Canterano, Rocca di Mezzo, Cerreto, Rocca di Santo Stefano, Civitella, Rojate, Asile, and Ponza. The front of S. Scholastica is modern, but its tower dates from 1053, when it was built by the Abbot Humbert. The most interesting parts of the building are its three cloisters. The first, which only dates from the seventeenth century, has its arcades decorated with frescoes of papal and royal benefactors, amongst which is a full-length portrait of "James III., king of England." Here is a curious sarcophagus with Bacchic ornaments. The second cloister, which dates from 1052, contains many beautiful fragments of Gothic decoration, but its chief feature is a richly decorated arch adorned with small figures and spiral columns. A basrelief of 981 represents two animals, apparently a wolf and a dog, drinking; on the body of one of the beasts is an inscription relating to the dedication of the church, Dec. 4th, 981, by Benedict VII. To the right of the church, we enter the third and smallest cloister-"Il chiostro dell' Abbate Lando"-built early in the thirteenth century. It is surrounded by a beautiful arcade of double pillars like those at the Lateran, and has an inscription in mosaic, the work of the famous Cosmo Cosmati and his two sons, Luca and Jacopo, to whom are due the beautiful decorations in the cloister of the Benedicune convent of S. Paolo at Rome : "Cosmus et Filii Lucas et Jacobus alter Hoc opus explerunt Abbatis tempore Landi." In the porch of the church is an interesting old Giottesque picture and the capital of a Corinthian column attesting the presence of a temple on this site. The interior, though modern, is not unimposing. S. Onorato sleeps beneath the high altar. THE SACRED ILEX GROVE. 305 Under his statue is an inscription which recalls the legend that the translation of his beloved master Benedict into the better world was miraculously revealed to him: "Scandentem hic alter Benedictum vidit in astra ; Primus et has ædes illo abeunte regit." As the path from Sta. Scholastica to the Sacro Speco is steep and fatiguing, a small chapel has been erected at a short distance beyond the larger monastery, where aged and infirm persons are allowed to accomplish their pilgrimage. It bears the inscription "Si montis superasse jugum negat ægra senectus, Hæc tibi cœlestes prodiga fundet opes." The scenery now becomes more romantic and savage at every step as we ascend the winding path, till, about half a mile further on, a small gate admits one to the famous immemorial Ilex Grove, which is said to date from the fifth century, and which has never been profaned by axe or hatchet. The grand old trees bowed with age, with twisted and contorted stems, form a dense mass of shadow, grateful after the arid rocks, and they hang in masses of grey-green verdure over the depth. Here and there the mossy trunks are covered with fern, upon which a ray of sunlight falls with dazzling brilliancy. At the end of the grove the path narrows, and a steep winding stair, just wide enough to admit one person at a time, leads to the platform before the convent, which up to that moment is entirely concealed. It is always said that monks have known how to choose the sites of their dwellings better than any one else, but surely no VOL. I. 20 situation was ever equal to this, to which they were led by its historical associations. There is an old Latin distich which says: "Bernardus valles, colles Benedictus amabat, Oppida Franciscus, magnas Ignatius urbes." The name of the monastery, Sacro Speco, commemorates the holy cave of S. Benedict. Over his caverned oratory a chapel was erected by Onorato, his immediate successor. Soon after another chapel was built in the cave which was his dwelling, and the two were united by the sixth abbot, Pietro. In the eleventh century a more imposing church was constructed by the Abbot Humbert, which was to enclose both the caves-utramque cryptam. His successor, the Abbot John V., finished the church much as we now see it, for the present buildings, raised on arches against the rocks, all date from the eleventh and the early part of the twelfth centuries; the lower church is of 1053. At the entrance, the thrilling interest of the place is at once recalled to us by the inscription-" Here is the patriarchal cradle of the monks of the West of the Order of S. Benedict." The entrance corridor, built on arches over the abyss, has frescoes of four sainted popes-Gregory, Agatho, Leo, and another. It ends in an antechamber with a painted statue of S. Benedict, some beautiful old Umbrian frescoes of the Virgin and Child between the four Evangelists, and the lines "Do you ask of Benedict, 'If you seek for light, why do you choose a cave, For a cavern can give no light to him who prays for it?' It gives more light in the gloom than the stars in the night." CHURCH OF THE SACRO SPECO. 307 We now reach the entrance of the all-glorious upperchurch, built by the Abbot John V. in 1116, and adorned with frescoes under John VI. in 1220. "One seems to be deeply embued with the mysterious associations of famous days of old, as one enters the first church from the gallery, and finds oneself suddenly in a little cathedral of graceful Gothic architecture, its walls and pillars gleaming with the varied colour of already fading frescoes. Unseen monks sing vespers in the choir, their powerful bass voices echoing solemnly through the twilight gloom of the church, and the pauses of the litanies are filled up by the louder croaking of ravens. For three young ravens are brought up here in the convent in memory of S. Benedict; it seems that the number of this living symbol of the order must always be maintained."-Gregorovius. On one side of the church the story of the Birth of Christ is told, introduced by the figures of the prophets who announced His coming, and the story of His life is continued round the church to the eastern wall, which is occupied by the history of the Crucifixion. Here, angels are represented as catching the streams of blood which flow from the Divine wounds; the soul of Dismas,* the penitent thief, is received by an angel, while that of the bad thief Gesmas is carried off by a black demon. Beneath the fresco of the Crucifixion, is S. Benedict throned with his principal disciples around him, over a triple arch, with hanging lamps, behind which the bare rock of the cavern is seen. A representation of Benedict writing his Rule in the cave, has the inscription: "Hic mons est pinguis, qui multis claruit signis, A Domino missus sanctus fuit Benedictus, Quisquis amas Christum talem sortire Magistrum." One of the litanies preserved in Santa Scholastica has the strange invocation"Sancte Dismas, latro de Cruce. . . . From the principal church we enter upon a perfect labyrinth of chapels hewn out of the rock, which frequently forms one of their walls, while the other is completely covered by ancient frescoes. The four chapels hewn in the rock to the right and left of the high altar, are devoted to the story of S. Benedict, together with that of Scholastica, Placidus, Maurus, and other of his followers. The holy water basin was once the sarcophagus of a Roman child, and is decorated with reliefs of birds. The frescoes continue in succession to the second or middle church. A Madonna throned between two angels has the inscription-" Magister Conciolus pinxit hoc opus." Concioli is a rare Umbrian master noticed by Vasari, who, however, seems scarcely to have been aware of the power of his works. The most striking frescoes are those of the death and burial of the Virgin: in the latter the Jews who attempted to intercept the funeral procession are represented as stricken with blindness. A picture of the martyrdom of S. Sebastian bears the date 1486. "Le goût moderne, qui s'attache surtout à l'effet extérieur et à la perfection matérielle, peut aujourd'hui regarder d'un œil dédaigneux ces types étranges mais singulièrement expressifs qui, pendant plusieurs siècles, furent invariablement reproduits par la piété autant que par le génie tout symbolique des premiers peintres chrétiens. Or, bien différent était sur ces questions le jugement des hommes du moyen âge. Animés du sentiment profondément religieux qui avait inspiré les œuvres des artistes, leurs contemporains, ils regardaient ces pieuses représentations avec les yeux de la foi, et n'y cherchaient qu'un nouvel aliment à la ferveur dont leur âme était remplie."— Alphonse Dantier, Les Monastères Bénédictins. In the sacristy are some small pictures by Bellini and the Caracci. Through the chapel on the left of the high altar a series of grotto-chapels are reached. In one of them is |