494 KOGEK OF WENDOVEK. [A.D. 1C27 of a slight meal, if any thing remained, he put nothing awav for the morrow, but gave it to the poor. He slept in his clothes by night, having a mat for a bed, and a stone for a pillow, and for covering by night he used only the cowl and cloak in which he walked by day. In this manner walking barefooted in the preparation of the gospel, and embracing the life of an apostle, he fulfilled the duties of preaching on Sundays and feast days in the parochial churches and other religious assemblies of the Christians ; and the more he refrained from satisfying the desires of the flesh and from good living, the more powerful impression he made on the minds of his hearers. This man of God. Francis, in order to carry his wholesome purpose into effect, had committed to writing the above mentioned articles with some others which are most strictly observed by the brothers of that order till the present time, and presented them to pope Innocent when sitting in the consistory court at Rome, asking at the same time for a confirmation of his petition by the apostolic sec. Ifow lite pope confirmed the aforesaid order by a privilege. The pope gazed fixedly on the ill-favoured mien of the aforesaid brother, his mournful countenance, lengthened beard, his untrimtned hair, and his dirty, overhanging brow, and when he heard his petition read which it was so difficult and impracticable to carry out, despised him, and said, " Go, brother, go to the pigs, to whom you are more fit to be compared than to men. and roll with them, and to them preach the rules you have so ably set forth." Francis, on hearing this bowed his head and went away, and having found some pigs he rolled with them in the mud till he had covered his body and clothes with dirt from head to foot ; he then, returning to the consistory, showed himself to the pope, and said, " My lord, I have done as you ordered me ; grant me now, I beseech you. my petition." The pope was astonished when he saw what he had done, and felt sorry for having treated him with contempt, at the same lime giving orders that he should wash himself and conic back to him again ; be therefore cleansed himself from his dirt, and returned directly to the pope. Hie pope, being much moved, then granted his petition, and, «fier confirming his office of preaching as well as the order he applied for, by a privilege from the church of Rome, he dismissed him with a blessing.