et 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 nobleman of Assisi, who
was just starting to fight in a war, if he might go with him. The
nobleman--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 Assisi.

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 God, 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 Assisi. 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 suffere