When the music was over, I was shown through the convent.  There were, as usual, the stock marvels:  a hole through which you looked and beheld a—­shall I call it sacred?—­picture of Satan with horns and hoof complete; a small plot of ground, where used to grow the thorns on which St Benedict was wont to roll himself in order to quench the desires of manhood, and where now grow the roses into which St Francis transformed the said thorns, in honour of his brother saint.  The monk who showed me the building talked much about the misery of the surrounding poor.  At the convent’s foot lies a little wood of dark green ilexes, of almost unknown age, valued on account of some tradition about St Benedict, and perhaps still more as forming a kind of oasis on the barren, bare mountain-side.  Armed guards have to be placed at night around this wood, to save it from the depredations of the peasantry; every tree belonging to the convent and not guarded was sure to be cut down.  No one, so my informant told me, would believe the sums of money the convent had spent of late on charity, and how for this purpose even their daily supplies of food had been curtailed; but alas! it was only like pouring water into a sieve, for the people were poorer than ever.  I own that when the old priest pointed out the number of churches and convents you could see in the valley below, and spoke, with regret, of the time when there were twelve convents round Subiaco alone, I felt that the cause of this hopeless misery was not far to seek, though hard to remedy.

On my way homewards to the town I beheld the half dozen sky-rockets which composed the display of fire-works, and also the two rows of oil-lamps on the cornices over the church-door, which formed the brilliant illuminations.  Neither sight seemed to collect much crowd or create much excitement.  As the dusk came on the streets emptied fast, and by night-time the town was almost deserted; and, except that the wine-shops were still filled with a few hardened topers, every sign of the fair had vanished.  There was not even a trace of drunkenness apparent.  The next morning the same scene was repeated with little difference, save that the crowd was rather greater, and a band of military music played in the market-place.  About noon the holy procession was seen coming down the winding road which leads from the convent to the town.  I had taken up my position on a roadside bank, and enjoyed a perfect view.  There were a number of shabby flags and banners preceded by a hundred able-bodied men dressed in dirty-white surplices, rather dirtier than the colour of their faces.  A crowd of ragged choristers followed swinging incense-pots, droning an unintelligible chant, and fighting with each other.  Then came a troop of monks and scholars with bare heads and downcast eyes.  All these walked in twos and twos, and carried a few crucifixes raised aloft.  The monks were succeeded by a pewter-looking bust, which, I suppose, was a likeness of St Benedict,