The three saints mounted him in this manner:
San Pancrazio stood on his left instep and put one arm round his leg to steady himself, and San Sebastiano stood on his right instep and put one arm round his leg to steady himself too; San Luigi also stood on the right instep of Iriello, close to San Sebastiano, who clasped him round the waist with his other arm. When they were ready the angel, with a downward swoop of his wings, rose from off the wall of gold, and then, spreading them out to their full extent, remained motionless and dropped gently but swiftly towards the earth.
I should tell you that they had all made themselves invisible, as the saints do when they come down into the world, except when there is some one present who is good enough to merit a vision of the holy ones. And when they alighted in the garden by the magnolia tree, they left the angel there and went to set down near the lily-beds. You understand that no one could see them, and they rested against the edge of the fountain and waited, and San Luigi took out his beads to while away the time.
Presently three of four men came into the garden very quietly, and they stood under the shade of a blue hydrangia bush. The eldest of them appeared to be giving directions to the others, and then they separated and went each to a different part of the garden.
"Who were those men?" asked San Luigi.
"Tell him, 'Bastiano," said San Pancrazio in a whisper.
"Gardeners," murmured San Sebastiano; "they have to stay up all the night between the twentieth and the twenty-first of June."
"And I suppose they will be going to cut the lilies for the boys who are coming to fetch them?" said San Luigi.
San Sebastiano and San Pancrazio nearly choked with laughter,
