BCCCAP00000000000000000001718

536 BENEDICTVADAKKEKARA 1880 when preparations were afoot for the Franciscan centennial of 1882. The var– iegated artpieces painstakingly collected from France, Germany, Italy, Belgium and England by Fr Louis-Anthony ofPorrentruy, the guardian of the friary ofMarseilles of the Capuchin Province of Lyon, in view of the publication of a classy commem– oration volume of the centennial 92 turned out to be an ad hoe museum housed in Marseilles 93 • Even after the book was launched in 1884, artpieces continued to be procured and the display halls attached to the friary were being enlarged. In 1891 Louis-Anthony was elected provincial Minister ofLyon and his new office seems to have helped him work also for the museum. The general Chapter of 1896 elected him as a general definitor and this meant that he had to take up his residence in the Capuchin general curia in Rome. His moving to Rome, however, did not deter him from continuing his work of building up the museum collection. In Marseilles his confrere Leo of Lyon served as his deputy. There was a strong rapport between the two. Meanwhile the ques– tion ofChurch-State separation was becoming a topic ofanimated public discussion in France. Getting wind of an eventual onset of sweeping changes in the political scenario there, Fr Louis-Anthony instructed his Fr Leo to cautiously transfer the artworks to the safekeeping of friends and well-wishers. Accordingly in 1901-1903 the main part of the collection was spirited away from the museum. And Louis-An– thony's worst fears were to prove true on 6-8 December 1905 when the entire house of the Capuchins in Marseilles together with their museum was auctioned off as part of the application of the law of suppression of religious institutes and the con– fiscation of their goods. But thanks to the foresight and down-to-earth approach of Louis-Anthony, the major part ofthe collection ofthe museum remained unscathed in good hands. The confiscation and the auctioning off of the properties of the religious was yet another cue for Louis-Anthony to instruct Leo to secretly transfer all the mu– seum pieces to the Capuchin General Curia in Rome, where he was based. In fact the parcels would keep on reaching Rome till 1913. The project of the museum had enjoyed the unstinting support of the general Minister Bernard of Andermatt and the general Definitory, then comprising Fr Louis-Anthony and from 14 February 1905 also Fr Pacificus ofSeggiano. As Louis-Anthony was very keen about locating the museum at the aptest place possible, he kept on weighing up the various possi- 92 The centenary commemoration volume, a quality production, was entitled SaintFranfois dAssise, ed. Leopold de Cherance - Henri de Grezes - Luois-Antoine de Porrentruy, Paris 1885. 93 Analecta OFMCap 28 (1912) 252: "Haec origo fuit Musaei Franciscalis quod in conven– tu Massiliensi annorum sequentium decursu instituit et operibus eximiis locupletare non destitit''.