But the sun declined, and we ascended the Giralda to see his last

beams shine upon so much beauty. What a strange and charming

scene! The forest of white houses painted with delicate blue and

green; the flat roofs decorated with gardens; the four hundred

and seventy-seven narrow streets, some hardly admitting two

people abreast, through which toiled the patient mules bearing

burdens of stones, mortar for building, wood, and vegetables; the

one hundred ornamented squares and promenades; the orange

gardens; the plaza de Toros; the cathedral just beneath us, with

its hundreds of turrets; the Torre del Oro, (Tower of Gold,) so

named from its yellow hue; the Lonja, (Exchange,) with its pink

color; the grey Alcazar; the palace San Telmo by the

Guadalquivir, which winds through the city and over the plain;

and convents, and churches, and palaces; and, beyond all, the

verdant plains and the blue mountains! As the sun sank, the

convent bells rang the "Ave Maria."

"Blessed be the hour!

The time, the chime, the spot."

Certainly we all "felt that moment in its fullest power"!

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Thursday, 24.

Our first visit to-day is to San Telmo--the royal palace given by

Queen Isabella to her sister, the Duchess de Montpensier--on the

banks of the Guadalquivir, with enchanting gardens, palms and

citrons, and orange-trees; and within, all oriental in its style

and decorations. Here are some lovely pictures--one of Murillo's

most beautiful Virgins, several splendid Zurbarans, a Sebastian

del Piombo, Holy Family, etc.

Next we visit the great tobacco manufactory, where 4000 women are

employed making cigars. As all these were talking at once, we

were glad soon to escape. And then the Alcazar, the wonderful

Moorish palace, than which not even the Alhambra can be more

beautiful--as it seems to us. We wander in delicious gardens

--like those described in the _Arabian Nights_--and then

enter the enchanted palace! Passing several courts, we find the

great door of entrance sculptured and painted in arabesque. Here

is a long hall, with exquisitely carved and painted roof, from

which we pass into a square marble court, or patio, with double

rows of marble columns and a fountain in the centre. From the

four sides of this patio you enter by immense doors, carved and

inlaid, into the apartments beyond. First, the Hall of the

Ambassadors, which communicates with others through elegant

arches profusely ornamented, supported by marble pillars of every

color with gilded capitals. The walls and dome are ornamented

with sentences from the Koran, in gilt letters upon grounds of

blue and crimson. Every chamber has different decorations, all

equally elegant.

Below, opening from the garden, we are shown some subterranean

cells said to have been the prisons of Christian captives, and

above these the luxurious baths of Maria de Padilla--the famous

mistress of Peter the Cruel. It was the custom for the king and

courtiers to sit by and see her bathe, and for the latter to

pretend to sip the water of the bath. Seeing one of these fail in

this gallant duty one day, the king asked why he omitted it.

"Because, sire," (said the witty courtier,) "I am afraid to like

the sauce so well that I shall covet the bird." Peter the Cruel

lived much in this palace, and did much to embellish it through

the Moorish artists whom he employed. Many of the Spanish kings

lived there, and Charles V. was married in one of the upper

rooms. These we did not see, and learned afterward that they were

inhabited by "Fernan Caballero," one of the most popular writers

of Spain--whose delightful books we learned later to admire.

Fernan Caballero is the _nom de plume_ of this lady, who has

had many misfortunes, and who by permission of the queen lives in

the Alcazar, devoting her life to deeds of benevolence amongst

the poor, whose traits and trials she records in many delightful

works. It is a pity that out of France these books should be

unknown. One of our party determines to take some of them to

America, that they may be translated and bring to the knowledge

of our people these charming scenes of Spanish home life so

inimitably described.[Footnote 79]

[Footnote 79: One of "Fernan Caballero's" (Mrs. Fabre) books,

_The Alvareda Family_, has already been translated here

and published in _The Catholic World_ three years ago;

and two others, _The Sea Gull_, and _The Castle and

Cottage in Spain_, have appeared in an English dress in

London, and _Lucia Garcia_ is already translated and

will soon appear in this magazine.--ED. CATH. W.]

In the evening we go to a ball, to see the Andalusian dances in

their proper costume. Boleros, and cachuchas, and seguidillas,

and manchegas! Such graceful movements, such little feet in such

dainty satin shoes!

{346}

Generally to the accompaniment of the guitar, with most peculiar

and monotonous music, singing at the same time, clapping the

hands, stamping the feet, and the dancer always with castanets.

All the dances were peculiar, solos, often in couples, or three

at a time, some of these coquettish--one, especially, danced by a

man and a woman, he in hat and cloak, she with fan and mantilla.

How she wielded this little "weapon"!--now hiding her face, now

peeping from behind it, which he also did with his _manta_.

By and by he takes off his hat and humbly lays it at her feet.

She dances over it scornfully; without ever losing the step, he

recovers it. She flies; he pursues, opening his manta

entreatingly; she relents; again he throws down the hat; she

stoops and gives it to him, and eventually they dance away with

the manta covering both.

Friday, 25.

We go again to the wonderful cathedral; examined many pictures

which yesterday escaped us. In the chapter house is one of

Murillo's "Conceptions," and eight charming heads (ovals) painted

by him, in the same room. In the chapel of the kings lies the

body of St. Ferdinand, and of Murillo; who asked to be buried at

the foot of a picture (The Descent from the Cross) of which he

was particularly fond, which is above the main altar.

Near the great entrance of the cathedral a stone in the pavement

marks the spot where lies Fernando, the son of Christopher

Columbus, with the motto upon it, "A Castilla y á Leon, mundo

nuevo dió Colon." From his tomb we go to the great Columbine

Library given by him to his country, containing some interesting

MSS. of his father--one, a book of quotations containing extracts

from the psalms and prophets, proving the existence of the new

world. There are a series of portraits round the room, of

Columbus, his son, St. Ferdinand, Cardinal Mendoza, and Cardinal

Wiseman, (who was a native of Seville.) There is also preserved

here the great two-edged sword of Ferdinand Gonsalves.

Some of our party go to visit the archbishop, in the hope to get

permission to see the treasures of the church, which are very

valuable; but the presence of the revolution obliges him to deny

us this as well as the _entrée_ to the convent of St.

Theresa, which is said to be exactly the same as when she founded

it. It was here she underwent such great trouble and persecution,

and where (finding she had but two or three coppers with which to

begin a great foundation) she said to her nuns, "Never mind, two

cents and Theresa are nothing; but two cents and God are

everything."

And this interesting convent we could not see.[Footnote 80]

Indeed, the time of our visit to Spain was inopportune for seeing

the inside of religious houses. A former revolution having

deprived them of their property, they have now the fear of being

turned out of their convents.

[Footnote 80: For a full description of this convent see Lady

Herbert's _Impressions of Spain_, just from the press of

the Catholic Publication Society. This work also contains

illustrations of cathedrals, churches, gardens, palaces, and

other places described in these letters.--ED. CATH. W.]

While we wait in the church for the return of our friends, we

enter into conversation with two of the little boys of the choir,

whose beauty attracts us, begging them to describe the style in

which they dance before the Blessed Sacrament on Corpus Christi,

which is said to be a ceremony most solemn, grave, and

impressive. These children evinced great curiosity about us, and

when told that one of the party was "a convert," (had been a

Protestant,) could not be made to comprehend what it meant; for

they confound all Protestants with unbelievers.

{347}

"And did not know about our dear Lord!" said one little fellow

with a look of sorrowful compassion, reminding one of the scene

in one of Fernan Caballero's tales (_The Alvareda Family_)

where the hero comes home from his travels and describes a

country covered with snow so that people are sometimes buried

under it.

We go to see the house in which Murillo lived and the spot where

he was first buried--passing the house in which Cardinal Wiseman

was born, upon which is a large tablet with a beautiful and

appropriate inscription. In Murillo's house is an extensive

gallery with many of his loveliest pictures, and some of the

pictures of monks for which Zurbaran is so famous.

Here we see the Infant St. John with the Lamb, and the Infant

Saviour, so often repeated by Murillo, apart and together an

exquisite Ecce Homo; several Madonnas, and Saints.

On our way we are shown the shop where dwelt the original Figaro,

and also the house of Don Juan!

The Casa de Pilatos, one of the residences of the Duke of Medina

Coeli, next claims us--a curious old palace, built in the

sixteenth century in imitation of Pilate's House in Jerusalem,

which was visited at that time by the founder. The patio is fine,

with a beautiful fountain, and double row of columns, (one above

another,) with statues at the four corners. The marble staircase

and halls--lined with azulejos, (colored porcelain tiles,)

universally used in this country--are particularly handsome.

Next we go to the "Caridad," one of the most celebrated hospitals

in the world, founded by a young nobleman of Seville in the

seventeenth century, upon ground which belonged to a brotherhood

whose duty it was to give consolation to those about to die on

the scaffold. This young man (Don Miguel de Mañara) was

distinguished for his profligacy, but also for his bravery,

generosity, and his patronage of art. One of our friends told us

some most interesting anecdotes connected with his conversion.

Returning from some orgies, one night, he saw a female figure

upon a low balcony beckon him. Thinking to have an adventure, he

sprang into the open window and found a dead body with a with

lights about it alone in the room. Another time, returning at

midnight through the streets, he saw a church lighted, and,

wondering what could be going on at such an hour, entered. Before

the altar was a bier upon which was extended a body covered with

the mantle of the knights of the order to which he belonged, the

priests about it singing the office for the dead. Asking whose

funeral it was, he was answered, "That of Don Miguel Mañara," and

going to the corpse and uncovering it, saw his own face. The

morning found him stretched upon the pavement, the vision gone.

But the impression remained, in which he recognized a call from

God to a better life, which he soon after entered, giving his

whole fortune to found this institution for the sick, the aged,

and "incurables;" and here he lived and died an example of

humility, piety, and penitence. Murillo and other eminent artists

were also members of this confraternity, and a letter of the

former is here shown in which he asks permission to join the

brotherhood. To the friendship of Don Miguel for Murillo the

hospital is indebted for some of the finest pictures in the

world. In the church are two of his grandest and largest

pictures, "Moses striking the Rock," called here the "Sed,"

(thirst,) and the "Miracle of the Loaves and Fishes," a

Visitation, an Infant Saviour, and a St. John.

{348}

There are also several most remarkable pictures by Valdes Leal;

one, "The Triumph of Time," in which the skeleton Death stands

triumphantly above crowns and sceptres and "all there is of

glory." Opposite to this is "The Dead Prelate," a picture made at

the suggestion of Mañara. From the top of the picture a

_pierced hand_ holds the scales, in one side of which a

kingly crown, and jewels, and sceptre, weigh against the mystic

"I. H. S." and a book, the Word of God. Below lies a dead

prelate, in mitre and crosier, half eaten by the worms; on the

other side, Don Miguel Mañara, wrapped in his knightly mantle,

upon which also the worms run riot. On one of the scales is

written "nor more;" upon the other, "nor less."

Murillo told the painter that he could never pass this picture

without involuntarily "holding his nose." Under the pavement,

near the door, lies the body of the founder; "the ashes of the

worst man that ever lived," so he styles himself in his epitaph;

and he requested that he might lie where the feet of every passer

should walk over him. The sisters conduct us over the clean and

airy wards. On the wall of the patio are these words, from the

pen of Mañara himself, "This house will last as long as God shall

be feared in it, and Jesus Christ be served in the persons of his

poor. Whoever enters here must leave at the door both avarice and

pride." And over his own cell is inscribed, "What is it we mean

when we speak of death? It is being free from the body of sin,

and from the yoke of our passions. Therefore, to live is a bitter

death, and to die is a sweet life."

Another of the charming histories told us by the same lady was of

St. Maria Coronel, whose body is preserved in the convent of St.

Inez, which we could not be permitted to see. Peter the Cruel,

because enamored of her great beauty, condemned her husband to

death, but offered to save him if she would yield to his wishes.

The husband was actually executed, and Maria fled to this

convent, where the king pursued her. One night he entered her

cell; and, seeing no other way to escape him, she seized the

burning lamp, and emptied its boiling contents over her face. The

poor lady lived the life of a saint, and died in this convent.

Her body is as fresh as if she had died yesterday, and the marks

of the oil upon her face as clearly visible as upon the day when

the heroic deed was committed.

In the evening we walk in the crowded streets, and find splendid

shops filled with lovely women, who go at this hour to walk or

shop, never stirring out in the day. As late as eleven, when we

came in, the streets and shops were yet filled with ladies.

Saturday, 26.

We spend the morning in the gallery, which is considered the

finest in Spain, after that of Madrid. This is especially rich in

Murillos, and has several Zurbarans, the Spanish Caravaggio so

famous for his pictures of monks. Here is "The Apotheosis of St.

Thomas Aquinas," considered his masterpiece; and of Murillo there

are about twenty-four of his greatest pictures: the "St. Thomas

of Villanuova giving Alms," which was the painter's own favorite;

the "St. Anthony of Padua kneeling before the Infant Saviour,"

who stands upon his book--the most perfect type of a child God;

and the ecstasy, the fervor, the humility, in the pale,

attenuated face of the monk brings the tears to one's eyes, you

so feel with him.

{349}

Next this is a picture preferred to the other by most persons,

"St. Felix of Cantalicia," with the infant Saviour in his arms,

the blessed Mother leaning forward to receive him. The beauty of

the Virgin Mother and the grace of her attitude is said by

critics to be beyond all praise. Then comes a beautiful

"Annunciation," a "St. Joseph with the child Jesus," "Saints

Rufina and Justina," (the patrons of Seville,) "Saints Leandro

and Buonaventura," several "Conceptions," and the exquisite

"Virgin de la Sevilleta," (Virgin of the Napkin,) said to have

been painted on a dinner napkin, and given as a present to the

cook of the convent where Murillo worked. The "St. John Baptist

in the Desert" should also be mentioned, as well as many others.

This evening we bid farewell to beautiful Seville, with all its

delights, and set out for Cadiz.

Certainly it is the Spaniards, not the French, who are "the

politest people in the world." The conductor opens the railway

carriage with "Good evening, ladies. May I trouble you for your

tickets?" concluding with "A happy night to you." In passing a

street, the other day, a gentleman with whom we had crossed the

mountains, and whose name we do not even know, rushes from his

house to say, "Ladies, is anything wanting? Here is your house."

Such is the pretty exaggerated Spanish phrase. Leaving Seville,

we pass orange-groves and fields divided by aloe and cactus

hedges, but the country is flat and uninteresting; and, except

Lebrija, which has a tower, the rival of the Giralda, and Jerez,

we see no towns of any size or interest till we near Cadiz.

"Jerez de la Frontera" (the frontier town) has always been of

importance; one of the earliest Phoenician colonies. Close to

this took place the battle of the Guadelete, which opened Spain

to the Moors. St. Ferdinand recovered it in 1251; but it was

retaken, and again recovered by his son, Alonzo the Learned, in

1264, who granted to it many important privileges, peopling it

with forty of his hidalgos--the source of the present Jerez

nobility. It has an Alcazar of great interest--its Alameda--some

fine old churches, and near it are the ruins of a fine old

Carthusian convent upon the Guadelete, which the Moors called the

River of Delight. Jerez is now celebrated for its wines; the

sherry so prized in England and America, which occupies palaces

rather than wine-cellars. These are called "bodegas," and

sometimes hold ten thousand casks. As we near Cadiz we see Puerta

San Maria, at the mouth of the Guadelete--a pretty town, looking

upon the sea, with a suspension bridge looking most picturesque

in the moonlight; then Puerto Real, San Fernando, Cadiz.

Cadiz, Fonda De Paris.

Sunday, 27.

The guide takes us first to hear high mass in the new

cathedral--a handsome building, entirely of white marble, within

and without. Some good pictures, (copies of Murillo,) fine music,

and the most devout of congregations. The loveliest of women, in

modest black dresses, mantillas, and fans, sat or knelt upon the

matting, which is spread upon the space between the high altar

and the choir. No seats are provided. A few bring little black

camp-stools. The bishop (who gave the benediction) is a most

dignified and elegant-looking person; and the guide tells us he

is much beloved and respected. Already the new order of things

pulls down churches and banishes the Jesuits, as the first proof

of that "liberty of worship" which is one of the most popular of

the war cries.

{350}

Such bandit-looking fellows as we saw yesterday! Catalan

soldiers, in red cap, short pantaloons with red stripe,

half-gaiters, and a red blanket on the left shoulder, a leathern

belt, with pistols and a great rifle.

The revolution spreads everywhere, "peacefully," as they say. We

see a handbill posted, in which the queen is spoken of as

"_Doña_ Isabella of Bourbon," to whom they wish "no harm."

Some Spanish ladies who had once lived in America, and are

friends of ours, came to visit us. They are intensely loyal, as

are all the women of Spain whom we encounter. From these we learn

that, as in all revolutions, the dregs of the people come to the

top, and are most conspicuous. It is only they make it who have

nothing to lose, and all to gain. These "juntas," who now rule in

each city under the provisional government, are composed of

people of low birth and bad morals. Here they are taken from the

low trades-people, who are noted drunkards and unbelievers. Into

such hands are committed the destinies of this lovely city. Their

first work has been to try and kill the Jesuits, who, with a

hundred little boys under their care, had to defend themselves

from these men and the rabble they encourage. And but for the

officers of the fleet, who, with pistols in hand, thrust

themselves between them, they must have been murdered. These

officers took them on board the ships for safety, and some are

yet secreted in the town, waiting an opportunity to escape.

To-day our guide takes us to several curious old churches which

were formerly convents, with pretty cloisters and marble courts.

These, he says, are doomed by the junta to be torn down to build

houses and theatres, thus destroying these beautiful old

monuments of a past time in their blind fury against religion.

In the evening we change our hotel to the "Fonda de Cadiz," on

the gay "plaza San Antonio." After dinner walk by the seashore on

the walls. As we pass the streets, we enter several churches,

where the people are hearing sermons, or saying prayers with the

priests. Such picturesque groups!

To-night we see from our windows a procession carrying the

Blessed Sacrament to the sick, from the parish church opposite. A

carriage is always sent, and a long procession, bearing lights,

precedes and follows. One of the ladies present tells us that

last carnival, in the midst of the gayeties on this square, men

and women, in every variety of ridiculous costume, were dancing

to merry music, when suddenly the bell was heard preceding the

Blessed Sacrament, which was being carried to a sick officer,

living upon the square. In an instant every knee was bent of the

motley throng, and the band struck up the Royal March in the most

effective manner, and accompanied the procession to the house;

returning, the fun recommenced. This lady says there was never

anything witnessed more affecting. "And," added she, "this is the

faith these revolutionists would take from us. Already they talk

of introducing every religion, and they will build a mosque and a

synagogue!"

Monday, 28.

The morning is given to shopping, to see the lovely mantillas of

every shape and style; fans of wonderful workmanship and

exquisite painting on kid or silk; the beautiful figures in every

variety of Spanish costumes, made in Malaga, of a particular kind

of clay for which Spain is famous; the pretty mattings of Cadiz,

etc.

{351}

In the evening we walk with our friends upon the "Alameda," a

charming promenade by the seaside, where stately palm-trees wave

above marble seats and columns. Entering the church of Mount

Carmel we find it filled with people saying prayers and the

rosary. To-night we are kept awake by the mob, who are marching

with drums and ringing the church bells in honor of a victory

over the queen's troops near Cordova.

Tuesday, 29.

At eight o'clock we set out upon an excursion to Jerez, to visit

the bodegas and taste the fine wines. Passing the salt-meadows we

see the white pyramids of salt glistening in the sunlight, which

had so puzzled us when we last saw them by moonlight. The bay of

Cadiz is on one side, the broad ocean on the other, in the

distance the mountains of the Sierra del Pinal. A friend joins us

at Puerta Real, and takes us to one of the largest bodegas in

Jerez, where are 10,000 casks of wine--each cask valued at $500!

The proprietor (a gentleman of English or Irish descent) is most

kind, shows us this extraordinary place, and gives us to taste of

the finest wines--brown sherry and pale sherry, fifty years of

age. But the most delicious of all are the sweet wines--which are

also sherries--and are called "Pedro Ximenes" from the name of

the person who first introduced this grape. These wines are rich

and oily, (perfect "nectar,") and are made from the grape when

almost as dry as raisins--twelve days from off the vine. In the

midst of these oceans of fine wines, Mr. Graves (the proprietor)

tells us he rarely tastes them, only occasionally taking a glass

of the sweet wine.

Jerez is said to be the richest town in Spain, the richest of its

size in the world. Beautiful plazas planted with palms, and fine

old palaces. We visited an ornamental garden belonging to one of

these wine princes, where were lakes, and streams, and grottoes,

and bridges, and groves, and flowers of every variety, birds and

fowls, and model cattle, etc. And then we saw San Miguel, one of

the finest churches we have seen, (gothic interior,) of the

fifteenth century, (1432,) elegantly ornamented. There is also a

cathedral and another most interesting church, (St. Dionisius,)

built by Alonzo the Learned in the thirteenth century, said to be

a particularly fine specimen of the gothic moresque of that

period. After a fine breakfast of the delicious Spanish ham,

chocolate, cakes, and sherry, we return to Cadiz. Passing "Puerta

San Maria," we see the Jesuit college, from which they have just

been ejected, the broken trees, the trampled gardens telling

their own story of violence. One of the gentlemen in the train

tells us there were two hundred and fifty boys cared for here,

and that the Jesuits fed five hundred poor each day with soup

from the leavings of the table. The great building looked a

picture of desolation.

To-night we have another ringing of bells and marching to the

sound of the odious revolutionary hymn. One of the gentlemen of

our party goes out to hear the speeches in the square. Some of

the speakers propose to offer the crown to the father of the King

of Portugal, (of the Catholic branch of that lucky _Coburg_

family who, possessing nothing, gain everything by marriage,)

others are for the Duke of Montpensier. Some cry "Vive Napoleon."

In fact, they are in great embarrassment--have caught the

elephant and do not know what to do with him, like another nation

we know of.

{352}

Wednesday, 30.

To-day we hear that all Catalonia has "pronounced," and even

Madrid, and that the rejoicings of last night were for the

victory of "Alcolea," just won, over the queen's troops, in

which, however, the liberals have lost three thousand men. These

troops were commanded by Serrano, (Duke de Torres,) who owes

everything to the queen's favor; and on the queen's side by the

Marquis de Novaliches, "faithful found amongst the faithless." We

hear of one of her officers (the young Count de Cheste) who has

shut himself with his men in the fortress of Montjuich, at

Barcelona, resolving to die rather than submit. One must admire

such devotion, in whatever cause it is shown. "Loyalty! the most

pure and beautiful feeling of the human breast. It is a love

which exists without requiring the usual nourishment of return; a

feeling void of every shade of egotism; that desires and requires

nothing but the happiness of loving, that causes one joyfully to

sacrifice life and property for the exalted object whose voice,

perhaps, never reached his ear. This feeling, in its highest

purity, is the very triumph of human capacity." Such is the true

definition of "Loyalty," which, like "Liberty," is often profaned

and constantly misunderstood. With our pretty Spanish friends we

go to see a church called the "Cave," a church only for

gentlemen, where they may go privately to their confession and

devotions. The confessionals are unlike those used for women, for

the men go in front and kneel face to face with the priest. It is

a beautiful chapel, wonderfully rich in marbles and fine

vestments and bassi-relievi, and below it is a gloomy chapel from

whence the church derives its name. Over the altar is represented

the crucifixion. It is dimly lighted through a dome, and the

figures (large as life) seem to live. Here the men go for

meditation, and for the Good Friday and other solemn festivals.

At one end of the chapel is a carved chair, raised on a platform,

upon which the priest sits to give his instructions, while a lamp

is so arranged that the light falls only upon the speaker's face,

leaving the rest of the chapel in darkness. The young priest who

showed us the church had the face of an angel, so fair and young

and holy; or, rather, such a face as is represented in a picture

of St. Aloysius Gonzaga, the patron of youth.

As we wander from shop to shop one of our pretty friends meets

one of the beaux of Cadiz, whose "loyalty" she suspects and whom

she berates most violently for deserting his queen in her need,

and helping to embarrass his country. The pretty way with which

she shakes her fan at him, and gesticulates with her hands, the

expressive eyes and play of feature, is altogether charming and

_Andalusian_.

Late this evening, we hear particulars of the late battle.

Novaliches fought against fearful odds--three thousand men to

sixteen thousand. He was severely if not mortally wounded, and

was carried off by his men to Portugal, the only way of retreat

open to them. This defeat, we suppose, will put an end to the

war.

Thursday, Oct. 1.

This is the feast of the Guardian Angel of Spain, so we hear mass

where the devotion of the forty hours begins. As in Italy, two by

two, kneeling and holding lights, the men of the congregation

keep watch before the Blessed Sacrament during these forty hours,

while hundreds of adorers continually coming and going attest the

devotion of this pious people.

{353}

The Church of the Guardian Angel is near that belonging to the

military hospital; and on the opposite side of the square is an

asylum for widows, founded many years ago by a converted Moor--a

most interesting institution. Widows of all ranks and conditions

find shelter here when their necessities require it. Each one has

her own chamber and sitting-room, and each one her little cooking

apparatus separate. The court with its open corridors on every

story, its pretty flowers, its fine promenade on the roof, makes

it a very inviting abode; and, with the usual Spanish courtesy,

the old widow who showed us about (the widow of an officer, who

had been there these forty years) placed it at our "disposition."

These poor women go out to walk, and to church when they wish,

though there is also a chapel in the house.

We go next to see the "Albergo dei Poveri," a magnificent

charity, founded and endowed by one man in memory of his mother,

and dedicated to St. Helena. Here five hundred children of both

sexes are taught weaving, sewing, washing, shoemaking, etc., and

there is also an asylum for five hundred old men and old women.

The school-rooms and dormitories are large and airy; the marble

courts, where the children play, and the sewing-room, where a

hundred girls sat at work, looked out upon the sea, and were

deliciously cool and comfortable. The school-rooms were decorated

with pictures of Bible history, and seemed to have all the modern

inventions which make easy the way to learning. The sister told

us how much they had been disturbed by this revolutionary

movement. Her little orphan boys (who had been taught music with

the view to enter the army as musicians) had been carried off at

night to play the revolutionary hymn, kept out marching over the

town till two o'clock in the morning, and then sent home

foot-sore and with aching heads.

The most interesting thing of all was to see the old men at

dinner--that helpless thing, an old man. Placed by the nice

table, a man with snow-white apron served the soup, a sister gave

round the meat, and then came a pudding. The bread was as white

as is all the bread of Spain, (even the poorest people have bread

of this very white flour,) and there seemed about a hundred of

these men over sixty years of age. The rain drives us home, but

by and by we go out again to buy some of the boots and shoes of

Cadiz, which are the prettiest in the world and cover the

prettiest of feet.

Feast Of The Guardian Angels.

Friday, Oct. 2.

We go to the lovely church of the Rosary for high mass. The

decorations are very tasteful and beautiful, and hundreds of men

and women, in their grave black garments, assist most devoutly;

the men have benches on each side, the women sit or kneel upon a

bit of matting before the altar.

From this we go to the "Capuchinos," where we see three of

Murillo's finest pictures, the "Marriage of St. Catherine," over

the altar, which he left unfinished and which is surrounded, in

five compartments, by five pictures of Zurbaran, almost equal to

the centre piece. There is here another "Conception," and that

picture of pictures, "St. Francis receiving the Stigmata," which

is certainly the most extraordinary of all the works of this

great master. The face of the saint seems to come entirely out of

its dark surroundings, and so do the wonderful hands. These all

look like the living flesh, and move us as if they were so.

{354}

This Capuchin convent, which Murillo loved to adorn, and in

painting for which he lost his life, is now a hospital for

lunatics--the monks all gone; the present Bishop of Cadiz was one

[of] them. And to show the devotion of the common people to

Murillo, they will not allow the bishop to move this picture of

St. Francis to an opposite altar, where it would be in a better

light and preserved from the smoke of the altar candles. "No; the

place for which Murillo painted it must be the best place, and

there it shall stay." In a chapel near by is a lovely picture of

"Our Lady of the Rosary," which must be a copy of the one in the

gallery of Madrid so celebrated. In this chapel and everywhere

here we see statues or pictures of the "Martyrs of Cadiz,"

(Servando and Germano,) two young Roman soldiers who, becoming

converts, died for the faith on a spot near the present city

gates. It is said that on the occasion of the terrible earthquake

which occurred here November 1st, 1755, when the sea rose and

threatened to devour the city, two young men in strange garments

appeared on the spot of their martyrdom and were seen by hundreds

of the inhabitants to stay the waves, speaking to the people and

bidding them pray to God. On another side of the city the

Dominican priests bore the favorite statue of "Our Lady of the

Rosary," with many prayers, to the waters' brink, and "the waves

receded and there was a great calm."

On the third side, where Cadiz is most exposed to the sea, is a

little church in which the priest was saying mass on the eventful

morning. 'The people ran to him saying, "Behold! the sea is at

the very door." He made haste to consume the consecrated Host,

then seizing the crucifix and the banner of "Our Lady of Mercy,"

went out upon the door-step where the waves already licked his

feet: "My Mother, let them not come further"--and they did not!

What is so remarkable in the accounts of this earthquake is, that

there had been no storm to precede it, but on a soft sunshiny day

came this terrible convulsion of the elements. We went to see

this church, where is yet shown the crucifix and the banner which

played so important a part on this occasion; and see the point to

which the water rose, and an inscription on the wall of a house

recording the event exactly as here related. Next we visit the

church of San Lorenzo, and afterward that of the Scalzi,

(barefoot friars,) where to-day was said the "last mass;" the

"junta" having decreed that it be torn down to build a theatre.

The work of destruction had already commenced. How the strong old

walls resisted! A dozen carpenters were taking down the gilded

altars and curiously carved "retablos," which, belonging to the

days when Spain had her argosies from the new world laden with

gold, were made to resist "all time." Four men with iron crowbars

were striving to dislodge an angel suspended over an altar, which

positively refused to come down; while below him, on the floor,

stood saints and martyrs covered with dust and _débris_,

hastily dislodged from the pedestals on which they had rested for

centuries--a rueful group! No wonder the women wept, and eyed

resentfully the malicious-looking revolutionists employed to

order the work; while armed soldiers, with the hateful red ribbon

on the arm, (the revolutionary mark,) kept off the populace, who

strove to get in at the doors, by the market, to bid farewell to

these ancient altars.

{355}

It had been the church of the market people, the cradle of some

of popular saints, the scene of the "first communion," the

"nuptial mass," the baptism of their children, the funeral mass

for their dead. Great is the clamor outside! Old people kiss the

walls, and the young gather bits of the broken altars, while

sorrowful-looking priests are permitted to carry away the

mutilated statues and gildings.

The convent of the Good Shepherd, opening into the church, is

also to be torn down, and its unhappy inmates driven elsewhere to

seek shelter. They are putting into the _same convent_

these, with Carmelites, Ursulines, and others; crowding together

those who teach with those who save the Magdalens in strange and

painful confusion. Such are some of the fruits of revolution! And

this is the "liberty" which England and America seek for the

Spaniard!

To-night we hear that the Marquis de Novaliches has died of

lockjaw, his face having been dreadfully wounded by a ball. The

Conte de la Cheste, who held Monjuich at Barcelona, has gone to

join the queen, abandoning his "forlorn hope" at her request.

Saturday, October 3.

To-day we hear the high mass in the cathedral, and go to see the

jewels in the sacristia. They have a remarkable "custodia," (the

gift of an ancestor of the Calderon de la Barca,) set in pearls

and emeralds of immense value; a superbly chased crucifix, the

gift of Alonzo the Learned; a small but exquisitely worked

tabernacle of gold with beautiful amethysts forming a cross,

given by the same king. After the mass we go to buy some of the

famous Cadiz gloves, and then drive on the ramparts to see the

fine sea view. In the evening, to the church of the Carmel. As it

is the eve of the feast of "Our Lady of the Rosary," the church

of the Rosary is illuminated, and most of the houses throughout

the city.

Sunday, Oct. 4.

In the church of the Rosary is a beautiful ceremony. The music is

lovely; the wind instruments, in certain parts of the mass, most

effective, and the whole one of the most solemn services at which

we have assisted.

The sermon is delivered with such grace and unction that we could

but realize the truth of that saying of Charles V., that Spanish

is the language in which to speak to God! So grand, so sonorous!

And there is something in the grave dignity of the Spanish priest

which makes him seem the perfection of ecclesiastical character.

We are all struck with the decorum of the people in the churches,

the quiet and devotion; none of the running in and out and the

familiarity with holy things which in Italy makes one see that

the people regard the church as their father's house, in which

they take liberties. Here, it is alone the house of God, as is

seen in the reverential manner and careful costume. All wear

black, and not even is a lace mantilla usual, but the Spanish

mantilla of modest silk. The men are alike reverential, and

nowhere have we seen so many men in church, particularly at

night.

To-day we hear the good news that the government of the city is

taken from the hands of the junta and given into the care of the

former military governor of Cadiz, in conjunction with the

admiral of the fleet. This is received with great favor by the

people of moderate opinion of both sides, as putting a stop to

extreme measures. They have countermanded the destruction of the

two old churches, the Franciscan and the Scalzi; of the

last-named they tell a most extraordinary story to-day.

{356}

Yesterday the destroyers had knocked down a portion of the thick

old wall. This morning it was found rebuilt as if by invisible

hands, with the same heavy masonry, as strong as before, and even

the white plaster upon the outside dry and barely to be

distinguished from the rest of the building. Everybody runs to

look at it. The people cry "a miracle," and say that the Blessed

Virgin, whose feast it is to-day, had _a hand in it_.

Monday, Oct. 5.

We go for the last time to the shops, and to hear our last mass

in San Antonio; for to-morrow we leave beautiful Cadiz and the

dear friends who have made our stay so delightful. The political

horizon to-day is a little clearer. In consequence of some

outrages upon priests and churches one man has been banished to

Ceuta, and large placards are upon the streets threatening with

like punishment every one who insults a priest or injures a

church. The banished man had harangued the mob, assuring them

that a Dominican father in the convent of that order had some

instruments of torture, formerly used in the Inquisition, and

that he applied them to his penitents. The unthinking mob, guided

by him, rushed to search the convent, broke the church windows,

and not finding what was promised them, turned their fury upon

the man who had deceived them.

In the war of 1835, when Saragossa began the work of burning the

monasteries and murdering the monks, Cadiz gave her monks five

hours to get away, and armed guards saved the monasteries. To be

sure, the populace burned the libraries and furniture; but as

Cadiz was then more moderate than her sister cities, she will not

now be less kind than then. How impossible to believe, in looking

out upon a city so smiling and so lovely, that evil passions

should lurk in it anywhere!

To Be Continued.

----------

The Approaching Council Of The Vatican.

The preparations for the approaching council continue to be made

on a grand scale, and with the greatest diligence. From the

_Chronicle of Matters relating to the future Council_, which

is regularly published at the office of the _Civilta

Cattolicà_, in Rome, we copy the list of the different

commissions and their members which are preparing the matters to

be discussed and decided upon by the bishops assembled in

ecumenical council.

The supreme directive congregation is composed of the most

eminent cardinals, Patrizi, de Reisach, Barnabo, Panebianco,

Bizarri, Bilio, Caterini, and Capalti. To these are joined, as

secretary, Mgr. Giannelli; and as consulters, Mgr. Tizzani, Mgr.

Angelini, vicegerent of Rome, Mgr. Talbot, (an Englishman,) Don

Melchior Galeotti, of the seminary of Palermo, F. Sanguineti, S.

J., professor of canon law in the Roman College, Professor Feije,

of the University of Louvain, and Professor Hefele, of Tübingen.

{357}

The commission of ceremonies is composed of prelates who have the

general supervision of the grand functions which take place in

the principal churches of Rome. The politico-ecclesiastical

commission is composed of;

Cardinal de Reisach, president,

Mgrs. Marini,

del Parco a Theatine,

Bartolini,

Jacobini,

Ferrari,

Nussi,

Gizzi, (a judge in one of the high courts,)

Guardi, (vicar-general of the religious

congregation of ministers of the sick,)

Canon Kovaes, of Kolocza in Bohemia,

Canon Molitor of Spire in Germany,

the Abbé Chesnel, vicar-general of Quimper,

Canon Moufang of Mayence,

the Abbé Gibert, vicar-general of Moulins, and

Mgr. Trinchieri, secretary.

The commission for eastern affairs is composed of

Cardinal Barnabo, president,

Don John Simeoni, of the Propaganda,

F. Bollig, S. J., professor of Sanscrit and Oriental

languages in the Roman university

and Roman college,

F. Vercellone, (Barnabite religious; since deceased,)

F. Theiner, of the Oratory,

the Most Rev. Leonard Valerga, prefect of Carmelite

missions in Syria,

the Right Rev. Joseph David, a Syrian bishop,

Canon Roncetti, professor in the Roman seminary,

Don Joseph Piazza,

Don Francis Rosi,

F. Haneberg, abbot of St. Boniface and professor

of theology in the university of Munich,

F. Martinoff,

S. J., Mgr. Howard, (an Englishman,) and

Mgr. Cretoni, secretary.

The commission on the religious orders and congregations is

composed of

Cardinal Bizarri, president,

Mgrs. Marini,

Svegliati, and

Lucidi,

F. Capelli, (Barnabite,)

F. Bianchi,(Dominican,)

F. Cipressa, (Minorite Franciscan,)

F. Cretoni, (Augustinian,)

F. Costa, (Jesuit,)

Mgr. Guisasola, arch-priest of the

cathedral of Seville, and

Don Francis Stoppani, secretary.

The commission of dogmatic theology is composed of

Cardinal Bilio, president,

Mgr. Cardoni, president of the ecclesiastical academy,

F. Spada, (Dominican,) master of the

sacred palace and professor of

dogma in the Roman university,

F. de Ferrari, (Dominican,)

F., Perrone, S.J.,

Mgr. Schwetz, professor of theology in the

university of Vienna,

F. Mura, ex-general of the Servites, rector

of the Roman university,

F. Adrogna, definitor-general of the

conventual Franciscans,

Mgr. Jacquenet, curé of St. Jacques at Rheims,

the Abbé Gay, vicar-general of Poitiers,

F. Martinelli, (Augustinian,) professor of Scripture in the Roman

university,

Don Joseph Pecci, professor of philosophy in the same,

F. Franzlin, S. J., professor

of theology in the Roman college,

F. Schrader, S.J., professor in the

university of Vienna,

Professor Petacci, of the Roman seminary,

Professor Hettinger, of Wurtzburg,

Professor Alzog, of Friburg,

the Rev. Dr. Corcoran, of Charleston, S. C.,

Canon Labrador, professor of philosophy and theology at Cadiz, and

Canon Santori, rector of the pontifical lyceum in the Roman

seminary, secretary.

The commission of ecclesiastical discipline is composed of

Cardinal Caterini, president,

Mgrs. Giannelli,

Angelini,

Svegliati,

Simeoni,

Nina,

Nobili,

Lucidi,

de Angelis, professor of canon law in the Roman

university,

F. Tarquini, S.J.,

Canon Jacobini,

Professor Hergenroether, of Wurtzburg,

Professor Feije of Louvain,

the Abbé Sauvé, of Laval,

Canon Giese, of Munster,

Professor Heuser, of Cologne,

Professor de Torres, of Seville, and

Mgr. Louis Jacobini, secretary.

Several other distinguished men have been added to these

commissioners since this list was published. Dr. Newman was

invited to assist, but declined on account of his infirm health.

Dr. Döllinger was also invited.

{358}

The sessions of the council will be held in one of the large

chapels of St. Peter's Church, which is capable of containing

several thousand persons. The principal architects of Rome are

already engaged in preparing the proper accommodations, under the

immediate supervision of the Holy Father himself. The altar of

the council is at one end of the chapel, the throne of the

sovereign pontiff at the opposite end. On the right and left of

the throne are placed the seats of the cardinals, patriarchs, and

ambassadors of sovereigns. The seats of the prelates are ranged

in two semicircles, each tier being elevated above the one before

it; the tribune of the orators is placed in the middle of the

open space between, and there are also tribunes prepared for

those who will be admitted as spectators of the public sessions.

A large and beautiful piece of black marble, which was found

among the treasures of the Emperor Nero, at the recent

exhumation, is to be made into an obelisk commemorative of the

council, which will be erected near the spot where St. Peter was

crucified. The base of the column is to be made of a number of

small blocks of white marble, equal to the number of prelates

assisting at the council, each one placing his own block, with

his name and title engraved upon it.

The bishops alone are entitled to a seat in the council by divine

right. Cardinals, abbots, and generals of religious orders are

entitled to a seat also, by ecclesiastical law or privilege. The

question of the right of bishops _in partibus infidelium_ to

a seat is now under discussion, and we have not learned whether

it has yet been decided or not.

This circumstance has given the Roman correspondent of the _New

York Herald_a chance of furnishing a specimen of the

ridiculous and reckless falsification of matters relating to the

Catholic Church, by which the ordinary readers of newspapers are

perpetually befooled and mystified. The doubt respecting the

right of these bishops is represented as having been raised in

order to keep out those who are not sufficiently subservient to

the holy see, and the conclusion drawn--with the usual flippant

impertinence of this class of writers--that Rome will admit none

who are not prepared to carry out fully her own policy. The truth

is, however, that these bishops _in partibus_--who are

prelates holding merely titular sees which are in fact extinct or

in the possession of schismatics, many of them having been

decorated with the episcopal character by the pope only for the

sake of honor--are precisely the men who have the least power of

opposing the holy see and the greatest interest in procuring its

favor. Some of them are vicars-apostolic governing missionary

districts, others are coadjutors of diocesan bishops, others are

prelates who have resigned their sees, and the remainder are

prelates filling certain high offices in the Roman court. It is

evident enough that if there were any reason to apprehend

opposition to the pontifical authority from any portion of the

hierarchy, it would be rather from the primates and metropolitans

of old and powerful sees, who have been nominated by sovereigns,

and who would have all their support and authority to sustain

them. There is no reason, however, to apprehend that any

collision will take place between the holy see and the hierarchy,

who have never in the whole history of the church been more

completely united than they are at present.

{359}

The bishops take no theologians with them, and, besides the

prelates themselves, only the theologians of the holy see and the

representatives of the sovereigns will participate in the

deliberations of the council.

In regard to the matters which will be proposed for the

adjudication of this supreme tribunal, we find many conjectures,

more or less plausible, both in Catholic and secular periodicals.

We prefer to wait until the acts of the council are made known in

an authentic manner, before speaking on this subject. We remark

merely that there is not the slightest foundation for the rumors

which are reported in certain newspapers respecting proposed

changes in the established discipline of the church, regarding

matters which have long ago been definitely settled.

The impression made upon the whole civilized world by the

convocation of an ecumenical council is deep, universal, and

continually increasing as the time for its assembling draws near.

The infidel and red-republican party in Europe manifest a fear

and dread which is certainly remarkable, and very encouraging to

all friends of religion and order. The politicians of the old

_régime_ of state supremacy over the church also manifest a

terrible and perfectly well-founded alarm, lest the church should

assert and regain her perfect liberty and independence, and

condemn, without any hope of appeal, those maxims and opinions by

which they have hitherto held a certain number of sincere

Catholics in alliance with themselves.

The reception given by the emperor of Russia and the patriarch of

Constantinople to the pope's invitation is too well known to need

any fresh notice. Of course, the great body of the oriental

prelates follow the dictation of these two potentates--a striking

commentary upon the value and sincerity of the protest which they

make against the tyranny of the Roman patriarch. There are not

wanting, however, certain instances showing the impression which

the pope's invitation has made upon the more sincere and

conscientious members of these separated communions. The bishop

of Trebizond, a man of venerable age, received the encyclical

letter with marks of great respect, raising it to his forehead

and pressing it to his bosom, exclaiming at the same time with

emotion, "O Rome! O Rome! O St. Peter! O St. Peter!" He would

not, however, declare any decisive intention either to attend the

council or to absent himself. The bishop of Adrianople returned

the letter, saying, "I wish first to reflect. I wish to decide

for myself." Letters from the east testify that many of the Greek

schismatics openly blame the patriarch and the bishops who have

refused to attend the council, saying, that by this refusal they

have shown that they are afraid to enter into discussion with the

Latin bishops. It is believed that the Armenian bishops who were

summoned by their patriarch, residing at Constantinople, to

advise with him respecting the pope's invitation, were in favor

of accepting it, from the fact that he afterward sent the

encyclical to the patriarch of Esmiasin with the report of the

doings of the synod. A strong unionist party has been formed

among the Armenians, and one of their prelates, Mgr. Narses, has

published a long letter advocating union with the Roman Church.

The Ottoman government favors union as a means of weakening the

influence of Russia, and has separated the Bulgarians, who number

four millions, from the jurisdiction of the patriarch of

Constantinople. It has also refused to recognize a prelate sent

by the patriarch of Esmiasin to act as his nuncio at

Constantinople for the purpose of counteracting the efforts of

the unionist party, and has given a semi-official warning to one

of the most violent _Russophilist_ journals. [Footnote 81]

[Footnote 81: Later news informs us that the Armenian

patriarch of Constantinople has been forced to resign by the

clamors raised against him, that the Greek patriarch had

called an "ecumenical" council, and that the Coptic patriarch

of Alexandria received the encyclical with great respect and

many expressions of courtesy toward the prelate who was the

bearer of it.]

{360}

It is an interesting fact that the king of Birmah, when made

acquainted with the desire of the Holy Father that sovereigns

should place no obstacle in the way of the attendance of the

bishops in their dominions at the council, exclaimed: "What! can

there be any princes who would oppose such a just and holy

desire? For my part, I not only promise to interpose no obstacle,

but I engage to pay the travelling expenses of the bishops of my

kingdom both going and returning." He has also announced the

intention of sending by each of the bishops a jewelled cross as a

present to the pope.

The Jansenist bishops of Holland, who are five or six in number,

each one having two or three priests and about a thousand people

under his jurisdiction, find themselves compelled, by their own

professed principles, to submit themselves to the judgment of the

council. They have appealed, ever since the condemnation of

Jansenius, from the pope to an ecumenical council. Now they find

an ecumenical council on the eve of assembling, before which they

have full liberty to appear, and plead their case. They

acknowledge the infallibility of the tribunal, and therefore can

have no choice but to submit to its decision, which they openly

profess their readiness to do, so that without doubt they will

all be reconciled to the church.

Among Protestants we find everywhere a great excitement

respecting the council, a full recognition of the immense

importance of the crisis which it must inevitably bring upon

Protestantism; in general, a disposition to rouse up for the

defence of their losing cause, and oppose an obstinate renewal of

their old protest to the admonition of their chief pastor to

return to their allegiance, but occasionally a manifestation of a

different sentiment--a disposition to listen, to hope for good

results, and to welcome the thought of a possible reconciliation.

On the tenth day of last November, M. Guizot uttered the

following words at a reunion of ecclesiastics and laymen, at

Notre Dame de Dozulè, in Normandy:

"You priests have faith; it is faith which directs you; and

even when you seem to act imprudently, success always justifies

you in the end. ... It is thus that the Catholic Church

sustains itself, happily for France and the world. ... The

clergy dies not, the papacy does not fall. ... Pius IX. has

exhibited an admirable wisdom in convoking this grand assembly,

from which, perhaps, will issue the salvation of the world; for

our societies are very sick; but, for great evils there are

great remedies. [Footnote 82]

[Footnote 82: _Rev. du Monde Catholique_, for January

25th, p. 299.]

The German publicist, Wolfgang Menzel, in the number of his

_Literary Leaves_ for last October, thus writes:

"We are far from wishing to blame a reunion of all good

Christians, even though the same authority in Protestants who

are truly Christian is not sufficiently recognized. Every

tentative of reunion, however restricted it may be, must be

hailed with joy."

{361}

Reinhold Baumstark, in a pamphlet upon the pontifical letter,

says:

"It is the Catholic Church which has directed and accomplished

the education of humanity during the whole middle age. Since

the Reformation, it has sustained without succumbing three

centuries of violent struggles, and, if the eternal truth of

God lives in it, we shall see the realization of the word of

its founder, that _"there shall be one fold and one

shepherd."_

In quite a different spirit writes Prof. Schenkel, of Heidelberg:

"It is impossible to deny that the Protestant church of Germany

is at present running a very great danger. The different

confessions are becoming daily more opposed to each other.

Theological parties engage in mortal combats; the liberal party

is combated by the servile party. The bond of peace is with

deliberate purpose torn and broken and a large portion of the

German people, witnesses of these disputes, fall into

discouragement, distrust, and indifference. The ancient and

malign enemy laughs at our folly, that, after having bitten one

another, we shall finish by eating one another up. ... Let us

say it, to our shame, we have no remedy to oppose to this evil.

Interiorly divided, absorbed in party disputes, deprived of

autonomy, the sport of political calculations, and

politico-ecclesiastical experiments which are perpetually

changing, torn by theological hatred, abandoned by the

populations, thrust aside by all classes of citizens, our

church resembles only too much a shipwrecked vessel which lets

in water on every side. How can we face the violent tempest

which is brewing, when we lack unity of direction, when we lack

a head, are destitute of any solid interior or exterior

organization, when we are consuming our forces in the continual

wars of one confession against another?"

We are sorry, Professor Schenkel, that we really cannot tell you

how you can do it. Perhaps Dr. Bellows, the American and Foreign

Christian Union, or the _New York Observer_ might suggest

something a little consoling or encouraging to the unfortunate

gentleman.

The official replies made by various Protestant bodies in Europe

are, as we might expect, a reiteration of their old protests

against the Roman Church, and a declaration of their contentment

with their present state. The most courteous and well-reasoned of

these papers which we have seen is that of the Unitarian pastors

who sit in the seat of Calvin at Geneva. It makes the issue

between rationalism, liberalism, and humanitarian progress, on

one side, and the supernatural revelation of doctrine and law, on

the other, very distinctly--imputing, in the usual style,

servility, formalism, tyranny, and obscurantism to the Catholic

Church, and claiming for Protestantism the merit of protecting

and promoting true liberty, intelligence, and happiness. There is

more of the same kind in the number of the _Liberal

Christian_ (February 6th) in which we have read this address.

As statements of the position and opinions of the parties issuing

them, these documents may pass. We are to expect that those who

are challenged in the way they have been will reply in just such

a manner. These are only the preliminaries of an earnest

controversy which must be carried on for a long time before any

result can be looked for.

Dr. Hedge, of Harvard University, has rendered himself supremely

ridiculous by denying that St. Peter was bishop of Rome, or even

visited Rome at any time; from which he concludes that the pope

has no right to issue encyclicals as his successor. [Footnote 83]

[Footnote 83: See article on this point in the present

number.]

{362}

The _Liberal Christian_, with a kind of audacious valor,

backs him up, and declares that "the whole claim of the bishop of

Rome is an absurdity." Suppose it to be so to the superior and

enlightened minds of this editor and his compeers; the assertion

of it carries no weight, and can have no effect upon any other

person's mind. Another Unitarian, the Rev. Samuel Johnson, of

Massachusetts, says: "If I believed in his (Christ's) authority

even as Matthew presents it, not to say Paul or John, I should

regard the principles of the papacy as in substance right,

whatsoever I might think of the conduct of its representatives."

[Footnote 84] Considering the very great importance of the

subject, the great learning and number of those who differ from

our enlightened friends, and the curious circumstance that almost

every person thinks that no opinion or sect but his own can

uphold itself against the claims of Rome, would it not be in

better taste to have patience a little longer, and speak with a

little more moderation?

[Footnote 84: _Radical_, January, 1869, p. 9.]

The _Christian Quarterly_, which is a ferocious young

Campbellite periodical published at Cincinnati, thus addresses

the Protestant community:

"Are you able to feel the sting in the following words of

'Pius, sovereign pontiff, ninth of the name, to all Protestants

and non-Catholics?' In speaking of the multitudinous sects of

the Protestant world, and of the restlessness, instability, and

uncertainty that everywhere characterizes Protestantism, he

says," etc. "The very fact that the Pope of Rome should, in the

last half of the nineteenth century, have occasion to pen such

a paragraph, ought to call the blush of shame to every

Protestant cheek! Protestantism has been experimenting for

three hundred years, and the pope of Rome has summed up the

result! Let Protestantism try the force of its logic upon this

papal dilemma!" [Footnote 85]

[Footnote 85: _C. Q._ Jan. 1869, pp. 52-3.]

We take the following item of news from the _London Tablet_:

"English Protestants And The Council.

"There are signs around us that a movement is beginning. The

_Diplomatic Review_, a peculiar and certainly a remarkable

journal, published the first Wednesday of every month, in

London, contains a Protestant address to the pope, and notifies

to its readers in town and country that it will lie for

signature at its office till the end of the month. The purport

of the address is to implore the pope to proclaim again, by his

own authority or by that of the council, the observance of the

laws of natural justice by Christian and civilized nations in

their relations with the heathen and the uncivilized. In an

article written in French this same journal says: 'We pronounce

the words of the pope like texts, we draw our deduction from

his maxims, and we see in the accomplishment of his work the

only hope for the preservation of European society.' ... 'The

strength of the pope is the law:' our duty is to announce

explicitly this truth, Christianity must be preached anew.' In

addition to this remarkable declaration, we have the public

expression of the Rev. E. W. Urquhart, at a meeting of the

'English Church Union,' presided over by the Hon. and Rev. C.

L. Courtenay, in South-Devonshire. He said that the separation

of church and state is not far distant, and suggested that the

Anglican party should seek reunion with the Church of Rome, and

that representatives should be sent to the council, to

stipulate the conditions of their submission to the see of

Rome. This language may sound startling in the mouth of an

Anglican clergyman; but we expect the courage of Mr. Urquhart's

utterance will unloose many a tongue. Of course, the only

stipulation that can be made is that of unqualified submission

to the holy see. To a human and fallible authority you may

bring conditions; to one that is divine and infallible, you can

bring only faith and docility."

{363}

The comments of the secular press upon the council, in many

cases, would seem as if their authors were aiming to carry

burlesque to its most farcical extreme. Their spirit is that of

the mocking ridicule of Voltairian infidelity without its show of

argument, together with the grossest materialism and the

systematic disavowal of any principle higher than self-interest

or political expediency. It is sufficiently absurd when such

writers attempt to express, under the protection of their

anonymous cloak, any opinions whatever in religious matters. Much

more, when they offer their ludicrous advice to the prelates and

theologians of the Catholic Church, and pretend to understand the

true nature of Christianity and its mission upon earth better

than the church herself. In itself the matter is only laughable,

and of course the really intelligent and well-informed would only

receive with a smile of derision the notion that any serious

meaning or value could be ascribed to such lucubrations. But it

becomes serious and lamentable when we reflect how small this

class really is. The proofs are continually forced upon us of the

fact, that a large proportion of those who are intelligent enough

to make money, to keep the run of politics and the exchange, to

dress well, and to make a show, really read nothing but the daily

papers, look to them for their ideas of religion as well as every

other topic, and are actually possessed by the grossest

ignorance, and the most dense and stolid prejudice, in regard to

everything relating to the Catholic Church and to all Catholic

nations. Any convert to the Catholic Church, who mixes with

ordinary men of business or with general society, will testify to

the fact that they are frequently accosted with expressions of

surprise that persons intelligent and reputable, such as they

are, can possibly be Catholics, and with the assertion, as of a

truism, that only the ignorant, the degraded, and the vicious,

which with Americans is generally a synonym for poor people or

foreigners, believe in the doctrines of the Catholic Church.

Those who read the sectarian newspapers suffer themselves to be

swept along by the lying current which runs through them, like

the filthy stream of a sewer. We happen to have just read a

description from a London paper of a visit to the sewers of that

city which presents an apt and forcible illustration of what we

are saying: "Under Farrington street west," says the writer, "the

Fleet Ditch was running in two swift, black streams; almost below

the footway upon each side, some three feet six inches deep, and

with so strong a current that we were assured it would be

impossible to save the life of any one who stepped or slipped

into them. These foul streams recalled the ancient Styx and made

one hold back with something like a shudder."

The following extract from the _Boston Traveller_ has just

fallen into our hands in good time to serve as an instance in

point:

"The New Light Of The Catholic Church.

"Mr. Editor: Sabbath evening, April 4th, Father I. T. Hecker,

editor of the _Catholic World_, delivered a lecture in the

Music Hall on 'The Religious Condition of the Country.' As it

has been reported by the press, it would seem to be little more

than a tissue of misrepresentations of New England in

particular, and of Protestantism in general. It would be a

sufficient reply to the exaggeration and conceit of the

reverend padre to say, that if Protestantism had done nothing

more than to enable him to rail for an hour and a half at the

most cherished and sacred feelings of our people, its mission

would not be in vain. And herein is its eminent superiority to

that cast-iron system which holds the reviler of our faith. Can

Catholicism do what Protestantism did on Sunday week? Will

Rome, or any other Catholic city, permit a Protestant minister,

placarded and advertised days in advance, in a public hall, to

burlesque and hold up to contempt the Catholic faith? This

lecturer knows that Rome is mean enough to forbid the exercise

of Protestant worship to travellers, or visitors from

Protestant lands sojourning temporarily within her walls.

{364}

And yet _he_ comes to the largest hall in the capital of

New England and has the impudence to undertake to tell our

people that they are adrift on two tides, one of which is to

Rome and the other to infidelity. And if his statements are

reliable, infidelity makes altogether the better stand. But we

insist that he is either wilfully false or wilfully ignorant,

or he would not have said that 'not one in ten of the people of

New England accepts as fundamental, the truths which his

forefathers held.'

"Father Hecker knows, if he knows anything, that the

evangelical churches of New England hold for substance the same

doctrines that their fathers held; and he knows, too, that

there is not a doctrine held or advocated in any Protestant

Church in Christendom which does not have its advocates in the

bosom of the Catholic Church. He must be aware that biblical

criticism has made sound progress within two hundred and fifty

years; and we can hardly believe that even he would be narrow

enough to deny that certain doctrines may be re-stated and

re-explained without plunging into infidelity, least of all

pushing for Rome.

"But as he has chosen to attack New England in particular, it

is no more than fair, perhaps, that New England should have the

privilege of being compared with the most favored Catholic

countries. He certainly will not object to France, which has

always been overwhelmingly Catholic, not one in ten of her

population being Protestant. And yet scarcely fifty years have

passed since the whole nation voted God out of existence, and

deified reason in the person of a harlot. The Romish priests,

he knows, were among the foremost in this carnival of

infidelity and blood. Nor need he be told that the men of

France, to-day, are infidels. Italy, too, the seat of this

boasting church, is overshadowed, as Father Hecker knows, by a

sneering, malignant infidelity. And Spain--blessed, so

recently, with the most Catholic queen to whom the Pope sent

the golden rose, which enjoyed for generations the blessings of

the Inquisition, and for many years committed the entire

education of her people into the hands of the Jesuits--what

shall we say of her? The best thing we can say of her is, that

she drove from her borders that nasty woman, and sent the

Jesuits after her. And this is the fruit of Catholicism, and

not of Protestantism.

"In only a single country where the Catholic Church has been

supreme has the result been the Catholic faith--that country is

Ireland. And if Father Hecker is willing to compare the Irish,

who are the best fruits of the Catholic Church, with the people

of New England, who are the best fruits of Protestantism, we

are entirely content. But it is not a little singular that

these best children of the Catholic Church should have

immigrated to this country by the million, and are still

coming, to improve their condition? And we think that Father

Hecker himself will not deny that these favorite sons of Rome

have wonderfully improved in intelligence, morals, and thrift

in this infidel New England.

"But what would this reviling priest have? Would he make of New

England another Ireland or Spain, another infidel France or

Italy? What would he have us do? Blot out our public schools,

take the Bible from the hands of our people, subject their

consciences to the priests, establish the inquisition, raise up

a generation of Christians like those of his church who hung

the negroes to the lamp-posts in New York, and roll back this

land into the old night of the middle ages, when Rome sat like

a nightmare upon all the peoples of Christendom? Does this

priest suppose that our people will swallow such stuff as was

offered them at the Music Hall? The common school has not

diffused general intelligence here for two hundred and fifty

years, that our people should need to go to a Catholic

schoolmaster to learn their own history, or the history of that

church which has made an Ireland and a Spain.

"PURITAN."

We do not expect that such a dense darkness of ignorance and

prejudice as that which exists in the Protestant world will be

immediately dispelled by the light which will radiate from the

city of God through the council of bishops assembled about their

august chief, the vicar of Jesus Christ. We have reason to expect

a great number of conversions, among those who are already

partially enlightened, as its immediate result, and the more

zealous and successful prosecution of the work of bringing back

all nations to the fold of truth and grace as its effect during a

long period to come.

{365}

But, no doubt, the greater number of those who are thoroughly

committed to the anti-Catholic cause will persevere to the last

in their hostility, and retain for a long time a multitude of

followers under their influence. It is useless to argue with such

men in the hope of convincing or converting them. They will be

forced, however, to meet the Catholic question fairly and

squarely, and no longer be able to hide themselves behind vague

platitudes and unmeaning generalities. They will be obliged,

also, to give account of their own systems, whatever they may be,

which they put forward as substitutes for the Catholic religion,

and thus undergo the crucial tests of logic, history, and

critical science. For ourselves, we cannot doubt for a moment

that, as the ultimate result, everything like orthodox or

positive Protestantism will be ground into dust between the two

opposing forces of Catholicity and infidelity, leaving the great

contest to be waged between these two. In regard to this last

great issue we venture to make no prognostics. There are reasons

both for fear and for hope; but the only course for us to pursue

is to aim for as much good as possible, leaving the rest with

God. That a crisis approaches in the conflict between the

universal divine order and universal lawlessness, between the

church and the world, that is, the wicked world or concrete mass

of all false and wicked principles, the _mundus positus in

malignos_, of which the apostle speaks; and that this crisis

will be hastened and materially affected by the council, cannot

be doubted. We desire to impress, therefore, upon all the really

sincere and upright lovers of truth and Christianity, the

importance of their paying careful attention to the doings of

this council and of looking to correct sources for their

information.

All Catholics must look forward to the council with sentiments of

the most profound veneration and ardent expectation of the

incalculable good which it will produce in the bosom of the

church. An ecumenical council is the representative Catholic

Church, the entire episcopate with its head and supreme bishop,

the highest tribunal on earth, with plenary authority to define

doctrines and enact laws, with the spiritual presence of Jesus

Christ in the midst of it, and the plenitude of the Holy Spirit

to enlighten and assist its deliberations and judgments;

infallible in all its decrees respecting faith and morals,

sovereign in all its enactments, with full power to bind all

minds and consciences to an implicit and unreserved obedience in

the name of God. The church is always infallible, and is

perpetually teaching the faith and the rule of morals; the holy

see is always invested with authority to decide controversies and

make laws; and is competent to make even definitions of faith, to

which the assent of the dispersed bishops gives the same force of

concurrent judgment which their conciliar action possesses.

Nevertheless, the pope with the episcopate assembled in

ecumenical council can do more than when they are dispersed. The

gift of active infallibility is in a higher and more intense

exercise, because the common intellect and will of the church is

prepared by common counsel and communion to receive a more

abundant illumination and vivification of the Holy Spirit. It is

by the councils, from that of Nice to that of Trent, that

heretics have been condemned, and the clear, explicit definitions

of the faith once delivered to the saints have been made. The

council of the Vatican will possess the same infallible authority

with that which met at Jerusalem under St. Peter, or that which

at under the presidency of the legates of St. Sylvester,

condemned the Arian heresy and defined the Son to be

consubstantial with the Father.

{366}

This august tribunal will therefore have full power to terminate

all controversies and differences among Catholics in regard to

which it shall judge that the interests of the faith and the

well-being of the church require a definite judgment to be made.

The result will be both a more perfect concordance in doctrine

and principles of action, regarding all the matters which will be

decided, and a more perfect recognition of liberty in reference

to all opinions which are left as open questions. That this will

be a great gain no truly loyal Catholic can doubt. Another result

to be expected is a more precise, definite, and uniform system of

ecclesiastical law and administration, providing a more perfect

adjustment of all the multiform relations of the church and her

hierarchy. Those portions of the church which are in an apathetic

and torpid state we may hope will be roused up; a multitude of

sluggish and unfaithful Catholics become reanimated with the

spirit of faith; and the unity, sanctity, catholicity, and

apostolicity of the church--the immortality of her life, the

divine authority of her teaching, the irresistible and universal

power of that spirit which is in her--be manifested with a

brightness which will make for ever glorious the close of the

nineteenth century, whose opening was so very dark and

inauspicious.

----------

St. Mary's.

If there is one spot in our country to which the American

Catholic turns with special interest, it is certainly to the

landing-place of Lord Baltimore's colony in Maryland and the site

of St. Mary's City. New Englanders are never weary of boasting of

"our pilgrim forefathers," who landed on Plymouth Rock to obtain

freedom to worship God according to their own peculiar notions.

To have an ancestor who came over in the Mayflower is equivalent

to a patent of nobility--it sets the fortunate individual above

his fellows, and makes him a member of a caste truly Brahminical.

The Catholic can turn with far greater pride to those spiritual

forefathers who, with no self-righteousness, sought in the new

world not only liberty of conscience, but allowed it to others;

who were so just in their dealings with the natives that they

never took an inch of land without paying for it; and who, by

their Christian kindness, won over so many of the Indians to

genuine Christianity. We truly have reason to say,

"Ay, call it holy ground

The soil where first they trod!"

I had always wished to visit this consecrated spot so dear to the

Catholic heart, and embraced the first convenient opportunity of

doing so. I rode down from Leonardtown during the pleasant Indian

summer time.

{367}

My most vivid remembrance of the ride is of passing over a

frequent succession of what my Aunt Pilcher used to call

"sarvent-madams."--a sudden depression, as if be tween two logs,

which unceremoniously pitched you forward in the carriage and

then brought you up with a sudden jerk, thus forcing you to make

an impromptu bow which gave point to the pleasant name of

"sarvent-madams." This sort of exercise may be novel, but a

continuation of it is not at all amusing, and I was glad when,

after a ride of about twenty miles, we emerged from a woody path,

crossed a stream, and found ourselves on the high plain where

once stood the city of St. Mary. One is surprised--pained--to

find not one stone left upon another of that settlement. When the

seat of government was removed, nature resumed her sway and

avenged herself for the ravages of man by obliterating most of

his traces and reclothing the place with her own freshness and

beauty. There are now a few dwellings belonging to the farmer who

owns this historic site, a barnlike church belonging to the

Episcopalians, said to have been built of the ruins of the old

state-house, and a large brick building that stands dreary and

treeless, looking like a factory, but which is really a seminary

for young ladies, the monument erected by the Maryland

legislature to commemorate the landing of the first colonists! It

would be an excellent place for a convent of Carthusians; but to

banish lively girls to this lonely region, lovely though it be,

so far from any town, several miles from the post-office, and

with no literary advantages, must have been the conception of

some malicious and dyspeptic old bachelor. The young are rarely

lovers of nature. Those whose souls have been chastened and

weaned from the world alone find a balm therein. It is a great

defect in the training of our youth that they are not made more

observant of natural objects. Insects, vegetation, the very

stones beneath the feet, are a source of unceasing pleasure to

the heart in sympathy with nature in all her infinite variety.

But this requires teachers who are capable of opening to youth

the great treasure-house of nature. It is not always the most

intellectual people who are the most fond of the country. Madame

de Staël preferred living in the fourth story of a house on the

Rue du Bac in Paris to a villa on the enchanted shores of Lake

Geneva. And Dr. Johnson thought there was no view that equalled

the high tide of human beings at Charing Cross.

This seminary is intended to educate the young ladies of

prevailing religious sects of the country, each of which is

represented by a teacher. I have understood that at times there

have been serious conflicts between those who were for Paul and

those who were for Apollos; but this is not at all surprising in

a place where they must be driven to desperation for a little

excitement. The only church near is the Episcopal, where the

services are very intermittent indeed, which obliges the teachers

to play the part of chaplain.

This uninviting church is in a yard full of old graves, shaded by

clumps of hollies and gloomy cedars. There is a venerable old

mulberry-tree in the midst, now quite decayed, but still putting

forth a few leafy branches, said to have been planted (a twig

from old England) by Leonard Calvert's own hands. There is a

tradition that he was buried in this yard--perhaps near his tree,

familiarly known as Lord Baltimore's tree--but there is nothing

to indicate the precise spot. It is more probable that he was

buried near the Catholic church, which was about a quarter of a

mile farther down.

{368}

Relic lovers have nearly killed this venerable tree, by cutting

out pieces for canes, crosses, etc. Passing through the grassy

graveyard, and descending a steep bank, you come to a narrow line

of sand, a miniature beach on the shore of St. Mary's River, the

place where the colony landed. The water is as salt as the sea,

and the broad river deep enough for the Dove and the Ark to

anchor. A gentle ripple came up over the yellow sand and

crystalline pebbles. The broad expanse of water lay like a lake,

with undulating hills in the background all covered with woods in

their gorgeous autumn foliage. The whole scene was as calm and

peaceful as if these waters had never been disturbed by Indian

canoe or white man's craft.

A quarter of a mile south of the seminary was a turnip-field,

where once stood the church the colonists hastened to build. You

would not imagine you stood on consecrated ground where holy

rites were once performed. This was not the place where the holy

sacrifice was first offered. Their first chapel was an Indian

wigwam, which a friendly native gave up to Father White; for the

colonists founded an Indian village here which owned the pacific

rule of King Yaocomico, and established themselves in peace

beside it. Opposite the place where the church stood, and east of

it, are some traces of the lord proprietary's residence. The old

cellar is nearly filled with rubbish, in which are found

fragments of crockery and bricks--bricks brought from the old

country. There were grand doings here once. Hilarity and

merriment had their hours in that miniature court, amid those of

grave deliberations. But, at last, Pallida Mors, "that at every

door knocks," came in the train, and brought mourning to all the

settlers; for here died Leonard Calvert. He was nursed in his

last moments by his relatives Margaret and Mary Brent. He died on

the 9th of June, 1647. The place of his burial is not known. In

these days of woman's rights, it may not be amiss to recall the

first woman in this country, perhaps, who asserted her claim to

share the privileges of the stronger sex. Margaret Brent was

appointed by Governor Calvert his sole administratrix, which is

certainly a proof of her capacity for business. By virtue of this

appointment she claimed to be the attorney of the lord

proprietor. Her claims were admitted by the council. She then

appeared in the general assembly, and claimed the right to vote

as Lord Baltimore's representative. This was not permitted. She

was a large land-owner, and displayed her energy in laying out

her estates; and she quelled a mutiny among some Virginia

soldiers who had served under Leonard Calvert. It is surprising

the strong-minded women of this day have not brought forward this

fine precedent, who has been ranked with the famous Margaret of

Parma, regent of the Netherlands. Let us hope, with all her fine

abilities, that she retained her sweet womanly ways and that

modesty which is the charm of her sex. I fancy she did, or she

would never have subdued those early representatives of the

gallant Virginia chivalry.

Close by the lord proprietary's place is a spot charming enough

for Egeria. It is a spring of delicious water bubbling up from

the rocks, that flows off in a streamlet, over tufts of the

thickest and greenest moss. It is shaded by a dense clump of

cedars and holly bushes---a fit haunt for the dryades and all the

sylvan deities. The warm noontide air was fanned into this cool

and leafy bower, where the birds still sang and insects floated,

bringing with it a certain aroma from the crushed leaves of the

wood.

{369}

From a distance came the measured cadence of some negro song,

snatched up at the hour of noonday rest, which harmonized with

the spot and the atmosphere. There is always an undertone of

melancholy in the gayest songs of the colored race which lulls

the heart, as sorrow underlies all gayety in the heart of man. It

was a place to be alone with nature, poetry, God, and just the

spot for an old hermit to set up his cell, and pass his days in

sympathy with nature and in communion with nature's God.

With all its beauty, this plain of St. Mary's is full of

melancholy, especially in the fall of the year. Haunted with

memories, its loneliness is in such contrast with its past

history that it touches the spring of regret. The autumn winds,

the slight veil of haze that hangs over the landscape, are full

of sadness. One seems to hear the wail of the forsaken lares

whose altars have so long been levelled with the rest.

"In consecrated earth,

And on the holy hearth,

The lares and lemures moan with midnight plaint."

The wailings of Jeremiah come to mind as we wander over the site

of the city that was once full of people, but now sitteth

solitary. "The city of thy sanctuary is become a desert, and the

house of thy holiness and our glory, wherein thou wert praised,

is laid desolate." Perhaps, after all, the melancholy was in my

own heart; for the sky was clear, the earth smiling, and before

us lay, glad and gleaming, the bright waters of the St. Mary's

river,

"Like any fair lake that the breeze is upon,

When it breaks into dimples and laughs in the sun."

There is this peculiarity about the river: its windings are so

abrupt that from certain points there seems to be no outlet, and

it has the appearance of a succession of lakelets; pellucid gems

set at this autumn time in bosses enamelled with every shade of

crimson and gold, which I loved to think a bright rosary strung

by nature in honor of Our Lady.

Two or three miles from St. Mary's is Rose Croft, a charming old

place at the very point between St. Inigoes Creek and St. Mary's

River. In old colonial times it was the residence of the

collector of the port of St. Mary's, and here lived the heroine

of Kennedy's _Rob of the Bowl_. As I rode up to it, I half

expected to see the fair Blanche peeping out of the window to see

if the carriage did not contain the secretary.

The house is a low, broad one, with verandas and porches, and

large, airy rooms, which look out upon a lovely water view. There

is a good deal of wainscoting about it, and some carvings in the

large parlor that witnessed the birthday festivities. The lady of

the house told me that, in making some repairs, a few years ago,

a ring and a pair of velvet slippers were found, perhaps once

worn by Blanche. All around the yard grows spontaneously the

passion flower, winding over every shrub and tree, and trailing

along the ground. Everything was left very much to nature, and

she had thrown over the grounds a certain sad grace of her own,

which harmonized with the antiquity of the house, and the echo of

past times that lingered in its rooms. A spruce garden and

well-trimmed trees and shrubbery would have ill accorded with

such a spot. And there was a certain melancholy in the large, sad

eyes of the mistress of this charming place that spoke more of

the past than of the present, as if she had imbibed something of

its spirit.

{370}

On the point between the river and creek, opposite Rose Croft, is

St. Inigoes manor-house, belonging to the Jesuit fathers. St.

Inigo, or St. Ignatius, was considered, from the first, as one of

the patrons of the colony. This house is built of brick brought

from the old country, perhaps two hundred years ago or more. It

has quite a foreign look, with its high pitched roof and dormer

windows. I have seen similar houses in the valley of the Loire.

At a distance it looks, as Kennedy says, like a chateau with its

dependencies around it. There is a huge windmill at the very

point, around which are washed up fine black sand and some spiral

shells. On the gable of the southern porch of the mansion is the

holy name of Jesus, in large black letters--the cognizance of the

Jesuits. The yard is a garden of roses. They grow in bushes,

cover the cottages, and climb the trees, blooming often as late

as Christmas tide. And the whole place is like an aviary--a

rendezvous of all the martins, wrens, whippoorwills, etc., of the

country--the very place for poor Miss Flite, who would never have

found names enough for them. There are martin-houses, dove-cotes,

and trees full of the American mocking-birds. When the windows of

the chapel are open in the morning, it is filled with their

musical variations, and with the perfume of the roses and

honeysuckles. That chapel always seemed to me a little corner of

heaven itself, full of the divine presence of which one never

wearies. I often betook myself to that sweet solitude. There were

memories that haunted me, an image between me and God, which I

sought there to consecrate to him. I loved to think the little

lamp could be seen all night from the very Potomac and miles up

the St. Mary's River; perhaps lighting up in some dark and sinful

soul some sweet thought of him before whom it burned.

A religious air prevails at St. Inigoes. Everything is quiet and

subdued, and favorable to meditation. The day commences with Mass

in the chapel. The Angelus is rung three times a day, which every

one kneels to say. Even Nimrod, the dog, howls while it is

ringing, as if infected by devotion. And they told me his

predecessor would pull at the bell till it sounded, if it was not

rung at the moment. Such devotional dogs certainly deserve a

place--if it is not profane to say so--among those fine little

dogs whom Luther declared would be among our companions in

heaven, whose every hair would be tipped with precious stones and

whose collars be of diamonds.[Footnote 86]

[Footnote 86: See Audin's _Life of Luther_.]

Everything about the house is extremely tidy and well preserved,

the garden trim, the walks swept, the whole house a temple of

purity and cleanliness. One could sit for ever in that southern

porch reading and dreaming life away. Thought would flow on for

ever with that current whose waters are as changeable in their

aspect as our own varied moods. When so many live merely for the

body, why should not some live for the imagination and fancy?

This is the very place for Mr. Skimpole, who had no idea of time,

no idea of money; who only wished to live, to have a little sun

and air, and float about like a butterfly from flower to flower;

who loved to see the sun shine, hear the wind blow, watch the

changing lights and shadows, and hear the birds sing. He asked of

society only to feed him, to give him a landscape, music, papers,

mutton, coffee, and to leave him at peace from the sordid

realities of the world.

{371}

In the dining-room is a large oval table of solid oak which once

belonged to the house of the lord proprietary. It is not

misplaced in this hospitable house. Daniel Webster, when at Piney

Point, used to sail over to St. Inigoes and sit at Leonard

Calvert's table. And he taught the cook how to make a genuine New

England chowder.

There is, hung up in one of the rooms, a picture of the famous

Prince Hohenlohe which interested me. I could not account for its

being there till I learned that Father Carberry, a former

incumbent, was a brother to Mrs. Mattingly, of Washington, who so

many years ago was miraculously cured by the prayers of the holy

prince--an occurrence that caused a great excitement at the time.

The parish church is about a half a mile from the manor-house. On

Sundays and other festivals you can see boats full of people

sailing up the creek. Others come flocking in on horseback or in

carriages. A graveyard surrounds the church, which is so hid

among the trees that it is not perceived till you are close upon

it. The yard is filled before service with the country-people,

who fasten their horses around the enclosure, and stand talking

in groups, or go wandering around among the grassy mounds,

reminding you of the English country church-yards. Our northern

churches are almost so exclusively filled up with foreigners that

it seemed strange to worship in a congregation almost wholly

American. A gallery was appropriated to the colored people, and

it was crowded. They seemed quite devout and kept up a great

rattling with their large rosaries. I noticed that the father, in

preaching, was careful to make them feel that his sermon was

addressed as particularly to them as to the others. I was

especially interested to see the number that came filing down the

aisle to receive holy communion. Sunday after Sunday it was the

same, and I was always affected to see these "images of God

carved in ebony," as old Fuller calls them, at the holy table to

receive Him who is no respecter of persons. In talking with the

father about their devotional tendencies, he told me there was

one saintly old negro who walked fifteen miles every Sunday to

worship the Word made flesh. What an example to the cold and

lukewarm in cities who daily pass our churches with scarcely a

thought of the Presence within! This little church is a

substantial one of brick, with arched windows, but no pretension

as to architecture. When the services were over, the ladies all

followed the priest into the sacristy to pay their respects to

him, and there is a pleasant exchange of greetings which is

pleasing and family-like. And many of the men, too, stroll around

the building to the rear door to take part in it.

Wandering off into the churchyard, I came upon a large cross

around which were clustered the graves of several priests. There

is a large monument to the memory of Father Carberry, a genial

old priest renowned throughout the country for his hospitality.

Among those buried here is Mr. Daniel Barber, of New Hampshire,

who became a convert to the Catholic Church, together with his

son's whole family, at a time when converts were more rare than

at the present time. The son, Rev. Virgil Barber, who was an

Episcopal minister, with his wife and five children, embraced the

religious life. One of the latter took the white veil at Mount

Benedict, near Boston, and was remarkable for her beauty and

accomplishments. She made her profession in Quebec, where she

died young.

{372}

I have heard a nun of that house tell, and with great feeling, of

her descending every morning to the chapel before the rest of the

community, even in the rigorous winter of that latitude, to make

the Way of the Cross, that touching devotion to the suffering

Saviour.

The grandfather, Mr. Daniel Barber, who was also a minister, only

took deacons' orders in the church on account of his age. He

loved to visit the old Catholic families of St. Mary's, but was

ill pleased when he did not find the cross--the sign of our

salvation--in the apartment. "Where's your sign?" he would

abruptly ask. He rests in peace in this quiet country

church-yard.

The father at St. Inigoes has to possess a variety of

accomplishments not acquired in the theological seminary. Priest,

farmer, horseman, and boatman must all be combined to form the

fine specimen of muscular Christianity required in this extensive

mission. The place is no sinecure.

Good Father Thomas, obliged to visit a sick person at the very

head of St. Mary's River, invited me to accompany him, and I

gladly did so. Two colored servants went to manage the sail, or

to row if necessary. The boat was black as a gondola of Venice.

Sailing over these waters, where passed the Dove and the Ark,

reminded me of the Père Jean and the novice René on the St.

Lawrence. The whole country was, as we set out, glorified by the

setting sun. The long points of land around which the river wound

were bathed on one side by a golden mist, and on the other in a

faint lilac. Over the gorgeous woods hung a purple haze that

faded every instant. The amber clouds grew crimson, and then

faded away into grey. The father said his breviary, leaving me to

my own reflections a part of the way. There was not a ripple on

the broad sheet save the receding ones left by our boat. Now and

then we would stop to drink in the beauty of the scene--the sky,

the water which reflected it, the lights and shadows on the

banks, the melancholy cry of the whippoorwill, and the gay sounds

of the laborers just through with their day's work. As it grew

darker, the deep coves were filled with mysterious shades; the

ripples left behind seemed tipped with a phosphorescent light. We

glided at last into a sheltered cove just as the moon came out,

giving enchantment to the whole scene. In such bright waters

bathed Diana when Actaeon beheld her and was punished for his

presumption. One of us repeated the beautiful lines of Shelley:

"My soul is an enchanted boat,

Which, like a sleeping swan, doth float

Upon the silver waves of thy sweet singing;

And thine doth like an angel sit

Beside the helm conducting it,

Whilst all the winds with melody are ringing.

It seems to float ever, for ever

Upon that many winding river,

Between mountains, woods, abysses,

A paradise of wildernesses!

Till, like one in slumber bound,

Borne to the ocean, I float down, around,

Into a sea profound, of ever-spreading sound."

A few days after, I sailed over to the Pavilion to take a boat

for Washington.

----------

{373}

A May Carol.

She hid her face from Joseph's blame,

The Spirit's glory-shrouded bride.

The Sword comes next; but first the Shame:

Meekly she bore, and naught replied.

For mutual sympathies we live:

The outraged heart forgives, but dies:

To her, that wound was sanative,

For life to her was sacrifice.

At us no random shaft is thrown

When charged with crimes by us unwrought;

For sins unchallenged, sins unknown,

Too oft have stained us--act and thought.

In past or present she could find

No sin to weep for; yet, no less,

Deeplier that hour the sense was shrined,

In her, of her own nothingness.

That hour foundations deeper yet

God sank in her; that so more high

Her greatness--spire and parapet--

Might rise, and nearer to the sky:

That, wholly overbuilt by grace,

Nature might vanish, like some isle

In great towers lost--the buried base

Of some surpassing fortress pile.

Aubrey De Vere.

-------

{374}

St. Peter, First Bishop of Rome.

The question of which we purpose to treat in this article is one

of those that are sure to receive prominence whenever the claims

of the Roman see are discussed with more than ordinary interest

and warmth. Just now the "Anglo-Catholic" mind is exercised to

find some way of establishing the existence of a one holy

catholic and apostolic church, without admitting the supremacy of

the bishop of Rome; besides, the approaching ecumenical council

directs men's attention to the eternal city, and the high

prerogatives of its pontiffs. Not unfrequently we meet with a

broad denial that St. Peter ever was at Rome at all, or at least

that he was ever bishop of Rome. This is not, indeed, the course

pursued by the most learned or thoughtful amongst our opponents;

they know history too well to stake their reputation for

erudition or fairness on any such denial; but it is in favor with

a lower or less instructed class of minds, and is adopted in

text-books for theological seminaries, as well as in some popular

works intended chiefly for the perusal of persons who, in all

likelihood, may never have the opportunity, even should they have

the inclination, of recurring to those more learned authorities

by consulting whom the imposture would soon be detected. Thus it

has come to pass that in popular works, lectures, magazine and

newspaper articles, and the like, one frequently meets with the

flippant assertion that it is very doubtful whether St. Peter

ever was at Rome, that the place of his death is uncertain; all

that we know for certain being that, shortly before his demise,

he was in Babylon, whence he wrote his first letter. We shall

endeavor to establish as a historical truth beyond all reasonable

doubt, supported by evidence that must be admitted as sufficient

by any unprejudiced critic, that St. Peter visited Rome, dwelt

there, was first bishop of the Roman church, and there, together

with St. Paul, laid down his life for his Master, in fulfilment

of the latter's prophecy, "When thou wilt be old, thou wilt

stretch forth thy hands, and another will gird thee, and lead

thee whither thou wouldst not;" words which, as the inspired

writer tells us, signified "by what death he should glorify God."

[Footnote 87]

[Footnote 87: John xxi. 18.]

The question has been so fully discussed, that we may not hope to

say anything that will be considered new; to the learned reader,

indeed, we can but repeat a "thrice-told tale;" but, as the

adversaries of the holy see do not disdain to furbish up the arms

which have already been stricken from the hands of their

predecessors, we shall be content to draw from the same arsenals

whence our fathers drew the weapons that they knew how to wield

so skilfully and successfully. All that we ask of the

non-Catholic reader is, that he approach the question as a merely

historical one, to be judged on the ordinary rules of historical

evidence. All dogmatical preoccupations against the supremacy of

the Roman pontiffs should be laid aside.

{375}

This is demanded by fairness and a sincere love of truth;

besides, although we acknowledge that to establish St. Peter's

Roman bishopric is, if not an indispensable, at least a very

important, preliminary to the successful assertion of the Roman

primacy, yet the ablest amongst Protestant theologians have

thought that, even admitting the historical fact, they could

successfully refute the dogma. Our inquiry, then, shall be purely

historical, to be decided on purely historical grounds. At the

beginning of this century, no one having any pretensions to

historical learning attempted to deny that St. Peter had really

lived and died at Rome. Such high names in the Anglican Church as

Cave, Pearson, and Dodwell had given their unbiassed and positive

testimony to the truth. Whiston had said: "That St. Peter was at

Rome is so clear in Christian antiquity, that it is a shame for a

Protestant to confess that any Protestant ever denied it." But,

about this period, the rage for the new system of biblical

interpretation raised doubts about the accepted meaning of the

word _Babylon_ in the thirteenth verse of the fifth chapter

of the first epistle of St. Peter, and the question whether the

apostle ever was at Rome again came up for discussion. Very

little new has been said, so that little remains to be confuted.

We repeat, we have merely to sum up what has been well and

conclusively said before. We have before us a work entitled _An

Exposition of the Thirty-nine Articles, Historical and

Doctrinal_, by Edward Harold Browne, lord bishop of Ely, in

which [Footnote 88] the author endeavors to confute "the position

of the Roman Church, that St. Peter was bishop of Rome."

[Footnote 88: Art. xxxvii. sec. II.]

As this work is used as a text-book in the New York Protestant

Episcopal Seminary, and may, therefore, be supposed to furnish

ideas and facts on church questions to the average Episcopalian

clerical mind, we shall follow the author in his argument, and

show how a plain tale can put down all his ingenious explanations

and evasions.

The plain statement is as follows: The earliest and most reliable

documents of Christian antiquity, with a clearness and unanimity

that leave no room for doubt or cavil, state that St. Peter was

at Rome, took a special care of the Roman Church, and died there.

The bishops of Rome are always represented as his successors, not

merely in that inheritance which has come down to all bishops

from the apostles, but as his successors in his _Cathedra_,

or episcopal chair. Our witnesses are numerous; their knowledge

and fidelity are unimpeachable; their statements cannot be evaded

or explained away; and thus the Roman bishopric of St. Peter is

as undoubted a fact of ecclesiastical history as any other in the

earlier ages. We shall give the proofs one by one, confining

ourselves to the first three centuries.

St. Clement, who was certainly bishop of Rome, and who, according

to Tertullian was ordained by Peter, in his epistle to the

Corinthians--admitted as genuine by the best

authorities--referring to the late persecution of the Roman

Church under Nero, mentions among other troubles the recent

martyrdom of SS. Peter and Paul, alleging them as noble examples

of patience under tribulation. We have here a witness on the

spot, who had seen the apostles, and been a special disciple of

St. Peter.

We have next another apostolic father, St. Ignatius of Antioch,

who suffered martyrdom about A.D. 107, and in a letter to the

Romans speaks of SS. Peter and Paul as their special preceptors

and masters: "I do not command you as Peter and Paul; I am a

condemned man."

{376}

It is to be remarked that no one attempts to deny that St. Paul

was at Rome, as one of his journeys thither is related in the

last chapter of the Acts, and he speaks of himself as in that

city; [Footnote 89] the union of St. Peter's name with his, as

both commanding the Romans, shows that the former apostle had

been with them in person as well as Paul.

[Footnote 89: 2 Tim. i. 17. This letter would seem to have

been written not long before the apostle's death. See ch. iv.

6,7.]

Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis, probably a disciple of St. John the

Apostle, as quoted by Eusebius, says that St. Mark wrote his

gospel from the preaching of St. Peter at Rome, [Footnote 90] and

that the apostle wrote his first letter from the same place,

calling it Babylon. [Footnote 91]

[Footnote 90: _Eus. Hist. Eccl._ lib. iii. c..39.]

[Footnote 91: _Ibid_. lib. iii. c. I.]

St. Dionysius of Corinth wrote a letter to the Roman Church under

the pontificate of Soter, (A.D. 151-170,) which is also quoted by

Eusebius, [Footnote 92] in which he says that SS. Peter and Paul,

after planting the faith at Corinth, went into Italy, planted the

faith amongst the Romans, and there sealed their testimony with

their blood.

[Footnote 92: _Ibid_. lib. ii. c. 25.]

St. Irenaeus, (Bishop of Lyons A.D. 178,) a disciple of Polycarp,

who was himself a hearer of the Apostle John, speaks of the Roman

Church as "the greatest and most ancient church, known to all,

founded and established at Rome by the two most glorious

apostles, Peter and Paul. [Footnote 93]

[Footnote 93: Lib. iii. _adv. Har._ c. iii.]

He adds: "The blessed apostles having founded and arranged the

church, delivered its bishopric and administration to Linus. To

him succeeded Anacletus, after him Clement, to him Evaristus, and

to Evaristus, Alexander. The sixth from the apostles was Sixtus,

after him Telesphorus, next Hyginus; then Pius, after whom came

Anicetus. Soter succeeded Anicetus, and now the bishopric is held

by Eleutherius, the twelfth from the apostles." This is an

authentic list of the bishops of Rome from the apostles to the

writer's time, placing the date of his work between A.D. 170 and

185, the fifteen years of the pontificate of Eleutherius.

Cajus, a priest of Rome under Zephyrinus, who governed the church

during the first seventeen years of the third century, says, in a

work quoted by Eusebius, [Footnote 94] but now lost: "I can show

you the trophies of the apostles; for whether we go to the

Vatican or the Ostian way, we shall meet with the trophies of the

founders of this church." This is remarkable testimony to the

accuracy of the tradition that prevails to this day of the places

where the apostles were buried--St. Peter at the Vatican, St.

Paul in the Ostian way, which now are marked by "trophies,"

greater in splendor and magnificence, but raised by the same

spirit of reverence and love as those which this Roman priest

pointed out in the third century.

[Footnote 94: _Ibid_. lib. ii. c. 15.]

Tertullian flourished about the same period, for he died A.D.

216. Speaking in his great work _On Prescriptions_ [Footnote

95] of apostolic churches, he says: "If you are near Italy, you

have Rome, whence we also [the African Church] derive our origin.

How happy is this church on which the apostles poured forth their

whole doctrine with their blood; where Peter by his martyrdom is

made like the Lord; where Paul is crowned with a wreath like that

of John!" Again: "Let us see ... what the Romans proclaim in our

ears, they to whom Peter and Paul left the Gospel sealed with

their blood." [Footnote 96]

[Footnote 95: C. 36.]

[Footnote 96: Lib. iv. adv. _Marcion_.]

{377}

And speaking in the book _On Prescriptions_ of the origin of

apostolic churches, he calls on heretics to "unfold the series of

their bishops, coming down from the beginning in succession, so

that the first bishop was appointed and preceded by any one of

the apostles, or apostolic men in communion with the apostles.

[Footnote 97] For in this way the apostolic churches exhibit

their origin; ... as the Church of Rome relates that Clement was

ordained by Peter." [Footnote 98] Clement of Alexandria (who died

A.D. 222) states that St. Paul wrote his gospel at the request of

the Romans, who wished to have a written record of what they had

heard from St. Peter. [Footnote 99]

[Footnote 97: "Ut primus ille episcopus aliquem ex Apostolis

habuerit auctorum et antecessorem." ]

[Footnote 98: Ch. 32.]

[Footnote 99: Eus. _Hist. Eccl_. lib. vi. c. 14. ]

Origen, (A.D. 185-255,) who visited Rome under the pontificate of

Zephyrinus, says that St. Peter having preached to the Jews in

Pontus, Galatia, Bithynia, Cappadocia, and Asia, toward the end

of his life [Footnote 100] came to Rome, and was crucified with

his head downward. [Footnote 101]

[Footnote 100: [Greek text]]

[Footnote 101: Quoted by Eusebius, _Hist. Eccl_. lib.

iii. C. II.]

St. Cyprian, (Bishop of Carthage A.D. 248, put to death for the

faith A.D. 258,) speaking of the irregular proceedings of some

local schismatics who had appealed to Pope Cornelius, says: "They

venture to set sail, and carry letters from schismatical and

profane men to the _chair of Peter_, and to the principal

church, whence sacerdotal unity has arisen." [Footnote 102] And

in another letter he speaks of the election of Cornelius, "when

the place of Fabian, that is, the place of Peter, and the rank of

the priestly chair, was vacant." [Footnote 103] Even Bishop

Hopkins, whom his friends cannot blame for too great facility in

his concessions, admits that St. Cyprian acknowledged that St.

Peter was bishop of Rome.

[Footnote 102: _Epist_. 59, ad _Cornel_.]

[Footnote 103: _Epist_. 52, ad Antonianum.]

We do not wish to go beyond the three hundred years immediately

following the death of the apostle, and shall therefore omit here

the clear and unmistakable statements of Optatus, Jerome,

Epiphanius, Augustine, and others, closing with the account given

by Eusebius of Caesarea, (bishop A.D. 315-340,) who is justly

regarded as the father of ecclesiastical history, and of the

greatest weight in historical matters. His accuracy and research

are universally acknowledged, and his authority alone is

generally regarded as conclusive. [Footnote 104] He says that

Simon Magus went to Rome, and that "against this bane of mankind,

the most merciful and kind Providence conducted to Rome Peter,

the most courageous and the greatest among the apostles, who on

account of his virtue was leader of all." [Footnote 105] He adds

in his chronicle: "Having first founded the Church of Antioch, he

goes to Rome, where, preaching the gospel, he continues

twenty-five years bishop of the same city."

[Footnote 104: "In questions of critical investigation

regarding the early church, no writer bears with him greater

authority than that of the learned Eusebius, bishop of

Caesarea. Removed only by two hundred years from the

apostolic times, and being attached to the imperial court,

and having at his command all the literary treasures of the

Caesarean library, he ever displays a profound knowledge of

the earlier Christian writers, and at the same time a truly

refined critical acumen in discriminating between their

genuine productions and those falsely assigned to them."

--_Dublin Review_, June,1858, art. vii.]

[Footnote 105: _Hist. Eccl._ lib. ii. c. xiv.]

We have here a continuous series of witnesses, from those who had

seen and conversed with the Apostle St. Peter to the date of the

first work on ecclesiastical history now extant, all of whom

clearly testify to the fact that he visited Rome, took special

charge of the Roman Church, and there died a martyr, as our Lord

had foretold he would die. After the apostolic writers, who, from

the proximity of the events to their own time, could not be

mistaken, the most important witnesses are Irenaeus and Origen,

Tertullian and Cyprian.

{378}

The two former had visited Rome, and are competent witnesses of

the tradition of the Roman Church, the most important of all in

this matter; the two latter can testify to the same tradition,

both because missionaries from Rome planted the faith in Africa,

and because the constant intercourse, as well in ecclesiastical

as in civil affairs, between the capital of the empire and

Carthage, must necessarily have brought about a community of

traditions between the two churches. The whole ancient church

thus bears witness to what some Protestants now vainly affect to

deny. Greece, Asia Minor, Syria, Egypt, Northern Africa, Gaul,

Palestine, repeat what Clement, ordained by Peter, tells. The

second century takes up the fact from those who had seen the

apostles; the third learns it from the second, and the father of

ecclesiastical history relates it as a matter beyond doubt, found

by him in those ancient records, for the greater part since lost,

the gist of which he has fortunately preserved to posterity.

Scarcely any matter of fact--and this is a _mere_ matter of

fact--connected with the early age of the church, leaving out

those recorded in the sacred pages, is better attested.