Francis of Assisi which now adorns the front of the Cathedral at Assisi. This was the last statue which he ever made. The model he had completed in clay and cast in plaster, and had somewhat advanced in executing it in marble, when death arrested his hand. It was finished by his daughter Amalia, who had for years been his loving and faithful pupil, and who had already won distinction for herself as a sculptor. In this his last work he found a peculiar attractiveness, and his heart and hand were earnestly given to it. "I am most happy," he says in his reply to the authorities of Assisi, who gave him this order, "that the Commission has thought of me,--not so much on account of what little talent I may possess, as for the love I bear to religious art." The statue itself is very simple, and informed by a deep religious sentiment. It is clothed in the dress of the order which St Francis founded, the hands crossed over the breast, the cowl falling behind, the head bent, and the eyes cast down in an attitude of submission and devotion. The statue had not only deeply interested all his feelings and sympathies, but in its treatment and sentiment he seems to have been satisfied. A singular presentiment, however, came over him as he was showing it to a friend upon its completion. "It will be a triumph to you and a glory to Assisi," said his friend. "Ah," he answered, "who knows that it may not be the last!" So indeed it proved. But a few days after this conversation he was seized by an attack of peritonitis. From this, however, he recovered, as well as from a second attack, which shortly afterwards followed. As he was recovering from this second attack he wrote to Monsignore Andrea Ulli: "The doctor has no doubt that I shall get well, and in a few days I hope he will allow me to return to my studio. But how I have suffered!--doubly suffered from having been deprived of the occupation that most delights me. This is my joy and my life. What a happy day it will be when I am permitted to put my foot again into my studio, and to resume my work and my St Francis." His hopes, however, were fated to be disappointed. Although he sufficiently recovered to go to his studio, he was able to do but little work; and shortly afterwards--on the 1st of January--he was again prostrated by a third attack of the same disease. His death, he felt, was now certain; but he met its approach with the courage, resignation, and piety that had always characterised him, looking forward with certainty to a reunion with the dear ones who had gone before him--Luisina, his daughter, whose loss he had so bitterly felt, and his wife Marina, his steadfast help and loving companion for so many years, who had died seven years previously. One regret constantly possessed him during these last days, that he should not be able, as he had projected, to model the statue of the Madonna for the Duomo at Florence, upon which he had set his heart. One day when he gave expression to this feeling, his daughter Amalia sought to console him by saying, "But you have already made her statue, and it is so beautiful--the _addolorata_ for Santa Croce." "Ah!" he answered, "but I desired to model her as Queen of Florence." This apparently was the only desire that haunted him during his last attack. In regard to...