What was that? The after effects of a sneeze, hanging about in the air for several minutes, with the car running at full speed? My curiosity was aroused, and looking about, I noticed a thin jet of steam hissing out of the engine. We had not gone far when I sneezed, and a few minutes later some spray blew across my face. It must be a steady, climb of a dozen miles or more. We were launched upon the long climb to the Consuma at full speed. Italian cars are powerful and their drivers reckless. It is possible that I provoked the stars by my arrogance in attempting to approach the sacred mountain in a vulgar automobile or, lifting the argument from the level of magic to pure ethics, perhaps I was being chastened for an extravagance which could no more be justified by the state of my purse than by my object in seeking a shrine of the Little Poor Man of Assisi.Īnyway, right or wrong, I set forth in great style, shooting out from Florence by way of Pontassieve and intending to motor over the Consuma Pass and down through the Casentino, that loveliest but inaccessible quarter of Tuscany. Francis received the Stigmata, and, as a seeker after the unseen, I ought to be willing to admit that my troubles may have been a visitation from above. As a practical modern, I put the blame on my chauffeur but I was making a religious pilgrimage to La Verna, the sacred mountain where St. It is just as well that he put the blame on the stars now and then he could not run them through with a sword or crack their heads with a hammer, and when this diagnosis came to the rescue, it must have saved the lives of not a few of his contemporaries. He had his share of misfortunes and rather fancied himself as an expert in diagnosing the origin of these obscure thrusts and hindrances. Benvenuto Cellini might have put it down to the malign influence of the stars.
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