"He lives like a prince; yet he is but the son of a cloth merchant,--rich though the merchant be."

So the neighbours, we are told, were always grumbling about Francis, the wild spendthrift. For young Francis dressed in silk and always in the latest fashion; he threw his pocket-money about with a free hand.

He loved beautiful things. He was very sensitive. He would ride a long way round to avoid seeing the dreadful face of a poor leper, and would hold his nose in his cloak as he pa.s.sed the place where the lepers lived.

He was handsome in face, gallant in bearing, idle and careless; a jolly companion, with beautiful courtly manners. His dark chestnut hair curled over his smooth, rather small forehead. His black twinkling eyes looked out under level brows; his nose was straight and finely shaped.

When he laughed he showed even, white, closely set teeth between thin and sensitive lips. He wore a short, black beard. His arms were shortish; his fingers long and sensitive. He was lightly built; his skin was delicate.

He was witty, and his voice when he spoke was powerful and sonorous, yet sweet-toned and very clear.

For him to be the son of a merchant seemed to the gossips of a.s.sisi all wrong--as though a grey goose had hatched out a gorgeous peac.o.c.k.

The song of the revellers pa.s.sed down the street and died away. The little city of a.s.sisi slept in quietness on the slopes of the Apennine Mountains under the dark clear sky.

A few nights later, however, no song of any revellers was heard.

Francis Bernardone was very ill with a fever. For week after week his mother nursed him; and each night hardly believed that her son would live to see the light of the next morning. When at last the fever left him, he was so feeble that for weeks he could not rise from his bed.

Gradually, however, he got better: as he did so the thing that he desired most of all in the world was to see the lovely country around a.s.sisi;--the mountains, the Umbrian Plain beneath, the blue skies, the dainty flowers.

At last one day, with aching limbs and in great feebleness, he crept out of doors. There were the great Apennine Mountains on the side of which his city of a.s.sisi was built. There were the grand rocky peaks pointing to the intense blue sky. There was the steep street with the houses built of stone of a strange, delicate pink colour, as though the light of dawn were always on them. There were the dark green olive trees, and the lovely tendrils of the vines. The gay Italian flowers were blooming.

Stretching away in the distance was one of the most beautiful landscapes of the world; the broad Umbrian Plain with its browns and greens melting in the distance into a bluish haze that softened the lines of the distant hills.

How he had looked forward to seeing it all, to being in the sunshine, to feeling the breeze on his hot brow! But what--he wondered--had happened to him? He looked at it all, but he felt no joy. It all seemed dead and empty. He turned his back on it and crawled indoors again, sad and sick at heart. He was sure that he would never feel again "the wild joys of living."

As Francis went back to his bed he began to think what he should do with the rest of his life. He made up his mind not to waste it any longer: but he did not see clearly what he should do with it.

A short time after Francis begged a young n.o.bleman of a.s.sisi, who was just starting to fight in a war, if he might go with him. The n.o.bleman--Walter of Brienne, agreed: so Francis bought splendid trappings for his horse, and a shield, sword and spear. His armour and his horse's harness were more splendid than even those of Walter. So they went clattering together out of a.s.sisi.

But he had not gone thirty miles before he was smitten again by fever.

After sunset one evening he lay dreamily on his bed when he seemed to hear a voice.

"Francis," it asked, "what could benefit thee most, the master or the servant, the rich man or the poor?"

"The master and the rich man," answered Francis in surprise.

"Why then," went on the voice, "dost thou leave G.o.d, Who is the Master and rich, for man, who is the servant and poor?"

"Then, Lord, what will Thou that I do?" asked Francis.

"Return to thy native town, and it shall be shown thee there what thou shall do," said the voice.

He obediently rose and went back to a.s.sisi. He tried to join again in the old revels, but the joy was gone. He went quietly away to a cave on the mountain side and there he lay--as young Mahomet had done, you remember, five centuries before, to wonder what he was to do.

Then a vision came to him. All at once like a flash his mind was clear, and his soul was full of joy. He saw the love of Jesus Christ--Who had lived and suffered and died for love of him and of all men;--that love was to rule his own life! He had found his Captain--the Master of his life, the Lord of his service,--Christ.

Yet even now he hardly knew what to do. He went home and told his friends as well as he could of the change in his heart.

Some smiled rather pityingly and went away saying to one another: "Poor fellow; a little mad, you can see; very sad for his parents!"

Others simply laughed and mocked.

One day, very lonely and sad at heart, he clambered up the mountain side to an old church just falling into ruin near which, in a cavern, lived a priest. He went into the ruin and fell on his knees.

"Francis," a voice in his soul seemed to say, "dost thou see my house going to ruin. Buckle to and repair it."

He dashed home, saddled his horse, loaded it with rich garments and rode off to another town to sell the goods. He sold the horse too; trudged back up the hill and gave the fat purse to the priest.

"No," said the priest, "I dare not take it unless your father says I may."

But his father, who had got rumour of what was going on, came with a band of friends to drag Francis home. Francis fled through the woods to a secret cave, where he lay hidden till at last he made up his mind to face all. He came out and walked straight towards home. Soon the townsmen of a.s.sisi caught sight of him.

"A madman," they yelled, throwing stones and sticks at him. All the boys of a.s.sisi came out and hooted and threw pebbles.

His father heard the riot and rushed out to join in the fun. Imagine his horror when he found that it was his own son. He yelled with rage, dashed at him and, clutching him by the robe, dragged him along, beating and cursing him. When he got him home he locked him up. But some days later Francis' mother let him out, when his father was absent; and Francis climbed the hill to the Church.

The bishop called in Francis and his father to his court to settle the quarrel.

"You must give back to your father all that you have," said he.

"I will," replied Francis.

He took off all his rich garments; and, clad only in a hair-vest, he put the clothes and the purse of money at his father's feet.

"Now," he cried, "I have but one father. Henceforth I can say in all truth 'Our Father Who art in heaven.'"

A peasant's cloak was given to Francis. He went thus, without home or any money, a wanderer. He went to a monastery and slaved in the kitchen. A friend gave him a tunic, some shoes, and a stick. He went out wandering in Italy again. He loved everybody; he owned nothing; he wanted everyone to know the love of Jesus as he knew and enjoyed that love.

There came to Francis many adventures. He was full of joy; he sang even to the birds in the woods. Many men joined him as his disciples in the way of obedience, of poverty, and of love. Men in Italy, in Spain, in Germany and in Britain caught fire from the flame of his simple love and careless courage. Never had Europe seen so clear a vision of the love of Jesus. His followers were called the Lesser Brothers (Friars Minor).

All who can should read the story of Francis' life: as for us we are here going simply to listen to what happened to him on a strange and perilous adventure.

II

About this time people all over Europe were agog with excitement about the Crusades. Four Crusades had come and gone. Richard Coeur-de-Lion was dead. But the pa.s.sion for fighting against the Saracen was still in the hearts of men.

"The tomb of our Lord in Jerusalem is in the hands of the Saracen,"

the cry went up over all Europe. "Followers of Jesus Christ are slain by the scimitars of Islam. Let us go and wrest the Holy City from the hands of the Saracen."

There was also the danger to Europe itself. The Mohammedans ruled in Spain as well as in North Africa, in Egypt and in the Holy Land.

So rich men sold their lands to buy horses and armour and to fit themselves and their foot soldiers for the fray. Poor men came armed with pike and helmet and leather jerkin. The knights wore a blood-red cross on their white tunics. In thousands upon thousands, with John of Brienne as their Commander-in-Chief (the brother of that Walter of Brienne with whom, you remember, Francis had started for the wars as a knight), they sailed the Mediterranean to fight for the Cross in Egypt.

They attacked Egypt because the Sultan there ruled over Jerusalem and they hoped by defeating him to free Jerusalem at the same time.

As Francis saw the knights going off to the Crusades in shining armour with the trappings of their horses all a-glitter and a-jingle, and as he thought of the lands where the people worshipped--not the G.o.d and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ--but the "Sultan in the Sky," the Allah of Mahomet, his spirit caught fire within him.

Francis had been a soldier and a knight only a few years before. He could not but feel the stir of the Holy War in his veins,--the tingle of the desire to be in it. He heard the stories of the daring of the Crusaders; he heard of a great victory over the Saracens.