Whilst the greatest effort has been made to ensure the quality of this text, due to the historical nature of this content, in some rare cases there may be minor issues with legibility. The future pope was a delicate child, although his earliest years were spent in the open air, and in his young boyhood he became a daring hill-climber. Until he was eight years of age he was educated at the family home, and, being the youngest, was the favorite son of his mother. There are none of the marvellous premonitions of future greatness usually chronicled in the stories of the boyhood of famous men by their biographers to be recorded of Vincenzo Pecci, and his youthful days are, therefore, destitute of gossip of the nursery or the school-room. When he had reached his eighth year he was sent to the Jesuit college at Viterbo, whither his brother Giuseppe had preceded him. His family had always been admirers of the Society of Jesus.