THE THREE CITIES

 ROME

 BY

 EMILE ZOLA

 TRANSLATED BY ERNEST A. VIZETELLY

 PART II

IV

ON the afternoon of that same day Pierre, having leisure before him, atonce thought of beginning his peregrinations through Rome by a visit onwhich he had set his heart. Almost immediately after the publication of"New Rome" he had been deeply moved and interested by a letter addressedto him from the Eternal City by old Count Orlando Prada, the hero ofItalian independence and reunion, who, although unacquainted with him, had written spontaneously after a first hasty perusal of his book. Andthe letter had been a flaming protest, a cry of the patriotic faith stillyoung in the heart of that aged man, who accused him of having forgottenItaly and claimed Rome, the new Rome, for the country which was at lastfree and united. Correspondence had ensued, and the priest, whileclinging to his dream of Neo-Catholicism saving the world, had from afargrown attached to the man who wrote to him with such glowing love ofcountry and freedom. He had eventually informed him of his journey, andpromised to call upon him. But the hospitality which he had accepted atthe Boccanera mansion now seemed to him somewhat of an impediment; forafter Benedetta's kindly, almost affectionate, greeting, he felt that hecould not, on the very first day and with out warning her, sally forth tovisit the father of the man from whom she had fled and from whom she nowasked the Church to part her for ever. Moreover, old Orlando was actuallyliving with his son in a little palazzo which the latter had erected atthe farther end of the Via Venti Settembre. 

Before venturing on any step Pierre resolved to confide in the Contessinaherself; and this seemed the easier as Viscount Philibert de la Choue hadtold him that the young woman still retained a filial feeling, mingledwith admiration, for the old hero. And indeed, at the very first wordswhich he uttered after lunch, Benedetta promptly retorted: "But go, Monsieur l'Abbe, go at once! Old Orlando, you know, is one of ournational glories--you must not be surprised to hear me call him by hisChristian name. All Italy does so, from pure affection and gratitude. Formy part I grew up among people who hated him, who likened him to Satan. It was only later that I learned to know him, and then I loved him, forhe is certainly the most just and gentle man in the world. "

She had begun to smile, but timid tears were moistening her eyes at therecollection, no doubt, of the year of suffering she had spent in herhusband's house, where her only peaceful hours had been those passed withthe old man. And in a lower and somewhat tremulous voice she added: "Asyou are going to see him, tell him from me that I still love him, and, whatever happens, shall never forget his goodness. "

So Pierre set out, and whilst he was driving in a cab towards the ViaVenti Settembre, he recalled to mind the heroic story of old Orlando'slife which had been told him in Paris. It was like an epic poem, full offaith, bravery, and the disinterestedness of another age. 

Born of a noble house of Milan, Count Orlando Prada had learnt to hatethe foreigner at such an early age that, when scarcely fifteen, healready formed part of a secret society, one of the ramifications of theantique Carbonarism. This hatred of Austrian domination had beentransmitted from father to son through long years, from the olden days ofrevolt against servitude, when the conspirators met by stealth inabandoned huts, deep in the recesses of the forests; and it was renderedthe keener by the eternal dream of Italy delivered, restored to herself, transformed once more into a great sovereign nation, the worthy daughterof those who had conquered and ruled the world. Ah! that land of whilomglory, that unhappy, dismembered, parcelled Italy, the prey of a crowd ofpetty tyrants, constantly invaded and appropriated by neighbouringnations--how superb and ardent was that dream to free her from such longopprobrium! To defeat the foreigner, drive out the despots, awaken thepeople from the base misery of slavery, to proclaim Italy free and Italyunited--such was the passion which then inflamed the young withinextinguishable ardour, which made the youthful Orlando's heart leapwith enthusiasm. He spent his early years consumed by holy indignation, proudly and impatiently longing for an opportunity to give his blood forhis country, and to die for her if he could not deliver her. 

Quivering under the yoke, wasting his time in sterile conspiracies, hewas living in retirement in the old family residence at Milan, when, shortly after his marriage and his twenty-fifth birthday, tidings came tohim of the flight of Pius IX and the Revolution of Rome. * And at once hequitted everything, wife and hearth, and hastened to Rome as if summonedthither by the call of destiny. This was the first time that he set outscouring the roads for the attainment of independence; and howfrequently, yet again and again, was he to start upon fresh campaigns, never wearying, never disheartened! And now it was that he becameacquainted with Mazzini, and for a moment was inflamed with enthusiasmfor that mystical unitarian Republican. He himself indulged in an ardentdream of a Universal Republic, adopted the Mazzinian device, "/Dio epopolo/" (God and the people), and followed the procession which wendedits way with great pomp through insurrectionary Rome. The time was one ofvast hopes, one when people already felt a need of renovated religion, and looked to the coming of a humanitarian Christ who would redeem theworld yet once again. But before long a man, a captain of the ancientdays, Giuseppe Garibaldi, whose epic glory was dawning, made Orlandoentirely his own, transformed him into a soldier whose sole cause wasfreedom and union. Orlando loved Garibaldi as though the latter were ademi-god, fought beside him in defence of Republican Rome, took part inthe victory of Rieti over the Neapolitans, and followed the stubbornpatriot in his retreat when he sought to succour Venice, compelled as hewas to relinquish the Eternal City to the French army of General Oudinot, who came thither to reinstate Pius IX. And what an extraordinary andmadly heroic adventure was that of Garibaldi and Venice! Venice, whichManin, another great patriot, a martyr, had again transformed into arepublican city, and which for long months had been resisting theAustrians! And Garibaldi starts with a handful of men to deliver thecity, charters thirteen fishing barks, loses eight in a naval engagement, is compelled to return to the Roman shores, and there in all wretchednessis bereft of his wife, Anita, whose eyes he closes before returning toAmerica, where, once before, he had awaited the hour of insurrection. Ah!that land of Italy, which in those days rumbled from end to end with theinternal fire of patriotism, where men of faith and courage arose inevery city, where riots and insurrections burst forth on all sides likeeruptions--it continued, in spite of every check, its invincible march tofreedom!

 * It was on November 24, 1848, that the Pope fled to Gaeta, consequent upon the insurrection which had broken out nine days previously. --Trans. 

Orlando returned to his young wife at Milan, and for two years livedthere, almost in concealment, devoured by impatience for the gloriousmorrow which was so long in coming. Amidst his fever a gleam of happinesssoftened his heart; a son, Luigi, was born to him, but the birth killedthe mother, and joy was turned into mourning. Then, unable to remain anylonger at Milan, where he was spied upon, tracked by the police, suffering also too grievously from the foreign occupation, Orlandodecided to realise the little fortune remaining to him, and to withdrawto Turin, where an aunt of his wife took charge of the child. Count diCavour, like a great statesman, was then already seeking to bring aboutindependence, preparing Piedmont for the decisive /role/ which it wasdestined to play. It was the time when King Victor Emmanuel evincedflattering cordiality towards all the refugees who came to him from everypart of Italy, even those whom he knew to be Republicans, compromised andflying the consequences of popular insurrection. The rough, shrewd Houseof Savoy had long been dreaming of bringing about Italian unity to theprofit of the Piedmontese monarchy, and Orlando well knew under whatmaster he was taking service; but in him the Republican already wentbehind the patriot, and indeed he had begun to question the possibilityof a united Republican Italy, placed under the protectorate of a liberalPope, as Mazzini had at one time dreamed. Was that not indeed a chimerabeyond realisation which would devour generation after generation if oneobstinately continued to pursue it? For his part, he did not wish to diewithout having slept in Rome as one of the conquerors. Even if libertywas to be lost, he desired to see his country united and erect, returningonce more to life in the full sunlight. And so it was with feverishhappiness that he enlisted at the outset of the war of 1859; and hisheart palpitated with such force as almost to rend his breast, when, after Magenta, he entered Milan with the French army--Milan which he hadquitted eight years previously, like an exile, in despair. The treaty ofVillafranca which followed Solferino proved a bitter deception: Venetiawas not secured, Venice remained enthralled. Nevertheless the Milanesewas conquered from the foe, and then Tuscany and the duchies of Parma andModena voted for annexation. So, at all events, the nucleus of theItalian star was formed; the country had begun to build itself up afresharound victorious Piedmont. 

Then, in the following year, Orlando plunged into epopoeia once more. Garibaldi had returned from his two sojourns in America, with the halo ofa legend round him--paladin-like feats in the pampas of Uruguay, anextraordinary passage from Canton to Lima--and he had returned to takepart in the war of 1859, forestalling the French army, overthrowing anAustrian marshal, and entering Como, Bergamo, and Brescia. And now, allat once, folks heard that he had landed at Marsala with only a thousandmen--the Thousand of Marsala, the ever illustrious handful of braves!Orlando fought in the first rank, and Palermo after three days'resistance was carried. Becoming the dictator's favourite lieutenant, hehelped him to organise a government, then crossed the straits with him, and was beside him on the triumphal entry into Naples, whose king hadfled. There was mad audacity and valour at that time, an explosion of theinevitable; and all sorts of supernatural stories were current--Garibaldiinvulnerable, protected better by his red shirt than by the strongestarmour, Garibaldi routing opposing armies like an archangel, by merelybrandishing his flaming sword! The Piedmontese on their side had defeatedGeneral Lamoriciere at Castelfidardo, and were invading the States of theChurch. And Orlando was there when the dictator, abdicating power, signedthe decree which annexed the Two Sicilies to the Crown of Italy; even assubsequently he took part in that forlorn attempt on Rome, when therageful cry was "Rome or Death!"--an attempt which came to a tragic issueat Aspromonte, when the little army was dispersed by the Italian troops, and Garibaldi, wounded, was taken prisoner, and sent back to the solitudeof his island of Caprera, where he became but a fisherman and a tiller ofthe rocky soil. *

 * M. Zola's brief but glowing account of Garibaldi's glorious achievements has stirred many memories in my mind. My uncle, Frank Vizetelly, the war artist of the /Illustrated London News/, whose bones lie bleaching somewhere in the Soudan, was one of Garibaldi's constant companions throughout the memorable campaign of the Two Sicilies, and afterwards he went with him to Caprera. Later, in 1870, my brother, Edward Vizetelly, acted as orderly-officer to the general when he offered the help of his sword to France. --Trans. 

Six years of waiting again went by, and Orlando still dwelt at Turin, even after Florence had been chosen as the new capital. The Senate hadacclaimed Victor Emmanuel, King of Italy; and Italy was indeed almostbuilt, it lacked only Rome and Venice. But the great battles seemed allover, the epic era was closed; Venice was to be won by defeat. Orlandotook part in the unlucky battle of Custozza, where he received twowounds, full of furious grief at the thought that Austria should betriumphant. But at that same moment the latter, defeated at Sadowa, relinquished Venetia, and five months later Orlando satisfied his desireto be in Venice participating in the joy of triumph, when Victor Emmanuelmade his entry amidst the frantic acclamations of the people. Rome aloneremained to be won, and wild impatience urged all Italy towards the city;but friendly France had sworn to maintain the Pope, and this acted as acheck. Then, for the third time, Garibaldi dreamt of renewing the featsof the old-world legends, and threw himself upon Rome like a soldier offortune illumined by patriotism and free from every tie. And for thethird time Orlando shared in that fine heroic madness destined to bevanquished at Mentana by the Pontifical Zouaves supported by a smallFrench corps. Again wounded, he came back to Turin in almost a dyingcondition. But, though his spirit quivered, he had to resign himself; thesituation seemed to have no outlet; only an upheaval of the nations couldgive Rome to Italy. 

All at once the thunderclap of Sedan, of the downfall of France, resounded through the world; and then the road to Rome lay open, andOrlando, having returned to service in the regular army, was with thetroops who took up position in the Campagna to ensure the safety of theHoly See, as was said in the letter which Victor Emmanuel wrote to PiusIX. There was, however, but the shadow of an engagement: GeneralKanzler's Pontifical Zouaves were compelled to fall back, and Orlando wasone of the first to enter the city by the breach of the Porta Pia. Ah!that twentieth of September--that day when he experienced the greatesthappiness of his life--a day of delirium, of complete triumph, whichrealised the dream of so many years of terrible contest, the dream forwhich he had sacrificed rest and fortune, and given both body and mind!

Then came more than ten happy years in conquered Rome--in Rome adored, flattered, treated with all tenderness, like a woman in whom one hasplaced one's entire hope. From her he awaited so much national vigour, such a marvellous resurrection of strength and glory for the endowment ofthe young nation. Old Republican, old insurrectional soldier that he was, he had been obliged to adhere to the monarchy, and accept a senatorship. But then did not Garibaldi himself--Garibaldi his divinity--likewise callupon the King and sit in parliament? Mazzini alone, rejecting allcompromises, was unwilling to rest content with a united and independentItaly that was not Republican. Moreover, another consideration influencedOrlando, the future of his son Luigi, who had attained his eighteenthbirthday shortly after the occupation of Rome. Though he, Orlando, couldmanage with the crumbs which remained of the fortune he had expended inhis country's service, he dreamt of a splendid destiny for the child ofhis heart. Realising that the heroic age was over, he desired to make agreat politician of him, a great administrator, a man who should beuseful to the mighty nation of the morrow; and it was on this accountthat he had not rejected royal favour, the reward of long devotion, desiring, as he did, to be in a position to help, watch, and guide Luigi. Besides, was he himself so old, so used-up, as to be unable to assist inorganisation, even as he had assisted in conquest? Struck by his son'squick intelligence in business matters, perhaps also instinctivelydivining that the battle would now continue on financial and economicgrounds, he obtained him employment at the Ministry of Finances. Andagain he himself lived on, dreaming, still enthusiastically believing ina splendid future, overflowing with boundless hope, seeing Rome doubleher population, grow and spread with a wild vegetation of new districts, and once more, in his loving enraptured eyes, become the queen of theworld. 

But all at once came a thunderbolt. One morning, as he was goingdownstairs, Orlando was stricken with paralysis. Both his legs suddenlybecame lifeless, as heavy as lead. It was necessary to carry him upagain, and never since had he set foot on the street pavement. At thattime he had just completed his fifty-sixth year, and for fourteen yearssince he had remained in his arm-chair, as motionless as stone, he whohad so impetuously trod every battlefield of Italy. It was a pitifulbusiness, the collapse of a hero. And worst of all, from that room wherehe was for ever imprisoned, the old soldier beheld the slow crumbling ofall his hopes, and fell into dismal melancholy, full of unacknowledgedfear for the future. Now that the intoxication of action no longer dimmedhis eyes, now that he spent his long and empty days in thought, hisvision became clear. Italy, which he had desired to see so powerful, sotriumphant in her unity, was acting madly, rushing to ruin, possibly tobankruptcy. Rome, which to him had ever been the one necessary capital, the city of unparalleled glory, requisite for the sovereign people ofto-morrow, seemed unwilling to take upon herself the part of a greatmodern metropolis; heavy as a corpse she weighed with all her centurieson the bosom of the young nation. Moreover, his son Luigi distressed him. Rebellious to all guidance, the young man had become one of the devouringoffsprings of conquest, eager to despoil that Italy, that Rome, which hisfather seemed to have desired solely in order that he might pillage themand batten on them. Orlando had vainly opposed Luigi's departure from theministry, his participation in the frantic speculations on land and houseproperty to which the mad building of the new districts had given rise. But at the same time he loved his son, and was reduced to silence, especially now when everything had succeeded with Luigi, even his mostrisky financial ventures, such as the transformation of the VillaMontefiori into a perfect town--a colossal enterprise in which many ofgreat wealth had been ruined, but whence he himself had emerged withmillions. And it was in part for this reason that Orlando, sad andsilent, had obstinately restricted himself to one small room on the thirdfloor of the little palazzo erected by Luigi in the Via VentiSettembre--a room where he lived cloistered with a single servant, subsisting on his own scanty income, and accepting nothing but thatmodest hospitality from his son. 

As Pierre reached that new Via Venti Settembre* which climbs the side andsummit of the Viminal hill, he was struck by the heavy sumptuousness ofthe new "palaces, " which betokened among the moderns the same taste forthe huge that marked the ancient Romans. In the warm afternoon glow, blent of purple and old gold, the broad, triumphant thoroughfare, withits endless rows of white house-fronts, bore witness to new Rome's proudhope of futurity and sovereign power. And Pierre fairly gasped when hebeheld the Palazzo delle Finanze, or Treasury, a gigantic erection, acyclopean cube with a profusion of columns, balconies, pediments, andsculptured work, to which the building mania had given birth in a day ofimmoderate pride. And on the other side of the street, a little higherup, before reaching the Villa Bonaparte, stood Count Prada's littlepalazzo. 

 * The name--Twentieth September Street--was given to the thoroughfare to commemorate the date of the occupation of Rome by Victor Emmanuel's army. --Trans. 

After discharging his driver, Pierre for a moment remained somewhatembarrassed. The door was open, and he entered the vestibule; but, as atthe mansion in the Via Giulia, no door porter or servant was to be seen. So he had to make up his mind to ascend the monumental stairs, which withtheir marble balustrades seemed to be copied, on a smaller scale, fromthose of the Palazzo Boccanera. And there was much the same coldbareness, tempered, however, by a carpet and red door-hangings, whichcontrasted vividly with the white stucco of the walls. Thereception-rooms, sixteen feet high, were on the first floor, and as adoor chanced to be ajar he caught a glimpse of two /salons/, onefollowing the other, and both displaying quite modern richness, with aprofusion of silk and velvet hangings, gilt furniture, and lofty mirrorsreflecting a pompous assemblage of stands and tables. And still there wasnobody, not a soul, in that seemingly forsaken abode, which exhalednought of woman's presence. Indeed Pierre was on the point of going downagain to ring, when a footman at last presented himself. 

"Count Prada, if you please. "

The servant silently surveyed the little priest, and seemed tounderstand. "The father or the son?" he asked. 

"The father, Count Orlando Prada. "

"Oh! that's on the third floor. " And he condescended to add: "The littledoor on the right-hand side of the landing. Knock loudly if you wish tobe admitted. "

Pierre indeed had to knock twice, and then a little withered old man ofmilitary appearance, a former soldier who had remained in the Count'sservice, opened the door and apologised for the delay by saying that hehad been attending to his master's legs. Immediately afterwards heannounced the visitor, and the latter, after passing through a dim andnarrow ante-room, was lost in amazement on finding himself in arelatively small chamber, extremely bare and bright, with wall-paper of alight hue studded with tiny blue flowers. Behind a screen was an ironbedstead, the soldier's pallet, and there was no other furniture than thearm-chair in which the cripple spent his days, with a table of black woodplaced near him, and covered with books and papers, and two oldstraw-seated chairs which served for the accommodation of the infrequentvisitors. A few planks, fixed to one of the walls, did duty asbook-shelves. However, the broad, clear, curtainless window overlookedthe most admirable panorama of Rome that could be desired. 

Then the room disappeared from before Pierre's eyes, and with a suddenshock of deep emotion he only beheld old Orlando, the old blanched lion, still superb, broad, and tall. A forest of white hair crowned hispowerful head, with its thick mouth, fleshy broken nose, and large, sparkling, black eyes. A long white beard streamed down with the vigourof youth, curling like that of an ancient god. By that leonine muzzle onedivined what great passions had growled within; but all, carnal andintellectual alike, had erupted in patriotism, in wild bravery, andriotous love of independence. And the old stricken hero, his torso stillerect, was fixed there on his straw-seated arm-chair, with lifeless legsburied beneath a black wrapper. Alone did his arms and hands live, andhis face beam with strength and intelligence. 

Orlando turned towards his servant, and gently said to him: "You can goaway, Batista. Come back in a couple of hours. " Then, looking Pierre fullin the face, he exclaimed in a voice which was still sonorous despite hisseventy years: "So it's you at last, my dear Monsieur Froment, and weshall be able to chat at our ease. There, take that chair, and sit downin front of me. "

He had noticed the glance of surprise which the young priest had castupon the bareness of the room, and he gaily added: "You will excuse mefor receiving you in my cell. Yes, I live here like a monk, like an oldinvalided soldier, henceforth withdrawn from active life. My son longbegged me to take one of the fine rooms downstairs. But what would havebeen the use of it? I have no needs, and I scarcely care for featherbeds, for my old bones are accustomed to the hard ground. And then too Ihave such a fine view up here, all Rome presenting herself to me, nowthat I can no longer go to her. "

With a wave of the hand towards the window he sought to hide theembarrassment, the slight flush which came to him each time that he thusexcused his son; unwilling as he was to tell the true reason, the scrupleof probity which had made him obstinately cling to his bare pauper'slodging. 

"But it is very nice, the view is superb!" declared Pierre, in order toplease him. "I am for my own part very glad to see you, very glad to beable to grasp your valiant hands, which accomplished so many greatthings. "

Orlando made a fresh gesture, as though to sweep the past away. "Pooh!pooh! all that is dead and buried. Let us talk about you, my dearMonsieur Froment, you who are young and represent the present; andespecially about your book, which represents the future! Ah! if you onlyknew how angry your book, your 'New Rome, ' made me first of all. "

He began to laugh, and took the book from off the table near him; then, tapping on its cover with his big, broad hand, he continued: "No, youcannot imagine with what starts of protest I read your book. The Pope, and again the Pope, and always the Pope! New Rome to be created by thePope and for the Pope, to triumph thanks to the Pope, to be given to thePope, and to fuse its glory in the glory of the Pope! But what about us?What about Italy? What about all the millions which we have spent inorder to make Rome a great capital? Ah! only a Frenchman, and a Frenchmanof Paris, could have written such a book! But let me tell you, my dearsir, if you are ignorant of it, that Rome has become the capital of thekingdom of Italy, that we here have King Humbert, and the Italian people, a whole nation which must be taken into account, and which means to keepRome--glorious, resuscitated Rome--for itself!"

This juvenile ardour made Pierre laugh in turn. "Yes, yes, " said he, "youwrote me that. Only what does it matter from my point of view? Italy isbut one nation, a part of humanity, and I desire concord and fraternityamong all the nations, mankind reconciled, believing, and happy. Of whatconsequence, then, is any particular form of government, monarchy orrepublic, of what consequence is any question of a united and independentcountry, if all mankind forms but one free people subsisting on truth andjustice?"

To only one word of this enthusiastic outburst did Orlando pay attention. In a lower tone, and with a dreamy air, he resumed: "Ah! a republic. Inmy youth I ardently desired one. I fought for one; I conspired withMazzini, a saintly man, a believer, who was shattered by collision withthe absolute. And then, too, one had to bow to practical necessities; themost obstinate ended by submitting. And nowadays would a republic saveus? In any case it would differ but little from our parliamentarymonarchy. Just think of what goes on in France! And so why risk arevolution which would place power in the hands of the extremerevolutionists, the anarchists? We fear all that, and this explains ourresignation. I know very well that a few think they can detect salvationin a republican federation, a reconstitution of all the former littlestates in so many republics, over which Rome would preside. The Vaticanwould gain largely by any such transformation; still one cannot say thatit endeavours to bring it about; it simply regards the eventualitywithout disfavour. But it is a dream, a dream!"

At this Orlando's gaiety came back to him, with even a little gentleirony: "You don't know, I suppose, what it was that took my fancy in yourbook--for, in spite of all my protests, I have read it twice. Well, whatpleased me was that Mazzini himself might almost have written it at onetime. Yes! I found all my youth again in your pages, all the wild hope ofmy twenty-fifth year, the new religion of a humanitarian Christ, thepacification of the world effected by the Gospel! Are you aware that, long before your time, Mazzini desired the renovation of Christianity? Heset dogma and discipline on one side and only retained morals. And it wasnew Rome, the Rome of the people, which he would have given as see to theuniversal Church, in which all the churches of the past were to befused--Rome, the eternal and predestined city, the mother and queen, whose domination was to arise anew to ensure the definitive happiness ofmankind! Is it not curious that all the present-day Neo-Catholicism, thevague, spiritualistic awakening, the evolution towards communion andChristian charity, with which some are making so much stir, should besimply a return of the mystical and humanitarian ideas of 1848? Alas! Isaw all that, I believed and burned, and I know in what a fine mess thoseflights into the azure of mystery landed us! So it cannot be helped, Ilack confidence. "

Then, as Pierre on his side was growing impassioned and sought to reply, he stopped him: "No, let me finish. I only want to convince you howabsolutely necessary it was that we should take Rome and make her thecapital of Italy. Without Rome new Italy could not have existed; Romerepresented the glory of ancient time; in her dust lay the sovereignpower which we wished to re-establish; she brought strength, beauty, eternity to those who possessed her. Standing in the middle of ourcountry, she was its heart, and must assuredly become its life as soon asshe should be awakened from the long sleep of ruin. Ah! how we desiredher, amidst victory and amidst defeat, through years and years offrightful impatience! For my part I loved her, and longed for her, farmore than for any woman, with my blood burning, and in despair that Ishould be growing old. And when we possessed her, our folly was a desireto behold her huge, magnificent, and commanding all at once, the equal ofthe other great capitals of Europe--Berlin, Paris, and London. Look ather! she is still my only love, my only consolation now that I amvirtually dead, with nothing alive in me but my eyes. "

With the same gesture as before, he directed Pierre's attention to thewindow. Under the glowing sky Rome stretched out in its immensity, empurpled and gilded by the slanting sunrays. Across the horizon, far, far away, the trees of the Janiculum stretched a green girdle, of alimpid emerald hue, whilst the dome of St. Peter's, more to the left, showed palely blue, like a sapphire bedimmed by too bright a light. Thencame the low town, the old ruddy city, baked as it were by centuries ofburning summers, soft to the eye and beautiful with the deep life of thepast, an unbounded chaos of roofs, gables, towers, /campanili/, andcupolas. But, in the foreground under the window, there was the newcity--that which had been building for the last five and twentyyears--huge blocks of masonry piled up side by side, still white withplaster, neither the sun nor history having as yet robed them in purple. And in particular the roofs of the colossal Palazzo delle Finanze had adisastrous effect, spreading out like far, bare steppes of cruelhideousness. And it was upon the desolation and abomination of all thenewly erected piles that the eyes of the old soldier of conquest at lastrested. 

Silence ensued. Pierre felt the faint chill of hidden, unacknowledgedsadness pass by, and courteously waited. 

"I must beg your pardon for having interrupted you just now, " resumedOrlando; "but it seems to me that we cannot talk about your book to anygood purpose until you have seen and studied Rome closely. You onlyarrived yesterday, did you not? Well, stroll about the city, look atthings, question people, and I think that many of your ideas will change. I shall particularly like to know your impression of the Vatican sinceyou have cone here solely to see the Pope and defend your book againstthe Index. Why should we discuss things to-day, if facts themselves arecalculated to bring you to other views, far more readily than the finestspeeches which I might make? It is understood, you will come to see meagain, and we shall then know what we are talking about, and, maybe, agree together. "

"Why certainly, you are too kind, " replied Pierre. "I only came to-day toexpress my gratitude to you for having read my book so attentively, andto pay homage to one of the glories of Italy. "

Orlando was not listening, but remained for a moment absorbed in thought, with his eyes still resting upon Rome. And overcome, despite himself, bysecret disquietude, he resumed in a low voice as though making aninvoluntary confession: "We have gone too fast, no doubt. There wereexpenses of undeniable utility--the roads, ports, and railways. And itwas necessary to arm the country also; I did not at first disapprove ofthe heavy military burden. But since then how crushing has been the warbudget--a war which has never come, and the long wait for which hasruined us. Ah! I have always been the friend of France. I only reproachher with one thing, that she has failed to understand the position inwhich we were placed, the vital reasons which compelled us to allyourselves with Germany. And then there are the thousand millions of/lire/* swallowed up in Rome! That was the real madness; pride andenthusiasm led us astray. Old and solitary as I've been for many yearsnow, given to deep reflection, I was one of the first to divine thepitfall, the frightful financial crisis, the deficit which would bringabout the collapse of the nation. I shouted it from the housetops, to myson, to all who came near me; but what was the use? They didn't listen;they were mad, still buying and selling and building, with no thought butfor gambling booms and bubbles. But you'll see, you'll see. And the worstis that we are not situated as you are; we haven't a reserve of men andmoney in a dense peasant population, whose thrifty savings are always athand to fill up the gaps caused by big catastrophes. There is no socialrise among our people as yet; fresh men don't spring up out of the lowerclasses to reinvigorate the national blood, as they constantly do in yourcountry. And, besides, the people are poor; they have no stockings toempty. The misery is frightful, I must admit it. Those who have any moneyprefer to spend it in the towns in a petty way rather than to risk it inagricultural or manufacturing enterprise. Factories are but slowly built, and the land is almost everywhere tilled in the same primitive manner asit was two thousand years ago. And then, too, take Rome--Rome, whichdidn't make Italy, but which Italy made its capital to satisfy an ardent, overpowering desire--Rome, which is still but a splendid bit of scenery, picturing the glory of the centuries, and which, apart from itshistorical splendour, has only given us its degenerate papal population, swollen with ignorance and pride! Ah! I loved Rome too well, and I stilllove it too well to regret being now within its walls. But, good heavens!what insanity its acquisition brought us, what piles of money it has costus, and how heavily and triumphantly it weighs us down! Look! look!"

 * 40, 000, 000 pounds. 

He waved his hand as he spoke towards the livid roofs of the Palazzodelle Finanze, that vast and desolate steppe, as though he could see theharvest of glory all stripped off and bankruptcy appear with its fearful, threatening bareness. Restrained tears were dimming his eyes, and helooked superbly pitiful with his expression of baffled hope and grievousdisquietude, with his huge white head, the muzzle of an old blanched lionhenceforth powerless and caged in that bare, bright room, whosepoverty-stricken aspect was instinct with so much pride that it seemed, as it were, a protest against the monumental splendour of the wholesurrounding district! So those were the purposes to which the conquesthad been put! And to think that he was impotent, henceforth unable togive his blood and his soul as he had done in the days gone by. 

"Yes, yes, " he exclaimed in a final outburst; "one gave everything, heartand brain, one's whole life indeed, so long as it was a question ofmaking the country one and independent. But, now that the country isours, just try to stir up enthusiasm for the reorganisation of itsfinances! There's no ideality in that! And this explains why, whilst theold ones are dying off, not a new man comes to the front among the youngones--"

All at once he stopped, looking somewhat embarrassed, yet smiling at hisfeverishness. "Excuse me, " he said, "I'm off again, I'm incorrigible. Butit's understood, we'll leave that subject alone, and you'll come backhere, and we'll chat together when you've seen everything. "

From that moment he showed himself extremely pleasant, and it wasapparent to Pierre that he regretted having said so much, by theseductive affability and growing affection which he now displayed. Hebegged the young priest to prolong his sojourn, to abstain from all hastyjudgments on Rome, and to rest convinced that, at bottom, Italy stillloved France. And he was also very desirous that France should loveItaly, and displayed genuine anxiety at the thought that perhaps sheloved her no more. As at the Boccanera mansion, on the previous evening, Pierre realised that an attempt was being made to persuade him toadmiration and affection. Like a susceptible woman with secret misgivingsrespecting the attractive power of her beauty, Italy was all anxiety withregard to the opinion of her visitors, and strove to win and retain theirlove. 

However, Orlando again became impassioned when he learnt that Pierre wasstaying at the Boccanera mansion, and he made a gesture of extremeannoyance on hearing, at that very moment, a knock at the outer door. "Come in!" he called; but at the same time he detained Pierre, saying, "No, no, don't go yet; I wish to know--"

But a lady came in--a woman of over forty, short and extremely plump, andstill attractive with her small features and pretty smile swamped in fat. She was a blonde, with green, limpid eyes; and, fairly well dressed in asober, nicely fitting mignonette gown, she looked at once pleasant, modest, and shrewd. 

"Ah! it's you, Stefana, " said the old man, letting her kiss him. 

"Yes, uncle, I was passing by and came up to see how you were gettingon. "

The visitor was the Signora Sacco, niece of Prada and a Neapolitan bybirth, her mother having quitted Milan to marry a certain Pagani, aNeapolitan banker, who had afterwards failed. Subsequent to that disasterStefana had married Sacco, then merely a petty post-office clerk. He, later on, wishing to revive his father-in-law's business, had launchedinto all sorts of terrible, complicated, suspicious affairs, which byunforeseen luck had ended in his election as a deputy. Since he hadarrived in Rome, to conquer the city in his turn, his wife had beencompelled to assist his devouring ambition by dressing well and opening a/salon/; and, although she was still a little awkward, she rendered himmany real services, being very economical and prudent, a thorough goodhousewife, with all the sterling, substantial qualities of Northern Italywhich she had inherited from her mother, and which showed conspicuouslybeside the turbulence and carelessness of her husband, in whom flaredSouthern Italy with its perpetual, rageful appetite. 

Despite his contempt for Sacco, old Orlando had retained some affectionfor his niece, in whose veins flowed blood similar to his own. He thankedher for her kind inquiries, and then at once spoke of an announcementwhich he had read in the morning papers, for he suspected that the deputyhad sent his wife to ascertain his opinion. 

"Well, and that ministry?" he asked. 

The Signora had seated herself and made no haste to reply, but glanced atthe newspapers strewn over the table. "Oh! nothing is settled yet, " sheat last responded; "the newspapers spoke out too soon. The Prime Ministersent for Sacco, and they had a talk together. But Sacco hesitates a gooddeal; he fears that he has no aptitude for the Department of Agriculture. Ah! if it were only the Finances--However, in any case, he would not havecome to a decision without consulting you. What do you think of it, uncle?"

He interrupted her with a violent wave of the hand: "No, no, I won't mixmyself up in such matters!"

To him the rapid success of that adventurer Sacco, that schemer andgambler who had always fished in troubled waters, was an abomination, thebeginning of the end. His son Luigi certainly distressed him; but it waseven worse to think that--whilst Luigi, with his great intelligence andmany remaining fine qualities, was nothing at all--Sacco, on the otherhand, Sacco, blunderhead and ever-famished battener that he was, had notmerely slipped into parliament, but was now, it seemed, on the point ofsecuring office! A little, swarthy, dry man he was, with big, round eyes, projecting cheekbones, and prominent chin. Ever dancing and chattering, he was gifted with a showy eloquence, all the force of which lay in hisvoice--a voice which at will became admirably powerful or gentle! Andwithal an insinuating man, profiting by every opportunity, wheedling andcommanding by turn. 

"You hear, Stefana, " said Orlando; "tell your husband that the onlyadvice I have to give him is to return to his clerkship at thepost-office, where perhaps he may be of use. "

What particularly filled the old soldier with indignation and despair wasthat such a man, a Sacco, should have fallen like a bandit on Rome--onthat Rome whose conquest had cost so many noble efforts. And in his turnSacco was conquering the city, was carrying it off from those who had wonit by such hard toil, and was simply using it to satisfy his wild passionfor power and its attendant enjoyments. Beneath his wheedling air therewas the determination to devour everything. After the victory, while thespoil lay there, still warm, the wolves had come. It was the North thathad made Italy, whereas the South, eager for the quarry, simply rushedupon the country, preyed upon it. And beneath the anger of the oldstricken hero of Italian unity there was indeed all the growingantagonism of the North towards the South--the North industrious, economical, shrewd in politics, enlightened, full of all the great modernideas, and the South ignorant and idle, bent on enjoying lifeimmediately, amidst childish disorder in action, and an empty show offine sonorous words. 

Stefana had begun to smile in a placid way while glancing at Pierre, whohad approached the window. "Oh, you say that, uncle, " she responded; "butyou love us well all the same, and more than once you have given memyself some good advice, for which I'm very thankful to you. Forinstance, there's that affair of Attilio's--"

She was alluding to her son, the lieutenant, and his love affair withCelia, the little Princess Buongiovanni, of which all the drawing-rooms, white and black alike, were talking. 

"Attilio--that's another matter!" exclaimed Orlando. "He and you are bothof the same blood as myself, and it's wonderful how I see myself again inthat fine fellow. Yes, he is just the same as I was at his age, good-looking and brave and enthusiastic! I'm paying myself compliments, you see. But, really now, Attilio warms my heart, for he is the future, and brings me back some hope. Well, and what about his affair?"

"Oh! it gives us a lot of worry, uncle. I spoke to you about it before, but you shrugged your shoulders, saying that in matters of that kind allthat the parents had to do was to let the lovers settle their affairsbetween them. Still, we don't want everybody to repeat that we are urgingour son to get the little princess to elope with him, so that he mayafterwards marry her money and title. "

At this Orlando indulged in a frank outburst of gaiety: "That's a finescruple! Was it your husband who instructed you to tell me of it? I know, however, that he affects some delicacy in this matter. For my own part, Ibelieve myself to be as honest as he is, and I can only repeat that, if Ihad a son like yours, so straightforward and good, and candidly loving, Ishould let him marry whomsoever he pleased in his own way. TheBuongiovannis--good heavens! the Buongiovannis--why, despite all theirrank and lineage and the money they still possess, it will be a greathonour for them to have a handsome young man with a noble heart as theirson-in-law!"

Again did Stefana assume an expression of placid satisfaction. She hadcertainly only come there for approval. "Very well, uncle, " she replied, "I'll repeat that to my husband, and he will pay great attention to it;for if you are severe towards him he holds you in perfect veneration. Andas for that ministry--well, perhaps nothing will be done, Sacco willdecide according to circumstances. "

She rose and took her leave, kissing the old soldier very affectionatelyas on her arrival. And she complimented him on his good looks, declaringthat she found him as handsome as ever, and making him smile by speakingof a lady who was still madly in love with him. Then, after acknowledgingthe young priest's silent salutation by a slight bow, she went off, oncemore wearing her modest and sensible air. 

For a moment Orlando, with his eyes turned towards the door, remainedsilent, again sad, reflecting no doubt on all the difficult, equivocalpresent, so different from the glorious past. But all at once he turnedto Pierre, who was still waiting. "And so, my friend, " said he, "you arestaying at the Palazzo Boccanera? Ah! what a grievous misfortune therehas been on that side too!"

However, when the priest had told him of his conversation with Benedetta, and of her message that she still loved him and would never forget hisgoodness to her, no matter whatever happened, he appeared moved and hisvoice trembled: "Yes, she has a good heart, she has no spite. But whatwould you have? She did not love Luigi, and he was possibly violent. There is no mystery about the matter now, and I can speak to you freely, since to my great grief everybody knows what has happened. "

Then Orlando abandoned himself to his recollections, and related how keenhad been his delight on the eve of the marriage at the thought that solovely a creature would become his daughter, and set some youth and charmaround his invalid's arm-chair. He had always worshipped beauty, andwould have had no other love than woman, if his country had not seizedupon the best part of him. And Benedetta on her side loved him, reveredhim, constantly coming up to spend long hours with him, sharing his poorlittle room, which at those times became resplendent with all the divinegrace that she brought with her. With her fresh breath near him, the purescent she diffused, the caressing womanly tenderness with which shesurrounded him, he lived anew. But, immediately afterwards, what afrightful drama and how his heart had bled at his inability to reconcilethe husband and the wife! He could not possibly say that his son was inthe wrong in desiring to be the loved and accepted spouse. At firstindeed he had hoped to soften Benedetta, and throw her into Luigi's arms. But when she had confessed herself to him in tears, owning her old lovefor Dario, and her horror of belonging to another, he realised that shewould never yield. And a whole year had then gone by; he had lived for awhole year imprisoned in his arm-chair, with that poignant dramaprogressing beneath him in those luxurious rooms whence no sound evenreached his ears. How many times had he not listened, striving to hear, fearing atrocious quarrels, in despair at his inability to prove stilluseful by creating happiness. He knew nothing by his son, who kept hisown counsel; he only learnt a few particulars from Benedetta at intervalswhen emotion left her defenceless; and that marriage in which he had fora moment espied the much-needed alliance between old and new Rome, thatunconsummated marriage filled him with despair, as if it were indeed thedefeat of every hope, the final collapse of the dream which had filledhis life. And he himself had ended by desiring the divorce, so unbearablehad become the suffering caused by such a situation. 

"Ah! my friend!" he said to Pierre; "never before did I so wellunderstand the fatality of certain antagonism, the possibility of workingone's own misfortune and that of others, even when one has the mostloving heart and upright mind!"

But at that moment the door again opened, and this time, withoutknocking, Count Luigi Prada came in. And after rapidly bowing to thevisitor, who had risen, he gently took hold of his father's hands andfelt them, as if fearing that they might be too warm or too cold. 

"I've just arrived from Frascati, where I had to sleep, " said he; "forthe interruption of all that building gives me a lot of worry. And I'mtold that you spent a bad night!"

"No, I assure you. "

"Oh! I knew you wouldn't own it. But why will you persist in living uphere without any comfort? All this isn't suited to your age. I should beso pleased if you would accept a more comfortable room where you mightsleep better. "

"No, no--I know that you love me well, my dear Luigi. But let me do as myold head tells me. That's the only way to make me happy. "

Pierre was much struck by the ardent affection which sparkled in the eyesof the two men as they gazed at one another, face to face. This seemed tohim very touching and beautiful, knowing as he did how many contraryideas and actions, how many moral divergencies separated them. And henext took an interest in comparing them physically. Count Luigi Prada, shorter, more thick-set than his father, had, however, much the samestrong energetic head, crowned with coarse black hair, and the same frankbut somewhat stern eyes set in a face of clear complexion, barred bythick moustaches. But his mouth differed--a sensual, voracious mouth itwas, with wolfish teeth--a mouth of prey made for nights of rapine, whenthe only question is to bite, and tear, and devour others. And for thisreason, when some praised the frankness in his eyes, another wouldretort: "Yes, but I don't like his mouth. " His feet were large, his handsplump and over-broad, but admirably cared for. 

And Pierre marvelled at finding him such as he had anticipated. He knewenough of his story to picture in him a hero's son spoilt by conquest, eagerly devouring the harvest garnered by his father's glorious sword. And he particularly studied how the father's virtues had deflected andbecome transformed into vices in the son--the most noble qualities beingperverted, heroic and disinterested energy lapsing into a ferociousappetite for possession, the man of battle leading to the man of booty, since the great gusts of enthusiasm no longer swept by, since men nolonger fought, since they remained there resting, pillaging, anddevouring amidst the heaped-up spoils. And the pity of it was that theold hero, the paralytic, motionless father beheld it all--beheld thedegeneration of his son, the speculator and company promoter gorged withmillions!

However, Orlando introduced Pierre. "This is Monsieur l'Abbe PierreFroment, whom I spoke to you about, " he said, "the author of the bookwhich I gave you to read. "

Luigi Prada showed himself very amiable, at once talking of home with anintelligent passion like one who wished to make the city a great moderncapital. He had seen Paris transformed by the Second Empire; he had seenBerlin enlarged and embellished after the German victories; and, according to him, if Rome did not follow the movement, if it did notbecome the inhabitable capital of a great people, it was threatened withprompt death: either a crumbling museum or a renovated, resuscitatedcity--those were the alternatives. *

 * Personally I should have thought the example of Berlin a great deterrent. The enlargement and embellishment of the Prussian capital, after the war of 1870, was attended by far greater roguery and wholesale swindling than even the previous transformation of Paris. Thousands of people too were ruined, and instead of an increase of prosperity the result was the very reverse. --Trans. 

Greatly struck, almost gained over already, Pierre listened to thisclever man, charmed with his firm, clear mind. He knew how skilfullyPrada had manoeuvred in the affair of the Villa Montefiori, enrichinghimself when every one else was ruined, having doubtless foreseen thefatal catastrophe even while the gambling passion was maddening theentire nation. However, the young priest could already detect marks ofweariness, precocious wrinkles and a fall of the lips, on thatdetermined, energetic face, as though its possessor were growing tired ofthe continual struggle that he had to carry on amidst surroundingdownfalls, the shock of which threatened to bring the most firmlyestablished fortunes to the ground. It was said that Prada had recentlyhad grave cause for anxiety; and indeed there was no longer any solidityto be found; everything might be swept away by the financial crisis whichday by day was becoming more and more serious. In the case of Luigi, sturdy son though he was of Northern Italy, a sort of degeneration hadset in, a slow rot, caused by the softening, perversive influence ofRome. He had there rushed upon the satisfaction of every appetite, andprolonged enjoyment was exhausting him. This, indeed, was one of thecauses of the deep silent sadness of Orlando, who was compelled towitness the swift deterioration of his conquering race, whilst Sacco, theItalian of the South--served as it were by the climate, accustomed to thevoluptuous atmosphere, the life of those sun-baked cities compounded ofthe dust of antiquity--bloomed there like the natural vegetation of asoil saturated with the crimes of history, and gradually graspedeverything, both wealth and power. 

As Orlando spoke of Stefana's visit to his son, Sacco's name wasmentioned. Then, without another word, the two men exchanged a smile. Arumour was current that the Minister of Agriculture, lately deceased, would perhaps not be replaced immediately, and that another ministerwould take charge of the department pending the next session of theChamber. 

Next the Palazzo Boccanera was mentioned, and Pierre, his interestawakened, became more attentive. "Ah!" exclaimed Count Luigi, turning tohim, "so you are staying in the Via Giulia? All the Rome of olden timesleeps there in the silence of forgetfulness. "

With perfect ease he went on to speak of the Cardinal and even ofBenedetta--"the Countess, " as he called her. But, although he was carefulto let no sign of anger escape him, the young priest could divine that hewas secretly quivering, full of suffering and spite. In him theenthusiastic energy of his father appeared in a baser, degenerate form. Quitting the yet handsome Princess Flavia in his passion for Benedetta, her divinely beautiful niece, he had resolved to make the latter his ownat any cost, determined to marry her, to struggle with her and overcomeher, although he knew that she loved him not, and that he would almostcertainly wreck his entire life. Rather than relinquish her, however, hewould have set Rome on fire. And thus his hopeless suffering was nowgreat indeed: this woman was but his wife in name, and so torturing wasthe thought of her disdain, that at times, however calm his outwarddemeanour, he was consumed by a jealous vindictive sensual madness thatdid not even recoil from the idea of crime. 

"Monsieur l'Abbe is acquainted with the situation, " sadly murmured oldOrlando. 

His son responded by a wave of the hand, as though to say that everybodywas acquainted with it. "Ah! father, " he added, "but for you I shouldnever have consented to take part in those proceedings for annulling themarriage! The Countess would have found herself compelled to return here, and would not nowadays be deriding us with her lover, that cousin ofhers, Dario!"

At this Orlando also waved his hand, as if in protest. 

"Oh! it's a fact, father, " continued Luigi. "Why did she flee from hereif it wasn't to go and live with her lover? And indeed, in my opinion, it's scandalous that a Cardinal's palace should shelter such goings-on!"

This was the report which he spread abroad, the accusation which heeverywhere levelled against his wife, of publicly carrying on a shameless/liaison/. In reality, however, he did not believe a word of it, beingtoo well acquainted with Benedetta's firm rectitude, and herdetermination to belong to none but the man she loved, and to him only inmarriage. However, in Prada's eyes such accusations were not only fairplay but also very efficacious. 

And now, although he turned pale with covert exasperation, and laughed ahard, vindictive, cruel laugh, he went on to speak in a bantering tone ofthe proceedings for annulling the marriage, and in particular of the pleaput forward by Benedetta's advocate Morano. And at last his languagebecame so free that Orlando, with a glance towards the priest, gentlyinterposed: "Luigi! Luigi!"

"Yes, you are right, father, I'll say no more, " thereupon added the youngCount. "But it's really abominable and ridiculous. Lisbeth, you know, ishighly amused at it. "

Orlando again looked displeased, for when visitors were present he didnot like his son to refer to the person whom he had just named. LisbethKauffmann, very blonde and pink and merry, was barely thirty years ofage, and belonged to the Roman foreign colony. For two years past she hadbeen a widow, her husband having died at Rome whither he had come tonurse a complaint of the lungs. Thenceforward free, and sufficiently welloff, she had remained in the city by taste, having a marked predilectionfor art, and painting a little, herself. In the Via Principe Amadeo, inthe new Viminal district, she had purchased a little palazzo, andtransformed a large apartment on its second floor into a studio hung withold stuffs, and balmy in every season with the scent of flowers. Theplace was well known to tolerant and intellectual society. Lisbeth wasthere found in perpetual jubilation, clad in a long blouse, somewhat of a/gamine/ in her ways, trenchant too and often bold of speech, butnevertheless capital company, and as yet compromised with nobody butPrada. Their /liaison/ had begun some four months after his wife had lefthim, and now Lisbeth was near the time of becoming a mother. This she inno wise concealed, but displayed such candid tranquillity and happinessthat her numerous acquaintances continued to visit her as if there werenothing in question, so facile and free indeed is the life of the greatcosmopolitan continental cities. Under the circumstances which his wife'ssuit had created, Prada himself was not displeased at the turn whichevents had taken with regard to Lisbeth, but none the less his incurablewound still bled. 

There could be no compensation for the bitterness of Benedetta's disdain, it was she for whom his heart burned, and he dreamt of one day wreakingon her a tragic punishment. 

Pierre, knowing nothing of Lisbeth, failed to understand the allusions ofOrlando and his son. But realising that there was some embarrassmentbetween them, he sought to take countenance by picking from off thelittered table a thick book which, to his surprise, he found to be aFrench educational work, one of those manuals for the /baccalaureat/, *containing a digest of the knowledge which the official programmesrequire. It was but a humble, practical, elementary work, yet itnecessarily dealt with all the mathematical, physical, chemical, andnatural sciences, thus broadly outlining the intellectual conquests ofthe century, the present phase of human knowledge. 

 * The examination for the degree of bachelor, which degree is the necessary passport to all the liberal professions in France. M. Zola, by the way, failed to secure it, being ploughed for "insufficiency in literature"!--Trans. 

"Ah!" exclaimed Orlando, well pleased with the diversion, "you arelooking at the book of my old friend Theophile Morin. He was one of thethousand of Marsala, you know, and helped us to conquer Sicily andNaples. A hero! But for more than thirty years now he has been living inFrance again, absorbed in the duties of his petty professorship, whichhasn't made him at all rich. And so he lately published that book, whichsells very well in France it seems; and it occurred to him that he mightincrease his modest profits on it by issuing translations, an Italian oneamong others. He and I have remained brothers, and thinking that myinfluence would prove decisive, he wishes to utilise it. But he ismistaken; I fear, alas! that I shall be unable to get anybody to take uphis book. "

At this Luigi Prada, who had again become very composed and amiable, shrugged his shoulders slightly, full as he was of the scepticism of hisgeneration which desired to maintain things in their actual state so asto derive the greatest profit from them. "What would be the good of it?"he murmured; "there are too many books already!"

"No, no!" the old man passionately retorted, "there can never be too manybooks! We still and ever require fresh ones! It's by literature, not bythe sword, that mankind will overcome falsehood and injustice and attainto the final peace of fraternity among the nations--Oh! you may smile; Iknow that you call these ideas my fancies of '48, the fancies of agreybeard, as people say in France. But it is none the less true thatItaly is doomed, if the problem be not attacked from down below, if thepeople be not properly fashioned. And there is only one way to make anation, to create men, and that is to educate them, to develop byeducational means the immense lost force which now stagnates in ignoranceand idleness. Yes, yes, Italy is made, but let us make an Italian nation. And give us more and more books, and let us ever go more and more forwardinto science and into light, if we wish to live and to be healthy, good, and strong!"

With his torso erect, with his powerful leonine muzzle flaming with thewhite brightness of his beard and hair, old Orlando looked superb. And inthat simple, candid chamber, so touching with its intentional poverty, heraised his cry of hope with such intensity of feverish faith, that beforethe young priest's eyes there arose another figure--that of CardinalBoccanera, erect and black save for his snow-white hair, and likewiseglowing with heroic beauty in his crumbling palace whose gilded ceilingsthreatened to fall about his head! Ah! the magnificent stubborn men ofthe past, the believers, the old men who still show themselves morevirile, more ardent than the young! Those two represented the oppositepoles of belief; they had not an idea, an affection in common, and inthat ancient city of Rome, where all was being blown away in dust, theyalone seemed to protest, indestructible, face to face like two partedbrothers, standing motionless on either horizon. And to have seen themthus, one after the other, so great and grand, so lonely, so detachedfrom ordinary life, was to fill one's day with a dream of eternity. 

Luigi, however, had taken hold of the old man's hands to calm him by anaffectionate filial clasp. "Yes, yes, you are right, father, alwaysright, and I'm a fool to contradict you. Now, pray don't move about likethat, for you are uncovering yourself, and your legs will get coldagain. "

So saying, he knelt down and very carefully arranged the wrapper; andthen remaining on the floor like a child, albeit he was two and forty, heraised his moist eyes, full of mute, entreating worship towards the oldman who, calmed and deeply moved, caressed his hair with a tremblingtouch. 

Pierre had been there for nearly two hours, when he at last took leave, greatly struck and affected by all that he had seen and heard. And againhe had to promise that he would return and have a long chat with Orlando. Once out of doors he walked along at random. It was barely four o'clock, and it was his idea to ramble in this wise, without any predeterminedprogramme, through Rome at that delightful hour when the sun sinks in therefreshed and far blue atmosphere. Almost immediately, however, he foundhimself in the Via Nazionale, along which he had driven on arriving theprevious day. And he recognised the huge livid Banca d'Italia, the greengardens climbing to the Quirinal, and the heaven-soaring pines of theVilla Aldobrandini. Then, at the turn of the street, as he stopped shortin order that he might again contemplate the column of Trajan which nowrose up darkly from its low piazza, already full of twilight, he wassurprised to see a victoria suddenly pull up, and a young man courteouslybeckon to him. 

"Monsieur l'Abbe Froment! Monsieur l'Abbe Froment!"

It was young Prince Dario Boccanera, on his way to his daily drive alongthe Corso. He now virtually subsisted on the liberality of his uncle theCardinal, and was almost always short of money. But, like all the Romans, he would, if necessary, have rather lived on bread and water than haveforgone his carriage, horse, and coachman. An equipage, indeed, is theone indispensable luxury of Rome. 

"If you will come with me, Monsieur l'Abbe Froment, " said the youngPrince, "I will show you the most interesting part of our city. "

He doubtless desired to please Benedetta, by behaving amiably towards herprotege. Idle as he was, too, it seemed to him a pleasant occupation toinitiate that young priest, who was said to be so intelligent, into whathe deemed the inimitable side, the true florescence of Roman life. 

Pierre was compelled to accept, although he would have preferred asolitary stroll. Yet he was interested in this young man, the last bornof an exhausted race, who, while seemingly incapable of either thought oraction, was none the less very seductive with his high-born pride andindolence. Far more a Roman than a patriot, Dario had never had thefaintest inclination to rally to the new order of things, being wellcontent to live apart and do nothing; and passionate though he was, heindulged in no follies, being very practical and sensible at heart, asare all his fellow-citizens, despite their apparent impetuosity. As soonas his carriage, after crossing the Piazza di Venezia, entered the Corso, he gave rein to his childish vanity, his desire to shine, his passion forgay, happy life in the open under the lovely sky. All this, indeed, wasclearly expressed in the simple gesture which he made whilst exclaiming:"The Corso!"

As on the previous day, Pierre was filled with astonishment. The longnarrow street again stretched before him as far as the white dazzlingPiazza del Popolo, the only difference being that the right-hand houseswere now steeped in sunshine, whilst those on the left were black withshadow. What! was that the Corso then, that semi-obscure trench, closepressed by high and heavy house-fronts, that mean roadway where threevehicles could scarcely pass abreast, and which serried shops lined withgaudy displays? There was neither space, nor far horizon, nor refreshinggreenery such as the fashionable drives of Paris could boast! Nothing butjostling, crowding, and stifling on the little footways under the narrowstrip of sky. And although Dario named the pompous and historicalpalaces, Bonaparte, Doria, Odescalchi, Sciarra, and Chigi; although hepointed out the column of Marcus Aurelius on the Piazza Colonna, the mostlively square of the whole city with its everlasting throng of lounging, gazing, chattering people; although, all the way to the Piazza delPopolo, he never ceased calling attention to churches, houses, andside-streets, notably the Via dei Condotti, at the far end of which theTrinity de' Monti, all golden in the glory of the sinking sun, appearedabove that famous flight of steps, the triumphal Scala di Spagna--Pierrestill and ever retained the impression of disillusion which the narrow, airless thoroughfare had conveyed to him: the "palaces" looked to himlike mournful hospitals or barracks, the Piazza Colonna suffered terriblyfrom a lack of trees, and the Trinity de' Monti alone took his fancy byits distant radiance of fairyland. 

But it was necessary to come back from the Piazza del Popolo to thePiazza di Venezia, then return to the former square, and come back yetagain, following the entire Corso three and four times without wearying. The delighted Dario showed himself and looked about him, exchangingsalutations. On either footway was a compact crowd of promenaders whoseeyes roamed over the equipages and whose hands could have shaken those ofthe carriage folks. So great at last became the number of vehicles thatboth lines were absolutely unbroken, crowded to such a point that thecoachmen could do no more than walk their horses. Perpetually going upand coming down the Corso, people scrutinised and jostled one another. Itwas open-air promiscuity, all Rome gathered together in the smallestpossible space, the folks who knew one another and who met here as in afriendly drawing-room, and the folks belonging to adverse parties who didnot speak together but who elbowed each other, and whose glancespenetrated to each other's soul. Then a revelation came to Pierre, and hesuddenly understood the Corso, the ancient custom, the passion and gloryof the city. Its pleasure lay precisely in the very narrowness of thestreet, in that forced elbowing which facilitated not only desiredmeetings but the satisfaction of curiosity, the display of vanity, andthe garnering of endless tittle-tattle. All Roman society met here eachday, displayed itself, spied on itself, offering itself in spectacle toits own eyes, with such an indispensable need of thus beholding itselfthat the man of birth who missed the Corso was like one out of hiselement, destitute of newspapers, living like a savage. And withal theatmosphere was delightfully balmy, and the narrow strip of sky betweenthe heavy, rusty mansions displayed an infinite azure purity. 

Dario never ceased smiling, and slightly inclining his head while herepeated to Pierre the names of princes and princesses, dukes andduchesses--high-sounding names whose flourish had filled history, whosesonorous syllables conjured up the shock of armour on the battlefield andthe splendour of papal pomp with robes of purple, tiaras of gold, andsacred vestments sparkling with precious stones. And as Pierre listenedand looked he was pained to see merely some corpulent ladies orundersized gentlemen, bloated or shrunken beings, whose ill-looks seemedto be increased by their modern attire. However, a few pretty women wentby, particularly some young, silent girls with large, clear eyes. Andjust as Dario had pointed out the Palazzo Buongiovanni, a hugeseventeenth-century facade, with windows encompassed by foliagedornamentation deplorably heavy in style, he added gaily:

"Ah! look--that's Attilio there on the footway. Young LieutenantSacco--you know, don't you?"

Pierre signed that he understood. Standing there in uniform, Attilio, soyoung, so energetic and brave of appearance, with a frank countenancesoftly illumined by blue eyes like his mother's, at once pleased thepriest. He seemed indeed the very personification of youth and love, withall their enthusiastic, disinterested hope in the future. 

"You'll see by and by, when we pass the palace again, " said Dario. "He'llstill be there and I'll show you something. "

Then he began to talk gaily of the girls of Rome, the little princesses, the little duchesses, so discreetly educated at the convent of the SacredHeart, quitting it for the most part so ignorant and then completingtheir education beside their mothers, never going out but to accompanythe latter on the obligatory drive to the Corso, and living throughendless days, cloistered, imprisoned in the depths of sombre mansions. Nevertheless what tempests raged in those mute souls to which none hadever penetrated! what stealthy growth of will suddenly appeared fromunder passive obedience, apparent unconsciousness of surroundings! Howmany there were who stubbornly set their minds on carving out their livesfor themselves, on choosing the man who might please them, and securinghim despite the opposition of the entire world! And the lover was chosenthere from among the stream of young men promenading the Corso, the loverhooked with a glance during the daily drive, those candid eyes speakingaloud and sufficing for confession and the gift of all, whilst not abreath was wafted from the lips so chastely closed. And afterwards therecame love letters, furtively exchanged in church, and the winning-over ofmaids to facilitate stolen meetings, at first so innocent. In the end, amarriage often resulted. 

Celia, for her part, had determined to win Attilio on the very first daywhen their eyes had met. And it was from a window of the PalazzoBuongiovanni that she had perceived him one afternoon of mortalweariness. He had just raised his head, and she had taken him for everand given herself to him with those large, pure eyes of hers as theyrested on his own. She was but an /amorosa/--nothing more; he pleasedher; she had set her heart on him--him and none other. She would havewaited twenty years for him, but she relied on winning him at once byquiet stubbornness of will. People declared that the terrible fury of thePrince, her father, had proved impotent against her respectful, obstinatesilence. He, man of mixed blood as he was, son of an American woman, andhusband of an English woman, laboured but to retain his own name andfortune intact amidst the downfall of others; and it was rumoured that asthe result of a quarrel which he had picked with his wife, whom heaccused of not sufficiently watching over their daughter, the Princesshad revolted, full not only of the pride of a foreigner who had brought ahuge dowry in marriage, but also of such plain, frank egotism that shehad declared she no longer found time enough to attend to herself, letalone another. Had she not already done enough in bearing him fivechildren? She thought so; and now she spent her time in worshippingherself, letting Celia do as she listed, and taking no further interestin the household through which swept stormy gusts. 

However, the carriage was again about to pass the Buongiovanni mansion, and Dario forewarned Pierre. "You see, " said he, "Attilio has come back. And now look up at the third window on the first floor. "

It was at once rapid and charming. Pierre saw the curtain slightly drawnaside and Celia's gentle face appear. Closed, candid lily, she did notsmile, she did not move. Nothing could be read on those pure lips, or inthose clear but fathomless eyes of hers. Yet she was taking Attilio toherself, and giving herself to him without reserve. And soon the curtainfell once more. 

"Ah, the little mask!" muttered Dario. "Can one ever tell what there isbehind so much innocence?"

As Pierre turned round he perceived Attilio, whose head was still raised, and whose face was also motionless and pale, with closed mouth, andwidely opened eyes. And the young priest was deeply touched, for this waslove, absolute love in its sudden omnipotence, true love, eternal andjuvenescent, in which ambition and calculation played no part. 

Then Dario ordered the coachman to drive up to the Pincio; for, before orafter the Corso, the round of the Pincio is obligatory on fine, clearafternoons. First came the Piazza del Popolo, the most airy and regularsquare of Rome, with its conjunction of thoroughfares, its churches andfountains, its central obelisk, and its two clumps of trees facing oneanother at either end of the small white paving-stones, betwixt thesevere and sun-gilt buildings. Then, turning to the right, the carriagebegan to climb the inclined way to the Pincio--a magnificent windingascent, decorated with bas-reliefs, statues, and fountains--a kind ofapotheosis of marble, a commemoration of ancient Rome, rising amidstgreenery. Up above, however, Pierre found the garden small, little betterthan a large square, with just the four necessary roadways to enable thecarriages to drive round and round as long as they pleased. Anuninterrupted line of busts of the great men of ancient and modern Italyfringed these roadways. But what Pierre most admired was the trees--treesof the most rare and varied kinds, chosen and tended with infinite care, and nearly always evergreens, so that in winter and summer alike the spotwas adorned with lovely foliage of every imaginable shade of verdure. Andbeside these trees, along the fine, breezy roadways, Dario's victoriabegan to turn, following the continuous, unwearying stream of the othercarriages. 

Pierre remarked one young woman of modest demeanour and attractivesimplicity who sat alone in a dark-blue victoria, drawn by awell-groomed, elegantly harnessed horse. She was very pretty, short, withchestnut hair, a creamy complexion, and large gentle eyes. Quietly robedin dead-leaf silk, she wore a large hat, which alone looked somewhatextravagant. And seeing that Dario was staring at her, the priestinquired her name, whereat the young Prince smiled. Oh! she was nobody, La Tonietta was the name that people gave her; she was one of the few/demi-mondaines/ that Roman society talked of. Then, with the freenessand frankness which his race displays in such matters, Dario added someparticulars. La Tonietta's origin was obscure; some said that she was thedaughter of an innkeeper of Tivoli, and others that of a Neapolitanbanker. At all events, she was very intelligent, had educated herself, and knew thoroughly well how to receive and entertain people at thelittle palazzo in the Via dei Mille, which had been given to her by oldMarquis Manfredi now deceased. She made no scandalous show, had but oneprotector at a time, and the princesses and duchesses who paid attentionto her at the Corso every afternoon, considered her nice-looking. Onepeculiarity had made her somewhat notorious. There was some one whom sheloved and from whom she never accepted aught but a bouquet of whiteroses; and folks would smile indulgently when at times for weeks togethershe was seen driving round the Pincio with those pure, white bridalflowers on the carriage seat. 

Dario, however, suddenly paused in his explanations to address aceremonious bow to a lady who, accompanied by a gentleman, drove by in alarge landau. Then he simply said to the priest: "My mother. "

Pierre already knew of her. Viscount de la Choue had told him her story, how, after Prince Onofrio Boccanera's death, she had married again, although she was already fifty; how at the Corso, just like some younggirl, she had hooked with her eyes a handsome man to her liking--one, too, who was fifteen years her junior. And Pierre also knew who that manwas, a certain Jules Laporte, an ex-sergeant of the papal Swiss Guard, anex-traveller in relics, compromised in an extraordinary "false relic"fraud; and he was further aware that Laporte's wife had made afine-looking Marquis Montefiori of him, the last of the fortunateadventurers of romance, triumphing as in the legendary lands whereshepherds are wedded to queens. 

At the next turn, as the large landau again went by, Pierre looked at thecouple. The Marchioness was really wonderful, blooming with all theclassical Roman beauty, tall, opulent, and very dark, with the head of agoddess and regular if somewhat massive features, nothing as yetbetraying her age except the down upon her upper lip. And the Marquis, the Romanised Swiss of Geneva, really had a proud bearing, with his solidsoldierly figure and long wavy moustaches. People said that he was in nowise a fool but, on the contrary, very gay and very supple, just the manto please women. His wife so gloried in him that she dragged him aboutand displayed him everywhere, having begun life afresh with him as if shewere still but twenty, spending on him the little fortune which she hadsaved from the Villa Montefiori disaster, and so completely forgettingher son that she only saw the latter now and again at the promenade andacknowledged his bow like that of some chance acquaintance. 

"Let us go to see the sun set behind St. Peter's, " all at once saidDario, conscientiously playing his part as a showman of curiosities. 

The victoria thereupon returned to the terrace, where a military band wasnow playing with a terrific blare of brass instruments. In order thattheir occupants might hear the music, a large number of carriages hadalready drawn up, and a growing crowd of loungers on foot had assembledthere. And from that beautiful terrace, so broad and lofty, one of themost wonderful views of Rome was offered to the gaze. Beyond the Tiber, beyond the pale chaos of the new district of the castle meadows, * andbetween the greenery of Monte Mario and the Janiculum arose St. Peter's. Then on the left came all the olden city, an endless stretch of roofs, arolling sea of edifices as far as the eye could reach. But one's glancesalways came back to St. Peter's, towering into the azure with pure andsovereign grandeur. And, seen from the terrace, the slow sunsets in thedepths of the vast sky behind the colossus were sublime. 

 * See /ante/ note on castle meadows. 

Sometimes there are topplings of sanguineous clouds, battles of giantshurling mountains at one another and succumbing beneath the monstrousruins of flaming cities. Sometimes only red streaks or fissures appear onthe surface of a sombre lake, as if a net of light has been flung to fishthe submerged orb from amidst the seaweed. Sometimes, too, there is arosy mist, a kind of delicate dust which falls, streaked with pearls by adistant shower, whose curtain is drawn across the mystery of the horizon. And sometimes there is a triumph, a /cortege/ of gold and purple chariotsof cloud rolling along a highway of fire, galleys floating upon an azuresea, fantastic and extravagant pomps slowly sinking into the less andless fathomable abyss of the twilight. 

But that night the sublime spectacle presented itself to Pierre with acalm, blinding, desperate grandeur. At first, just above the dome of St. Peter's, the sun, descending in a spotless, deeply limpid sky, proved yetso resplendent that one's eyes could not face its brightness. And in thisresplendency the dome seemed to be incandescent, you would have said adome of liquid silver; whilst the surrounding districts, the house-roofsof the Borgo, were as though changed into a lake of live embers. Then, asthe sun was by degrees inclined, it lost some of its blaze, and one couldlook; and soon afterwards sinking with majestic slowness it disappearedbehind the dome, which showed forth darkly blue, while the orb, nowentirely hidden, set an aureola around it, a glory like a crown offlaming rays. And then began the dream, the dazzling symbol, the singularillumination of the row of windows beneath the cupola which weretranspierced by the light and looked like the ruddy mouths of furnaces, in such wise that one might have imagined the dome to be poised upon abrazier, isolated, in the air, as though raised and upheld by theviolence of the fire. It all lasted barely three minutes. Down below thejumbled roofs of the Borgo became steeped in violet vapour, sank intoincreasing gloom, whilst from the Janiculum to Monte Mario the horizonshowed its firm black line. And it was the sky then which became allpurple and gold, displaying the infinite placidity of a supernaturalradiance above the earth which faded into nihility. Finally the lastwindow reflections were extinguished, the glow of the heavens departed, and nothing remained but the vague, fading roundness of the dome of St. Peter's amidst the all-invading night. 

And, by some subtle connection of ideas, Pierre at that moment once againsaw rising before him the lofty, sad, declining figures of CardinalBoccanera and old Orlando. On the evening of that day when he had learntto know them, one after the other, both so great in the obstinacy oftheir hope, they seemed to be there, erect on the horizon above theirannihilated city, on the fringe of the heavens which death apparently wasabout to seize. Was everything then to crumble with them? was everythingto fade away and disappear in the falling night following uponaccomplished Time?

V

ON the following day Narcisse Habert came in great worry to tell Pierrethat Monsignor Gamba del Zoppo complained of being unwell, and asked fora delay of two or three days before receiving the young priest andconsidering the matter of his audience. Pierre was thus reduced toinaction, for he dared not make any attempt elsewhere in view of seeingthe Pope. He had been so frightened by Nani and others that he feared hemight jeopardise everything by inconsiderate endeavours. And so he beganto visit Rome in order to occupy his leisure. 

His first visit was for the ruins of the Palatine. Going out alone oneclear morning at eight o'clock, he presented himself at the entrance inthe Via San Teodoro, an iron gateway flanked by the lodges of thekeepers. One of the latter at once offered his services, and thoughPierre would have preferred to roam at will, following the bent of hisdream, he somehow did not like to refuse the offer of this man, who spokeFrench very distinctly, and smiled in a very good-natured way. He was asquatly built little man, a former soldier, some sixty years of age, andhis square-cut, ruddy face was barred by thick white moustaches. 

"Then will you please follow me, Monsieur l'Abbe, " said he. "I can seethat you are French, Monsieur l'Abbe. I'm a Piedmontese myself, but Iknow the French well enough; I was with them at Solferino. Yes, yes, whatever people may say, one can't forget old friendships. Here, thisway, please, to the right. "

Raising his eyes, Pierre had just perceived the line of cypresses edgingthe plateau of the Palatine on the side of the Tiber; and in the delicateblue atmosphere the intense greenery of these trees showed like a blackfringe. They alone attracted the eye; the slope, of a dusty, dirty grey, stretched out bare and devastated, dotted by a few bushes, among whichpeeped fragments of ancient walls. All was instinct with the ravaged, leprous sadness of a spot handed over to excavation, and where only menof learning could wax enthusiastic. 

"The palaces of Tiberius, Caligula, and the Flavians are up above, "resumed the guide. "We must keep then for the end and go round. "Nevertheless he took a few steps to the left, and pausing before anexcavation, a sort of grotto in the hillside, exclaimed: "This is theLupercal den where the wolf suckled Romulus and Remus. Just here at theentry used to stand the Ruminal fig-tree which sheltered the twins. "

Pierre could not restrain a smile, so convinced was the tone in which theold soldier gave these explanations, proud as he was of all the ancientglory, and wont to regard the wildest legends as indisputable facts. However, when the worthy man pointed out some vestiges of RomaQuadrata--remnants of walls which really seemed to date from thefoundation of the city--Pierre began to feel interested, and a firsttouch of emotion made his heart beat. This emotion was certainly not dueto any beauty of scene, for he merely beheld a few courses of tufablocks, placed one upon the other and uncemented. But a past which hadbeen dead for seven and twenty centuries seemed to rise up before him, and those crumbling, blackened blocks, the foundation of such a mightyeclipse of power and splendour, acquired extraordinary majesty. 

Continuing their inspection, they went on, skirting the hillside. Theoutbuildings of the palaces must have descended to this point; fragmentsof porticoes, fallen beams, columns and friezes set up afresh, edged therugged path which wound through wild weeds, suggesting a neglectedcemetery; and the guide repeated the words which he had used day by dayfor ten years past, continuing to enunciate suppositions as facts, andgiving a name, a destination, a history, to every one of the fragments. 

"The house of Augustus, " he said at last, pointing towards some masses ofearth and rubbish. 

Thereupon Pierre, unable to distinguish anything, ventured to inquire:"Where do you mean?"

"Oh!" said the man, "it seems that the walls were still to be seen at theend of the last century. But it was entered from the other side, from theSacred Way. On this side there was a huge balcony which overlooked theCircus Maximus so that one could view the sports. However, as you cansee, the greater part of the palace is still buried under that big gardenup above, the garden of the Villa Mills. When there's money for freshexcavations it will be found again, together with the temple of Apolloand the shrine of Vesta which accompanied it. "

Turning to the left, he next entered the Stadium, the arena erected forfoot-racing, which stretched beside the palace of Augustus; and thepriest's interest was now once more awakened. It was not that he foundhimself in presence of well-preserved and monumental remains, for not acolumn had remained erect, and only the right-hand walls were stillstanding. But the entire plan of the building had been traced, with thegoals at either end, the porticus round the course, and the colossalimperial tribune which, after being on the left, annexed to the house ofAugustus, had afterwards opened on the right, fitting into the palace ofSeptimius Severus. And while Pierre looked on all the scattered remnants, his guide went on chattering, furnishing the most copious and preciseinformation, and declaring that the gentlemen who directed theexcavations had mentally reconstructed the Stadium in each and everyparticular, and were even preparing a most exact plan of it, showing allthe columns in their proper order and the statues in their niches, andeven specifying the divers sorts of marble which had covered the walls. 

"Oh! the directors are quite at ease, " the old soldier eventually addedwith an air of infinite satisfaction. "There will be nothing for theGermans to pounce on here. They won't be allowed to set thingstopsy-turvy as they did at the Forum, where everybody's at sea since theycame along with their wonderful science!"

Pierre--a Frenchman--smiled, and his interest increased when, by brokensteps and wooden bridges thrown over gaps, he followed the guide into thegreat ruins of the palace of Severus. Rising on the southern point of thePalatine, this palace had overlooked the Appian Way and the Campagna asfar as the eye could reach. Nowadays, almost the only remains are thesubstructures, the subterranean halls contrived under the arches of theterraces, by which the plateau of the hill was enlarged; and yet thesedismantled substructures suffice to give some idea of the triumphantpalace which they once upheld, so huge and powerful have they remained intheir indestructible massiveness. Near by arose the famous Septizonium, the tower with the seven tiers of arcades, which only finally disappearedin the sixteenth century. One of the palace terraces yet juts out uponcyclopean arches and from it the view is splendid. But all the rest is acommingling of massive yet crumbling walls, gaping depths whose ceilingshave fallen, endless corridors and vast halls of doubtful destination. Well cared for by the new administration, swept and cleansed of weeds, the ruins have lost their romantic wildness and assumed an aspect of bareand mournful grandeur. However, flashes of living sunlight often gild theancient walls, penetrate by their breaches into the black halls, andanimate with their dazzlement the mute melancholy of all this deadsplendour now exhumed from the earth in which it slumbered for centuries. Over the old ruddy masonry, stripped of its pompous marble covering, isthe purple mantle of the sunlight, draping the whole with imperial gloryonce more. 

For more than two hours already Pierre had been walking on, and yet hestill had to visit all the earlier palaces on the north and east of theplateau. "We must go back, " said the guide, "the gardens of the VillaMills and the convent of San Bonaventura stop the way. We shall only beable to pass on this side when the excavations have made a clearance. Ah!Monsieur l'Abbe, if you had walked over the Palatine merely some fiftyyears ago! I've seen some plans of that time. There were only somevineyards and little gardens with hedges then, a real campagna, where nota soul was to be met. And to think that all these palaces were sleepingunderneath!"

Pierre followed him, and after again passing the house of Augustus, theyascended the slope and reached the vast Flavian palace, * still halfburied by the neighbouring villa, and composed of a great number of hallslarge and small, on the nature of which scholars are still arguing. Theaula regia, or throne-room, the basilica, or hall of justice, thetriclinium, or dining-room, and the peristylium seem certainties; but forall the rest, and especially the small chambers of the private part ofthe structure, only more or less fanciful conjectures can be offered. Moreover, not a wall is entire; merely foundations peep out of theground, mutilated bases describing the plan of the edifice. The only ruinpreserved, as if by miracle, is the house on a lower level which someassert to have been that of Livia, * a house which seems very small besideall the huge palaces, and where are three halls comparatively intact, with mural paintings of mythological scenes, flowers, and fruits, stillwonderfully fresh. As for the palace of Tiberius, not one of its stonescan be seen; its remains lie buried beneath a lovely public garden;whilst of the neighbouring palace of Caligula, overhanging the Forum, there are only some huge substructures, akin to those of the house ofSeverus--buttresses, lofty arcades, which upheld the palace, vastbasements, so to say, where the praetorians were posted and gorgedthemselves with continual junketings. And thus this lofty plateaudominating the city merely offered some scarcely recognisable vestiges tothe view, stretches of grey, bare soil turned up by the pick, and dottedwith fragments of old walls; and it needed a real effort of scholarlyimagination to conjure up the ancient imperial splendour which once hadtriumphed there. 

 * Begun by Vespasian and finished by Domitian. --Trans. 

 ** Others assert it to have been the house of Germanicus, father of Caligula. --Trans. 

Nevertheless Pierre's guide, with quiet conviction, persisted in hisexplanations, pointing to empty space as though the edifices still rosebefore him. "Here, " said he, "we are in the Area Palatina. Yonder, yousee, is the facade of Domitian's palace, and there you have that ofCaligula's palace, while on turning round the temple of Jupiter Stator isin front of you. The Sacred Way came up as far as here, and passed underthe Porta Mugonia, one of the three gates of primitive Rome. "

He paused and pointed to the northwest portion of the height. "You willhave noticed, " he resumed, "that the Caesars didn't build yonder. Andthat was evidently because they had to respect some very ancientmonuments dating from before the foundation of the city and greatlyvenerated by the people. There stood the temple of Victory built byEvander and his Arcadians, the Lupercal grotto which I showed you, andthe humble hut of Romulus constructed of reeds and clay. Oh! everythinghas been found again, Monsieur l'Abbe; and, in spite of all that theGermans say there isn't the slightest doubt of it. "

Then, quite abruptly, like a man suddenly remembering the mostinteresting thing of all, he exclaimed: "Ah! to wind up we'll just go tosee the subterranean gallery where Caligula was murdered. "

Thereupon they descended into a long crypto-porticus, through thebreaches of which the sun now casts bright rays. Some ornaments of stuccoand fragments of mosaic-work are yet to be seen. Still the spot remainsmournful and desolate, well fitted for tragic horror. The old soldier'svoice had become graver as he related how Caligula, on returning from thePalatine games, had been minded to descend all alone into this gallery towitness certain sacred dances which some youths from Asia were practisingthere. And then it was that the gloom gave Cassius Chaereas, the chief ofthe conspirators, an opportunity to deal him the first thrust in theabdomen. Howling with pain, the emperor sought to flee; but theassassins, his creatures, his dearest friends, rushed upon him, threw himdown, and dealt him blow after blow, whilst he, mad with rage and fright, filled the dim, deaf gallery with the howling of a slaughtered beast. When he had expired, silence fell once more, and the frightened murderersfled. 

The classical visit to the Palatine was now over, and when Pierre came upinto the light again, he wished to rid himself of his guide and remainalone in the pleasant, dreamy garden on the summit of the height. Forthree hours he had been tramping about with the guide's voice buzzing inhis ears. The worthy man was now talking of his friendship for France andrelating the battle of Magenta in great detail. He smiled as he took thepiece of silver which Pierre offered him, and then started on the battleof Solferino. Indeed, it seemed impossible to stop him, when fortunatelya lady came up to ask for some information. And, thereupon, he went offwith her. "Good-evening, Monsieur l'Abbe, " he said; "you can go down byway of Caligula's palace. "

Delightful was Pierre's relief when he was at last able to rest for amoment on one of the marble seats in the garden. There were but fewclumps of trees, cypresses, box-trees, palms, and some fine evergreenoaks; but the latter, sheltering the seat, cast a dark shade of exquisitefreshness around. The charm of the spot was also largely due to itsdreamy solitude, to the low rustle which seemed to come from that ancientsoil saturated with resounding history. Here formerly had been thepleasure grounds of the Villa Farnese which still exists though greatlydamaged, and the grace of the Renascence seems to linger here, its breathpassing caressingly through the shiny foliage of the old evergreen oaks. You are, as it were, enveloped by the soul of the past, an etherealconglomeration of visions, and overhead is wafted the straying breath ofinnumerable generations buried beneath the sod. 

After a time, however, Pierre could no longer remain seated, so powerfulwas the attraction of Rome, scattered all around that august summit. Sohe rose and approached the balustrade of a terrace; and beneath himappeared the Forum, and beyond it the Capitoline hill. To the eye thelatter now only presented a commingling of grey buildings, lacking bothgrandeur and beauty. On the summit one saw the rear of the Palace of theSenator, flat, with little windows, and surmounted by a high, squarecampanile. The large, bare, rusty-looking walls hid the church of SantaMaria in Ara Coeli and the spot where the temple of Capitoline Jove hadformerly stood, radiant in all its royalty. On the left, some ugly housesrose terrace-wise upon the slope of Monte Caprino, where goats werepastured in the middle ages; while the few fine trees in the grounds ofthe Caffarelli palace, the present German embassy, set some greeneryabove the ancient Tarpeian rock now scarcely to be found, lost, hidden asit is, by buttress walls. Yet this was the Mount of the Capitol, the mostglorious of the seven hills, with its citadel and its temple, the templeto which universal dominion was promised, the St. Peter's of pagan Rome;this indeed was the hill--steep on the side of the Forum, and a precipiceon that of the Campus Martius--where the thunder of Jupiter fell, wherein the dimmest of the far-off ages the Asylum of Romulus rose with itssacred oaks, a spot of infinite savage mystery. Here, later, werepreserved the public documents of Roman grandeur inscribed on tablets ofbrass; hither climbed the heroes of the triumphs; and here the emperorsbecame gods, erect in statues of marble. And nowadays the eye inquireswonderingly how so much history and so much glory can have had for theirscene so small a space, such a rugged, jumbled pile of paltry buildings, a mole-hill, looking no bigger, no loftier than a hamlet perched betweentwo valleys. 

Then another surprise for Pierre was the Forum, starting from the Capitoland stretching out below the Palatine: a narrow square, close pressed bythe neighbouring hills, a hollow where Rome in growing had been compelledto rear edifice close to edifice till all stifled for lack of breathingspace. It was necessary to dig very deep--some fifty feet--to find thevenerable republican soil, and now all you see is a long, clean, lividtrench, cleared of ivy and bramble, where the fragments of paving, thebases of columns, and the piles of foundations appear like bits of bone. Level with the ground the Basilica Julia, entirely mapped out, looks likean architect's ground plan. On that side the arch of Septimius Severusalone rears itself aloft, virtually intact, whilst of the temple ofVespasian only a few isolated columns remain still standing, as if bymiracle, amidst the general downfall, soaring with a proud elegance, withsovereign audacity of equilibrium, so slender and so gilded, into theblue heavens. The column of Phocas is also erect; and you see someportions of the Rostra fitted together out of fragments discovered nearby. But if the eye seeks a sensation of extraordinary vastness, it musttravel beyond the three columns of the temple of Castor and Pollux, beyond the vestiges of the house of the Vestals, beyond the temple ofFaustina, in which the Christian Church of San Lorenzo has so composedlyinstalled itself, and even beyond the round temple of Romulus, to lightupon the Basilica of Constantine with its three colossal, gapingarchways. From the Palatine they look like porches built for a nation ofgiants, so massive that a fallen fragment resembles some huge rock hurledby a whirlwind from a mountain summit. And there, in that illustrious, narrow, overflowing Forum the history of the greatest of nations held forcenturies, from the legendary time of the Sabine women, reconciling theirrelatives and their ravishers, to that of the proclamation of publicliberty, so slowly wrung from the patricians by the plebeians. Was notthe Forum at once the market, the exchange, the tribunal, the open-airhall of public meeting? The Gracchi there defended the cause of thehumble; Sylla there set up the lists of those whom he proscribed; Cicerothere spoke, and there, against the rostra, his bleeding head was hung. Then, under the emperors, the old renown was dimmed, the centuries buriedthe monuments and temples with such piles of dust that all that themiddle ages could do was to turn the spot into a cattle market! Respecthas come back once more, a respect which violates tombs, which is full offeverish curiosity and science, which is dissatisfied with merehypotheses, which loses itself amidst this historical soil wheregenerations rise one above the other, and hesitates between the fifteenor twenty restorations of the Forum that have been planned on paper, eachof them as plausible as the other. But to the mere passer-by, who is nota professional scholar and has not recently re-perused the history ofRome, the details have no significance. All he sees on this searched andscoured spot is a city's cemetery where old exhumed stones are whitening, and whence rises the intense sadness that envelops dead nations. Pierre, however, noting here and there fragments of the Sacred Way, now turning, now running down, and now ascending with their pavement of silex indentedby the chariot-wheels, thought of the triumphs, of the ascent of thetriumpher, so sorely shaken as his chariot jolted over that roughpavement of glory. 

But the horizon expanded towards the southeast, and beyond the arches ofTitus and Constantine he perceived the Colosseum. Ah! that colossus, onlyone-half or so of which has been destroyed by time as with the stroke ofa mighty scythe, it rises in its enormity and majesty like a stonelace-work with hundreds of empty bays agape against the blue of heaven!There is a world of halls, stairs, landings, and passages, a world whereone loses oneself amidst death-like silence and solitude. The furrowedtiers of seats, eaten into by the atmosphere, are like shapeless stepsleading down into some old extinct crater, some natural circus excavatedby the force of the elements in indestructible rock. The hot suns ofeighteen hundred years have baked and scorched this ruin, which hasreverted to a state of nature, bare and golden-brown like amountain-side, since it has been stripped of its vegetation, the florawhich once made it like a virgin forest. And what an evocation when themind sets flesh and blood and life again on all that dead osseousframework, fills the circus with the 90, 000 spectators which it couldhold, marshals the games and the combats of the arena, gathers a wholecivilisation together, from the emperor and the dignitaries to thesurging plebeian sea, all aglow with the agitation and brilliancy of animpassioned people, assembled under the ruddy reflection of the giantpurple velum. And then, yet further, on the horizon, were other cyclopeanruins, the baths of Caracalla, standing there like relics of a race ofgiants long since vanished from the world: halls extravagantly andinexplicably spacious and lofty; vestibules large enough for an entirepopulation; a /frigidarium/ where five hundred people could swimtogether; a /tepidarium/ and a /calidarium/* on the same proportions, born of a wild craving for the huge; and then the terrific massiveness ofthe structures, the thickness of the piles of brick-work, such as nofeudal castle ever knew; and, in addition, the general immensity whichmakes passing visitors look like lost ants; such an extraordinary riot ofthe great and the mighty that one wonders for what men, for whatmultitudes, this monstrous edifice was reared. To-day, you would say amass of rocks in the rough, thrown from some height for building theabode of Titans. 

 * Tepidarium, warm bath; calidarium, vapour bath. --Trans. 

And as Pierre gazed, he became more and more immersed in the limitlesspast which encompassed him. On all sides history rose up like a surgingsea. Those bluey plains on the north and west were ancient Etruria; thosejagged crests on the east were the Sabine Mountains; while southward, theAlban Mountains and Latium spread out in the streaming gold of thesunshine. Alba Longa was there, and so was Monte Cavo, with its crown ofold trees, and the convent which has taken the place of the ancienttemple of Jupiter. Then beyond the Forum, beyond the Capitol, the greaterpart of Rome stretched out, whilst behind Pierre, on the margin of theTiber, was the Janiculum. And a voice seemed to come from the whole city, a voice which told him of Rome's eternal life, resplendent with pastgreatness. He remembered just enough of what he had been taught at schoolto realise where he was; he knew just what every one knows of Rome withno pretension to scholarship, and it was more particularly his artistictemperament which awoke within him and gathered warmth from the flame ofmemory. The present had disappeared, and the ocean of the past was stillrising, buoying him up, carrying him away. 

And then his mind involuntarily pictured a resurrection instinct withlife. The grey, dismal Palatine, razed like some accursed city, suddenlybecame animated, peopled, crowned with palaces and temples. There hadbeen the cradle of the Eternal City, founded by Romulus on that summitoverlooking the Tiber. There assuredly the seven kings of its two and ahalf centuries of monarchical rule had dwelt, enclosed within high, strong walls, which had but three gateways. Then the five centuries ofrepublican sway spread out, the greatest, the most glorious of all thecenturies, those which brought the Italic peninsula and finally the knownworld under Roman dominion. During those victorious years of social andwar-like struggle, Rome grew and peopled the seven hills, and thePalatine became but a venerable cradle with legendary temples, and waseven gradually invaded by private residences. But at last Caesar, theincarnation of the power of his race, after Gaul and after Pharsaliatriumphed in the name of the whole Roman people, having completed thecolossal task by which the five following centuries of imperialism wereto profit, with a pompous splendour and a rush of every appetite. Andthen Augustus could ascend to power; glory had reached its climax;millions of gold were waiting to be filched from the depths of theprovinces; and the imperial gala was to begin in the world's capital, before the eyes of the dazzled and subjected nations. Augustus had beenborn on the Palatine, and after Actium had given him the empire, he sethis pride in reigning from the summit of that sacred mount, venerated bythe people. He bought up private houses and there built his palace withluxurious splendour: an atrium upheld by four pilasters and eightcolumns; a peristylium encompassed by fifty-six Ionic columns; privateapartments all around, and all in marble; a profusion of marble, broughtat great cost from foreign lands, and of the brightest hues, resplendentlike gems. And he lodged himself with the gods, building near his ownabode a large temple of Apollo and a shrine of Vesta in order to ensurehimself divine and eternal sovereignty. And then the seed of the imperialpalaces was sown; they were to spring up, grow and swarm, and cover theentire mount. 

Ah! the all-powerfulness of Augustus, his four and forty years of total, absolute, superhuman power, such as no despot has known even in hisdreams! He had taken to himself every title, united every magistracy inhis person. Imperator and consul, he commanded the armies and exercisedexecutive power; pro-consul, he was supreme in the provinces; perpetualcensor and princeps, he reigned over the senate; tribune, he was themaster of the people. And, formerly called Octavius, he had causedhimself to be declared Augustus, sacred, god among men, having histemples and his priests, worshipped in his lifetime like a divinitydeigning to visit the earth. And finally he had resolved to be supremepontiff, annexing religious to civil power, and thus by a stroke ofgenius attaining to the most complete dominion to which man can climb. Asthe supreme pontiff could not reside in a private house, he declared hisabode to be State property. As the supreme pontiff could not leave thevicinity of the temple of Vesta, he built a temple to that goddess nearhis own dwelling, leaving the guardianship of the ancient altar below thePalatine to the Vestal virgins. He spared no effort, for he well realisedthat human omnipotence, the mastery of mankind and the world, lay in thatreunion of sovereignty, in being both king and priest, emperor and pope. All the sap of a mighty race, all the victories achieved, and all thefavours of fortune yet to be garnered, blossomed forth in Augustus, in aunique splendour which was never again to shed such brilliant radiance. He was really the master of the world, amidst the conquered and pacifiednations, encompassed by immortal glory in literature and in art. In himwould seem to have been satisfied the old intense ambition of his people, the ambition which it had pursued through centuries of patient conquest, to become the people-king. The blood of Rome, the blood of Augustus, atlast coruscated in the sunlight, in the purple of empire. And the bloodof Augustus, of the divine, triumphant, absolute sovereign of bodies andsouls, of the man in whom seven centuries of national pride hadculminated, was to descend through the ages, through an innumerableposterity with a heritage of boundless pride and ambition. For it wasfatal: the blood of Augustus was bound to spring into life once more andpulsate in the veins of all the successive masters of Rome, ever hauntingthem with the dream of ruling the whole world. And later on, after thedecline and fall, when power had once more become divided between theking and the priest, the popes--their hearts burning with the red, devouring blood of their great forerunner--had no other passion, no otherpolicy, through the centuries, than that of attaining to civil dominion, to the totality of human power. 

But Augustus being dead, his palace having been closed and consecrated, Pierre saw that of Tiberius spring up from the soil. It had stood wherehis feet now rested, where the beautiful evergreen oaks sheltered him. Hepictured it with courts, porticoes, and halls, both substantial andgrand, despite the gloomy bent of the emperor who betook himself far fromRome to live amongst informers and debauchees, with his heart and brainpoisoned by power to the point of crime and most extraordinary insanity. Then the palace of Caligula followed, an enlargement of that of Tiberius, with arcades set up to increase its extent, and a bridge thrown over theForum to the Capitol, in order that the prince might go thither at hisease to converse with Jove, whose son he claimed to be. And sovereigntyalso rendered this one ferocious--a madman with omnipotence to do as helisted! Then, after Claudius, Nero, not finding the Palatine largeenough, seized upon the delightful gardens climbing the Esquiline inorder to set up his Golden House, a dream of sumptuous immensity which hecould not complete and the ruins of which disappeared in the troublesfollowing the death of this monster whom pride demented. Next, ineighteen months, Galba, Otho, and Vitellius fell one upon the other, inmire and in blood, the purple converting them also into imbeciles andmonsters, gorged like unclean beasts at the trough of imperial enjoyment. And afterwards came the Flavians, at first a respite, with commonsenseand human kindness: Vespasian; next Titus, who built but little on thePalatine; but then Domitian, in whom the sombre madness of omnipotenceburst forth anew amidst a /regime/ of fear and spying, idiotic atrocitiesand crimes, debauchery contrary to nature, and building enterprises bornof insane vanity instinct with a desire to outvie the temples of thegods. The palace of Domitian, parted by a lane from that of Tiberius, arose colossal-like--a palace of fairyland. There was the hall ofaudience, with its throne of gold, its sixteen columns of Phrygian andNumidian marble and its eight niches containing colossal statues; therewere the hall of justice, the vast dining-room, the peristylium, thesleeping apartments, where granite, porphyry, and alabaster overflowed, carved and decorated by the most famous artists, and lavished on allsides in order to dazzle the world. And finally, many years later, a lastpalace was added to all the others--that of Septimius Severus: again abuilding of pride, with arches supporting lofty halls, terraced storeys, towers o'er-topping the roofs, a perfect Babylonian pile, rising up atthe extreme point of the mount in view of the Appian Way, so that theemperor's compatriots--those from the province of Africa, where he wasborn--might, on reaching the horizon, marvel at his fortune and worshiphim in his glory. 

And now Pierre beheld all those palaces which he had conjured up aroundhim, resuscitated, resplendent in the full sunlight. They were as iflinked together, parted merely by the narrowest of passages. In orderthat not an inch of that precious summit might be lost, they had sproutedthickly like the monstrous florescence of strength, power, and unbridledpride which satisfied itself at the cost of millions, bleeding the wholeworld for the enjoyment of one man. And in truth there was but one palacealtogether, a palace enlarged as soon as one emperor died and was placedamong the deities, and another, shunning the consecrated pile wherepossibly the shadow of death frightened him, experienced an imperiousneed to build a house of his own and perpetuate in everlasting stone thememory of his reign. All the emperors were seized with this buildingcraze; it was like a disease which the very throne seemed to carry fromone occupant to another with growing intensity, a consuming desire toexcel all predecessors by thicker and higher walls, by a more and morewonderful profusion of marbles, columns, and statues. And among all theseprinces there was the idea of a glorious survival, of leaving a testimonyof their greatness to dazzled and stupefied generations, of perpetuatingthemselves by marvels which would not perish but for ever weigh heavilyupon the earth, when their own light ashes should long since have beenswept away by the winds. And thus the Palatine became but the venerablebase of a monstrous edifice, a thick vegetation of adjoining buildings, each new pile being like a fresh eruption of feverish pride; while thewhole, now showing the snowy brightness of white marble and now theglowing hues of coloured marble, ended by crowning Rome and the worldwith the most extraordinary and most insolent abode of sovereignty--whether palace, temple, basilica, or cathedral--that omnipotence anddominion have ever reared under the heavens. 

But death lurked beneath this excess of strength and glory. Seven hundredand thirty years of monarchy and republic had sufficed to make Romegreat; and in five centuries of imperial sway the people-king was to bedevoured down to its last muscles. There was the immensity of theterritory, the more distant provinces gradually pillaged and exhausted;there was the fisc consuming everything, digging the pit of fatalbankruptcy; and there was the degeneration of the people, poisoned by thescenes of the circus and the arena, fallen to the sloth and debauchery oftheir masters, the Caesars, while mercenaries fought the foe and tilledthe soil. Already at the time of Constantine, Rome had a rival, Byzantium; disruption followed with Honorius; and then some ten emperorssufficed for decomposition to be complete, for the bones of the dyingprey to be picked clean, the end coming with Romulus Augustulus, thesorry creature whose name is, so to say, a mockery of the whole glorioushistory, a buffet for both the founder of Rome and the founder of theempire. 

The palaces, the colossal assemblage of walls, storeys, terraces, andgaping roofs, still remained on the deserted Palatine; many ornaments andstatues, however, had already been removed to Byzantium. And the empire, having become Christian, had afterwards closed the temples andextinguished the fire of Vesta, whilst yet respecting the ancientPalladium. But in the fifth century the barbarians rush upon Rome, sackand burn it, and carry the spoils spared by the flames away in theirchariots. As long as the city was dependent on Byzantium a custodian ofthe imperial palaces remained there watching over the Palatine. Then allfades and crumbles in the night of the middle ages. It would really seemthat the popes then slowly took the place of the Caesars, succeeding themboth in their abandoned marble halls and their ever-subsisting passionfor domination. Some of them assuredly dwelt in the palace of SeptimiusSeverus; a council of the Church was held in the Septizonium; and, lateron, Gelasius II was elected in a neighbouring monastery on the sacredmount. It was as if Augustus were again rising from the tomb, once moremaster of the world, with a Sacred College of Cardinals resuscitating theRoman Senate. In the twelfth century the Septizonium belonged to someBenedictine monks, and was sold by them to the powerful Frangipanifamily, who fortified it as they had already fortified the Colosseum andthe arches of Constantine and Titus, thus forming a vast fortress roundabout the venerable cradle of the city. And the violent deeds of civilwar and the ravages of invasion swept by like whirlwinds, throwing downthe walls, razing the palaces and towers. And afterwards successivegenerations invaded the ruins, installed themselves in them by right oftrover and conquest, turned them into cellars, store-places for forage, and stables for mules. Kitchen gardens were formed, vines were planted onthe spots where fallen soil had covered the mosaics of the imperialhalls. All around nettles and brambles grew up, and ivy preyed on theoverturned porticoes, till there came a day when the colossal assemblageof palaces and temples, which marble was to have rendered eternal, seemedto dive beneath the dust, to disappear under the surging soil andvegetation which impassive Nature threw over it. And then, in the hotsunlight, among the wild flowerets, only big, buzzing flies remained, whilst herds of goats strayed in freedom through the throne-room ofDomitian and the fallen sanctuary of Apollo. 

A great shudder passed through Pierre. To think of so much strength, pride, and grandeur, and such rapid ruin--a world for ever swept away! Hewondered how entire palaces, yet peopled by admirable statuary, couldthus have been gradually buried without any one thinking of protectingthem. It was no sudden catastrophe which had swallowed up thosemasterpieces, subsequently to be disinterred with exclamations ofadmiring wonder; they had been drowned, as it were--caught progressivelyby the legs, the waist, and the neck, till at last the head had sunkbeneath the rising tide. And how could one explain that generations hadheedlessly witnessed such things without thought of putting forth ahelping hand? It would seem as if, at a given moment, a black curtainwere suddenly drawn across the world, as if mankind began afresh, with anew and empty brain which needed moulding and furnishing. Rome had becomedepopulated; men ceased to repair the ruins left by fire and sword; theedifices which by their very immensity had become useless were utterlyneglected, allowed to crumble and fall. And then, too, the new religioneverywhere hunted down the old one, stole its temples, overturned itsgods. Earthly deposits probably completed the disaster--there were, it issaid, both earthquakes and inundations--and the soil was ever rising, thealluvia of the young Christian world buried the ancient pagan society. And after the pillaging of the temples, the theft of the bronze roofs andmarble columns, the climax came with the filching of the stones torn fromthe Colosseum and the Theatre of Marcellus, with the pounding of thestatuary and sculpture-work, thrown into kilns to procure the lime neededfor the new monuments of Catholic Rome. 

It was nearly one o'clock, and Pierre awoke as from a dream. The sun-rayswere streaming in a golden rain between the shiny leaves of theever-green oaks above him, and down below Rome lay dozing, overcome bythe great heat. Then he made up his mind to leave the garden, and wentstumbling over the rough pavement of the Clivus Victoriae, his mind stillhaunted by blinding visions. To complete his day, he had resolved tovisit the old Appian Way during the afternoon, and, unwilling to returnto the Via Giulia, he lunched at a suburban tavern, in a large, dim room, where, alone with the buzzing flies, he lingered for more than two hours, awaiting the sinking of the sun. 

Ah! that Appian Way, that ancient queen of the high roads, crossing theCampagna in a long straight line with rows of proud tombs on eitherhand--to Pierre it seemed like a triumphant prolongation of the Palatine. He there found the same passion for splendour and domination, the samecraving to eternise the memory of Roman greatness in marble and daylight. Oblivion was vanquished; the dead refused to rest, and remained for evererect among the living, on either side of that road which was traversedby multitudes from the entire world. The deified images of those who werenow but dust still gazed on the passers-by with empty eyes; theinscriptions still spoke, proclaiming names and titles. In former timesthe rows of sepulchres must have extended without interruption along allthe straight, level miles between the tomb of Caecilia Metella and thatof Casale Rotondo, forming an elongated cemetery where the powerful andwealthy competed as to who should leave the most colossal and lavishlydecorated mausoleum: such, indeed, was the craving for survival, thepassion for pompous immortality, the desire to deify death by lodging itin temples; whereof the present-day monumental splendour of the GenoeseCampo Santo and the Roman Campo Verano is, so to say, a remoteinheritance. And what a vision it was to picture all the tremendous tombson the right and left of the glorious pavement which the legions trod ontheir return from the conquest of the world! That tomb of CaeciliaMetella, with its bond-stones so huge, its walls so thick that the middleages transformed it into the battlemented keep of a fortress! And thenall the tombs which follow, the modern structures erected in order thatthe marble fragments discovered might be set in place, the old blocks ofbrick and concrete, despoiled of their sculptured-work and rising up likeseared rocks, yet still suggesting their original shapes as shrines, /cippi/, and /sarcophagi/. There is a wondrous succession of high reliefsfiguring the dead in groups of three and five; statues in which the deadlive deified, erect; seats contrived in niches in order that wayfarersmay rest and bless the hospitality of the dead; laudatory epitaphscelebrating the dead, both the known and the unknown, the children ofSextius Pompeius Justus, the departed Marcus Servilius Quartus, HilariusFuscus, Rabirius Hermodorus; without counting the sepulchres venturouslyascribed to Seneca and the Horatii and Curiatii. And finally there is themost extraordinary and gigantic of all the tombs, that known as CasaleRotondo, which is so large that it has been possible to establish afarmhouse and an olive garden on its substructures, which formerly uphelda double rotunda, adorned with Corinthian pilasters, large candelabra, and scenic masks. *

 * Some believe this tomb to have been that of Messalla Corvinus, the historian and poet, a friend of Augustus and Horace; others ascribe it to his son, Aurelius Messallinus Cotta. --Trans. 

Pierre, having driven in a cab as far as the tomb of Caecilia Metella, continued his excursion on foot, going slowly towards Casale Rotondo. Inmany places the old pavement appears--large blocks of basaltic lava, worninto deep ruts that jolt the best-hung vehicles. Among the ruined tombson either hand run bands of grass, the neglected grass of cemeteries, scorched by the summer suns and sprinkled with big violet thistles andtall sulphur-wort. Parapets of dry stones, breast high, enclose therusset roadsides, which resound with the crepitation of grasshoppers;and, beyond, the Campagna stretches, vast and bare, as far as the eye cansee. A parasol pine, a eucalyptus, some olive or fig trees, white withdust, alone rise up near the road at infrequent intervals. On the leftthe ruddy arches of the Acqua Claudia show vigorously in the meadows, andstretches of poorly cultivated land, vineyards, and little farms, extendto the blue and lilac Sabine and Alban hills, where Frascati, Rocca diPapa, and Albano set bright spots, which grow and whiten as one getsnearer to them. Then, on the right, towards the sea, the houseless, treeless plain grows and spreads with vast, broad ripples, extraordinaryocean-like simplicity and grandeur, a long, straight line alone partingit from the sky. At the height of summer all burns and flares on thislimitless prairie, then of a ruddy gold; but in September a green tingebegins to suffuse the ocean of herbage, which dies away in the pink andmauve and vivid blue of the fine sunsets. 

As Pierre, quite alone and in a dreary mood, slowly paced the endless, flat highway, that resurrection of the past which he had beheld on thePalatine again confronted his mind's eye. On either hand the tombs oncemore rose up intact, with marble of dazzling whiteness. Had not the headof a colossal statue been found, mingled with fragments of huge sphinxes, at the foot of yonder vase-shaped mass of bricks? He seemed to see theentire colossal statue standing again between the huge, crouching beasts. Farther on a beautiful headless statue of a woman had been discovered inthe cella of a sepulchre, and he beheld it, again whole, with featuresexpressive of grace and strength smiling upon life. The inscriptions alsobecame perfect; he could read and understand them at a glance, as ifliving among those dead ones of two thousand years ago. And the road, too, became peopled: the chariots thundered, the armies tramped along, the people of Rome jostled him with the feverish agitation of greatcommunities. It was a return of the times of the Flavians or theAntonines, the palmy years of the empire, when the pomp of the AppianWay, with its grand sepulchres, carved and adorned like temples, attainedits apogee. What a monumental Street of Death, what an approach to Rome, that highway, straight as an arrow, where with the extraordinary pomp oftheir pride, which had survived their dust, the great dead greeted thetraveller, ushered him into the presence of the living! He may well havewondered among what sovereign people, what masters of the world, he wasabout to find himself--a nation which had committed to its dead the dutyof telling strangers that it allowed nothing whatever to perish--that itsdead, like its city, remained eternal and glorious in monuments ofextraordinary vastness! To think of it--the foundations of a fortress, and a tower sixty feet in diameter, that one woman might be laid to rest!And then, far away, at the end of the superb, dazzling highway, borderedwith the marble of its funereal palaces, Pierre, turning round, distinctly beheld the Palatine, with the marble of its imperialpalaces--the huge assemblage of palaces whose omnipotence had dominatedthe world!

But suddenly he started: two carabiniers had just appeared among theruins. The spot was not safe; the authorities watched over tourists evenin broad daylight. And later on came another meeting which caused himsome emotion. He perceived an ecclesiastic, a tall old man, in a blackcassock, edged and girt with red; and was surprised to recognise CardinalBoccanera, who had quitted the roadway, and was slowly strolling alongthe band of grass, among the tall thistles and sulphur-wort. With hishead lowered and his feet brushing against the fragments of the tombs, the Cardinal did not even see Pierre. The young priest courteously turnedaside, surprised to find him so far from home and alone. Then, onperceiving a heavy coach, drawn by two black horses, behind a building, he understood matters. A footman in black livery was waiting motionlessbeside the carriage, and the coachman had not quitted his box. And Pierreremembered that the Cardinals were not expected to walk in Rome, so thatthey were compelled to drive into the country when they desired to takeexercise. But what haughty sadness, what solitary and, so to say, ostracised grandeur there was about that tall, thoughtful old man, thusforced to seek the desert, and wander among the tombs, in order tobreathe a little of the evening air!

Pierre had lingered there for long hours; the twilight was coming on, andonce again he witnessed a lovely sunset. On his left the Campagna becameblurred, and assumed a slaty hue, against which the yellowish arcades ofthe aqueduct showed very plainly, while the Alban hills, far away, fadedinto pink. Then, on the right, towards the sea, the planet sank among anumber of cloudlets, figuring an archipelago of gold in an ocean of dyingembers. And excepting the sapphire sky, studded with rubies, above theendless line of the Campagna, which was likewise changed into a sparklinglake, the dull green of the herbage turning to a liquid emerald tint, there was nothing to be seen, neither a hillock nor a flock--nothing, indeed, but Cardinal Boccanera's black figure, erect among the tombs, andlooking, as it were, enlarged as it stood out against the last purpleflush of the sunset. 

Early on the following morning Pierre, eager to see everything, returnedto the Appian Way in order to visit the catacomb of St. Calixtus, themost extensive and remarkable of the old Christian cemeteries, and one, too, where several of the early popes were buried. You ascend through ascorched garden, past olives and cypresses, reach a shanty of boards andplaster in which a little trade in "articles of piety" is carried on, andthere a modern and fairly easy flight of steps enables you to descend. Pierre fortunately found there some French Trappists, who guard thesecatacombs and show them to strangers. One brother was on the point ofgoing down with two French ladies, the mother and daughter, the formerstill comely and the other radiant with youth. They stood there smiling, though already slightly frightened, while the monk lighted some long, slim candles. He was a man with a bossy brow, the large, massive jaw ofan obstinate believer and pale eyes bespeaking an ingenuous soul. 

"Ah! Monsieur l'Abbe, " he said to Pierre, "you've come just in time. Ifthe ladies are willing, you had better come with us; for three Brothersare already below with people, and you would have a long time to wait. This is the great season for visitors. "

The ladies politely nodded, and the Trappist handed a candle to thepriest. In all probability neither mother nor daughter was devout, forboth glanced askance at their new companion's cassock, and suddenlybecame serious. Then they all went down and found themselves in a narrowsubterranean corridor. "Take care, mesdames, " repeated the Trappist, lighting the ground with his candle. "Walk slowly, for there areprojections and slopes. "

Then, in a shrill voice full of extraordinary conviction, he began hisexplanations. Pierre had descended in silence, his heart beating withemotion. Ah! how many times, indeed, in his innocent seminary days, hadhe not dreamt of those catacombs of the early Christians, those asylumsof the primitive faith! Even recently, while writing his book, he hadoften thought of them as of the most ancient and venerable remains ofthat community of the lowly and simple, for the return of which hecalled. But his brain was full of pages written by poets and great prosewriters. He had beheld the catacombs through the magnifying glass ofthose imaginative authors, and had believed them to be vast, similar tosubterranean cities, with broad highways and spacious halls, fit for theaccommodation of vast crowds. And now how poor and humble the reality!

"Well, yes, " said the Trappist in reply to the ladies' questions, "thecorridor is scarcely more than a yard in width; two persons could notpass along side by side. How they dug it? Oh! it was simple enough. Afamily or a burial association needed a place of sepulchre. Well, a firstgallery was excavated with pickaxes in soil of this description--granulartufa, as it is called--a reddish substance, as you can see, both soft andyet resistant, easy to work and at the same time waterproof. In a word, just the substance that was needed, and one, too, that has preserved theremains of the buried in a wonderful way. " He paused and brought theflamelet of his candle near to the compartments excavated on either handof the passage. "Look, " he continued, "these are the /loculi/. Well, asubterranean gallery was dug, and on both sides these compartments werehollowed out, one above the other. The bodies of the dead were laid inthem, for the most part simply wrapped in shrouds. Then the aperture wasclosed with tiles or marble slabs, carefully cemented. So, as you cansee, everything explains itself. If other families joined the first one, or the burial association became more numerous, fresh galleries wereadded to those already filled. Passages were excavated on either hand, inevery sense; and, indeed, a second and lower storey, at times even athird, was dug out. And here, you see, we are in a gallery which iscertainly thirteen feet high. Now, you may wonder how they raised thebodies to place them in the compartments of the top tier. Well, they didnot raise them to any such height; in all their work they kept on goinglower and lower, removing more and more of the soil as the compartmentsbecame filled. And in this wise, in these catacombs of St. Calixtus, inless than four centuries, the Christians excavated more than ten miles ofgalleries, in which more than a million of their dead must have been laidto rest. Now, there are dozens of catacombs; the environs of Rome arehoneycombed with them. Think of that, and perhaps you will be able toform some idea of the vast number of people who were buried in thismanner. "

Pierre listened, feeling greatly impressed. He had once visited a coalpit in Belgium, and he here found the same narrow passages, the sameheavy, stifling atmosphere, the same nihility of darkness and silence. The flamelets of the candles showed merely like stars in the deep gloom;they shed no radiance around. And he at last understood the character ofthis funereal, termite-like labour--these chance burrowings continuedaccording to requirements, without art, method, or symmetry. The ruggedsoil was ever ascending and descending, the sides of the gallery snaked:neither plumb-line nor square had been used. All this, indeed, had simplybeen a work of charity and necessity, wrought by simple, willinggrave-diggers, illiterate craftsmen, with the clumsy handiwork of thedecline and fall. Proof thereof was furnished by the inscriptions andemblems on the marble slabs. They reminded one of the childish drawingswhich street urchins scrawl upon blank walls. 

"You see, " the Trappist continued, "most frequently there is merely aname; and sometimes there is no name, but simply the words /In Pace/. Atother times there is an emblem, the dove of purity, the palm ofmartyrdom, or else the fish whose name in Greek is composed of fiveletters which, as initials, signify: 'Jesus Christ, Son of God, Saviour. '"

He again brought his candle near to the marble slabs, and the palm couldbe distinguished: a central stroke, whence started a few oblique lines;and then came the dove or the fish, roughly outlined, a zigzag indicatinga tail, two bars representing the bird's feet, while a round pointsimulated an eye. And the letters of the short inscriptions were allaskew, of various sizes, often quite misshapen, as in the coarsehandwriting of the ignorant and simple. 

However, they reached a crypt, a sort of little hall, where the graves ofseveral popes had been found; among others that of Sixtus II, a holymartyr, in whose honour there was a superbly engraved metricalinscription set up by Pope Damasus. Then, in another hall, a family vaultof much the same size, decorated at a later stage, with naive muralpaintings, the spot where St. Cecilia's body had been discovered wasshown. And the explanations continued. The Trappist dilated on thepaintings, drawing from them a confirmation of every dogma and belief, baptism, the Eucharist, the resurrection, Lazarus arising from the tomb, Jonas cast up by the whale, Daniel in the lions' den, Moses drawing waterfrom the rock, and Christ--shown beardless, as was the practice in theearly ages--accomplishing His various miracles. 

"You see, " repeated the Trappist, "all those things are shown there; andremember that none of the paintings was specially prepared: they areabsolutely authentic. "

At a question from Pierre, whose astonishment was increasing, he admittedthat the catacombs had been mere cemeteries at the outset, when noreligious ceremonies had been celebrated in them. It was only later, inthe fourth century, when the martyrs were honoured, that the crypts wereutilised for worship. And in the same way they only became places ofrefuge during the persecutions, when the Christians had to conceal theentrances to them. Previously they had remained freely and legally open. This was indeed their true history: cemeteries four centuries oldbecoming places of asylum, ravaged at times during the persecutions;afterwards held in veneration till the eighth century; then despoiled oftheir holy relics, and subsequently blocked up and forgotten, so thatthey remained buried during more than seven hundred years, peoplethinking of them so little that at the time of the first searches in thefifteenth century they were considered an extraordinary discovery--anintricate historical problem--one, moreover, which only our own age hassolved. 

"Please stoop, mesdames, " resumed the Trappist. "In this compartment hereis a skeleton which has not been touched. It has been lying here forsixteen or seventeen hundred years, and will show you how the bodies werelaid out. Savants say that it is the skeleton of a female, probably ayoung girl. It was still quite perfect last spring; but the skull, as youcan see, is now split open. An American broke it with his walking stickto make sure that it was genuine. "

The ladies leaned forward, and the flickering light illumined their palefaces, expressive of mingled fright and compassion. Especially noticeablewas the pitiful, pain-fraught look which appeared on the countenance ofthe daughter, so full of life with her red lips and large black eyes. Then all relapsed into gloom, and the little candles were borne aloft andwent their way through the heavy darkness of the galleries. The visitlasted another hour, for the Trappist did not spare a detail, fond as hewas of certain nooks and corners, and as zealous as if he desired to workthe redemption of his visitors. 

While Pierre followed the others, a complete evolution took place withinhim. As he looked about him, and formed a more and more complete idea ofhis surroundings, his first stupefaction at finding the reality sodifferent from the embellished accounts of story-tellers and poets, hisdisillusion at being plunged into such rudely excavated mole-burrows, gave way to fraternal emotion. It was not that he thought of the fifteenhundred martyrs whose sacred bones had rested there. But how humble, resigned, yet full of hope had been those who had chosen such a place ofsepulchre! Those low, darksome galleries were but temporarysleeping-places for the Christians. If they did not burn the bodies oftheir dead, as the Pagans did, it was because, like the Jews, theybelieved in the resurrection of the body; and it was that lovely idea ofsleep, of tranquil rest after a just life, whilst awaiting the celestialreward, which imparted such intense peacefulness, such infinite charm, tothe black, subterranean city. Everything there spoke of calm and silentnight; everything there slumbered in rapturous quiescence, patient untilthe far-off awakening. What could be more touching than those terra-cottatiles, those marble slabs, which bore not even a name--nothing but thewords /In Pace/--at peace. Ah! to be at peace--life's work at lastaccomplished; to sleep in peace, to hope in peace for the advent ofheaven! And the peacefulness seemed the more delightful as it was enjoyedin such deep humility. Doubtless the diggers worked chance-wise andclumsily; the craftsmen no longer knew how to engrave a name or carve apalm or a dove. Art had vanished; but all the feebleness and ignorancewere instinct with the youth of a new humanity. Poor and lowly and meekones swarmed there, reposing beneath the soil, whilst up above the suncontinued its everlasting task. You found there charity and fraternityand death; husband and wife often lying together with their offspring attheir feet; the great mass of the unknown submerging the personage, thebishop, or the martyr; the most touching equality--that springing frommodesty--prevailing amidst all that dust, with compartments ever similarand slabs destitute of ornament, so that rows and rows of the sleepersmingled without distinctive sign. The inscriptions seldom ventured on aword of praise, and then how prudent, how delicate it was: the men werevery worthy, very pious: the women very gentle, very beautiful, verychaste. A perfume of infancy arose, unlimited human affection spread:this was death as understood by the primitive Christians--death which hiditself to await the resurrection, and dreamt no more of the empire of theworld!

And all at once before Pierre's eyes arose a vision of the sumptuoustombs of the Appian Way, displaying the domineering pride of a wholecivilisation in the sunlight--tombs of vast dimensions, with a profusionof marbles, grandiloquent inscriptions, and masterpieces ofsculptured-work. Ah! what an extraordinary contrast between that pompousavenue of death, conducting, like a highway of triumph, to the regalEternal City, when compared with the subterranean necropolis of theChristians, that city of hidden death, so gentle, so beautiful, and sochaste! Here only quiet slumber, desired and accepted night, resignationand patience were to be found. Millions of human beings had here laidthemselves to rest in all humility, had slept for centuries, and wouldstill be sleeping here, lulled by the silence and the gloom, if theliving had not intruded on their desire to remain in oblivion so long asthe trumpets of the Judgment Day did not awaken them. Death had thenspoken of Life: nowhere had there been more intimate and touching lifethan in these buried cities of the unknown, lowly dead. And a mightybreath had formerly come from them--the breath of a new humanity destinedto renew the world. With the advent of meekness, contempt for the flesh, terror and hatred of nature, relinquishment of terrestrial joys, and apassion for death, which delivers and opens the portals of Paradise, another world had begun. And the blood of Augustus, so proud of purplingin the sunlight, so fired by the passion for sovereign dominion, seemedfor a moment to disappear, as if, indeed, the new world had sucked it upin the depths of its gloomy sepulchres. 

However, the Trappist insisted on showing the ladies the steps ofDiocletian, and began to tell them the legend. "Yes, " said he, "it was amiracle. One day, under that emperor, some soldiers were pursuing severalChristians, who took refuge in these catacombs; and when the soldiersfollowed them inside the steps suddenly gave way, and all the persecutorswere hurled to the bottom. The steps remain broken to this day. Come andsee them; they are close by. "

But the ladies were quite overcome, so affected by their prolongedsojourn in the gloom and by the tales of death which the Trappist hadpoured into their ears that they insisted on going up again. Moreover, the candles were coming to an end. They were all dazzled when they foundthemselves once more in the sunlight, outside the little hut wherearticles of piety and souvenirs were sold. The girl bought a paperweight, a piece of marble on which was engraved the fish symbolical of"Jesus Christ, Son of God, Saviour of Mankind. "

On the afternoon of that same day Pierre decided to visit St. Peter's. Hehad as yet only driven across the superb piazza with its obelisk and twinfountains, encircled by Bernini's colonnades, those four rows of columnsand pilasters which form a girdle of monumental majesty. At the far endrises the basilica, its facade making it look smaller and heavier than itreally is, but its sovereign dome nevertheless filling the heavens. 

Pebbled, deserted inclines stretched out, and steps followed steps, wornand white, under the burning sun; but at last Pierre reached the door andwent in. It was three o'clock. Broad sheets of light streamed in throughthe high square windows, and some ceremony--the vesper service, nodoubt--was beginning in the Capella Clementina on the left. Pierre, however, heard nothing; he was simply struck by the immensity of theedifice, as with raised eyes he slowly walked along. At the entrance camethe giant basins for holy water with their boy-angels as chubby asCupids; then the nave, vaulted and decorated with sunken coffers; thenthe four cyclopean buttress-piers upholding the dome, and then again thetransepts and apsis, each as large as one of our churches. And the proudpomp, the dazzling, crushing splendour of everything, also astonishedhim: he marvelled at the cupola, looking like a planet, resplendent withthe gold and bright colours of its mosaic-work, at the sumptuous/baldacchino/ of bronze, crowning the high altar raised above the verytomb of St. Peter, and whence descend the double steps of the Confession, illumined by seven and eighty lamps, which are always kept burning. Andfinally he was lost in astonishment at the extraordinary profusion ofmarble, both white and coloured. Oh! those polychromatic marbles, Bernini's luxurious passion! The splendid pavement reflecting the entireedifice, the facings of the pilasters with their medallions of popes, thetiara and the keys borne aloft by chubby angels, the walls covered withemblems, particularly the dove of Innocent X, the niches with theircolossal statues uncouth in taste, the /loggie/ and their balconies, thebalustrade and double steps of the Confession, the rich altars and yetricher tombs--all, nave, aisles, transepts, and apsis, were in marble, resplendent with the wealth of marble; not a nook small as the palm ofone's hand appearing but it showed the insolent opulence of marble. Andthe basilica triumphed, beyond discussion, recognised and admired byevery one as the largest and most splendid church in the whole world--thepersonification of hugeness and magnificence combined. 

Pierre still wandered on, gazing, overcome, as yet not distinguishingdetails. He paused for a moment before the bronze statue of St. Peter, seated in a stiff, hierarchical attitude on a marble pedestal. A few ofthe faithful were there kissing the large toe of the Saint's right foot. Some of them carefully wiped it before applying their lips; others, withno thought of cleanliness, kissed it, pressed their foreheads to it, andthen kissed it again. Next, Pierre turned into the transept on the left, where stand the confessionals. Priests are ever stationed there, ready toconfess penitents in every language. Others wait, holding long staves, with which they lightly tap the heads of kneeling sinners, who therebyobtain thirty days' indulgence. However, there were few people present, and inside the small wooden boxes the priests occupied their leisure timein reading and writing, as if they were at home. Then Pierre again foundhimself before the Confession, and gazed with interest at the eightylamps, scintillating like stars. The high altar, at which the Pope alonecan officiate, seemed wrapped in the haughty melancholy of solitude underits gigantic, flowery /baldacchino/, the casting and gilding of whichcost two and twenty thousand pounds. But suddenly Pierre remembered theceremony in the Capella Clementina, and felt astonished, for he couldhear nothing of it. As he drew near a faint breath, like the far-awaypiping of a flute, was wafted to him. Then the volume of sound slowlyincreased, but it was only on reaching the chapel that he recognised anorgan peal. The sunlight here filtered through red curtains drawn beforethe windows, and thus the chapel glowed like a furnace whilst resoundingwith the grave music. But in that huge pile all became so slight, soweak, that at sixty paces neither voice nor organ could be distinguished. 

On entering the basilica Pierre had fancied that it was quite empty andlifeless. There were, however, some people there, but so few and farbetween that their presence was not noticed. A few tourists wanderedabout wearily, guide-book in hand. In the grand nave a painter with hiseasel was taking a view, as in a public gallery. Then a French seminarywent by, conducted by a prelate who named and explained the tombs. But inall that space these fifty or a hundred people looked merely like a fewblack ants who had lost themselves and were vainly seeking their way. AndPierre pictured himself in some gigantic gala hall or tremendousvestibule in an immeasurable palace of reception. The broad sheets ofsunlight streaming through the lofty square windows of plain white glassillumined the church with blending radiance. There was not a single stoolor chair: nothing but the superb, bare pavement, such as you might findin a museum, shining mirror-like under the dancing shower of sunrays. Norwas there a single corner for solitary reflection, a nook of gloom andmystery, where one might kneel and pray. In lieu thereof the sumptuous, sovereign dazzlement of broad daylight prevailed upon every side. And, onthus suddenly finding himself in this deserted opera-house, all aglowwith flaring gold and purple, Pierre could but remember the quiveringgloom of the Gothic cathedrals of France, where dim crowds sob andsupplicate amidst a forest of pillars. In presence of all this ceremonialmajesty--this huge, empty pomp, which was all Body--he recalled with apang the emaciate architecture and statuary of the middle ages, whichwere all Soul. He vainly sought for some poor, kneeling woman, somecreature swayed by faith or suffering, yielding in a modest half-light tothoughts of the unknown, and with closed lips holding communion with theinvisible. These he found not: there was but the weary wandering of thetourists, and the bustle of the prelates conducting the young priests tothe obligatory stations; while the vesper service continued in theleft-hand chapel, nought of it reaching the ears of the visitors save, perhaps, a confused vibration, as of the peal of a bell penetrating fromoutside through the vaults above. 

And Pierre then understood that this was the splendid skeleton of acolossus whence life was departing. To fill it, to animate it with asoul, all the gorgeous display of great religious ceremonies was needed;the eighty thousand worshippers which it could hold, the great pontificalpomps, the festivals of Christmas and Easter, the processions and/corteges/ displaying all the luxury of the Church amidst operaticscenery and appointments. And he tried to conjure up a picture of thepast magnificence--the basilica overflowing with an idolatrous multitude, and the superhuman /cortege/ passing along whilst every head was lowered;the cross and the sword opening the march, the cardinals going two bytwo, like twin divinities, in their rochets of lace and their mantles androbes of red moire, which train-bearers held up behind them; and at last, with Jove-like pomp, the Pope, carried on a stage draped with red velvet, seated in an arm-chair of red velvet and gold, and dressed in whitevelvet, with cope of gold, stole of gold, and tiara of gold. The bearersof the /Sedia gestatoria/* shone bravely in red tunics broidered withgold. Above the one and only Sovereign Pontiff of the world the/flabelli/ waved those huge fans of feathers which formerly were wavedbefore the idols of pagan Rome. And around the seat of triumph what adazzling, glorious court there was! The whole pontifical family, thestream of assistant prelates, the patriarchs, the archbishops, and thebishops, with vestments and mitres of gold, the /Camerieri segretipartecipanti/ in violet silk, the /Camerieri partecipanti/ of the capeand the sword in black velvet Renascence costumes, with ruffs and goldenchains, the whole innumerable ecclesiastical and laical suite, which noteven a hundred pages of the "Gerarchia" can completely enumerate, theprothonotaries, the chaplains, the prelates of every class and degree, without mentioning the military household, the gendarmes with theirbusbies, the Palatine Guards in blue trousers and black tunics, the SwissGuards costumed in red, yellow, and black, with breastplates of silver, suggesting the men at arms of some drama of the Romantic school, and theNoble Guards, superb in their high boots, white pigskins, red tunics, gold lace, epaulets, and helmets! However, since Rome had become thecapital of Italy the doors were no longer thrown wide open; on the rareoccasions when the Pope yet came down to officiate, to show himself asthe supreme representative of the Divinity on earth, the basilica wasfilled with chosen ones. To enter it you needed a card of invitation. Youno longer saw the people--a throng of fifty, even eighty, thousandChristians--flocking to the Church and swarming within it promiscuously;there was but a select gathering, a congregation of friends convened asfor a private function. Even when, by dint of effort, thousands werecollected together there, they formed but a picked audience invited tothe performance of a monster concert. 

 * The chair and stage are known by that name. --Trans. 

And as Pierre strolled among the bright, crude marbles in that cold ifgorgeous museum, the feeling grew upon him that he was in some pagantemple raised to the deity of Light and Pomp. The larger temples ofancient Rome were certainly similar piles, upheld by the same preciouscolumns, with walls covered with the same polychromatic marbles andvaulted ceilings having the same gilded panels. And his feeling wasdestined to become yet more acute after his visits to the otherbasilicas, which could but reveal the truth to him. First one found theChristian Church quietly, audaciously quartering itself in a paganchurch, as, for instance, San Lorenzo in Miranda installed in the templeof Antoninus and Faustina, and retaining the latter's rare porticus in/cipollino/ marble and its handsome white marble entablature. Then therewas the Christian Church springing from the ruins of the destroyed paganedifice, as, for example, San Clemente, beneath which centuries ofcontrary beliefs are stratified: a very ancient edifice of the time ofthe kings or the republic, then another of the days of the empireidentified as a temple of Mithras, and next a basilica of the primitivefaith. Then, too, there was the Christian Church, typified by that ofSaint Agnes-beyond-the-walls which had been built on exactly the samepattern as the Roman secular basilica--that Tribunal and Exchange whichaccompanied every Forum. And, in particular, there was the ChristianChurch erected with material stolen from the demolished pagan temples. Tothis testified the sixteen superb columns of that same Saint Agnes, columns of various marbles filched from various gods; the one and twentycolumns of Santa Maria in Trastevere, columns of all sorts of orders tornfrom a temple of Isis and Serapis, who even now are represented on theircapitals; also the six and thirty white marble Ionic columns of SantaMaria Maggiore derived from the temple of Juno Lucina; and the two andtwenty columns of Santa Maria in Ara Coeli, these varying in substance, size, and workmanship, and certain of them said to have been stolen fromJove himself, from the famous temple of Jupiter Capitolinus which roseupon the sacred summit. In addition, the temples of the opulent Imperialperiod seemed to resuscitate in our times at San Giovanni in Laterano andSan Paolo-fuori-le-mura. Was not that Basilica of San Giovanni--"theMother and Head of all the churches of the city and the earth"--like theabode of honour of some pagan divinity whose splendid kingdom was of thisworld? It boasted five naves, parted by four rows of columns; it was aprofusion of bas-reliefs, friezes, and entablatures, and its twelvecolossal statues of the Apostles looked like subordinate deities liningthe approach to the master of the gods! And did not San Paolo, latelycompleted, its new marbles shimmering like mirrors, recall the abode ofthe Olympian immortals, typical temple as it was with its majesticcolonnade, its flat, gilt-panelled ceiling, its marble pavementincomparably beautiful both in substance and workmanship, its violetcolumns with white bases and capitals, and its white entablature withviolet frieze: everywhere, indeed, you found, the mingling of those twocolours so divinely carnal in their harmony. And there, as at St. Peter's, not one patch of gloom, not one nook of mystery where one mightpeer into the invisible, could be found! And, withal, St. Peter'sremained the monster, the colossus, larger than the largest of allothers, an extravagant testimony of what the mad passion for the huge canachieve when human pride, by dint of spending millions, dreams of lodgingthe divinity in an over-vast, over-opulent palace of stone, where intruth that pride itself, and not the divinity, triumphs!

And to think that after long centuries that gala colossus had been theoutcome of the fervour of primitive faith! You found there a blossomingof that ancient sap, peculiar to the soil of Rome, which in all ages hasthrown up preposterous edifices, of exaggerated hugeness and dazzling andruinous luxury. It would seem as if the absolute masters successivelyruling the city brought that passion for cyclopean building with them, derived it from the soil in which they grew, for they transmitted it oneto the other, without a pause, from civilisation to civilisation, howeverdiverse and contrary their minds. It has all been, so to say, acontinuous blossoming of human vanity, a passionate desire to set one'sname on an imperishable wall, and, after being master of the world, toleave behind one an indestructible trace, a tangible proof of one'spassing glory, an eternal edifice of bronze and marble fit to attest thatglory until the end of time. At the bottom the spirit of conquest, theproud ambition to dominate the world, subsists; and when all hascrumbled, and a new society has sprung up from the ruins of itspredecessor, men have erred in imagining it to be cured of the sin ofpride, steeped in humility once more, for it has had the old blood in itsveins, and has yielded to the same insolent madness as its ancestors, aprey to all the violence of its heredity directly it has become great andstrong. Among the illustrious popes there has not been one that did notseek to build, did not revert to the traditions of the Caesars, eternising their reigns in stone and raising temples for resting-places, so as to rank among the gods. Ever the same passion for terrestrialimmortality has burst forth: it has been a battle as to who should leavethe highest, most substantial, most gorgeous monument; and so acute hasbeen the disease that those who, for lack of means and opportunity, havebeen unable to build, and have been forced to content themselves withrepairing, have, nevertheless, desired to bequeath the memory of theirmodest achievements to subsequent generations by commemorative marbleslabs engraved with pompous inscriptions! These slabs are to be seen onevery side: not a wall has ever been strengthened but some pope hasstamped it with his arms, not a ruin has been restored, not a palacerepaired, not a fountain cleaned, but the reigning pope has signed thework with his Roman and pagan title of "Pontifex Maximus. " It is ahaunting passion, a form of involuntary debauchery, the fated florescenceof that compost of ruins, that dust of edifices whence new edifices areever arising. And given the perversion with which the old Roman soilalmost immediately tarnished the doctrines of Jesus, that resolutepassion for domination and that desire for terrestrial glory whichwrought the triumph of Catholicism in scorn of the humble and pure, thefraternal and simple ones of the primitive Church, one may well askwhether Rome has ever been Christian at all!

And whilst Pierre was for the second time walking round the hugebasilica, admiring the tombs of the popes, truth, like a suddenillumination, burst upon him and filled him with its glow. Ah! thosetombs! Yonder in the full sunlight, in the rosy Campagna, on either sideof the Appian Way--that triumphal approach to Rome, conducting thestranger to the august Palatine with its crown of circling palaces--therearose the gigantic tombs of the powerful and wealthy, tombs ofunparalleled artistic splendour, perpetuating in marble the pride andpomp of a strong race that had mastered the world. Then, near at hand, beneath the sod, in the shrouding night of wretched mole-holes, othertombs were hidden--the tombs of the lowly, the poor, and thesuffering--tombs destitute of art or display, but whose very humilityproclaimed that a breath of affection and resignation had passed by, thatOne had come preaching love and fraternity, the relinquishment of thewealth of the earth for the everlasting joys of a future life, andcommitting to the soil the good seed of His Gospel, sowing the newhumanity which was to transform the olden world. And, behold, from thatseed, buried in the soil for centuries, behold, from those humble, unobtrusive tombs, where martyrs slept their last and gentle sleep whilstwaiting for the glorious call, yet other tombs had sprung, tombs asgigantic and as pompous as the ancient, destroyed sepulchres of theidolaters, tombs uprearing their marbles among a pagan-temple-likesplendour, proclaiming the same superhuman pride, the same mad passionfor universal sovereignty. At the time of the Renascence Rome becamepagan once more; the old imperial blood frothed up and swept Christianityaway with the greatest onslaught ever directed against it. Ah! thosetombs of the popes at St. Peter's, with their impudent, insolentglorification of the departed, their sumptuous, carnal hugeness, defyingdeath and setting immortality upon this earth. There are giant popes ofbronze, allegorical figures and angels of equivocal character wearing thebeauty of lovely girls, of passion-compelling women with the thighs andthe breasts of pagan goddesses! Paul III is seated on a high pedestal, Justice and Prudence are almost prostrate at his feet. Urban VIII isbetween Prudence and Religion, Innocent XI between Religion and Justice, Innocent XII between Justice and Charity, Gregory XIII between Religionand Strength. Attended by Prudence and Justice, Alexander VII appearskneeling, with Charity and Truth before him, and a skeleton rises updisplaying an empty hour-glass. Clement XIII, also on his knees, triumphsabove a monumental sarcophagus, against which leans Religion bearing theCross; while the Genius of Death, his elbow resting on the right-handcorner, has two huge, superb lions, emblems of omnipotence, beneath him. Bronze bespeaks the eternity of the figures, white marble describesopulent flesh, and coloured marble winds around in rich draperies, deifying the monuments under the bright, golden glow of nave and aisles. 

And Pierre passed from one tomb to the other on his way through themagnificent, deserted, sunlit basilica. Yes, these tombs, so imperial intheir ostentation, were meet companions for those of the Appian Way. Assuredly it was Rome, the soil of Rome, that soil where pride anddomination sprouted like the herbage of the fields that had transformedthe humble Christianity of primitive times, the religion of fraternity, justice, and hope into what it now was: victorious Catholicism, allied tothe rich and powerful, a huge implement of government, prepared for theconquest of every nation. The popes had awoke as Caesars. Remote heredityhad acted, the blood of Augustus had bubbled forth afresh, flowingthrough their veins and firing their minds with immeasurable ambition. Asyet none but Augustus had held the empire of the world, had been bothemperor and pontiff, master of the body and the soul. And thence had comethe eternal dream of the popes in despair at only holding the spiritualpower, and obstinately refusing to yield in temporal matters, clingingfor ever to the ancient hope that their dream might at last be realised, and the Vatican become another Palatine, whence they might reign withabsolute despotism over all the conquered nations. 

VI

PIERRE had been in Rome for a fortnight, and yet the affair of his bookwas no nearer solution. He was still possessed by an ardent desire to seethe Pope, but could in no wise tell how to satisfy it, so frequent werethe delays and so greatly had he been frightened by Monsignor Nani'spredictions of the dire consequences which might attend any imprudentaction. And so, foreseeing a prolonged sojourn, he at last betook himselfto the Vicariate in order that his "celebret" might be stamped, andafterwards said his mass each morning at the Church of Santa Brigida, where he received a kindly greeting from Abbe Pisoni, Benedetta's formerconfessor. 

One Monday evening he resolved to repair early to Donna Serafina'scustomary reception in the hope of learning some news and expediting hisaffairs. Perhaps Monsignor Nani would look in; perhaps he might be luckyenough to come across some cardinal or domestic prelate willing to helphim. It was in vain that he had tried to extract any positive informationfrom Don Vigilio, for, after a short spell of affability and willingness, Cardinal Pio's secretary had relapsed into distrust and fear, and avoidedPierre as if he were resolved not to meddle in a business which, allconsidered, was decidedly suspicious and dangerous. Moreover, for acouple of days past a violent attack of fever had compelled him to keephis room. 

Thus the only person to whom Pierre could turn for comfort was VictorineBosquet, the old Beauceronne servant who had been promoted to the rank ofhousekeeper, and who still retained a French heart after thirty years'residence in Rome. She often spoke to the young priest of Auneau, hernative place, as if she had left it only the previous day; but on thatparticular Monday even she had lost her wonted gay vivacity, and when sheheard that he meant to go down in the evening to see the ladies shewagged her head significantly. "Ah! you won't find them very cheerful, "said she. "My poor Benedetta is greatly worried. Her divorce suit is notprogressing at all well. "

All Rome, indeed, was again talking of this affair. An extraordinaryrevival of tittle-tattle had set both white and black worlds agog. And sothere was no need for reticence on Victorine's part, especially inconversing with a compatriot. It appeared, then, that, in reply toAdvocate Morano's memoir setting forth that the marriage had not beenconsummated, there had come another memoir, a terrible one, emanatingfrom Monsignor Palma, a doctor in theology, whom the Congregation of theCouncil had selected to defend the marriage. As a first point, MonsignorPalma flatly disputed the alleged non-consummation, questioned thecertificate put forward on Benedetta's behalf, and quoted instancesrecorded in scientific text-books which showed how deceptive appearancesoften were. He strongly insisted, moreover, on the narrative which CountPrada supplied in another memoir, a narrative well calculated to inspiredoubt; and, further, he so turned and twisted the evidence of Benedetta'sown maid as to make that evidence also serve against her. Finally heargued in a decisive way that, even supposing the marriage had not beenconsummated, this could only be ascribed to the resistance of theCountess, who had thus set at defiance one of the elementary laws ofmarried life, which was that a wife owed obedience to her husband. 

Next had come a fourth memoir, drawn up by the reporter of theCongregation, who analysed and discussed the three others, andsubsequently the Congregation itself had dealt with the matter, opiningin favour of the dissolution of the marriage by a majority of onevote--such a bare majority, indeed, that Monsignor Palma, exercising hisrights, had hastened to demand further inquiry, a course which broughtthe whole /procedure/ again into question, and rendered a fresh votenecessary. 

"Ah! the poor Contessina!" exclaimed Victorine, "she'll surely die ofgrief, for, calm as she may seem, there's an inward fire consuming her. It seems that Monsignor Palma is the master of the situation, and canmake the affair drag on as long as he likes. And then a deal of money hadalready been spent, and one will have to spend a lot more. Abbe Pisoni, whom you know, was very badly inspired when he helped on that marriage;and though I certainly don't want to soil the memory of my good mistress, Countess Ernesta, who was a real saint, it's none the less true that shewrecked her daughter's life when she gave her to Count Prada. "

The housekeeper paused. Then, impelled by an instinctive sense ofjustice, she resumed. "It's only natural that Count Prada should beannoyed, for he's really being made a fool of. And, for my part, as thereis no end to all the fuss, and this divorce is so hard to obtain, Ireally don't see why the Contessina shouldn't live with her Dario withouttroubling any further. Haven't they loved one another ever since theywere children? Aren't they both young and handsome, and wouldn't they behappy together, whatever the world might say? Happiness, /mon Dieu/! onefinds it so seldom that one can't afford to let it pass. "

Then, seeing how greatly surprised Pierre was at hearing such language, she began to laugh with the quiet composure of one belonging to thehumble classes of France, whose only desire is a quiet and happy life, irrespective of matrimonial ties. Next, in more discreet language, sheproceeded to lament another worry which had fallen on the household, another result of the divorce affair. A rupture had come about betweenDonna Serafina and Advocate Morano, who was very displeased with the illsuccess of his memoir to the congregation, and accused FatherLorenza--the confessor of the Boccanera ladies--of having urged them intoa deplorable lawsuit, whose only fruit could be a wretched scandalaffecting everybody. And so great had been Morano's annoyance that he hadnot returned to the Boccanera mansion, but had severed a connection ofthirty years' standing, to the stupefaction of all the Romandrawing-rooms, which altogether disapproved of his conduct. DonnaSerafina was, for her part, the more grieved as she suspected theadvocate of having purposely picked the quarrel in order to secure anexcuse for leaving her; his real motive, in her estimation, being asudden, disgraceful passion for a young and intriguing woman of themiddle classes. 

That Monday evening, when Pierre entered the drawing-room, hung withyellow brocatelle of a flowery Louis XIV pattern, he at once realisedthat melancholy reigned in the dim light radiating from the lace-veiledlamps. Benedetta and Celia, seated on a sofa, were chatting with Dario, whilst Cardinal Sarno, ensconced in an arm-chair, listened to theceaseless chatter of the old relative who conducted the little Princessto each Monday gathering. And the only other person present was DonnaSerafina, seated all alone in her wonted place on the right-hand side ofthe chimney-piece, and consumed with secret rage at seeing the chair onthe left-hand side unoccupied--that chair which Morano had always takenduring the thirty years that he had been faithful to her. Pierre noticedwith what anxious and then despairing eyes she observed his entrance, herglance ever straying towards the door, as though she even yet hoped forthe fickle one's return. Withal her bearing was erect and proud; sheseemed to be more tightly laced than ever; and there was all the wontedhaughtiness on her hard-featured face, with its jet-black eyebrows andsnowy hair. 

Pierre had no sooner paid his respects to her than he allowed his ownworry to appear by inquiring whether they would not have the pleasure ofseeing Monsignor Nani that evening. Thereupon Donna Serafina could notrefrain from answering: "Oh! Monsignor Nani is forsaking us like theothers. People always take themselves off when they can be of service. "

She harboured a spite against the prelate for having done so little tofurther the divorce in spite of his many promises. Beneath his outwardshow of extreme willingness and caressing affability he doubtlessconcealed some scheme of his own which he was tenaciously pursuing. However, Donna Serafina promptly regretted the confession which anger hadwrung from her, and resumed: "After all, he will perhaps come. He is sogood-natured, and so fond of us. "

In spite of the vivacity of her temperament she really wished to actdiplomatically, so as to overcome the bad luck which had recently set in. Her brother the Cardinal had told her how irritated he was by theattitude of the Congregation of the Council; he had little doubt that thefrigid reception accorded to his niece's suit had been due in part to thedesire of some of his brother cardinals to be disagreeable to him. Personally, he desired the divorce, as it seemed to him the only means ofensuring the perpetuation of the family; for Dario obstinately refused tomarry any other woman than his cousin. And thus there was an accumulationof disasters; the Cardinal was wounded in his pride, his sister sharedhis sufferings and on her own side was stricken in the heart, whilst bothlovers were plunged in despair at finding their hopes yet again deferred. 

As Pierre approached the sofa where the young folks were chatting hefound that they were speaking of the catastrophe. "Why should you be sodespondent?" asked Celia in an undertone. "After all, there was amajority of a vote in favour of annulling the marriage. Your suit hasn'tbeen rejected; there is only a delay. "

But Benedetta shook her head. "No, no! If Monsignor Palma provesobstinate his Holiness will never consent. It's all over. "

"Ah! if one were only rich, very rich!" murmured Dario, with such an airof conviction that no one smiled. And, turning to his cousin, he added ina whisper: "I must really have a talk with you. We cannot go on livinglike this. "

In a breath she responded: "Yes, you are right. Come down to-morrowevening at five. I will be here alone. "

Then dreariness set in; the evening seemed to have no end. Pierre wasgreatly touched by the evident despair of Benedetta, who as a rule was socalm and sensible. The deep eyes which illumined her pure, delicate, infantile face were now blurred as by restrained tears. He had alreadyformed a sincere affection for her, pleased as he was with her equable ifsomewhat indolent disposition, the semblance of discreet good sense withwhich she veiled her soul of fire. That Monday even she certainly triedto smile while listening to the pretty secrets confided to her by Celia, whose love affairs were prospering far more than her own. There was onlyone brief interval of general conversation, and that was brought about bythe little Princess's aunt, who, suddenly raising her voice, began tospeak of the infamous manner in which the Italian newspapers referred tothe Holy Father. Never, indeed, had there been so much bad feelingbetween the Vatican and the Quirinal. Cardinal Sarno felt so strongly onthe subject that he departed from his wonted silence to announce that onthe occasion of the sacrilegious festivities of the Twentieth ofSeptember, celebrating the capture of Rome, the Pope intended to cast afresh letter of protest in the face of all the Christian powers, whoseindifference proved their complicity in the odious spoliation of theChurch. 

"Yes, indeed! what folly to try and marry the Pope and the King, "bitterly exclaimed Donna Serafina, alluding to her niece's deplorablemarriage. 

The old maid now seemed quite beside herself; it was already so late thatneither Monsignor Nani nor anybody else was expected. However, at theunhoped-for sound of footsteps her eyes again brightened and turnedfeverishly towards the door. But it was only to encounter a finaldisappointment. The visitor proved to be Narcisse Habert, who stepped upto her, apologising for making so late a call. It was Cardinal Sarno, hisuncle by marriage, who had introduced him into this exclusive /salon/, where he had received a cordial reception on account of his religiousviews, which were said to be most uncompromising. If, however, despitethe lateness of the hour, he had ventured to call there that evening, itwas solely on account of Pierre, whom he at once drew on one side. 

"I felt sure I should find you here, " he said. "Just now I managed to seemy cousin, Monsignor Gamba del Zoppo, and I have some good news for you. He will see us to-morrow at about eleven in his rooms at the Vatican. "Then, lowering his voice: "I think he will endeavour to conduct you tothe Holy Father. Briefly, the audience seems to me assured. "

Pierre was greatly delighted by this promised certainty, which came tohim so suddenly in that dreary drawing-room, where for a couple of hourshe had been gradually sinking into despair! So at last a solution was athand!

Meantime Narcisse, after shaking hands with Dario and bowing to Benedettaand Celia, approached his uncle the Cardinal, who, having rid himself ofthe old relation, made up his mind to talk. But his conversation wasconfined to the state of his health, and the weather, and sundryinsignificant anecdotes which he had lately heard. Not a word escaped himrespecting the thousand complicated matters with which he dealt at thePropaganda. It was as though, once outside his office, he plunged intothe commonplace and the unimportant by way of resting from the anxioustask of governing the world. And after he had spoken for a time every onegot up, and the visitors took leave. 

"Don't forget, " Narcisse repeated to Pierre, "you will find me at theSixtine Chapel to-morrow at ten. And I will show you the Botticellisbefore we go to our appointment. "

At half-past nine on the following morning Pierre, who had come on foot, was already on the spacious Piazza of St. Peter's; and before turning tothe right, towards the bronze gate near one corner of Bernini'scolonnade, he raised his eyes and lingered, gazing at the Vatican. Nothing to his mind could be less monumental than the jumble of buildingswhich, without semblance of architectural order or regularity of anykind, had grown up in the shadow cast by the dome of the basilica. Roofsrose one above the other and broad, flat walls stretched out chance-wise, just as wings and storeys had been added. The only symmetry observableabove the colonnade was that of the three sides of the court of SanDamaso, where the lofty glass-work which now encloses the old /loggie/sparkled in the sun between the ruddy columns and pilasters, suggesting, as it were, three huge conservatories. 

And this was the most beautiful palace in the world, the largest of allpalaces, comprising no fewer than eleven thousand apartments andcontaining the most admirable masterpieces of human genius! But Pierre, disillusioned as he was, had eyes only for the lofty facade on the right, overlooking the piazza, for he knew that the second-floor windows therewere those of the Pope's private apartments. And he contemplated thosewindows for a long time, and remembered having been told that the fifthone on the right was that of the Pope's bed-room, and that a lamp couldalways be seen burning there far into the night. 

What was there, too, behind that gate of bronze which he saw beforehim--that sacred portal by which all the kingdoms of the worldcommunicated with the kingdom of heaven, whose august vicar had secludedhimself behind those lofty, silent walls? From where he stood Pierregazed on that gate with its metal panels studded with large square-headednails, and wondered what it defended, what it concealed, what it shut offfrom the view, with its stern, forbidding air, recalling that of the gateof some ancient fortress. What kind of world would he find behind it, what treasures of human charity jealously preserved in yonder gloom, whatrevivifying hope for the new nations hungering for fraternity andjustice? He took pleasure in fancying, in picturing the one holy pastorof humanity, ever watching in the depths of that closed palace, and, while the nations strayed into hatred, preparing all for the final reignof Jesus, and at last proclaiming the advent of that reign bytransforming our democracies into the one great Christian communitypromised by the Saviour. Assuredly the world's future was being preparedbehind that bronze portal; assuredly it was that future which would issueforth. 

But all at once Pierre was amazed to find himself face to face withMonsignor Nani, who had just left the Vatican on his way to theneighbouring Palace of the Inquisition, where, as Assessor, he had hisresidence. 

"Ah! Monsignor, " said Pierre, "I am very pleased. My friend MonsieurHabert is going to present me to his cousin, Monsignor Gamba del Zoppo, and I think I shall obtain the audience I so greatly desire. "

Monsignor Nani smiled with his usual amiable yet keen expression. "Yes, yes, I know. " But, correcting himself as it were, he added: "I share yoursatisfaction, my dear son. Only, you must be prudent. " And then, as iffearing that the young priest might have understood by his first wordsthat he had just seen Monsignor Gamba, the most easily terrified prelateof the whole prudent pontifical family, he related that he had beenrunning about since an early hour on behalf of two French ladies, wholikewise were dying of a desire to see the Pope. However, he greatlyfeared that the help he was giving them would not prove successful. 

"I will confess to you, Monsignor, " replied Pierre, "that I myself wasgetting very discouraged. Yes, it is high time I should find a littlecomfort, for my sojourn here is hardly calculated to brace my soul. "

He went on in this strain, allowing it to be seen that the sights of Romewere finally destroying his faith. Such days as those which he had spenton the Palatine and along the Appian Way, in the Catacombs and at St. Peter's, grievously disturbed him, spoilt his dream of Christianityrejuvenated and triumphant. He emerged from them full of doubt andgrowing lassitude, having already lost much of his usually rebelliousenthusiasm. 

Still smiling, Monsignor Nani listened and nodded approvingly. Yes, nodoubt that was the fatal result. He seemed to have foreseen it, and to bewell satisfied thereat. "At all events, my dear son, " said he, "everything is going on well, since you are now certain that you will seehis Holiness. "

"That is true, Monsignor; I have placed my only hope in the very just andperspicacious Leo XIII. He alone can judge me, since he alone canrecognise in my book his own ideas, which I think I have very faithfullyset forth. Ah! if he be willing he will, in Jesus' name and by democracyand science, save this old world of ours!"

Pierre's enthusiasm was returning again, and Nani, smiling more and moreaffably with his piercing eyes and thin lips, again expressed approval:"Certainly; quite so, my dear son. You will speak to him, you will see. "

Then as they both raised their heads and looked towards the Vatican, Nanicarried his amiability so far as to undeceive Pierre with respect to thePope's bed-room. No, the window where a light was seen every evening wassimply that of a landing where the gas was kept burning almost all night. The window of his Holiness's bed-chamber was the second one farther on. Then both relapsed into silence, equally grave as they continued to gazeat the facade. 

"Well, till we meet again, my dear son, " said Nani at last. "You willtell me of your interview, I hope. "

As soon as Pierre was alone he went in by the bronze portal, his heartbeating violently, as if he were entering some redoubtable sanctuarywhere the future happiness of mankind was elaborated. A sentry was onduty there, a Swiss guard, who walked slowly up and down in a grey-bluecloak, below which one only caught a glimpse of his baggy red, black, andyellow breeches; and it seemed as if this cloak of sober hue werepurposely cast over a disguise in order to conceal its strangeness, whichhad become irksome. Then, on the right-hand, came the covered stairwayconducting to the Court of San Damaso; but to reach the Sixtine Chapel itwas necessary to follow a long gallery, with columns on either hand, andascend the royal staircase, the Scala Regia. And in this realm of thegigantic, where every dimension is exaggerated and replete withoverpowering majesty, Pierre's breath came short as he ascended the broadsteps. 

He was much surprised on entering the Sixtine Chapel, for it at firstseemed to him small, a sort of rectangular and lofty hall, with adelicate screen of white marble separating the part where guestscongregate on the occasion of great ceremonies from the choir where thecardinals sit on simple oaken benches, while the inferior prelates remainstanding behind them. On a low platform to the right of the soberlyadorned altar is the pontifical throne; while in the wall on the leftopens the narrow singing gallery with its balcony of marble. And foreverything suddenly to spread out and soar into the infinite one mustraise one's head, allow one's eyes to ascend from the huge fresco of theLast Judgment, occupying the whole of the end wall, to the paintingswhich cover the vaulted ceiling down to the cornice extending between thetwelve windows of white glass, six on either hand. 

Fortunately there were only three or four quiet tourists there; andPierre at once perceived Narcisse Habert occupying one of the cardinals'seats above the steps where the train-bearers crouch. Motionless, andwith his head somewhat thrown back, the young man seemed to be inecstasy. But it was not the work of Michael Angelo that he thuscontemplated. His eyes never strayed from one of the earlier frescoesbelow the cornice; and on recognising the priest he contented himselfwith murmuring: "Ah! my friend, just look at the Botticelli. " Then, withdreamy eyes, he relapsed into a state of rapture. 

Pierre, for his part, had received a great shock both in heart and inmind, overpowered as he was by the superhuman genius of Michael Angelo. The rest vanished; there only remained, up yonder, as in a limitlessheaven, the extraordinary creations of the master's art. That which atfirst surprised one was that the painter should have been the soleartisan of the mighty work. No marble cutters, no bronze workers, nogilders, no one of another calling had intervened. The painter with hisbrush had sufficed for all--for the pilasters, columns, and cornices ofmarble, for the statues and the ornaments of bronze, for the /fleurons/and roses of gold, for the whole of the wondrously rich decorative workwhich surrounded the frescoes. And Pierre imagined Michael Angelo on theday when the bare vault was handed over to him, covered with plaster, offering only a flat white surface, hundreds of square yards to beadorned. And he pictured him face to face with that huge white page, refusing all help, driving all inquisitive folks away, jealously, violently shutting himself up alone with his gigantic task, spending fourand a half years in fierce solitude, and day by day adding to hiscolossal work of creation. Ah! that mighty work, a task to fill a wholelifetime, a task which he must have begun with quiet confidence in hisown will and power, drawing, as it were, an entire world from his brainand flinging it there with the ceaseless flow of creative virility in thefull heyday of its omnipotence. 

And Pierre was yet more overcome when he began to examine thesepresentments of humanity, magnified as by the eyes of a visionary, overflowing in mighty sympathetic pages of cyclopean symbolisation. Royalgrace and nobility, sovereign peacefulness and power--every beauty shoneout like natural florescence. And there was perfect science, the mostaudacious foreshortening risked with the certainty of success--aneverlasting triumph of technique over the difficulty which an archedsurface presented. And, in particular, there was wonderful simplicity ofmedium; matter was reduced almost to nothingness; a few colours were usedbroadly without any studied search for effect or brilliancy. Yet thatsufficed, the blood seethed freely, the muscles projected, the figuresbecame animated and stood out of their frames with such energy and dashthat it seemed as if a flame were flashing by aloft, endowing all thosebeings with superhuman and immortal life. Life, aye, it was life, whichburst forth and triumphed--mighty, swarming life, miraculous life, thecreation of one sole hand possessed of the supreme gift--simplicityblended with power. 

That a philosophical system, a record of the whole of human destiny, should have been found therein, with the creation of the world, of man, and of woman, the fall, the chastisement, then the redemption, andfinally God's judgment on the last day--this was a matter on which Pierrewas unable to dwell, at this first visit, in the wondering stupor intowhich the paintings threw him. But he could not help noticing how thehuman body, its beauty, its power, and its grace were exalted! Ah! thatregal Jehovah, at once terrible and paternal, carried off amid thewhirlwind of his creation, his arms outstretched and giving birth toworlds! And that superb and nobly outlined Adam, with extended hand, whomJehovah, though he touch him not, animates with his finger--a wondrousand admirable gesture, leaving a sacred space between the finger of theCreator and that of the created--a tiny space, in which, nevertheless, abides all the infinite of the invisible and the mysterious. And thenthat powerful yet adorable Eve, that Eve with the sturdy flanks fit forthe bearing of humanity, that Eve with the proud, tender grace of a womanbent on being loved even to perdition, that Eve embodying the whole ofwoman with her fecundity, her seductiveness, her empire! Moreover, eventhe decorative figures of the pilasters at the corners of the frescoescelebrate the triumph of the flesh: there are the twenty young menradiant in their nakedness, with incomparable splendour of torso and oflimb, and such intensity of life that a craze for motion seems to carrythem off, bend them, throw them over in superb attitudes. And between thewindows are the giants, the prophets and the sibyls--man and womandeified, with inordinate wealth of muscle and grandeur of intellectualexpression. There is Jeremiah with his elbow resting on his knee and hischin on his hand, plunged as he is in reflection--in the very depths ofhis visions and his dreams; there is the Sibylla Erithraea, so pure ofprofile, so young despite the opulence of her form, and with one fingerresting on the open book of destiny; there is Isaiah with the thick lipsof truth, virile and haughty, his head half turned and his hand raisedwith a gesture of command; there is the Sibylla Cumaea, terrifying withher science and her old age, her wrinkled countenance, her vulture'snose, her square protruding chin; there is Jonah cast forth by the whale, and wondrously foreshortened, his torso twisted, his arms bent, his headthrown back, and his mouth agape and shouting: and there are the others, all of the same full-blown, majestic family, reigning with thesovereignty of eternal health and intelligence, and typifying the dreamof a broader, loftier, and indestructible humanity. Moreover, in thelunettes and the arches over the windows other figures of grace, power, and beauty appear and throng, the ancestors of the Christ, thoughtfulmothers with lovely nude infants, men with wondering eyes peering intothe future, representatives of the punished weary race longing for thepromised Redeemer; while in the pendentives of the four corners variousbiblical episodes, the victories of Israel over the Spirit of Evil, spring into life. And finally there is the gigantic fresco at the farend, the Last Judgment with its swarming multitude, so numerous that daysand days are needed to see each figure aright, a distracted crowd, fullof the hot breath of life, from the dead rising in response to thefurious trumpeting of the angels, from the fearsome groups of the damnedwhom the demons fling into hell, even to Jesus the justiciar, surroundedby the saints and apostles, and to the radiant concourse of the blessedwho ascend upheld by angels, whilst higher and still higher other angels, bearing the instruments of the Passion, triumph as in full glory. Andyet, above this gigantic composition, painted thirty years subsequently, in the full ripeness of age, the ceiling retains its ethereality, itsunquestionable superiority, for on it the artist bestowed all his virginpower, his whole youth, the first great flare of his genius. 

And Pierre found but one word to express his feelings: Michael Angelo wasthe monster dominating and crushing all others. Beneath his immenseachievement you had only to glance at the works of Perugino, Pinturicchio, Roselli, Signorelli, and Botticelli, those earlierfrescoes, admirable in their way, which below the cornice spread outaround the chapel. 

Narcisse for his part had not raised his eyes to the overpoweringsplendour of the ceiling. Wrapt in ecstasy, he did not allow his gaze tostray from one of the three frescoes of Botticelli. "Ah! Botticelli, " heat last murmured; "in him you have the elegance and the grace of themysterious; a profound feeling of sadness even in the midst ofvoluptuousness, a divination of the whole modern soul, with the mosttroublous charm that ever attended artist's work. "

Pierre glanced at him in amazement, and then ventured to inquire: "Youcome here to see the Botticellis?"

"Yes, certainly, " the young man quietly replied; "I only come here forhim, and five hours every week I only look at his work. There, just studythat fresco, Moses and the daughters of Jethro. Isn't it the mostpenetrating work that human tenderness and melancholy have produced?"

Then, with a faint, devout quiver in his voice and the air of a priestinitiating another into the delightful but perturbing atmosphere of asanctuary, he went on repeating the praises of Botticelli's art; hiswomen with long, sensual, yet candid faces, supple bearing, and roundedforms showing from under light drapery; his young men, his angels ofdoubtful sex, blending stateliness of muscle with infinite delicacy ofoutline; next the mouths he painted, fleshy, fruit-like mouths, at timessuggesting irony, at others pain, and often so enigmatical with theirsinuous curves that one knew not whether the words they left unutteredwere words of purity or filth; then, too, the eyes which he bestowed onhis figures, eyes of languor and passion, of carnal or mystical rapture, their joy at times so instinct with grief as they peer into the nihilityof human things that no eyes in the world could be more impenetrable. Andfinally there were Botticelli's hands, so carefully and delicatelypainted, so full of life, wantoning so to say in a free atmosphere, nowjoining, caressing, and even, as it were, speaking, the whole evincingsuch intense solicitude for gracefulness that at times there seems to beundue mannerism, though every hand has its particular expression, eachvarying expression of the enjoyment or pain which the sense of touch canbring. And yet there was nothing effeminate or false about the painter'swork: on all sides a sort of virile pride was apparent, an atmosphere ofsuperb passionate motion, absolute concern for truth, direct study fromlife, conscientiousness, veritable realism, corrected and elevated by agenial strangeness of feeling and character that imparted anever-to-be-forgotten charm even to ugliness itself. 

Pierre's stupefaction, however, increased as he listened to Narcisse, whose somewhat studied elegance, whose curly hair cut in the Florentinefashion, and whose blue, mauvish eyes paling with enthusiasm he now forthe first time remarked. "Botticelli, " he at last said, "was no doubt amarvellous artist, only it seems to me that here, at any rate, MichaelAngelo--"

But Narcisse interrupted him almost with violence. "No! no! Don't talk ofhim! He spoilt everything, ruined everything! A man who harnessed himselfto his work like an ox, who laboured at his task like a navvy, at therate of so many square yards a day! And a man, too, with no sense of themysterious and the unknown, who saw everything so huge as to disgust onewith beauty, painting girls like the trunks of oak-trees, women likegiant butchers, with heaps and heaps of stupid flesh, and never a gleamof a divine or infernal soul! He was a mason--a colossal mason, if youlike--but he was nothing more. "

Weary "modern" that Narcisse was, spoilt by the pursuit of the originaland the rare, he thus unconsciously gave rein to his fated hate of healthand power. That Michael Angelo who brought forth without an effort, whohad left behind him the most prodigious of all artistic creations, wasthe enemy. And his crime precisely was that he had created life, producedlife in such excess that all the petty creations of others, even the mostdelightful among them, vanished in presence of the overflowing torrent ofhuman beings flung there all alive in the sunlight. 

"Well, for my part, " Pierre courageously declared, "I'm not of youropinion. I now realise that life is everything in art; that realimmortality belongs only to those who create. The case of Michael Angeloseems to me decisive, for he is the superhuman master, the monster whooverwhelms all others, precisely because he brought forth thatmagnificent living flesh which offends your sense of delicacy. Those whoare inclined to the curious, those who have minds of a pretty turn, whoseintellects are ever seeking to penetrate things, may try to improve onthe equivocal and invisible, and set all the charm of art in someelaborate stroke or symbolisation; but, none the less, Michael Angeloremains the all-powerful, the maker of men, the master of clearness, simplicity, and health. "

At this Narcisse smiled with indulgent and courteous disdain. And heanticipated further argument by remarking: "It's already eleven. Mycousin was to have sent a servant here as soon as he could receive us. Iam surprised to have seen nobody as yet. Shall we go up to see the/stanze/ of Raffaelle while we wait?"

Once in the rooms above, he showed himself perfect, both lucid in hisremarks and just in his appreciations, having recovered all his easyintelligence as soon as he was no longer upset by his hatred of colossallabour and cheerful decoration. 

It was unfortunate that Pierre should have first visited the SixtineChapel; for it was necessary he should forget what he had just seen andaccustom himself to what he now beheld in order to enjoy its pure beauty. It was as if some potent wine had confused him, and prevented anyimmediate relish of a lighter vintage of delicate fragrance. Admirationdid not here fall upon one with lightning speed; it was slowly, irresistibly that one grew charmed. And the contrast was like that ofRacine beside Corneille, Lamartine beside Hugo, the eternal pair, themasculine and feminine genius coupled through centuries of glory. WithRaffaelle it is nobility, grace, exquisiteness, and correctness of line, and divineness of harmony that triumph. You do not find in him merely thematerialist symbolism so superbly thrown off by Michael Angelo; heintroduces psychological analysis of deep penetration into the painter'sart. Man is shown more purified, idealised; one sees more of that whichis within him. And though one may be in presence of an artist ofsentimental bent, a feminine genius whose quiver of tenderness one canfeel, it is also certain that admirable firmness of workmanship confrontsone, that the whole is very strong and very great. Pierre graduallyyielded to such sovereign masterliness, such virile elegance, such avision of supreme beauty set in supreme perfection. But if the "Disputeon the Sacrament" and the so-called "School of Athens, " both prior to thepaintings of the Sixtine Chapel, seemed to him to be Raffaelle'smasterpieces, he felt that in the "Burning of the Borgo, " andparticularly in the "Expulsion of Heliodorus from the Temple, " and "PopeSt. Leo staying Attila at the Gates of Rome, " the artist had lost theflower of his divine grace, through the deep impression which theoverwhelming grandeur of Michael Angelo had wrought upon him. Howcrushing indeed had been the blow when the Sixtine Chapel was thrown openand the rivals entered! The creations of the monster then appeared, andthe greatest of the humanisers lost some of his soul at sight of them, thenceforward unable to rid himself of their influence. 

From the /stanze/ Narcisse took Pierre to the /loggie/, those glazedgalleries which are so high and so delicately decorated. But here youonly find work which pupils executed after designs left by Raffaelle athis death. The fall was sudden and complete, and never had Pierre betterunderstood that genius is everything--that when it disappears the schoolcollapses. The man of genius sums up his period; at a given hour hethrows forth all the sap of the social soil, which afterwards remainsexhausted often for centuries. So Pierre became more particularlyinterested in the fine view that the /loggie/ afford, and all at once henoticed that the papal apartments were in front of him, just across theCourt of San Damaso. This court, with its porticus, fountain, and whitepavement, had an aspect of empty, airy, sunlit solemnity which surprisedhim. There was none of the gloom or pent-up religious mystery that he haddreamt of with his mind full of the surroundings of the old northerncathedrals. Right and left of the steps conducting to the rooms of thePope and the Cardinal Secretary of State four or five carriages wereranged, the coachmen stiffly erect and the horses motionless in thebrilliant light; and nothing else peopled that vast square desert of acourt which, with its bareness gilded by the coruscations of itsglass-work and the ruddiness of its stones, suggested a pagan templededicated to the sun. But what more particularly struck Pierre was thesplendid panorama of Rome, for he had not hitherto imagined that the Popefrom his windows could thus behold the entire city spread out before himas if he merely had to stretch forth his hand to make it his own oncemore. 

While Pierre contemplated the scene a sound of voices caused him to turn;and he perceived a servant in black livery who, after repeating a messageto Narcisse, was retiring with a deep bow. Looking much annoyed, the/attache/ approached the young priest. "Monsignor Gamba del Zoppo, " saidhe, "has sent word that he can't see us this morning. Some unexpectedduties require his presence. " However, Narcisse's embarrassment showedthat he did not believe in the excuse, but rather suspected some one ofhaving so terrified his cousin that the latter was afraid of compromisinghimself. Obliging and courageous as Habert himself was, this made himindignant. Still he smiled and resumed: "Listen, perhaps there's a meansof forcing an entry. If your time is your own we can lunch together andthen return to visit the Museum of Antiquities. I shall certainly end bycoming across my cousin and we may, perhaps, be lucky enough to meet thePope should he go down to the gardens. "

At the news that his audience was yet again postponed Pierre had feltkeenly disappointed. However, as the whole day was at his disposal, hewillingly accepted the /attache's/ offer. They lunched in front of St. Peter's, in a little restaurant of the Borgo, most of whose customerswere pilgrims, and the fare, as it happened, was far from good. Then atabout two o'clock they set off for the museum, skirting the basilica byway of the Piazza della Sagrestia. It was a bright, deserted, burningdistrict; and again, but in a far greater degree, did the young priestexperience that sensation of bare, tawny, sun-baked majesty which hadcome upon him while gazing into the Court of San Damaso. Then, as hepassed the apse of St. Peter's, the enormity of the colossus was broughthome to him more strongly than ever: it rose like a giant bouquet ofarchitecture edged by empty expanses of pavement sprinkled with fineweeds. And in all the silent immensity there were only two childrenplaying in the shadow of a wall. The old papal mint, the Zecca, now anItalian possession, and guarded by soldiers of the royal army, is on theleft of the passage leading to the museums, while on the right, just infront, is one of the entrances of honour to the Vatican where the papalSwiss Guard keeps watch and ward; and this is the entrance by which, according to etiquette, the pair-horse carriages convey the Pope'svisitors into the Court of San Damaso. 

Following the long lane which ascends between a wing of the palace andits garden wall, Narcisse and Pierre at last reached the Museum ofAntiquities. Ah! what a museum it is, with galleries innumerable, amuseum compounded of three museums, the Pio-Clementino, Chiaramonti, andthe Braccio-Nuovo, and containing a whole world found beneath the soil, then exhumed, and now glorified in full sunlight. For more than two hoursPierre went from one hall to another, dazzled by the masterpieces, bewildered by the accumulation of genius and beauty. It was not only thecelebrated examples of statuary, the Laocoon and the Apollo of thecabinets of the Belvedere, the Meleager, or even the torso ofHercules--that astonished him. He was yet more impressed by the/ensemble/, by the innumerable quantities of Venuses, Bacchuses, anddeified emperors and empresses, by the whole superb growth of beautifulor August flesh celebrating the immortality of life. Three dayspreviously he had visited the Museum of the Capitol, where he had admiredthe Venus, the Dying Gaul, * the marvellous Centaurs of black marble, andthe extraordinary collection of busts, but here his admiration becameintensified into stupor by the inexhaustible wealth of the galleries. And, with more curiosity for life than for art, perhaps, he againlingered before the busts which so powerfully resuscitate the Rome ofhistory--the Rome which, whilst incapable of realising the ideal beautyof Greece, was certainly well able to create life. The emperors, thephilosophers, the learned men, the poets are all there, and live such asthey really were, studied and portrayed in all scrupulousness with theirdeformities, their blemishes, the slightest peculiarities of theirfeatures. And from this extreme solicitude for truth springs a wonderfulwealth of character and an incomparable vision of the past. Nothing, indeed, could be loftier: the very men live once more, and retrace thehistory of their city, that history which has been so falsified that theteaching of it has caused generations of school-boys to hold antiquity inhorror. But on seeing the men, how well one understands, how fully onecan sympathise! And indeed the smallest bits of marble, the maimedstatues, the bas-reliefs in fragments, even the isolated limbs--whetherthe divine arm of a nymph or the sinewy, shaggy thigh of a satyr--evokethe splendour of a civilisation full of light, grandeur, and strength. 

 * Best known in England, through Byron's lines, as the Dying Gladiator, though that appellation is certainly erroneous. --Trans. 

At last Narcisse brought Pierre back into the Gallery of the Candelabra, three hundred feet in length and full of fine examples of sculpture. "Listen, my dear Abbe, " said he. "It is scarcely more than four o'clock, and we will sit down here for a while, as I am told that the Holy Fathersometimes passes this way to go down to the gardens. It would be reallylucky if you could see him, perhaps even speak to him--who can tell? Atall events, it will rest you, for you must be tired out. "

Narcisse was known to all the attendants, and his relationship toMonsignor Gamba gave him the run of almost the entire Vatican, where hewas fond of spending his leisure time. Finding two chairs, they sat down, and the /attache/ again began to talk of art. 

How astonishing had been the destiny of Rome, what a singular, borrowedroyalty had been hers! She seemed like a centre whither the whole worldconverged, but where nothing grew from the soil itself, which from theoutset appeared to be stricken with sterility. The arts required to beacclimatised there; it was necessary to transplant the genius ofneighbouring nations, which, once there, however, flourishedmagnificently. Under the emperors, when Rome was the queen of the earth, the beauty of her monuments and sculpture came to her from Greece. Later, when Christianity arose in Rome, it there remained impregnated withpaganism; it was on another soil that it produced Gothic art, theChristian Art /par excellence/. Later still, at the Renascence, it wascertainly at Rome that the age of Julius II and Leo X shone forth; butthe artists of Tuscany and Umbria prepared the evolution, brought it toRome that it might thence expand and soar. For the second time, indeed, art came to Rome from without, and gave her the royalty of the world byblossoming so triumphantly within her walls. Then occurred theextraordinary awakening of antiquity, Apollo and Venus resuscitatedworshipped by the popes themselves, who from the time of Nicholas Vdreamt of making papal Rome the equal of the imperial city. After theprecursors, so sincere, tender, and strong in their art--Fra Angelico, Perugino, Botticelli, and so many others--came the two sovereigns, Michael Angelo and Raffaelle, the superhuman and the divine. Then thefall was sudden, years elapsed before the advent of Caravaggio with powerof colour and modelling, all that the science of painting could achievewhen bereft of genius. And afterwards the decline continued until Berniniwas reached--Bernini, the real creator of the Rome of the present popes, the prodigal child who at twenty could already show a galaxy of colossalmarble wenches, the universal architect who with fearful activityfinished the facade, built the colonnade, decorated the interior of St. Peter's, and raised fountains, churches, and palaces innumerable. Andthat was the end of all, for since then Rome has little by littlewithdrawn from life, from the modern world, as though she, who alwayslived on what she derived from others, were dying of her inability totake anything more from them in order to convert it to her own glory. 

"Ah! Bernini, that delightful Bernini!" continued Narcisse with hisrapturous air. "He is both powerful and exquisite, his verve alwaysready, his ingenuity invariably awake, his fecundity full of grace andmagnificence. As for their Bramante with his masterpiece, that cold, correct Cancelleria, we'll dub him the Michael Angelo and Raffaelle ofarchitecture and say no more about it. But Bernini, that exquisiteBernini, why, there is more delicacy and refinement in his pretended badtaste than in all the hugeness and perfection of the others! Our own ageought to recognise itself in his art, at once so varied and so deep, sotriumphant in its mannerisms, so full of a perturbing solicitude for theartificial and so free from the baseness of reality. Just go to the VillaBorghese to see the group of Apollo and Daphne which Bernini executedwhen he was eighteen, * and in particular see his statue of Santa Teresain ecstasy at Santa Maria della Vittoria! Ah! that Santa Teresa! It islike heaven opening, with the quiver that only a purely divine enjoymentcan set in woman's flesh, the rapture of faith carried to the point ofspasm, the creature losing breath and dying of pleasure in the arms ofthe Divinity! I have spent hours and hours before that work withoutexhausting the infinite scope of its precious, burning symbolisation. "

 * There is also at the Villa Borghese Bernini's /Anchises carried by Aeneas/, which he sculptured when only sixteen. No doubt his faults were many; but it was his misfortune to belong to a decadent period. --Trans. 

Narcisse's voice died away, and Pierre, no longer astonished at hiscovert, unconscious hatred of health, simplicity, and strength, scarcelylistened to him. The young priest himself was again becoming absorbed inthe idea he had formed of pagan Rome resuscitating in Christian Rome andturning it into Catholic Rome, the new political, sacerdotal, domineeringcentre of earthly government. Apart from the primitive age of theCatacombs, had Rome ever been Christian? The thoughts that had come tohim on the Palatine, in the Appian Way, and in St. Peter's were gatheringconfirmation. Genius that morning had brought him fresh proof. No doubtthe paganism which reappeared in the art of Michael Angelo and Raffaellewas tempered, transformed by the Christian spirit. But did it not stillremain the basis? Had not the former master peered across Olympus whensnatching his great nudities from the terrible heavens of Jehovah? Didnot the ideal figures of Raffaelle reveal the superb, fascinating fleshof Venus beneath the chaste veil of the Virgin? It seemed so to Pierre, and some embarrassment mingled with his despondency, for all thosebeautiful forms glorifying the ardent passions of life, were inopposition to his dream of rejuvenated Christianity giving peace to theworld and reviving the simplicity and purity of the early ages. 

All at once he was surprised to hear Narcisse, by what transition hecould not tell, speaking to him of the daily life of Leo XIII. "Yes, mydear Abbe, at eighty-four* the Holy Father shows the activity of a youngman and leads a life of determination and hard work such as neither younor I would care for! At six o'clock he is already up, says his mass inhis private chapel, and drinks a little milk for breakfast. Then, fromeight o'clock till noon, there is a ceaseless procession of cardinals andprelates, all the affairs of the congregations passing under his eyes, and none could be more numerous or intricate. At noon the public andcollective audiences usually begin. At two he dines. Then comes thesiesta which he has well earned, or else a promenade in the gardens untilsix o'clock. The private audiences then sometimes keep him for an hour ortwo. He sups at nine and scarcely eats, lives on nothing, in fact, and isalways alone at his little table. What do you think, eh, of the etiquettewhich compels him to such loneliness? There you have a man who foreighteen years has never had a guest at his table, who day by day sitsall alone in his grandeur! And as soon as ten o'clock strikes, aftersaying the Rosary with his familiars, he shuts himself up in his room. But, although he may go to bed, he sleeps very little; he is frequentlytroubled by insomnia, and gets up and sends for a secretary to dictatememoranda or letters to him. When any interesting matter requires hisattention he gives himself up to it heart and soul, never letting itescape his thoughts. And his life, his health, lies in all this. His mindis always busy; his will and strength must always be exerting themselves. You may know that he long cultivated Latin verse with affection; and Ibelieve that in his days of struggle he had a passion for journalism, inspired the articles of the newspapers he subsidised, and even dictatedsome of them when his most cherished ideas were in question. "

 * The reader should remember that the period selected for this narrative is the year 1894. Leo XIII was born in 1810. --Trans. 

Silence fell. At every moment Narcisse craned his neck to see if thelittle papal /cortege/ were not emerging from the Gallery of theTapestries to pass them on its way to the gardens. "You are perhapsaware, " he resumed, "that his Holiness is brought down on a low chairwhich is small enough to pass through every doorway. It's quite ajourney, more than a mile, through the /loggie/, the /stanze/ ofRaffaelle, the painting and sculpture galleries, not to mention thenumerous staircases, before he reaches the gardens, where a pair-horsecarriage awaits him. It's quite fine this evening, so he will surelycome. We must have a little patience. "

Whilst Narcisse was giving these particulars Pierre again sank into areverie and saw the whole extraordinary history pass before him. Firstcame the worldly, ostentatious popes of the Renascence, those whoresuscitated antiquity with so much passion and dreamt of draping theHoly See with the purple of empire once more. There was Paul II, themagnificent Venetian who built the Palazzo di Venezia; Sixtus IV, to whomone owes the Sixtine Chapel; and Julius II and Leo X, who made Rome acity of theatrical pomp, prodigious festivities, tournaments, ballets, hunts, masquerades, and banquets. At that time the papacy had justrediscovered Olympus amidst the dust of buried ruins, and as thoughintoxicated by the torrent of life which arose from the ancient soil, itfounded the museums, thus reviving the superb temples of the pagan age, and restoring them to the cult of universal admiration. Never had theChurch been in such peril of death, for if the Christ was still honouredat St. Peter's, Jupiter and all the other gods and goddesses, with theirbeauteous, triumphant flesh, were enthroned in the halls of the Vatican. Then, however, another vision passed before Pierre, one of the modernpopes prior to the Italian occupation--notably Pius IX, who, whilst yetfree, often went into his good city of Rome. His huge red and gold coachwas drawn by six horses, surrounded by Swiss Guards and followed by NobleGuards; but now and again he would alight in the Corso, and continue hispromenade on foot, and then the mounted men of the escort gallopedforward to give warning and stop the traffic. The carriages drew up, thegentlemen had to alight and kneel on the pavement, whilst the ladiessimply rose and devoutly inclined their heads, as the Holy Father, attended by his Court, slowly wended his way to the Piazza del Popolo, smiling and blessing at every step. And now had come Leo XIII, thevoluntary prisoner, shut up in the Vatican for eighteen years, and he, behind the high, silent walls, in the unknown sphere where each of hisdays flowed by so quietly, had acquired a more exalted majesty, instinctwith sacred and redoubtable mysteriousness. 

Ah! that Pope whom you no longer meet or see, that Pope hidden from thecommon of mankind like some terrible divinity whom the priests alone dareto approach! It is in that sumptuous Vatican which his forerunners of theRenascence built and adorned for giant festivities that he has secludedhimself; it is there he lives, far from the crowd, in prison with thehandsome men and the lovely women of Michael Angelo and Raffaelle, withthe gods and goddesses of marble, with the whole of resplendent Olympuscelebrating around him the religion of life and light. With him theentire Papacy is there steeped in paganism. What a spectacle when theslender, weak old man, all soul, so purely white, passes along thegalleries of the Museum of Antiquities on his way to the gardens. Rightand left the statues behold him pass with all their bare flesh. There isJupiter, there is Apollo, there is Venus the /dominatrix/, there is Pan, the universal god in whose laugh the joys of earth ring out. Nereidsbathe in transparent water. Bacchantes roll, unveiled, in the warm grass. Centaurs gallop by carrying lovely girls, faint with rapture, on theirsteaming haunches. Ariadne is surprised by Bacchus, Ganymede fondles theeagle, Adonis fires youth and maiden with his flame. And on and on passesthe weak, white old man, swaying on his low chair, amidst that splendidtriumph, that display and glorification of the flesh, which shouts aloudthe omnipotence of Nature, of everlasting matter! Since they have foundit again, exhumed it, and honoured it, that it is which once more reignsthere imperishable; and in vain have they set vine leaves on the statues, even as they have swathed the huge figures of Michael Angelo; sex stillflares on all sides, life overflows, its germs course in torrents throughthe veins of the world. Near by, in that Vatican library of incomparablewealth, where all human science lies slumbering, there lurks a yet moreterrible danger--the danger of an explosion which would sweep awayeverything, Vatican and St. Peter's also, if one day the books in theirturn were to awake and speak aloud as speak the beauty of Venus and themanliness of Apollo. But the white, diaphanous old man seems neither tosee nor to hear, and the huge heads of Jupiter, the trunks of Hercules, the equivocal statues of Antinous continue to watch him as he passes on!

However, Narcisse had become impatient, and, going in search of anattendant, he learnt from him that his Holiness had already gone down. Toshorten the distance, indeed, the /cortege/ often passes along a kind ofopen gallery leading towards the Mint. "Well, let us go down as well, "said Narcisse to Pierre; "I will try to show you the gardens. "

Down below, in the vestibule, a door of which opened on to a broad path, he spoke to another attendant, a former pontifical soldier whom hepersonally knew. The man at once let him pass with Pierre, but was unableto tell him whether Monsignor Gamba del Zoppo had accompanied hisHoliness that day. 

"No matter, " resumed Narcisse when he and his companion were alone in thepath; "I don't despair of meeting him--and these, you see, are the famousgardens of the Vatican. "

They are very extensive grounds, and the Pope can go quite two and a halfmiles by passing along the paths of the wood, the vineyard, and thekitchen garden. Occupying the plateau of the Vatican hill, which themedieval wall of Leo IV still girdles, the gardens are separated from theneighbouring valleys as by a fortified rampart. The wall formerlystretched to the castle of Sant' Angelo, thereby forming what was knownas the Leonine City. No inquisitive eyes can peer into the groundsexcepting from the dome of St. Peter's, which casts its huge shadow overthem during the hot summer weather. They are, too, quite a little world, which each pope has taken pleasure in embellishing. There is a largeparterre with lawns of geometrical patterns, planted with handsome palmsand adorned with lemon and orange trees in pots; there is a less formal, a shadier garden, where, amidst deep plantations of yoke-elms, you findGiovanni Vesanzio's fountain, the Aquilone, and Pius IV's old Casino;then, too, there are the woods with their superb evergreen oaks, theirthickets of plane-trees, acacias, and pines, intersected by broadavenues, which are delightfully pleasant for leisurely strolls; andfinally, on turning to the left, beyond other clumps of trees, come thekitchen garden and the vineyard, the last well tended. 

Whilst walking through the wood Narcisse told Pierre of the life led bythe Holy Father in these gardens. He strolls in them every second daywhen the weather allows. Formerly the popes left the Vatican for theQuirinal, which is cooler and healthier, as soon as May arrived; andspent the dog days at Castle Gandolfo on the margins of the Lake ofAlbano. But nowadays the only summer residence possessed by his Holinessis a virtually intact tower of the old rampart of Leo IV. He here spendsthe hottest days, and has even erected a sort of pavilion beside it forthe accommodation of his suite. Narcisse, like one at home, went in andsecured permission for Pierre to glance at the one room occupied by thePope, a spacious round chamber with semispherical ceiling, on which arepainted the heavens with symbolical figures of the constellations; one ofthe latter, the lion, having two stars for eyes--stars which a system oflighting causes to sparkle during the night. The walls of the tower areso thick that after blocking up a window, a kind of room, for theaccommodation of a couch, has been contrived in the embrasure. Besidethis couch the only furniture is a large work-table, a dining-table withflaps, and a large regal arm-chair, a mass of gilding, one of the giftsof the Pope's episcopal jubilee. And you dream of the days of solitudeand perfect silence, spent in that low donjon hall, where the coolness ofa tomb prevails whilst the heavy suns of August are scorching overpoweredRome. 

An astronomical observatory has been installed in another tower, surmounted by a little white cupola, which you espy amidst the greenery;and under the trees there is also a Swiss chalet, where Leo XIII is fondof resting. He sometimes goes on foot to the kitchen garden, and takesmuch interest in the vineyard, visiting it to see if the grapes areripening and if the vintage will be a good one. What most astonishedPierre, however, was to learn that the Holy Father had been very fond of"sport" before age had weakened him. He was indeed passionately addictedto bird snaring. Broad-meshed nets were hung on either side of a path onthe fringe of a plantation, and in the middle of the path were placedcages containing the decoys, whose songs soon attracted all the birds ofthe neighbourhood--red-breasts, white-throats, black-caps, nightingales, fig-peckers of all sorts. And when a numerous company of them wasgathered together Leo XIII, seated out of sight and watching, wouldsuddenly clap his hands and startle the birds, which flew up and werecaught by the wings in the meshes of the nets. All that then remained tobe done was to take them out of the nets and stifle them by a touch ofthe thumb. Roast fig-peckers are delicious. *

 * Perhaps so; but what a delightful pastime for the Vicar of the Divinity!--Trans. 

As Pierre came back through the wood he had another surprise. He suddenlylighted on a "Grotto of Lourdes, " a miniature imitation of the original, built of rocks and blocks of cement. And such was his emotion at thesight that he could not conceal it. "It's true, then!" said he. "I wastold of it, but I thought that the Holy Father was of loftier mind--freefrom all such base superstitions!"

"Oh!" replied Narcisse, "I fancy that the grotto dates from Pius IX, whoevinced especial gratitude to our Lady of Lourdes. At all events, it mustbe a gift, and Leo XIII simply keeps it in repair. "

For a few moments Pierre remained motionless and silent before thatimitation grotto, that childish plaything. Some zealously devout visitorshad left their visiting cards in the cracks of the cement-work! For hispart, he felt very sad, and followed his companion with bowed head, lamenting the wretched idiocy of the world. Then, on emerging from thewood, on again reaching the parterre, he raised his eyes. 

Ah! how exquisite in spite of everything was that decline of a lovelyday, and what a victorious charm ascended from the soil in that part ofthe gardens. There, in front of that bare, noble, burning parterre, farmore than under the languishing foliage of the wood or among the fruitfulvines, Pierre realised the strength of Nature. Above the grass growingmeagrely over the compartments of geometrical pattern which the pathwaystraced there were barely a few low shrubs, dwarf roses, aloes, rare tuftsof withering flowers. Some green bushes still described the escutcheon ofPius IX in accordance with the strange taste of former times. And amidstthe warm silence one only heard the faint crystalline murmur of the watertrickling from the basin of the central fountain. But all Rome, itsardent heavens, sovereign grace, and conquering voluptuousness, seemedwith their own soul to animate this vast rectangular patch of decorativegardening, this mosaic of verdure, which in its semi-abandonment andscorched decay assumed an aspect of melancholy pride, instinct with theever returning quiver of a passion of fire that could not die. Someantique vases and statues, whitely nude under the setting sun, skirtedthe parterres. And above the aroma of eucalyptus and of pine, strongereven than that of the ripening oranges, there rose the odour of thelarge, bitter box-shrubs, so laden with pungent life that it disturbedone as one passed as if indeed it were the very scent of the fecundity ofthat ancient soil saturated with the dust of generations. 

"It's very strange that we have not met his Holiness, " exclaimedNarcisse. "Perhaps his carriage took the other path through the woodwhile we were in the tower. "

Then, reverting to Monsignor Gamba del Zoppo, the /attache/ explainedthat the functions of /Copiere/, or papal cup-bearer, which his cousinshould have discharged as one of the four /Camerieri segretipartecipanti/ had become purely honorary since the dinners offered todiplomatists or in honour of newly consecrated bishops had been given bythe Cardinal Secretary of State. Monsignor Gamba, whose cowardice andnullity were legendary, seemed therefore to have no other /role/ thanthat of enlivening Leo XIII, whose favour he had won by his incessantflattery and the anecdotes which he was ever relating about both theblack and the white worlds. Indeed this fat, amiable man, who could evenbe obliging when his interests were not in question, was a perfectnewspaper, brimful of tittle-tattle, disdaining no item of gossipwhatever, even if it came from the kitchens. And thus he was quietlymarching towards the cardinalate, certain of obtaining the hat withoutother exertion than that of bringing a budget of gossip to beguile thepleasant hours of the promenade. And Heaven knew that he was always ableto garner an abundant harvest of news in that closed Vatican swarmingwith prelates of every kind, in that womanless pontifical family of oldbegowned bachelors, all secretly exercised by vast ambitions, covert andrevolting rivalries, and ferocious hatreds, which, it is said, are stillsometimes carried as far as the good old poison of ancient days. 

All at once Narcisse stopped. "Ah!" he exclaimed, "I was certain of it. There's the Holy Father! But we are not in luck. He won't even see us; heis about to get into his carriage again. "

As he spoke a carriage drew up at the verge of the wood, and a little/cortege/ emerging from a narrow path, went towards it. 

Pierre felt as if he had received a great blow in the heart. Motionlessbeside his companion, and half hidden by a lofty vase containing alemon-tree, it was only from a distance that he was able to see the whiteold man, looking so frail and slender in the wavy folds of his whitecassock, and walking so very slowly with short, gliding steps. The youngpriest could scarcely distinguish the emaciated face of old diaphanousivory, emphasised by a large nose which jutted out above thin lips. However, the Pontiff's black eyes were glittering with an inquisitivesmile, while his right ear was inclined towards Monsignor Gamba delZoppo, who was doubtless finishing some story at once rich and short, flowery and dignified. And on the left walked a Noble Guard; and twoother prelates followed. 

It was but a familiar apparition; Leo XIII was already climbing into theclosed carriage. And Pierre, in the midst of that large, odoriferous, burning garden, again experienced the singular emotion which had comeupon him in the Gallery of the Candelabra while he was picturing the Popeon his way between the Apollos and Venuses radiant in their triumphantnudity. There, however, it was only pagan art which had celebrated theeternity of life, the superb, almighty powers of Nature. But here he hadbeheld the Pontiff steeped in Nature itself, in Nature clad in the mostlovely, most voluptuous, most passionate guise. Ah! that Pope, that oldman strolling with his Divinity of grief, humility, and renunciationalong the paths of those gardens of love, in the languid evenings of thehot summer days, beneath the caressing scents of pine and eucalyptus, ripe oranges, and tall, acrid box-shrubs! The whole atmosphere around himproclaimed the powers of the great god Pan. How pleasant was the thoughtof living there, amidst that magnificence of heaven and of earth, ofloving the beauty of woman and of rejoicing in the fruitfulness of all!And suddenly the decisive truth burst forth that from a land of such joyand light it was only possible for a temporal religion of conquest andpolitical domination to rise; not the mystical, pain-fraught religion ofthe North--the religion of the soul!

However, Narcisse led the young priest away, telling him other anecdotesas they went--anecdotes of the occasional /bonhomie/ of Leo XIII, whowould stop to chat with the gardeners, and question them about the healthof the trees and the sale of the oranges. And he also mentioned thePope's former passion for a pair of gazelles, sent him from Africa, twograceful creatures which he had been fond of caressing, and at whosedeath he had shed tears. But Pierre no longer listened. When they foundthemselves on the Piazza of St. Peter's, he turned round and gazed at theVatican once more. 

His eyes had fallen on the gate of bronze, and he remembered havingwondered that morning what there might be behind these metal panelsornamented with big nails. And he did not yet dare to answer thequestion, and decide if the new nations thirsting for fraternity andjustice would really find there the religion necessary for thedemocracies of to-morrow; for he had not been able to probe things, andonly carried a first impression away with him. But how keen it was, andhow ill it boded for his dreams! A gate of bronze! Yes, a hard, impregnable gate, so completely shutting the Vatican off from the rest ofthe world that nothing new had entered the palace for three hundredyears. Behind that portal the old centuries, as far as the sixteenth, remained immutable. Time seemed to have stayed its course there for ever;nothing more stirred; the very costumes of the Swiss Guards, the NobleGuards, and the prelates themselves were unchanged; and you foundyourself in the world of three hundred years ago, with its etiquette, itscostumes, and its ideas. That the popes in a spirit of haughty protestshould for five and twenty years have voluntarily shut themselves up intheir palace was already regrettable; but this imprisonment of centurieswithin the past, within the grooves of tradition, was far more seriousand dangerous. It was all Catholicism which was thus imprisoned, whosedogmas and sacerdotal organisation were obstinately immobilised. Perhaps, in spite of its apparent flexibility, Catholicism was really unable toyield in anything, under peril of being swept away, and therein lay bothits weakness and its strength. And then what a terrible world was there, how great the pride and ambition, how numerous the hatreds and rivalries!And how strange the prison, how singular the company assembled behind thebars--the Crucified by the side of Jupiter Capitolinus, all paganantiquity fraternising with the Apostles, all the splendours of theRenascence surrounding the pastor of the Gospel who reigns in the name ofthe humble and the poor!

The sun was sinking, the gentle, luscious sweetness of the Roman eveningswas falling from the limpid heavens, and after that splendid day spentwith Michael Angelo, Raffaelle, the ancients, and the Pope, in the finestpalace of the world, the young priest lingered, distracted, on the Piazzaof St. Peter's. 

"Well, you must excuse me, my dear Abbe, " concluded Narcisse. "But I willnow confess to you that I suspect my worthy cousin of a fear that hemight compromise himself by meddling in your affair. I shall certainlysee him again, but you will do well not to put too much reliance on him. "

It was nearly six o'clock when Pierre got back to the Boccanera mansion. As a rule, he passed in all modesty down the lane, and entered by thelittle side door, a key of which had been given him. But he had thatmorning received a letter from M. De la Choue, and desired to communicateit to Benedetta. So he ascended the grand staircase, and on reaching theanteroom was surprised to find nobody there. As a rule, whenever theman-servant went out Victorine installed herself in his place and busiedherself with some needlework. Her chair was there, and Pierre evennoticed some linen which she had left on a little table when probablysummoned elsewhere. Then, as the door of the first reception-room wasajar, he at last ventured in. It was almost night there already, thetwilight was softly dying away, and all at once the young priest stoppedshort, fearing to take another step, for, from the room beyond, the largeyellow /salon/, there came a murmur of feverish, distracted words, ardententreaties, fierce panting, a rustling and a shuffling of footsteps. Andsuddenly Pierre no longer hesitated, urged on despite himself by theconviction that the sounds he heard were those of a struggle, and thatsome one was hard pressed. 

And when he darted into the further room he was stupefied, for Dario wasthere, no longer showing the degenerate elegance of the last scion of anexhausted race, but maddened by the hot, frantic blood of the Boccaneraswhich had bubbled up within him. He had clasped Benedetta by theshoulders in a frenzy of passion and was scorching her face with his hot, entreating words: "But since you say, my darling, that it is all over, that your marriage will never be dissolved--oh! why should we be wretchedfor ever! Love me as you do love me, and let me love you--let me loveyou!"

But the Contessina, with an indescribable expression of tenderness andsuffering on her tearful face, repulsed him with her outstretched arms, she likewise evincing a fierce energy as she repeated: "No, no; I loveyou, but it must not, it must not be. "

At that moment, amidst the roar of his despair, Dario became consciousthat some one was entering the room. He turned and gazed at Pierre withan expression of stupefied insanity, scarce able even to recognise him. Then he carried his two hands to his face, to his bloodshot eyes and hischeeks wet with scalding tears, and fled, heaving a terrible, pain-fraught sigh in which baffled passion mingled with grief andrepentance. 

Benedetta seated herself, breathing hard, her strength and couragewellnigh exhausted. But as Pierre, too much embarrassed to speak, turnedtowards the door, she addressed him in a calmer voice: "No, no, Monsieurl'Abbe, do not go away--sit down, I pray you; I should like to speak toyou for a moment. "

He thereupon thought it his duty to account for his sudden entrance, andexplained that he had found the door of the first /salon/ ajar, and thatVictorine was not in the ante-room, though he had seen her work lying onthe table there. 

"Yes, " exclaimed the Contessina, "Victorine ought to have been there; Isaw her there but a short time ago. And when my poor Dario lost his headI called her. Why did she not come?" Then, with sudden expansion, leaningtowards Pierre, she continued: "Listen, Monsieur l'Abbe, I will tell youwhat happened, for I don't want you to form too bad an opinion of my poorDario. It was all in some measure my fault. Last night he asked me for anappointment here in order that we might have a quiet chat, and as I knewthat my aunt would be absent at this time to-day I told him to come. Itwas only natural--wasn't it?--that we should want to see one another andcome to an agreement after the grievous news that my marriage willprobably never be annulled. We suffer too much, and must form a decision. And so when he came this evening we began to weep and embrace, minglingour tears together. I kissed him again and again, telling him how Iadored him, how bitterly grieved I was at being the cause of hissufferings, and how surely I should die of grief at seeing him sounhappy. Ah! no doubt I did wrong; I ought not to have caught him to myheart and embraced him as I did, for it maddened him, Monsieur l'Abbe; helost his head, and would have made me break my vow to the BlessedVirgin. "

She spoke these words in all tranquillity and simplicity, without sign ofembarrassment, like a young and beautiful woman who is at once sensibleand practical. Then she resumed: "Oh! I know my poor Dario well, but itdoes not prevent me from loving him; perhaps, indeed, it only makes melove him the more. He looks delicate, perhaps rather sickly, but in truthhe is a man of passion. Yes, the old blood of my people bubbles up inhim. I know something of it myself, for when I was a child I sometimeshad fits of angry passion which left me exhausted on the floor, and evennow, when the gusts arise within me, I have to fight against myself andtorture myself in order that I may not act madly. But my poor Dario doesnot know how to suffer. He is like a child whose fancies must begratified. And yet at bottom he has a good deal of common sense; he waitsfor me because he knows that the only real happiness lies with the womanwho adores him. "

As Pierre listened he was able to form a more precise idea of the youngprince, of whose character he had hitherto had but a vague perception. Whilst dying of love for his cousin, Dario had ever been a man ofpleasure. Though he was no doubt very amiable, the basis of histemperament was none the less egotism. And, in particular, he was unableto endure suffering; he loathed suffering, ugliness, and poverty, whetherthey affected himself or others. Both his flesh and his soul requiredgaiety, brilliancy, show, life in the full sunlight. And withal he wasexhausted, with no strength left him but for the idle life he led, soincapable of thought and will that the idea of joining the new /regime/had not even occurred to him. Yet he had all the unbounded pride of aRoman; sagacity--a keen, practical perception of the real--was mingledwith his indolence; while his inveterate love of woman, more frequentlydisplayed in charm of manner, burst forth at times in attacks of franticsensuality. 

"After all he is a man, " concluded Benedetta in a low voice, "and I mustnot ask impossibilities of him. " Then, as Pierre gazed at her, hisnotions of Italian jealousy quite upset, she exclaimed, aglow withpassionate adoration: "No, no. Situated as we are, I am not jealous. Iknow very well that he will always return to me, and that he will be minealone whenever I please, whenever it may be possible. "

Silence followed; shadows were filling the room, the gilding of the largepier tables faded away, and infinite melancholy fell from the lofty, dimceiling and the old hangings, yellow like autumn leaves. But soon, bysome chance play of the waning light, a painting stood out above the sofaon which the Contessina was seated. It was the portrait of the beautifulyoung girl with the turban--Cassia Boccanera the forerunner, the/amorosa/ and avengeress. Again was Pierre struck by the portrait'sresemblance to Benedetta, and, thinking aloud, he resumed: "Passionalways proves the stronger; there invariably comes a moment when onesuccumbs--"

But Benedetta violently interrupted him: "I! I! Ah! you do not know me; Iwould rather die!" And with extraordinary exaltation, all aglow withlove, as if her superstitious faith had fired her passion to ecstasy, shecontinued: "I have vowed to the Madonna that I will belong to none butthe man I love, and to him only when he is my husband. And hitherto Ihave kept that vow, at the cost of my happiness, and I will keep itstill, even if it cost me my life! Yes, we will die, my poor Dario and I, if it be necessary; but the holy Virgin has my vow, and the angels shallnot weep in heaven!"

She was all in those words, her nature all simplicity, intricate, inexplicable though it might seem. She was doubtless swayed by that ideaof human nobility which Christianity has set in renunciation and purity;a protest, as it were, against eternal matter, against the forces ofNature, the everlasting fruitfulness of life. But there was more thanthis; she reserved herself, like a divine and priceless gift, to bebestowed on the one being whom her heart had chosen, he who would be herlord and master when God should have united them in marriage. For hereverything lay in the blessing of the priest, in the religioussolemnisation of matrimony. And thus one understood her long resistanceto Prada, whom she did not love, and her despairing, grievous resistanceto Dario, whom she did love, but who was not her husband. And howtorturing it was for that soul of fire to have to resist her love; howcontinual was the combat waged by duty in the Virgin's name against thewild, passionate blood of her race! Ignorant, indolent though she mightbe, she was capable of great fidelity of heart, and, moreover, she wasnot given to dreaming: love might have its immaterial charms, but shedesired it complete. 

As Pierre looked at her in the dying twilight he seemed to see andunderstand her for the first time. The duality of her nature appeared inher somewhat full, fleshy lips, in her big black eyes, which suggested adark, tempestuous night illumined by flashes of lightning, and in thecalm, sensible expression of the rest of her gentle, infantile face. And, withal, behind those eyes of flame, beneath that pure, candid skin, onedivined the internal tension of a superstitious, proud, and self-willedwoman, who was obstinately intent on reserving herself for her one love. And Pierre could well understand that she should be adored, that sheshould fill the life of the man she chose with passion, and that to hisown eyes she should appear like the younger sister of that lovely, tragicCassia who, unwilling to survive the blow that had rendered self-bestowalimpossible, had flung herself into the Tiber, dragging her brother Ercoleand the corpse of her lover Flavio with her. 

However, with a gesture of kindly affection Benedetta caught hold ofPierre's hands. "You have been here a fortnight, Monsieur l'Abbe, " saidshe, "and I have come to like you very much, for I feel you to be afriend. If at first you do not understand us, at least pray do not judgeus too severely. Ignorant as I may be, I always strive to act for thebest, I assure you. "

Pierre was greatly touched by her affectionate graciousness, and thankedher whilst for a moment retaining her beautiful hands in his own, for healso was becoming much attached to her. A fresh dream was carrying himoff, that of educating her, should he have the time, or, at all events, of not returning home before winning her soul over to his own ideas offuture charity and fraternity. Did not that adorable, unoccupied, indolent, ignorant creature, who only knew how to defend her love, personify the Italy of yesterday? The Italy of yesterday, so lovely andso sleepy, instinct with a dying grace, charming one even in herdrowsiness, and retaining so much mystery in the fathomless depths of herblack, passionate eyes! And what a /role/ would be that of awakening her, instructing her, winning her over to truth, making her the rejuvenatedItaly of to-morrow such as he had dreamt of! Even in that disastrousmarriage with Count Prada he tried to see merely a first attempt atrevival which had failed, the modern Italy of the North being over-hasty, too brutal in its eagerness to love and transform that gentle, belatedRome which was yet so superb and indolent. But might he not take up thetask? Had he not noticed that his book, after the astonishment of thefirst perusal, had remained a source of interest and reflection withBenedetta amidst the emptiness of her days given over to grief? What! wasit really possible that she might find some appeasement for her ownwretchedness by interesting herself in the humble, in the happiness ofthe poor? Emotion already thrilled her at the idea, and he, quivering atthe thought of all the boundless love that was within her and that shemight bestow, vowed to himself that he would draw tears of pity from hereyes. 

But the night had now almost completely fallen, and Benedetta rose to askfor a lamp. Then, as Pierre was about to take leave, she detained him foranother moment in the gloom. He could no longer see her; he only heardher grave voice: "You will not go away with too bad an opinion of us, will you, Monsieur l'Abbe? We love one another, Dario and I, and that isno sin when one behaves as one ought. Ah! yes, I love him, and have lovedhim for years. I was barely thirteen, he was eighteen, and we alreadyloved one another wildly in those big gardens of the Villa Montefioriwhich are now all broken up. Ah! what days we spent there, wholeafternoons among the trees, hours in secret hiding-places, where wekissed like little angels. When the oranges ripened their perfumeintoxicated us. And the large box-plants, ah, /Dio!/ how they envelopedus, how their strong, acrid scent made our hearts beat! I can never smellthen nowadays without feeling faint!"

A man-servant brought in the lamp, and Pierre ascended to his room. Butwhen half-way up the little staircase he perceived Victorine, who startedslightly, as if she had posted herself there to watch his departure fromthe /salon/. And now, as she followed him up, talking and seeking forinformation, he suddenly realised what had happened. "Why did you not goto your mistress instead of running off, " he asked, "when she called you, while you were sewing in the ante-room?"

At first she tried to feign astonishment and reply that she had heardnothing. But her good-natured, frank face did not know how to lie, andshe ended by confessing, with a gay, courageous air. "Well, " she said, "it surely wasn't for me to interfere between lovers! Besides, my poorlittle Benedetta is simply torturing herself to death with those ideas ofhers. Why shouldn't they be happy, since they love one another? Lifeisn't so amusing as some may think. And how bitterly one regrets nothaving seized hold of happiness when the time for it has gone!"

Once alone in his room, Pierre suddenly staggered, quite overcome. Thegreat box-plants, the great box-plants with their acrid, perturbingperfume! She, Benedetta, like himself, had quivered as she smelt them;and he saw them once more in a vision of the pontifical gardens, thevoluptuous gardens of Rome, deserted, glowing under the August sun. Andnow his whole day crystallised, assumed clear and full significance. Itspoke to him of the fruitful awakening, of the eternal protest of Natureand life, Venus and Hercules, whom one may bury for centuries beneath thesoil, but who, nevertheless, one day arise from it, and though one mayseek to wall them up within the domineering, stubborn, immutable Vatican, reign yet even there, and rule the whole, wide world with sovereignpower!