While traveling in Italy as a young priest, Newman fell ill and stayed at Castle Giovanni almost three weeks. Finally, he was well enough continue his journey to Palermo:
Before starting from my inn, I sat down on my bed and began to sob bitterly. My servant, who had acted as my nurse, asked what ailed me. I could only answer,
I have a work to do in England.I was aching to get home, yet for want of a vessel I was kept at Palermo for three weeks. I began to visit the churches, and they calmed my impatience, though I did not attend any services. At last I got off in an orange boat, bound for Marseilles. We were becalmed for whole week in the Straits of Bonifacio, and it was there that I wrote the lines,Lead, Kindly Light,which have since become so well known.