ROME--GOOD-FRIDAY AND EASTER.
I can imagine no drearier ride than that by rail from Pisa to Rome. The
road skirts the sea most of the way. For many miles it traverses the
Roman Campagna. The dreaded miasma which rises at night from this vast
plain has left it tenantless, except by the station-masters and hands,
and the herdsmen needed to watch over the droves of horses and oxen and
flocks of sheep which browse on the abundant herbage. These herdsmen
look wild and brigandish in their peaked hats and slashed jackets.
Whether they take quinine freely, or are naturally proof against
malaria, I know not. But it is a fact that most of them--as also of
the railway servants--do not have the haggard and palsied look I had
expected to note among them. Even they, however, have fears of the
consequences of their exposure; for I noticed at every station, where
there were several buildings, large young groves of the eucalyptus or
blue-gum tree. Its balsamic odor was perceptible from the car-windows.
The Italian Government encourages the setting out of this tree as a
preventive of malaria.
The success of the experiment is still a matter of dispute. In point of
fact, the shepherds and others who live in miserable huts, hundreds of
feet from the railway-track and have no such protection, seem as strong
and hearty as those who dwell continually in the shade of the blue-gum
tree.
We attended the special services at St. Peter’s on Good-Friday. Driving
through the streets we found the banks and shops of all kinds open
as usual. The only indication of the solemnity of the day was the
increased attendance at all the churches. And this may be, in part,
explained by the extraordinary musical attractions. At St. Peter’s
many thousand persons must have been present between 4.30 and 6.30 P.
M., when the _Tenebrœ_ and _Miserere_ were chanted or sung by a great
concourse of priests and a select choir. The music was impressive, but
its proper effects were lost on all hearers who could not squeeze into
the little side-chapel where it was performed. Every effort had been
made to render St. Peter’s gloomy, but without avail. The brilliant
mosaics and frescoes were all shrouded. The eighty-nine lamps which
burn about the crypt of St. Peter’s tomb were extinguished. But
glorious sunshine flooded the whole interior. It streamed in mighty
beams through the colorless windows facing the west, and set at naught
all puny attempts to make the most splendid church in the world look
dark and dull. About six o’clock the throng was the greatest. For two
hours people had been pouring in, but only a small part of the vast
floor was occupied. Among the worshipers or spectators were friars
of every known order, richly attired officers of every grade in the
Italian army, common soldiers of all branches of the service, men and
women representing every nation of Europe, and a great many Americans,
besides countless numbers of the highest as well as the lowest classes
of Roman society. The spectacle was one of deep interest, aside from
the somber devotional exercises which had convoked this immense
multitude.
On Easter-Sunday hundreds of shops were still open in the narrower
and poorer streets of Rome. The day was perfect. The sun shone from
a cloudless sky--just warm enough to be pleasant. We drove to St.
Peter’s at 9.30 A. M., and found everybody going in the same direction.
But, although people had been streaming into the church for an hour
before we arrived, the number on the floor was hardly noticeable. The
magnificent pictures were again revealed in all the undimmed freshness
of their original tints. The lights which circle St. Peter’s tomb
were once more burning. Red cloths had been hung over some of the
marble pillars. The church was thus made as bright and beautiful as
possible, but to me it seemed scarcely more so than on Good-Friday. On
this joyous occasion the English cardinal, Howard--a thick-set man,
with a large head and a deep, sonorous voice--conducted the services.
These took place almost directly beneath the dome, and were heard
and witnessed by a great congregation. The singing by the choir was
very fine--the boys’ and men’s voices mingling with exquisite effect.
The chanting of the priests was less pleasing to the musical ear.
While these exercises were progressing under the dome, priests were
celebrating masses in many of the side-chapels, which were also partly
filled with worshipers. At the boxes, which serve as confessionals,
were fathers, who touched the kneeling faithful with long wands. As
for the bronze image of St. Peter, there was a constant succession
of persons, of all ages and stations in life, who kissed his foot in
passing, carefully wiping the well-worn spot before applying their lips
to the cold metal.
Interesting as was the occasion, it was tame compared with the
ceremonies observed by the Popes before the patrimony of Peter passed
under the control of the King of Italy. In the old days the Holy Father
read the mass in St. Peter’s on Easter-Sunday, and was borne from
the church in grand procession. At a later hour he appeared on the
_loggia_, and gave his benediction “to the city and the world.” After
dark there was a wonderful illumination of the dome. All these striking
rites and customs are now things of the past. Pope Leo XIII was nowhere
publicly visible during the joyous festival of 1886. He was seen only
by a few of the strangers in Rome--themselves devout Catholics--who had
previously obtained cards of admission to the private chapel where the
Pope himself officiated, and they took the sacrament from his hands.
The most popular man in Italy is the King. No statesman shares with
him the confidence and affection of the people. One day I noticed a
stir in and about the great doorway of the Hôtel de Londres, where I
was stopping. Heads were bared on all sides. Everybody in sight was
bowing profoundly. In front of the hotel stood a common open carriage
with two horses, simply caparisoned, and a driver in dark livery. A
tall, handsome officer of high rank, splendidly attired, sat on the
left side of the vehicle. The rest of the seat was occupied by a stout,
middle-aged man in citizen’s clothes. His cheek-bones were high, his
lower jaw was massive, his mustache iron-gray, and, as he kept up a
constant motion of doffing and replacing his hat, I remarked a broad
forehead crowned with hair thick and bristling. He looked just enough
like the portraits of Humbert the First to convince me that he was the
King of Italy. And so it proved. He had called at the Hôtel de Londres
to visit the Prussian Princess Marie, who had a suite of rooms at the
house. This lady is the widow of the “Red Prince” Frederick Charles.
She happened to be out at the time, and so the King did not alight, but
drove away in his modest turn-out, receiving from all persons on the
Piazza di Spagna the most respectful salutation. Drivers of carriages
on hire, and even beggars at the street corners, were greeted by him as
courteously as the Roman nobles who dashed past him in equipages far
more showy than his own. The day previous to this visit he had made
a return-call on Prince Fushimy of Japan at the same hotel. Though
politeness costs nothing, it goes far to make King Humbert a great
favorite with crowned heads as well as with the Italian people. That
policy of Italy, which has made friends of every nation in Europe, is
dictated by the King, and represents his considerate politeness and
native shrewdness. The courage which he showed at Naples during the
last cholera epidemic was only one of numerous instances proving his
devotion to the welfare of his constitutional subjects. His queen--the
“Pearl of Savoy”--is not less successful in winning hearts. She is a
fine-looking blonde, an accomplished whip, the patroness of unnumbered
charities, and as courteous as her lord.
Visiting the Pantheon, I saw, just as I did three years before, many
people standing in front of the tomb of the late Victor Emanuel. They
were mostly Italians, by whom the memory of the man who made their
country one is almost worshiped. Hundreds of wreaths of immortelles
and other flowers are hung around and above the tomb. These come from
all the secular universities, academies, and public institutions of
Italy, and also from private hands. They are renewed from time to
time, and look beautifully fresh. Long streamers of silk or satin
attached to the floral offerings bear inscriptions eulogistic of _Il
Rè Galantuomo_. In a large book which lies open, visitors voluntarily
enter their names. Hundreds of thousands have thus been registered
since the mortal remains of Victor Emanuel were here inshrined. There
could be no grander mausoleum than the Pantheon. It is the best
preserved of all the great edifices of ancient Rome--identified with
the mightiest power of the old world, and with the rise and progress
of Christianity. No longer a pagan temple, but a Christian church,
it is the proper resting-place of the unifier of Italy. Although the
relations between the Quirinal and the Vatican have been much strained
ever since the Pope lost his temporal sovereignty, it is not impossible
that, some day, the Roman Catholic Church will be proud that she
holds within her consecrated Pantheon the ashes of the king who was
still her son. At the Pantheon, as at St. Peter’s, I am always struck
with the magnificent effect of the admission of pure sunlight, free
from the intervention of stained glass. The sole illumination of the
Pantheon, you know, comes from a great circular hole in the dome. It
admits the rain, which leaves a round wet place on the stone floor
beneath. But there is still ample room for the free movement of the
crowds that come and go, without dampening their feet. Majestic as is
the dome that rises in its perfect curve to a height of 140 feet above
the floor, it impresses the beholder even less than the sight of the
distant blue concave which he sees through that immense opening. As for
the details of the interior, they appear in the flood of daylight in
all their richness and variety of color. It by no means follows that
a “religious light” should be “dim.” St. Peter’s and the Pantheon
triumphantly refute that too prevalent notion.
None of my guide-books--even the most recent in date--give any
description of some remarkable and interesting statues and pedestals
which have been brought to light within a year. The images are
life-sized sculptures of what might be called “lady superiors” of
the Vestal Virgins. No one of whom I inquired could tell me where
they were; but I found them for myself in an open excavated space not
far from the Forum Romanum. Two or three of the statues are almost
perfect. They are marble, exquisitely chiseled, and are doubtless good
resemblances of the distinguished originals. Though vestal virgins,
they have a matronly look. They were evidently women of intellectual
ability, as also of high social rank. They seem born to command. Their
main attire was the full, graceful robe universally worn in their
day. Five or six thick fillets bound about their foreheads, covering
also part of their hair, reminded me of a badge almost similar, worn
by nuns of various orders in the Roman Catholic Church. But, though
their dress was all simplicity and modesty, their bearing was anything
but humble. The whole expression of face and form was one of intense
self-satisfaction and pride. The pedestals to which these statues
once belonged have been mostly recovered in fine condition. They bear
warm tributes to the many virtues of the illustrious ladies whom they
commemorate. And yet history tells us that the vestal virgins had
seats of honor near the Cæsars in the Colosseum, and without pity saw
Christians devoured in the arena by wild beasts, and that no spectators
were more heartless than they when the fallen gladiators looked up to
their boxes for the signal of mercy which should have saved them from
the victor’s sword!
At least once a year that dreadful old ruin--the Colosseum--is the
scene of a ghastly and weird illumination. The exhibition came off on
the night of the 24th of April, between ten o’clock and midnight. The
interior of the stupendous structure was packed with human beings who
waited for a long time with much impatience for the show to begin.
Suddenly brilliant lights--many electric and others calcium--flashed
out from the lofty tiers of the amphitheatre, while a belt of fire
girded the top wall. The effect was startling. Every stone and brick
in the huge pile was instantaneously revealed, photographing itself in
imperishable lines on the brain of the beholder. The feeling excited
was akin to terror. The faces of all those men and women looked pale,
as they were upturned to the heights where thousands of brutal Romans
had so often sat and feasted on scenes of torture and butchery. To
behold the Colosseum by moonlight is something never to be forgotten,
as the partial shadows lend themselves to the conjuration of specters
from the dark passage-ways which one sees all around him. But the
illumination of which I write is still more impressive, when red and
green lights are alternately used. These are somehow infernal in their
suggestiveness. When to their peculiar effects you add the hoarse cries
of great companies of rooks aroused from their repose in the crevices
of the topmost tiers--and circling wildly through the air overhead--you
have something very much like a pandemonium, which is repeated in a
nightmare when you return home to sleep.