The Little Bedesman of Christ 189

And from that day to this the bells have rung
out the Angelus at sunset, and now there is
no land under heaven wherein those bells are
not heard and wherein devout men hearing
them do not pause to repeat that greeting
angelic.

In like fashion it was great delight to him
(the Pope having given him leave) to make
in the churches of the Order a representation
of the Crib of Bethlehem on the feast of the
Nativity. Of these the first was made at
the hermitage of Greccio. Thither the
peasants flocked on Christmas Eve, with
lanterns and torches, making the forest ring
with their carols; and there in the church
they found a stable with straw, and an ox
and an ass tethered to the manger; and St.
Francis spoke to the folk about Bethlehem
and the Shepherds in the field, and the birth
of the divine Babe, so that all who heard
him wept happy tears of compassion and
thankfulness.

And as St. Francis stood sighing for joy
and gazing at the empty manger, behold! a
wondrous thing happened. For the knight
Giovanni, who had given the ox and the ass
and the stable, saw that on the straw in the