and St. Elizabeth.

The Convent

It is natural to think that the Basilica and Convent built under the guidance of Elias was as we see it now in its full magnificence of chapels, porch, colonnades and cloisters. Certainly the essential form of the building has not been altered, but in the early days it stood isolated from the town, surrounded by such rocks as jut out among the grass in the ravine outside Porta S. Pietro, and approached by a drawbridge which made it resemble, even more than it does now, afeudal stronghold guarding the Umbrian valley. Later on, as the life of the place centred ever more round the church of the saint, the citizens no longer built their houses near San Rufino or below the castle, but close to San Francesco, until a second town sprang up where once were only rough mountain pastures. It is still possible to form an idea of how it looked by following round the base of the hill by the Tescio, whence a wonderful and unique view of the northern side of church and convent is obtained (seeAppendix). Assisi lies hidden, and standing high above us, shutting out the view of the valley, is San Francesco; not the building with great arches we are familiar with, rising high above the vineyards, but a castle, seen clearly defined and strong against the sky, whose bastions clasp the hill top as powerfully as a good rider bestrides his horse. Oak copses cover the slopes from the convent wall straight down to the banks of the Tescio, where little mills are set above deep pools of emerald green water and narrow canals fringed by poplar trees. The minute detail of the landscape in this deep ravine gives a curious feeling that we are walking in the background of one of Pier della Francesca's pictures—even to the distant view of low-lying hills where the torrent makes the sudden bend round the mountain edge; and the contrast is strange between it and the fortress-church upon the dark hill, where deep shadows lie across it and lurk within the crannies of its traceries in the bay windows of the chapels and in the depths of jutting stones. Such was the massive building "Jacopo" planned to stand upon the mountain ridge, as much a part of the rocks and the red earth as the cypresses which crown the summit. And in the midst, but on the southern side, he placed, as if to balance the rest, a square and boldly conceived bell-tower risinghigh above the church.[92]At the time it was the wonder of the Assisans, who boasted that for beauty as well as for solidity it could be counted among the first, not in Italy only, but in Europe. Bartolomeo of Pisa, came to cast one of the big bells, and together with his own name he inscribed those of Elias, Gregory IX, and Frederick II. On another bell, which has been recast, was graven a delightful couplet informing the faithful of the many services which consecrated bronze could render to the country round.

SAN FRANCESCO FROM THE TESCIOSAN FRANCESCO FROM THE TESCIO

SAN FRANCESCO FROM THE TESCIO

"Sabbatha pango, funera plango, fulgura frango:Excito lentos, domo cruentos, dissipo ventos."("I ring in Sunday, I lament for the dead, the lightning I break,I hurry the sluggards, I vanquish the wicked, the winds I disperse.")

"Sabbatha pango, funera plango, fulgura frango:

Excito lentos, domo cruentos, dissipo ventos."

("I ring in Sunday, I lament for the dead, the lightning I break,

I hurry the sluggards, I vanquish the wicked, the winds I disperse.")

To the time of Elias also belongs the fine entrance to the Upper Church, where the Guelph lion and the eagle of Frederick II, record the liberality of both parties towards the building of the church, while the four animals round the wheel window seem to show that "Jacopo," notwithstanding his marked love for pure Gothic architecture, could not quite forget the strange but fascinating beasts of Lombard façades.

STAIRCASE LEADING FROM THE UPPER TO THE LOWER PIAZZA OF SAN FRANCESCOSTAIRCASE LEADING FROM THE UPPER TO THELOWER PIAZZA OF SAN FRANCESCO

STAIRCASE LEADING FROM THE UPPER TO THELOWER PIAZZA OF SAN FRANCESCO

One friar in the fifteenth century inherited some of the enthusiasm of Elias for the basilica; this was Francesco Nani, the General of the franciscans, known as Francesco Sansone because his patron, Sixtus IV, is said to have addressed him with these words in allusion to his energy and strength of character,"Tu es fortissimus Samson." His name is found upon the beautiful stalls of the Upper Church, and it was he who superintended the laying out of the upper piazza, connected with the lower one by a long flight of stairs. It may also have been at this time that theloggieof San Francesco were built for the purpose of erecting booths during the festival of the "Pardon of St. Francis." Certainly it was chiefly at his expense that Baccio Pintelli (1478) built the handsome entrance door and porch to the Lower Church, which in olden times was entered by a small door close to the campanile. The architect fitted his work admirably into a corner of the building, completing with clustered columns of pink marble, wheel window, trefoiled arches and stone traceries, the scheme of colour and the perfect proportions for which San Francesco is so remarkable. The doors of carved wood, darkened now and of such massive workmanship as to resemble bronze, were made in 1546 by Niccolò da Gubbio, who has carefully commemorated the legend of St. Francis and the wolf of Gubbio in one of the panels to the left. Sansone also commissioned thedoorway of what is now the entrance to the friars' convent a year after the porch was finished, then it was only a small chapel, built by the members of the Third order when St. Bernardine of Siena revived the religious enthusiasm of the people. The Assisan artist placed a bas-relief of the saint in the arch above the door, and it is still called "la porta di San Bernardino."

SAN FRANCESCO FROM THE PONTE S. VITTORINOSAN FRANCESCO FROM THE PONTE S. VITTORINO

SAN FRANCESCO FROM THE PONTE S. VITTORINO

None should leave Assisi, not even those who only hurry over for the day, without visiting the convent, which recalls an eastern building from the whiteness of its great vaulted rooms, long corridors and arcaded courtyards when seen against the bluest of summer skies.[93]Then from the cool and spacious convent, a place to linger in upon a hot day in August, we step out into the open colonnade which skirts the building to the south, makes a sharp turn west, and then juts out at the end, facing south again. This last portion was added by Cardinal Albornoz in 1368, and goes by the name of theCalcio. But two centuries later the foundations were found to be insecure, and Sixtus IV, strengthened it by a bastion, which looks solid enough to resist even the havoc of an earthquake. The Pope was a great benefactor of the convent, and the friars placed his statue in a niche in the bastion, where he sits, his hand raised in benediction, on a papal throne overlooking the valley. From the rounded arches of rough stone, turned by storm and sunshine to russet-red, pink and yellow, we look out upon one of the most beautiful and extensive views in Umbria. To the right is Perugia standing out almost aggressively on the hill top; opposite, on a separate spur which divides the valley of Spoleto from that of the Tiber, Bettona and Montefalco hang upon peaks like the nests of birds in trees, and beyond are Spoleto, Trevi and Narni,nearer again Spello, and the domes of Foligno in the plain, with a host of small villages near. All the Umbrian world lies before us from the convent of San Francesco.

Many weary people besides the popes came to resthere in early times, and one mediæval warrior, Count Guido of Montefeltro, the great leader of the Ghibellines, laid down his arms and left his castle at Urbino in the year 1296, to pass his last days as a friar doing penance within the peaceful shelter of San Francesco for a long life of intrigue and bloodshed. He prayed by day, for at night they say he stood gazing out of his window, one of those we see above the walled orchard of the monks, watching the stars and attempting to divine the mysteries and destinies he read there, exceeding even the superstition of the age by his faith in the laws of astrology. But his meditations and careful preparation for a holy death were suddenly disturbed, and he found himself once more plunged into the whirl of Italian politics and intrigue. War raged between Pope Boniface VIII, a Gaetani, and the powerful family of the Colonna who braved his excommunications, and, when their Roman palaces were burnt, fled to their strongholds in the country. Many of these fell into the hands of the papal troops, but Penestrino, their principal fief, resisted all attacks and the Pope was nearly defeated when, remembering the old soldier Count Guido known to be "more cunning than any Italian of his time, masterly alike in war and in diplomacy," he hastened to ask his counsel. The story is recounted by Dante, who could not forgive the Ghibelline chieftain for coming to the assistance of the Pope.

Boniface, seeking to silence the scruples of the friar, promised to absolve him from all sin, even before committal, if only he would tell him how to act so "that Penestrino cumber earth no more." Guido, whose subtlety had not deserted him in the cloister, gave an answer which, while it ensured success to the papal arms, stamped him as a man of such deceit and treachery that Dante placed him in the eighth gulf of hell, amongthe evil counsellors eternally surrounded by flaming tongues of fire.

"Then, yielding to the forced arguments,Of silence as more perilous I deem'd,And answer'd: 'Father! since thou washest me'Clear of that guilt wherein I now must fall,'Large promise with performance scant, be sure'Shall make thee triumph in thy lofty seat.'"[94]

"Then, yielding to the forced arguments,

Of silence as more perilous I deem'd,

And answer'd: 'Father! since thou washest me

'Clear of that guilt wherein I now must fall,

'Large promise with performance scant, be sure

'Shall make thee triumph in thy lofty seat.'"[94]

Besides Count Guido and the popes who, finding the large and airy rooms of the convent a convenient summer resort, were constant visitors at Assisi, it can show a fine list of royal visitors. Among them is the Queen of Sweden who, in 1655, came escorted by Papal Nuncios, foreign ambassadors and cavalry, to pray at the tomb of St. Francis. The Assisans sent out their best carriages with horses ridden by postillions to meet her, adorned their palaces with flags and damask hangings, and rang all the bells as she approached the Basilica. "The Queen is called Christina," a chronicler tells us; "she is aged twenty-nine, is very learned, being able to write in eleven languages; she is small but very comely.... One hundred and fifty beds were prepared in the convent and beautiful it was to see the numerous suite and the pages of the nobles."

A FRIAR OF THE MINOR CONVENTUAL ORDER OF ST. FRANCISA FRIAR OF THE MINOR CONVENTUAL ORDER OF ST. FRANCIS

A FRIAR OF THE MINOR CONVENTUAL ORDER OF ST. FRANCIS

It strikes the visitor to Assisi as strange that the black-robed friars in charge of the Basilica are so unlike the franciscans with whom everyone is familiar, and it may be well to give a few facts relating to the many divisions in the Order which, as we have seen, began already to change in the time of Elias. In 1517 a portion of the brethren, desiring a mitigation of their rule, obtained from Leo X, a dispensation and received the title of Friars MinorConventuals with the permission to choose their own Minister General. Their dress is shown in the illustration. Those who kept to the rule more nearly approaching to that of St. Francis, like those of Sta. Maria degli Angeli, the Carceri and San Damiano, were called Friars Minor of the Observance, or Observants, and take precedence over the others, enjoying the privilege of electing the "Minister General of the whole order of the Friars Minor and successor of St. Francis." In 1528, Matteo Baschi, an observant, instituted a new branch called the Capucins, because of their long pointed capuce, whom he inspired with the desire to lead a hermit's life in solitary places, preaching to the people but once in the year. They have deserted their hermitages and are a very popular order in Italy, devoting themselves especially to preaching and hearing confessions, and form quite a distinct family from the rest. The Basilica at Assisi no longer belongs to the Conventuals, as after the union of Italy it was declared to be a national monument. The Government also took possession of the convent as a school for boys, leaving only a small portion for the reduced number of friars to inhabit. They went to law, and the judge pronounced the convent to be the property of the Holy See which had never ceased to exercise jurisdiction over it; but a proviso was made that the school was to remain in its present quarters until the Pope or the franciscans should erect a suitable building for it in another part of the town. As much money is required for so large an edifice and sites are not so easily procured, it seems probable that for many years the sound of boys at play will be heard in the convent walls instead of the slow footsteps of silent friars.

CHAPTER VIII

Giotto's Legend of St. Francis in the Upper Church

"What, therefore, Giotto gave to art was, before all things, vitality."—J. A. Symonds.Renaissance in Italy.

Giotto in the Lower Church had felt his way towards the full expression of his genius; succeeding so well in the four Allegories that he was chosen to illustrate the life of St. Francis, withheld, as we have seen, from all former artists, while Cimabue was to hear the poet's praise of his pupil, "Ora ha Giotto il grido." The task undertaken by the young painter, already a master at twenty-five, was almost superhuman, and certainly unique in the career of any artist; for whereas the pictorial treatment of the New Testament had been attempted by many during several centuries, Giotto was destined to invent forms for the whole franciscan cycle with such perfection that no succeeding artist has varied his formula. It remains a wonderful achievement, and the noble manner of its accomplishment proved him to be, as Mr Roger Fry expresses it, "the supreme epic painter of the world."

If St. Francis was fortunate in having his life related by so admirable a story-teller, Giotto also owed something to the early chroniclers who seeing, perhaps unconsciously, the extraordinary poetry and the dramatic incidents in the saint's career, had faithfully recorded them in simple and beautiful language. So far thework was ready for Giotto, even the exact scenes were chosen for him to illustrate, but the problem how to unfold and make them familiar to the faithful by simple means, and yet not to lose the dignity and charm of the theme, remained for him to solve; and the representation, by a few figures, of a whole dramatic incident in so vivid a manner could only have succeeded in the hands of a great master of the fourteenth century. It is nearly certain that Giotto used St. Bonaventure'sLife of St. Francis, finished in 1263 and founded, with but few additions, uponThe Three Companionsand Celano's first and secondLife of St. Francis. Though written with a certain charm of style and though it lacks the ring of those early pages, in which St. Francis becomes known to us in such a way that we forget he lived seven hundred years ago; and although the various incidents of his life are presented like so many beautiful pictures, there is the feeling always that St. Bonaventure was writing about a saint already honoured upon earth and in heaven, and not of the man whom all loved as the "Poverello d'Assisi." But this legend served Giotto's purpose; and a knowledge of the words he followed being necessary in order to see where he simply kept to the franciscan legend, and where he penetrated the true spirit of the saint's life and its dramatic interest, we quote from it at some length, although many of the main facts have already been treated of in a preceding chapter.[95]

1.St. Francis honoured by the Simpleton.—(We begin on the right wall by the High Altar, and follow straighton to the opposite side, the legend unfolding as in the pages of a book.)

"A certain man of great simplicity dwelt in those days in Assisi, who, by virtue of knowledge divinely infused, whenever he met Francis in the street, would take off his mantle, and spread it upon the ground before him, declaring that he did so because he was a man worthy of all honour and reverence, who should shortly perform great works and marvellous deeds...."[96]

The bare facts are here narrated which Giotto does not alter, but he puts such life into the scene that we feel he might have been present when the simpleton cast himself at Francis' feet and astonished the Assisans by his words. Attention is fixed upon the six people in the foreground. Two worthy citizens have just arrived in time to see the cloak being spread on the ground before Francis, and to hear the prophetic words; and as they turn to each other, one pointing to the scene, the other raising his hand with a movement of surprise, we seem to hear their carping criticisms upon the brilliant youth who, although he spent his time in singing and carousals, was one day to bring renown to their city. The young Francis, ever heedless of worldly comment, is stepping lightly on to the cloak, with a movement of surprise that he should receive such honour. All have the Florentine headgear, but the head of St. Francis is covered by a small white cap fitting close behind the ears, just showing his hair in front, and we feel that Giotto would have left him so, but the franciscans, ever to and fro in the church to see that the story was painted as they liked, insisted upon an aureole being added. As much glory for St. Francis they cried, as gold and money can give him. So Giotto, who disliked unnecessary decorations, was made to put an aureole above the whitecap, larger than any we have ever seen. But take away the halo and we should yet know which of the figures is the saint, for he stands a little apart from his two noble friends with ermine lined cloaks who talk with hands clasped together, and is perhaps already wondering about the destiny which awaits him and of which he was unaware, "for as yet he understood not the great purposes of God towards him."

Besides the human interest of the frescoes it is a delightful task to study the architecture in each scene, for here, in the Upper Church, Giotto has built a whole city of little pink houses with balconies, towers and turrets, of exquisite Gothic basilicas, of temples and gabled thrones. His priests sit within palaces full of lancet windows and pointed arches, the groined roofs, as in the Assisan Church, ablaze with myriads of stars. What love he had for dainty ornaments, simple, nay almost severe in outline, but perfectly finished; and he always likes to show the blue sky overhead, or at least peeping through one of the windows, making the marble seem more lustrous and creamy white. Would that all Florence had been built by him.

2.St. Francis giving his cloak to a poor Knight.

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