I am not ill this time yet.

And now I must go and ring the 'Angelus.'" And the old monk did go, and the "Angelus" was duly rung.

But Brother Simone, as he lay upon his fevered bed, was very well able to tell that the rope was pulled by a very uncertain and unsteady hand.

"Poor old fellow! he's going fast! I wonder whether there's any chance of their moving me when he's gone ?" thought Brother Simone to himself.
But Father Fabiano, for his own part, judged that prayer and penance were more needed for the healing of his present disorder, than either bark or quinine.

And when he had rung the bell, he betook himself again to the altar of St.Apollinare, and with cowl drawn over his head, and frequent prostrations till his forehead touched the marble flags of the altar-step, spent before it most of the remaining hours of that day.
Nevertheless, it was true that, be the cause what it might, the aged friar was ill, not in mind only, but also in the body.