Page:The Saint (1906, 5th ed.).djvu/21

Rh baffled endeavour to establish the Kingdom of God on earth, and of woman's unquenchable love, is a great fact in the world-literature of our time.

Il Santo is the third of a series of novels, it stands by itself as an entirely independent work, and can be read and enjoyed without any reference to its predecessors. At the same time it may enhance the reader's pleasure and interest to know something of the antecedents of those he is about to meet for the first time. Hence a few words of retrospective explanation.

The central figure of the novel, Piero Maironi of Brescia, is the son of Don Franco Maironi, who had incurred the violent displeasure of the Marchesa Maironi, the grandmother with whom he had lived ever since he had been left an orphan, in consequence of his marriage with a lady neither noble nor wealthy. He was killed in the war of 1859, and his wife did not long survive him. Piero was then taken charge of by the imperious old lady, who, at her death, left a large fortune to her young great-grandson From that time forward he was brought up by some Venetian relatives, the Marchese and Marchesa Scremin. When still very young he was induced, half against his will, to marry their daughter, and shortly after the marriage his wife went out of her mind. Piero now finds himself in the tragic position of a widower who, still bound, is exposed to all the temptations likely to assail a young hot-blooded man of his age. But his is no ordinary character. Even at that early stage of development he is at heart deeply religious, indeed a mystic, with a strong leaning towards asceticism. He struggles