Chapter III (2)

"'No,' I replied, 'I do not wish for anything that is not strictly fair. What I propose is this--viz., that I should keep the ring in my possession until you have disbursed the three pauls out of your share. Then, after the ring has been estimated by a trustworthy party and turned into money, then we will share the produce equally.'

"'Ho! ho!' laughed he, 'so that's what you are after, is it? Ha! ha! I see it all. You fancy that under the excuse of waiting for your three pauls (which I know as well as you do yourself you do not care a straw for, since you have become enriched with the half of my treasure) that I am going to allow you quietly to abscond with the ring, which may be worth as much as all the treasure put together, for what I know, never to be heard of afterwards. Well, that is a cool idea! Ha! ha! ha!'

"'I protest,' said I, 'that such a thought never entered my head.'

"'Oh, of course not,' said he, incredulously. 'Friend Antonio, it is clear that our respective mothers hatched neither of us two yesterday. I am only a poor goatherd, yet I have learnt as much of the world from watching the antics of my goats as you have in trailing and pruning your vines. We are both of us men, and we know what men are. We all have our wants, and our brains were given us to supply them.'

"'Yes,' replied I, 'in a conscientious and legitimate manner, and not to over-reach our fellow-men in the shortest and most unscrupulous way that our petty interests may dictate, to the scandal of all good saints and the blessed Madonna at their head.'

"And here I launched out into a moral strain for at least an hour, hoping to bring him round by dint of argument and persuasion to my view of the case, but finding him at the end of that time still obdurate, and in the same state of hardness of heart as before--for who can moralise with such a heathen as Peppe?--I attempted to seize the ring by force, intending to keep it until he should pay me the debt he owed me, but he was before me, and a scuffle ensued, he declaring that he would not suffer me to keep the ring in my possession, and I being equally firm in refusing to let him keep it in his without first paying me my three pauls.

"He promised faithfully to pay me the debt when he should have changed one of the pieces of money that fell to his lot; until then, however, I remained firm in my resolution. Words had by this time led to blows, and the conflict was getting desperate, when, it being now fairly morning, we were interrupted by the sacristan entering the church to light the candles on the altar.

"Starting back in wonderment and terror at what he naturally believed to be a miraculous resuscitation, it it was some time before he was sufficiently calm to hear from me the true account of the case.

"At length, recovering from his stupor, his eyes sparkled with an avaricious light at the divided treasure on the ground, and his skinny fingers opened and shut convulsively. Then gazing furtively over each shoulder, he put his finger to his lip, winked, and whispered hoarsely, 'My friends, the secret of your newly-acquired wealth is as yet only known to us three. I think you will find it to your interest that it should not be known to more, as in that case it might come to the ears of the arch-priest, who would be sure to deprive you of every penny of it, in consideration of its being found in his church. Reflect well, my friends; there is but one way to swear me to secrecy.'

"'And that is?' asked I.

"'To let me have an equal share of the treasure,' said he, impudently. 'What other way would you buy my silence?'

"We both violently opposed this proposition, considering it no less than an act of brigandage, and however Peppe and I might differ in opinion on many subjects, we both agreed that this was a piece of extortion to which we were not bound to submit. I said that I would sooner await the decision of the arch-priest, which would perhaps, after all, not be such as he--the sacristan--represented it, and Peppe swore that he would knock his dastardly brains out in the middle of the church before he would let him touch a _baiocco_.

"'Think again, my friends,' said the sacristan, exchanging his customary look of sanctity for one of deep cunning and malignity. 'Think again, and decide quickly. In another minute the arch-priest will enter the church to perform mass. All the inhabitants of the village will be pouring in. There is no time to be lost. Either let me have a third of the treasure, or I shall swear by all the saints to the arch-priest that I caught _you_, Signor Antonio, in the act of robbing the alms-box, and that the Madonna wrought a miracle before my very eyes by raising _you_, Signor Guiseppe, from the dead in order to chastise the burglar for his sacrilege.'

"'He will not believe thee, thou imp of Satan!' roared Peppe.

"'We shall see,' rejoined the sacristan, with a malicious chuckle, and rubbing his hands.

"At this moment the arch-priest entered, attired in his robes, and all the congregation at his heels.

"'Oh, Signor Arch-priest!' began the sacristan, in a loud voice, before the assembled multitude, rolling up his eyes and crossing himself with mock devotion, 'I have witnessed this morning a miracle with these very eyes.'

"'A miracle!' exclaimed the arch-priest and all the congregation in chorus.

"'Ay,' persisted the sacristan; 'a genuine, undeniable miracle. As I entered the church this morning to light the candles on the altar, I discovered this burglar (pointing to me) in the act of robbing the alms-box. He had just succeeded in extracting all that treasure that you see on the ground before you, and which was doubtless all of it placed in the box by our blessed Lady's own hands for the use of her holy church. For who else in our little village could have amassed such a sum, or, having amassed it, would have been willing to put it all of a heap within the alms-box?

"'Well, Signor Arciprete, just as the sacrilegious knave was about to count his unhallowed gains, lo! a miracle, such as these eyes never before beheld, and may never see again before they close for ever in peace.'

"'Well, well,' said the arch-priest, impatiently.

"'Well, Signor Arciprete mio, will you believe it? Yon image of our blessed Lady suddenly raised its arm in a commanding attitude, and with a voice of ineffable sweetness blended with severity cried out to yon corpse, or, rather, that man, who _was_ a corpse only last night, as all good people may recollect, "Corpse! arise and seize yon sacrilegious ruffian by the scruff of the neck!" The words were no sooner out of the blessed image's mouth, when up leapt the corpse from his bier, and seizing the burglar with an iron grasp, continued to hold him until vostra Reverenza entered the church!'

"The arch-priest remained dumbfounded for a time, not knowing what to say; but just as I was about to break silence and try to exculpate myself, my voice was immediately drowned by the multitude crying out, 'Down with him! down with him! Down with the thief, the burglar, the heathen! Let him not seek to exculpate himself with lies. Hear him not; he is guilty of sacrilege! Down with the Protestant! Blessed be the holy man who was raised from the dead and the good sacristan to whose eyes the miracle was vouchsafed! Down with the Jew, the Protestant, the heretic! _Away_ with the miscreant! away with him.'

"I saw and heard no more. Hurried away, midst the hootings and execrations of the crowd, I was flung into prison, where I have remained ever since the morning."

There was much in Antonio's story that moved me to laughter, though not a smile appeared upon the face of the narrator himself throughout the whole recital. There was an air of truth, too, about his manner that left no doubt in my mind that he had retailed the facts of the case as they had occurred without adding to or taking from them in the minutest particular.

I was then able to tell him the sequel of the story; how the arch-priest had put the greater part of the treasure into the alms-box, and, for the rest, the sum being too large to enter all of it into the box, he had taken charge of it, together with the diamond ring, and had designed the whole sum to be expended for the benefit of the church.

On hearing this he replied that he had rather that the money should be disposed of in that way than that blackleg of a sacristan should get a penny of it. He said that he was perfectly sure that the arch-priest had only so disposed of the money from a sincere belief that it had been miraculously placed in the alms-box, he himself being the dupe of his own rascally sacristan to whom he trusted implicitly.

He was of opinion that had he been allowed to explain himself to the arch-priest, his reverence would have granted him, if not his proper share of the sum, at least some portion of it. I promised him that I would lay his case before the arch-priest, and do what I could to get him liberated from prison. He thanked me, and slipping a small coin into the turnkey's hand, I quitted the cell.

It was now quite dark, so I thought I would make the best of my way home, where my supper awaited me. The following morning was rainy, and not being able to work out of doors, I resolved to call again upon the arch-priest, and finding him at home, I related to him my interview with the prisoner and the statement he gave of the case.

My reverend friend looked thoughtful for a time, shook his head, and hinted that the prisoner's veracity might not be depended on.

"However," he added, "the tale seems feasible, and I desire nothing more than that the prisoner should have justice. I will probe the matter to the bottom, and if he has spoken the truth I will get him liberated as soon as possible, and will moreover give out publicly in the church that what we had erroneously taken for a miracle was nothing more than a curious combination of circumstances perfectly natural, though strange, and that I had been imposed upon by the villainous and profane lies of my sacristan. It will require time to prove all this; meanwhile, Antonio must take his trial at Gennazzano. He left here at five o'clock this morning."

"So early!" I exclaimed. "I wanted, if possible, to prevent his going."

"You take great interest in his case," said my friend.

"I like to see mysteries cleared up as soon as possible," I replied. "I know that the love of the marvellous is so great among the ignorant in these parts, that they prefer persisting to believe in a miracle, even in the face of facts which explain it away in the most natural manner possible. This proneness to attribute to supernatural causes everything that we are unable to account for on the first glance, and to yield ourselves up implicitly to the belief of what is irrational, absurd, improbable, without first weighing thoroughly the _pros_ and _cons_ of the case, is one of the unmistakable signs of a barbarous and uncultivated intellect, and ought to be discouraged as a trait unworthy the dignity of human nature by everyone who has the improvement and well-being of his fellow creatures at heart."

The arch-priest smiled drily, as if he had taken my last speech to himself; then, after a pause, he began:

"No Christian man will deny that miracles have been wrought, or will dare to call in question those of our blessed Lord or of His saints. If, then, he acknowledges these, why should he try to combat the existence of modern miracles, seeing that everything is possible to the Almighty? What! Shall we limit the power of the Omnipotent, or dare to measure things infinite by our finite faculties? It would be the height of presumption for anyone to maintain that these things cannot be, or that our Heavenly Father cares less for His creatures now than he did in the days of yore."

"No wise man, Christian or otherwise," I replied, "would deny that any wonder were possible to the Divine author of the universe, the Great Source of all things wonderful. Yet science, the gift of God Himself, mind you, since He in the first place created us with intellect to see into, in some measure, however darkly, His wonderful workings, in order that we might be taught to admire them and thereby come to a more perfect knowledge of His unspeakable greatness--science, I say, reveals to us that our universal Father rules all nature by means of certain fixed laws, from which we have no reason to believe that He would turn aside for a trifle--to excite mere wonderment among an ignorant multitude by performing such a conjuring trick as a bleeding crucifix or weeping Madonna. Our Lord Himself was chary of His miracles, and when asked for a sign would often refuse; yet when He did perform miracles, they were invariably to do good, and not to excite wonderment. If many intelligent people disbelieve in modern miracles, it is because they have not come within their experience, or that many seeming miracles they have been able to explain by natural causes.

"They have been made, moreover, doubly cautious in receiving hearsay miracles for gospel from the numerous cases of imposture that have been discovered among the priesthood in all countries where the Roman Catholic religion has prevailed. Then, why should miracles only be wrought in little sequestered villages, among the ignorant and superstitious, and not in large towns, in the presence of an intelligent and investigating population? Why, moreover, should they be more prevalent in mountainous districts than in any others? Why? Save that from the topographical configuration of the country, the inhabitants of mountain villages are necessarily more shut out from intercommunication with their kind than the dwellers in more accessible regions, and consequently cut off from that interchange of ideas so necessary to the development of the human intellect.

"Because their minds thus necessarily forced into one narrow channel till the intelligence borders on that of the brute, and is kept down to that pitch by a coarse and monotonous diet, which hard labour enables them to earn but scantily, and, finally, because by intermarrying closely among their own narrow population they reproduce offspring, if anything, more stunted in intelligence than themselves--to say nothing of other natural influences which help to produce cretinism, goitre, and deformity--and thus shutting out from their poor benighted intellects their last chance of fair play.

"Ignorant by force of circumstances, superstitious because they are ignorant, naturally discontented, with a life of hard labour that barely supplies that life's necessaries, what wonder that the human mind thus stunted and oppressed by all its surroundings, should seek an outlet? That that outlet should be one that held out promises of a better time to come than they are ever likely to see in their plodding every-day life?

"What wonder that such a one should throw himself more entirely upon the comforts of the religion that his village priest holds out to him than one more contented with his earthly lot, or that, superstitious as he is ignorant, he should daily hope for some miracle to be wrought for his own special benefit? Is it too much to infer that a mind in which faith reigns supreme and reason is hushed to sleep may be deluded by its senses--that it may imagine it sees or hears anything that it desires to see or hear?

"Is this an irrational solution of the stories so common of pictures of the Virgin or other saints moving their eyes or speaking? Then just consider when the average intelligence of a scanty population is at this ebb, what temptation this holds out to the priest of the parish whose office it is to rule his little flock by maintaining order and restraining crime, to strike awe into his congregation and keep alive their fanatical faith by some pious fraud in the shape of a crucifix that bleeds by an easy mechanical contrivance, an image of the Madonna that sheds tears, or a picture that rolls its eyes!

"These tricks were known to the heathen priests of antiquity long before the introduction of Christianity, and have been repeatedly carried out since by the priests of Rome. It is to the successful delusion of these poor benighted wretches that the Church of Rome owes her vaunted laurels. These are your miracle seers! To these alone do the saints vouchsafe to perform their wonders! As for the intelligent and wise, if they go to a church on purpose to see a miracle, and come away without seeing it, they are told by the priest that it is because they lack faith, that they do not go in the proper spirit, that their natures are too material, that such sights are reserved only for the faithful, and that few are sufficiently spiritualised to behold them.

"So you see there is no way of catching a priest napping. He will always find some hole to creep out of. Like an eel, he will slip through your fingers at the very moment that you may think you have got him. Should any individual be bold enough to force his way through the wonder-gazing crowd, and publicly demolish the miracle-working image or picture and reveal to the devout bystanders the paltry mechanism by which they have been deluded, people's eyes would at length be opened, all miracles be liable to suspicion, and reason at length admitted into some share of man's being.

"But there are difficulties that beset so bold an expedient. In the first place, a man must be possessed of more than an ordinary amount of courage to face the fury of a fanatical mob whom he knows to be ready to tear him in pieces should he attempt to rob them of their darling prejudices, or dare to break one chip off their sacred wood or stone.

"Secondly, the wonder-working image or picture is generally in an inaccessible place, high up on the wall or surrounded by railings, to prevent a too close scrutiny. Thirdly, the miracle often exists merely in the imaginations of devout believers, without any aid of mechanism on the part of the priest. In this case, if any man were daring enough to step forward and openly to break in pieces the supposed miraculous image or picture, and, having done so, was unable to detect in the fragments any trace of machinery or means of imposture whatever, the fame of the miracle would then gain ground, and the daring unbeliever be guilty of sacrilege."

When I had got thus far, my friend the arch-priest drew himself up and was about to reply in a lengthy rejoinder, when he was suddenly interrupted by the servant girl of his household bursting hurriedly into the room and crying out at the top of her voice, "Oh, Signor Arciprete, have you heard the news? The _vetturino_ of the mail has just arrived. He says that the night before last the mail was stopped on its way to Rome by a band of brigands, who robbed the passengers, consisting of six English gentlemen and others, of everything they had about them. Gold, silver, and paper money--quite a heap--besides some gold and silver watches, and, among other things, a diamond ring of great value, belonging to one of the English gentlemen. The soldiers are on the track of the brigands already, and a heavy reward is offered to whosoever shall give such information as shall lead to their discovery.

"Poor Luigi! He says that he himself was robbed of his silver watch and paper money, amounting to forty pauls, all he possessed in the world. I do hope they'll catch the nasty wretches. I myself would see them executed. _Gesu Maria!_ What hungry wolves! But I must be off now to tell all the people in the village, or else that horrid gossip Maria Giovanna will be before me, and I always like to be first."

So saying, she bounced out of the room, slamming the door after her, and we were left once more alone.

There was a pause, and my friend was the first to break silence. The thread of his ideas had been broken by the girl's sudden entry into the room with the startling news, so he did not resume his discourse, but after a while observed:--

"I suppose you see in the wild tale of this girl a corroboration of the prisoner's statement, and a link in the chain of evidence."

"Well," said I, "it looks like it, does it not? The heaps of gold and silver, the paper money, the gold and silver watches, and, moreover, the diamond ring. It certainly looks as if the mystery were beginning to clear up."

"Softly, my friend, softly," rejoined the priest, who still grudged the event to natural causes. "Do not be rash in jumping at conclusions, for the evidence is not yet complete. Let us first satisfy ourselves that the girl's tale is true, for reports get wind about our village--one hardly knows how--without the least vestige of truth in them. I will speak to the _vetturino_ myself, and if the tale prove true, or partly true--for, depend upon it, the story will have lost nothing in the telling--need it do away entirely with the miracle?

"For instance, suppose instead of being a band of a dozen brigands, it should have been only one brigand, and that brigand your friend Antonio himself. That he alone, laden with his treasure, and being attracted by the light of a candle that he descried through the chinks of the church door, forced his way into the church to count over his booty. Supposing this to have been the case, the miracle may, nevertheless, have occurred precisely as related to me by the sacristan."

"You are very ingenious," said I, "in suggesting an improbability in order to support your miracle, but, if you recollect, the sacristan declared that he caught Antonio in the act of breaking open the alms-box."

"That may have been a mistake caused by the excited state of his mind on the occasion. However, I will see Luigi at once, and learn from his own lips the true state of the case, for I am as anxious to get at the truth as you are."

"Then let us lose no time in speaking to him at once," said I. "The weather is clearing up now, and as I have nothing better to do, I will accompany you in your stroll down to his house."

This was agreed on; so, putting on our hats, we found ourselves once more among the dirty streets, until we reached the house of the _vetturino_. Here we found him in front of his own door, surrounded by a crowd of eager peasants, who were listening with avidity to the recital of his adventures.

"_Buon giorno, Signor Arciprete_," said Luigi, raising his hat as we approached.

"_Buon giorno, Luigi_," responded the arch-priest. "There is a strange tale current in the village about you and your passengers having been robbed on the high road. Can it be true."

"Perfectly true, Reverenza," was the reply. "Only the night before last we were assaulted by at least a dozen banditti armed to the teeth, and my passengers, six of whom were English gentlemen, along with myself."

"Stay," said the arch-priest. "You are perfectly sure there were a dozen of them?"

"A dozen at the very least, your Reverence, I could swear."

"Tell me," said the arch-priest, "did you see Antonio the prisoner amongst them."

"Antonio?" inquired the _vetturino_, in extreme surprise.

"Ay," replied the arch-priest. "He that hath been accused of robbing the church and is now at Gennazzano awaiting his trial. You will have heard the tale by this time."

"I certainly did hear a wonderful story, Reverenza, but did not know how far to credit it," replied the _vetturino_. "The night was very dark and I could recognise no faces.

"But, _Corpi di Bacco_! Antonio! Why I always considered Antonio as an honest man, a simple _vignauolo_ who earned his bread by the sweat of his brow, and whom, for his steady plodding, the saints had awarded by granting him a better share of this world's goods than most of his fellows."

"Ay, ay," said several bystanders at once, "we all thought so, too, Signor Arciprete. Still, what we all saw with our own eyes, only yesterday morning, made us change our opinion."

The arch-priest looked thoughtful, and then enquired of Luigi if he knew anything of Peppe, the man who had been raised from the dead.

"Peppe!" exclaimed the _vetturino_, laughing, "ay, do I, and a greater rascal never walked God's earth. That is why I was so cautious in believing a story in which Peppe the goatherd was mixed up. I never yet heard any tale in which he figured but had some devilry at the bottom of it."

"You do not believe, then, in the miracle?"

"Not upon such testimony," replied Luigi. "I should believe _you_, Signor Arciprete, if you had seen it with your own eyes," he added, respectfully.

"All I can declare is," replied the priest, "that I saw the man Peppe, apparently dead, and decked out as a corpse, placed within the church upon his bier, and the morning after, as I entered the church to say mass, I saw him as alive as ever again, still in his shroud, and appearing to dispute the treasure with Antonio. As for the rest, it was communicated to me by Ricardo, my sacristan. Do you know Ricardo?"

"I do," replied Luigi, in a tone of deep meaning.

"Well," said the arch-priest, "what do you think of him?"

"Well, Signor Arciprete," said the _vetturino_, hesitatingly, "as he is your sacristan, perhaps you would not like to hear _what_ I think of him."

"Speak out, man," said the arch-priest. "If I find him unworthy of his post, I shall discharge him. Come, now, what do you know about him?"

"Since your Reverence presses me," replied the _vetturino_, "I must confess that I have found him to be just such another scamp as Peppe the goatherd, if not worse, and, in spite of all his mock piety, I have found him to be as cunning a knave as I know for miles round. Grasping as an eagle, wily as a serpent, and withal as poor spirited as a hare, seeking to cover his knavery with the cloak of religion; imagining that no one can see through his hypocrisy."

"You surprise me," exclaimed the arch-priest; "but what proof have you of his knavery?"

"Well, in the first place," replied the _vetturino_, "he is in debt with almost every man in the village, myself among the number, and not in one instance has he been known to repay what he has borrowed. I have pressed him over and over again, but he always sneaks out of it by some lame excuse, even when I know he has been able to pay me. He wanted to marry my sister once, because he thought there was a little money to be had, but when he spoke to my mother about her dowry, and received for reply that she did not intend to give her daughter to one who sought her for her dowry, and that he who would marry her must support her himself, he very soon slunk off. Not that I'd have given my consent to such a scarecrow marrying my sister, even if he _had_ been less grasping. Then, would you believe it, your Reverence, he actually had the impudence to insult my sister when he encountered her alone, as he thought, in the campagna. He little knew that I was only a short distance behind. I came upon him unawares in time to overhear part of his impertinent conversation, and I gave him such a thrashing as will make him remember Luigi the _vetturino_ as long as he lives.

"Then, there is no doubt that it was he who picked the pocket of poor old Matteo when he happened to be drunk; everybody believes that, besides several other dirty tricks that I will not weary your patience by relating, though I could if I would. As for cheating at cards, he is quite an adept, and yet, with all this, he walks with his eyes hypocritically fixed on the ground, counting his beads and crossing himself, as if he were a very saint. But he doesn't take _me_ in, your Reverence, however he may impose on our simple peasantry, for when a man is a _vetturino_, he sees other towns besides his own, and gets to know people of all sorts. I have been in Rome, and have picked up a thing or two."

"Well, enough for the present, Luigi," said the arch-priest. "I will enquire into this matter; meanwhile I intend to take a stroll with this gentleman. Till we meet again," and he waved his hand to the _vetturino_.

"A rivederla, Signor Arciprete," responded Luigi, raising his hat respectfully.

"You see now," said I to my friend, as we strolled together from the narrow streets into one of the main roads, "that there is some evidence to support my view of the case. I never did think much of your sacristan; his face was enough for me, but after the evidence you have just heard, methinks you would do well to rid yourself of such an ornament to your church."

"It is odd," replied my friend, "that I never suspected him of being that sort of character. On the contrary, I thought him a most exemplary young man. It is not long ago since he informed me of his ardent desire to enter holy orders."

"A fine priest he'd make!" said I, laughing. "The church has no need of him, for there are too many of his sort among your priesthood already. Not that he wouldn't be popular," I added, soothingly. "On the contrary, he would be able to manufacture miracles by the cart-load, I warrant, in order to satisfy his flock's thirst for the marvellous. He would probably die in the odour of sanctity and be canonised after his death."

"My friend, my friend," said the arch-priest, gravely, "our church is not, as you think, rash in canonising a man a saint. Our lawsuits are extremely rigid, and long--so much so, that many a holy man has been rejected as a saint on account of the insufficient evidence of his miracles."

Then he proceeded to enlarge upon the miracles of the saints of old and all the legendary lore of his religion, and thus he entertained me until we found ourselves once more at the door of his house.

"Signor Arciprete," said the aforementioned servant girl, whom we discovered on the threshold, conversing with an elderly peasant, "here is a man who wishes to speak to you in private. He says he has something to communicate."

"Show him into my study," said the arch-priest. "I suppose you do not mind my friend being present?" said he, addressing the man and glancing at me.

"No, Reverenza," said the peasant, shutting the door of the priest's study behind him, "it was only to bring you some information concerning the brigands."

"Ha!" exclaimed the arch-priest, pricking up his ears. "Proceed."

"Well, your Reverence," began the peasant, "hearing that a reward had been offered to anyone able to give such information as should lead to the discovery of the brigands, I thought I would make known what happened to me on the very night of the robbery, which I hope may prove of some use to the brigand-catchers.

"It was long past midnight when I was returning from Civitella, having purchased a hog there, which I was leading along by a string attached to its hind leg, when in the darkness I heard the sound of many voices, and upon listening attentively I recognised them as belonging to the brigands, into whose hands I had fallen twice before, and I began to be alarmed for my hog, which I made sure would be seized as a prize, and accordingly hid myself behind a tree until the whole band should have passed by. I was near enough to hear every word they said, but their voices seemed neither to grow louder nor to grow less.

"At length the moon breaking from behind a cloud, revealed to me the features of the brigand chief. He was standing erect whilst the rest of his band were squatting or lounging around him in a circle. He then proceeded to harangue them.

"I trembled from head to foot, and felt that my only chance of escaping observation was to continue rooted to the spot without disturbing the dead leaves that lay strewn at my feet, but the wretched animal, my companion, commenced grunting and squealing, as if purposely to mark my whereabouts, and I made sure every moment that the brigands would be down upon us both.

"'Hush!' I cried, coaxingly.

"'Grunt,' went the brute, louder than ever.

"'Madonna mia Santissima!' I muttered, crossing myself, 'preserve a poor man and his pig from the depredations of these marauders!'

"I know not if our good lady vouchsafed to hear my prayer, but certain it was that the brigands paid no attention whatever to either of us, so engrossed did they all seem with the oration of their chief, every word of which fell distinctly on my ear in the stillness of the night, and I must own that the tenor of it surprised me, for instead of the profane oaths, fiendish laughter, or the planning of some new daring exploit, as I should have expected from such men, I now listened to a pious discourse, filled with godly phrases such as you, Signor Arciprete, might have used yourself from the pulpit. I think I can give you almost word for word the discourse as it ran.

"'My comrades,' he commenced, 'we have for many years toiled together in an arduous and perilous profession; at war with society, wresting from the innocent and good their hard-earned substance to supply our own wants, instead of getting our own livelihood honestly and by the sweat of our brow, as God hath decreed. Oppressed in our turn by the avengers of our victims, we are hunted like wolves, and have to take refuge from our pursuers in the most inaccessible parts of the mountains, in caves, in forests and such-like secret places.

"'Rest has departed from our slumbers--for what man can rest in the fear that the vigilant myrmidons of the law with which he has lived at enmity are ever on his track?

"'Like Ishmael, our hand is against every man, and every man's hand is against us. This is the lot of the brigand, as we all know. Born and bred in danger, nurtured from the breast, not with the milk of human kindness, but by the blood of his fellow men; his childish joys, the groans and sufferings of his mutilated victims; feasting on horrors from his earliest youth, unbridled and brutal in his appetites, his highest ambition through life to be a hardier ruffian than his father before him.

"'Have we not, my friends, committed every sort of atrocity of which degraded humanity is capable? Nay, revelled in it, impiously defying that very God whom we ought humbly and reverently to thank as the Author of our beings? Let each of us look back upon our past lives and ask ourselves how we have thanked Almighty God for his innumerable blessings.

"'How have we repaid His ineffable love and care over us? Has it not been by subverting His wise laws, despising His holy ordinances, brutalising our natures, even to a degree lower than the very brutes themselves? My brethren, we may be powerful against the weak and against the law, yet there is One above us more powerful than ourselves, to Whom we shall all one day have to give an account. Let us fight no longer against God; for what is man when matched against Omnipotence. Deem it not cowardice, my friends, to relinquish a life of evil now that your souls have received the light of truth, but rather thank God for His infinite mercy in vouchsafing so great a miracle through His Holy Mother to save our souls from the bottomless pit.

"'I confess that almost from my earliest youth I never have looked upon religion as aught but priest-craft, and scoffed at all miracles as tricks of the priesthood to impose upon the ignorant and simple; but what shall we say, my brethren, to the miracle we have all so lately witnessed, or how shall we attempt to explain it away? Was it not the intervention of the blessed Virgin herself to scare us--the impious desecraters of her holy Church--from our evil ways? Could anything short of Divine power have raised the dead at the lonely hour of midnight within the very church itself, and have struck such terror into us, the hardy sons of the mountains, who never yet quailed before mortal man?

"'Tell me, my friends, if in all my wild life, in all our joint villainies and wicked enterprises, in the very face of death, if you have ever known me to lack courage before to-night?'

"'Never, Capitano, never,' cried several voices at once. 'We know your courage to be undaunted, and that there is no mortal man that you stand in awe of; but when it comes to running counter to spirits raised from the dead, or devils from hell, that is quite another sort of thing, and a man need be the arch-fiend himself to be without fear.'

"'Just so,' replied the brigand chief; 'then, since none of you are able to accuse me with a lack of human courage, you may know that my exhortation to you to repent and alter the course of your unholy lives is not the mere words of a craven soul who fears the law and seeks to shun the just penalty of his misdeeds, but those of a repentant sinner miraculously brought to conversion through the intervention of the blessed Madonna, whom, in her boundless mercy, she had deigned to bring to a sense of his wickedness, even in the very midst of his crimes.

"'Let us turn from our evil ways, oh, my comrades! Take the advice of a brother sinner, more deeply dyed in iniquity than any of yourselves, and repent ere it be too late! What can atone for all our past wickedness save the utter renouncement of our evil ways, a life of rigid penance and the entire devotion of ourselves to God? Marvel not, then, my comrades in wickedness, that you hear the man once your chief and foremost in wrong, exhort you to throw down your arms, divest yourselves of your trappings, and don the holy convent garb, in order that by a life of fasting and prayer you may endeavour to open up a communication with Heaven, and wrest your souls from the hands of the Devil. I myself will set you the example.

"'As I have been the first to incite you to evil, so will I be the first to exhort you to repentance. Follow me, all ye that have a mind to save your souls. Yet I no longer command, but entreat you for your own good, for I aspire no longer to be your chief, but to live humbly as your fellow labourer in Christ, to whom be all honour and glory, now and for evermore. Amen.'

"As the chief brigand terminated his harangue the pale grey of the morning sky lighted up the faces of the whole band, so that I could now distinguish the features of each individual and the various expressions of their countenances. Several appeared deeply affected, with tears of repentance standing in their eyes, others sullen and obdurate. Some with a look of vacant astonishment, others scowling and suspicious, or with a suppressed grin.

"Their chief's harangue seemed to call for a reply, and there was a silence of some minutes, during which period the members of the band appeared debating among themselves by means of winking and nudging as to what their reply should be, and who should take it upon himself to speak for the rest. I observed that they looked towards a sturdy brigand, whom next to their chief they honoured with the deepest veneration. To him they turned as the mouthpiece of the gang, and seemed to intimate that they would abide by his decision.

"This man, who appeared wrapt in thought, finding himself thus appealed to, and feeling that he represented the sentiments of the whole band, at length addressed his chief in these words:--

"'Signor Capitano, we are ready as ever to follow you to the very jaws of death, according to our oath. We have served you long and faithfully in all your deeds of daring and crime, and we will not abandon you now in your change of sentiment, knowing, as we do, that you are still the same brave and generous man as ever, and as such will always remain, in whatever capacity, whether as the lawless brigand of the mountains, or as a holy monk in the retirement of the convent cell; therefore, in the presence of the whole band I repeat my former vows of fidelity and friendship, and reiterate my protestations of following you through life, to the utmost ends of the earth, if need be. The discipline of our monastic life will be merely the exchanging one life of hardships for another no less hard, therefore we cannot be charged with cowardice or idleness, since there are duties before us that will call forth all the courage and endurance of our natures.

"'As for learning and psalm-singing, it has never been exactly my speciality; nevertheless, I quite agree with you, Captain, that the life we have been in the habit of leading for years past is not the best to suit us for Heaven, and I am not ashamed to say that I have long had qualms of conscience for my past misdeeds, and had resolved upon repentance at some future period, but never did I look back upon the past with such horror and remorse as at the present moment, having now been brought to a thorough knowledge of my crimes and of the bountiful mercy of our blessed Lady to us miserable sinners, as shown in the undoubted miracle that we all so clearly witnessed.

"'After having received so great a proof of the blessed Virgin's love and care for us, would it not be the blackest ingratitude to continue in mortal sin? Would it not be the most egregious folly as well, after having had Divine warning to alter our lives, still to persist in preferring death and hell to the sublime promises held out to the good?

"'Why longer delay, then, my friends? Think of your precious souls, and repent while there is still breath left in your bodies. It may not be long ere we shall be captured and executed. How shall we pass our last moments on earth, or how brook the vengeance of a just God with all our crimes upon our heads?

"'Enough, then, of pusillanimous disbelief and impotent struggling against Divine will. Let us hasten to the nearest convent, confess our sins, then, with a clean breast and humble spirit, endeavour to atone for the past by a life of penitence and prayer, that we may fearlessly meet our end as men and Christians.'

"This exhortation was universally applauded, and as every man is governed by the public opinion of the little circle wherein he lives and moves, so even those who had shown themselves obdurate and suspicious felt themselves forced to yield to the overwhelming tide of changed opinion, feeling ashamed of being left in the minority.

"The chief, doffing his hat, fell upon his knees and thanked the Most High for his conversion and that of his whole band, in which prayer all the rest reverently joined. Then rising from their knees, but with heads still uncovered, they walked on towards the convent, singing an 'Ave Maria,' by the way.

"I did not know what to make of all this, for as yet I had heard nothing of the miracle, but I had hardly reached home safely with my pig, when I heard from almost every mouth in the village of the great miracle wrought on the night of the robbery."

The peasant having concluded his narrative, was dismissed with an assurance from the arch-priest that should his revelation lead to the capture of the brigands he would be duly rewarded. Nevertheless, he informed him that he was not the person to apply to, and that he should mention the affair to the authorities.

Being left once more alone with my friend, I asked him what he thought of the man's tale, and whether or no it corroborated the statements made by Luigi and Antonio. All three witnesses bore testimony to a plurality of brigands, which seemed to me completely to overthrow my worthy friend's hypothesis as to there being only one brigand.

I confess, though, I was still puzzled by the peasant's wonderful story. I could hardly bring myself to believe in the utter and simultaneous conversion of a whole band of brigands, even though they _had_ been terrified and thwarted for a moment in their crimes by an apparent miracle, and yet what object could the man have had in inventing such a lie, knowing, as he must have done, that he was not entitled to the reward until after the capture of the brigands.

My friend the priest suggested that possibly he might have been fool enough to expect payment beforehand, and that he had concocted this fable on the strength of it. The man was simple enough, it is true, but there was an air of truth about the manner in which he told his tale that induced me to give credit to it, strange though it appeared.

In any case, I knew that the truth or falsity of the man's statement would soon be made manifest, for the brigand-catchers, once sent off in the direction indicated by the peasant, would not fail to call at the convent and inquire if the brigands were taking shelter there, in which case the monks would be forced to deliver up their charge into the hands of justice. As it happened, the brigand-catchers had already started in search of their prey, though in quite an opposite direction.

But let us return to our landlady, who had been impatiently awaiting me, having now prepared my noon-day meal some time.

"The signor is late to-day," she said, as I entered. "I fear he will find the macaroni cold."

"No matter," I replied. "I have a good appetite, from having been very busy all the morning."

"The signor has been busy--yes? And yet I notice that he left all his painting tools at home," observed the landlady.

"True, my good woman," I replied. "The morning being rainy, I was prevented from painting out-of-doors, but I have been very busy, nevertheless."

"Indeed, Signor," she exclaimed, "what could have occupied you so much as to forget your dinner, if I may be permitted to ask?"

I expected this question, knowing that my hostess inherited the vice of curiosity, in common with the rest of her sex, in a marked degree.

"How was I occupied?" I repeated. "Why, how else than by searching to the bottom that confounded miracle you were so full of all yesterday and the day before."

"Oh, Signor, how you talk!" exclaimed my hostess, horrified. "What! do you mean to say that the Blessed Virgin has not wrought among us the greatest miracle ever heard of in these parts?"

"Well, if this is one of the greatest," I replied, "I should advise her to give up miracles for the future, for she is no hand at them."

"How say you, Signor?" cried the landlady, shocked at my levity, and crossing herself again and again. "Oh, you Protestants believe in nothing! What! Is it not a great miracle to raise the dead?"

"It would be, if it were true," I interrupted.

"If it were true!" she repeated. "How should it not be true? Have you not heard that the arch-priest himself believes it, that all the village believes it, that the good Ricardo the sacristan was an eye-witness of the miracle?"

"I must have better testimony than his in order to believe in the miraculous character of the story you related to me. However, I have since looked into the case myself and find it to be a gross piece of imposture."

"_Imposture!_" cried the hostess. "Impossible! Who has been imposing--his reverence, perhaps?"

"No," I said; "the arch-priest was only one of the dupes. His rascal of a sacristan was at the bottom of all the mischief. That scoundrel Peppe, too, was another prominent actor in the farce."

"What do I hear?" exclaimed my landlady; "the pious Ricardo and the holy Peppe called 'rascal' and 'scoundrel.' You surely mistake their characters."

"We are all liable to make mistakes sometimes," said I; "but I will hope, for their own sakes, that they are not as black as they appear."

"You mystify me, Signor," she replied; "but I am sure you must be labouring under a gross mistake, for as a proof of Peppe's being a holy man, he has been doing nothing but miracles since he was raised from the dead."

"What is that you say?" cried I, pricking up my ears.

"Why, Signor, you must know that as soon as Peppe left the church on the morning of the miracle he was followed by a great crowd of the faithful."

"Of the curious and the idle, you mean," I observed, interrupting her. "Well, proceed."

"Who followed him to the door of his house," she continued; "and as divers of them were labouring under sore diseases, they besought him to touch them that they might be healed. Well, very many of them went away cured; others, he said, he was unable to cure on account of their want of faith."

"The artful dog!" said I, smiling. "Now, I'll be bound to say he made all those who imagined themselves cured pay him well."

"Oh, they all gave him something, of course, from a _baiocco_ upwards, according to their means. They tell me the worthy man has made a heap of money by his miraculous touch."

"Miraculous humbug!" I exclaimed, half-amused and half-angry at the success of such a vagabond.

"_Humbug!_ say you still?" cried my hostess. "How can it be humbug, if he really _has_ cured the sick?"

"Come now," said I; "perhaps you will oblige me with a list of the diseases that this new saint professes to have cured."

"Willingly," she replied.

"In the first case, there is old Margherita, who lives at the bottom of the dell, and has been suffering much from nervous headaches; he but touched her forehead, and she walked away declaring herself cured. Then there was poor old Carluccio, who goes about begging from one place to another. He suffered much from rheumatism; but having been touched by Peppe on the parts affected, he immediately pronounced himself much better, if not quite cured. Then the girl Lucia, who lives half-way down the hill, and who used to suffer from the jumps, she likewise has not complained since. Then, again, Pietro, the vignauolo, who was suffering from stomach-ache, felt himself considerably better some few hours after he had been touched by Peppe. Brigida, the daughter of old Angeluccio, has for some time been the victim of a deep melancholy. Since she received the magic touch she has done nothing but laugh and sing, Giacomuccio, the idiot boy, complained of loss of appetite, but after Peppe had touched him he went home and ate up all the _maritozza_ in the house. Then the number of children he has cured is something fabulous; at least, so their parents say."

"Well, well, my good woman," said I; "but these are all trifles. Can you give me no great cure that he has effected, such as giving sight to the blind, causing the lame to walk, the dumb to speak, the deaf to hear, and the like?"

"One blind man came to be cured," replied my hostess; "but he, so Peppe said, had not sufficient faith, so of course no cure could be effected. It was the same with a cripple who had a withered arm, a man who had the small-pox, as well as several others. He said he could do nothing with them, as they were wanting in faith."