crazed, and locked him up. In the night the Virgin released him. After some further trouble, and some further miracles, the story was believed and the sanctuary was erected.
Beside the image is a little marble figure representing the countryman who started the cult. Beneath the feet of the Virgin issues a spring of water that is supposed to cure all diseases, but is so intensely cold as to be more likely to do harm than good.
At Varazzi, near Savona, was born the famous Jacques de Voragine, about the year 1230. Nothing is known of the social position of his parents. In one of his writings he speaks of the eclipse of 1239, and says that he was still a child when it occurred. He became a dominican in 1244, and in 1292 was elected to the bishopric of Genoa. He laboured hard to effect a truce between the Ghibelline and Guelf factions, which for two whole months converted the streets of the capital of Liguria into a field of battle. He succeeded. But the peace was soon broken again. The story goes of him that, being present in S. Peter's along with Boniface VI II. on Ash Wednesday, during the ceremonies, the pontiff, supposing him to belong to the imperial party, dashed the ashes in his face, shouting, " Remember, thou Ghibelline, that thou and thy Ghibellines will be reduced to dust." Jacques is chiefly known through his Legenda Aurea, a collection of the most outrageous, but also the most romantic fables of the saints; a work that had an enormous sale in the Middle Ages, and was copied again and again, and read everywhere, and, incredible as it may seem, was believed as gospel. He died 1298.
At Albizzola Superiore is the palace of the Delia
