The Sun.
London, England, 1867-05-01 00:00:00

ROME.

ROME, April 20.

Padre Franco preached the Three Hours' Agony
at the Gesii yesterday, every recess of the vast
building being crowded to excess. Of course there
has been the usual confluence at all the Holy Week
offices conducted by the Papal choir. For my own
part I always prefer the less known to English
visitors, but more popular services of the parish
churches. Of course, except in a few instances, the
" musical treat " is very inferior, but it is far more
interesting to find yourself in the midst of a throng
of earnest people brimming over with faith and
devotion, than to be surrounded by a gaping crowd
of mere listeners. Some of the functions of the
smaller churches are strangely thrilling, and make
you imagine yourself attending sonic dreamy or
mesmeric reproduction of a scene from the " Ages
of Faith," rather than standing in a living assembly
of common nineteenth century people. Not the
least stirring of these are the mission services ;
they begin at Mid-Lent. The earliest, at half-past
five in the morning, is, perhaps, the least well at-
tended, but still you may always find a good-sized
congregation assembled " while it is yet dark." At
twelve and at four there are sermons and litanies,
and before the latest, at seven, processions. These
start from four succursal churches an hour after
the evening Angelus, and are attended by repre-
sentatives of any confraternities of .the parish,
habited in their peculiar dresses. Preceded by
Crucifix and tapers, they wind along the streets
singing hymns and litanies. The more devout of
the passers-by (and they are not the smaller pro-
portion) abandon for the moment whatever busi•

ness they were pursuing, and join themselves to
the swelling procession, and the more careless are

arrested when it stops at some open space, and the

priest, in a few earnest words, exhorts them to
_ _

come and attend to the affairs of their soul in this
time of Lent ; and so they proceed, gathering as
they go, and by the very earnestness of their
charity " compel " men to come in with them, that
God's House may be full. At one spot you may
meet a bearded Capuchin, at another a close-shaven
Passsionist, further on an impassioned son of St.
Dominic, or St. Ignatius, but all gesticulating with
genuine Italian earnestness. The Gesa is gene-
rally one of the most remarkable churches on these

occasions. Night services are rare in Rome, and
there is no permanent provision for lighting up the
body of a church. Twelve large tapers, at long
intervals down the vast nave of the Gesii, but just
serve to throw into strong shadow the silhouette
of the assembled thousands, and leave the vast

vault above looking like the sky on a dark night.
Now and then the huge doors are thrown open, and
finishing the last petitions of the Litany begun in
a distant street, there come in the various confra-
ternities, marshalling the flocks of stray sheep they
have gathered, whose crowds are soon lost in the
general throng. Then come the Litanies of Loretto
and of the Saints, responded to by the united voices
of the masses, and then a sermon, short, loud, bold,
and sententious. You are behind a pillar, and you
don't hear much of it ; the chances are in the Gesit

you wont hear much, but you have no difficulty in
making out the leading idea—some sentences are
sure to be sent rolling along in your direction from
time to time, which give you the subject under
meditation. " Fede, fede, sempre fede !" will,
perhaps, be the words you catch, and then, per-
haps, nothing more, till the next period winds up
with the same exclamation ; or, perhaps, some ,
illustration which strikes him as very popular and
irresistible, will make the preacher at pains to
enunciate more distinctly, while being less of an
oratorical effort he is less loud, and you are not
distracted by the reverberation. " After all, faith
is more rational than unbelief. How many of you
are there who could undertake to explain the laws
of gravitation ; how. many who never even heard
of them ; yet that does not make you disbelieve
the fact that if you drop that walking-stick from
your hand it will fall to the ground. You cannot
explain either the great laws of Divine Providence
and government of the universe, yet would you,
on that account, disbelieve that the prayer which
you launch upwards from an earnest heart will
reach the Throne of God ! The one recommends
itself to the mind as naturally as the other." And
then you lose the thread again, till once more you
catch the refrain, " Fede, fede,
sempre fede !"
Then follows Benediction, the people managing
the singing all by themselves, and at the end an
Italian hymn, intoned by a priest, the ritornelli
taken up bff_the'people in a sort of perdona!
Mio Diof- perdona !" Persons of
sail classes., are
'crowded together without distinction. I noticed-
near me the other night a well-known Roman
nobleman with his young wife, and, close to them
a most interesting group, consisting of a venerable
old man, with a scarcely less venerable, looking
dog, who rested his head on his knee and licked
his hands at intervals all through the sermon, and
a stalwart young mechanic, doubtless his son, who
showed the greatest solicitude in adjusting the old
man's cloak before letting him
go out into the
night air.

Not to neglect the Vatican offices entirely, how,
ever, I attended on Thursday the most interesting
of them, and got to the Piazza at a quarter to 12,
just in time to secure a place for the Benediction
in the shade of St. Peter's statue, for the sun is
already very powerful. I need hardly say that
the Pope's voice was heard loud and strong at
that distance. There was great excitement, as
usual, to catch the indulgence papers as they
fell ; one flew into the hands of a young villano,
who seemed to prize it immensely. An English
tourist standing near offered him up to 21 sendi
for it, but he would not part with the prize. The
ostritch feathers form a fine background to the
chair in which the Pope alternately sits and stands
while giving the Benediction ; when it is over he
is carried backwards. Then, without a moment's
lows of time, I went to keep niy appointment with-
an Italian friend who had promised to give me
a view of the ceremonies without going into the
crowd. Near the door of St. Marta we found
admittance to a seemingly interminable corkscrew
staircase, wide enough for three or four people
abreast, and with a view down the centre like the
sliaf
le coal mine. This brought us at last
on to the gallery round the dome, whence we
t of a white
could look down on to the multitudes thronging
into the church below. The strange humming
roar coining up from their supposed silent ranks
was very remarkable. On a framed board in this
gallery are preserved the authenticated measure-
ments of the building, given according to the
mode of reckoning of every European country ; I
had time to note some of them before the Pope
arrived. One of the most curious is that of the
giro of the cornice, which runs all round the inte-
rior of the building, viz., 1,943 9-25 English feet,
or 11 palms less than half a Roman mile. Ths
height of the letters of the inscription round the
dome, "Tu es Petrus, &e.," is 4 16-25 feet. The
greatest height (from the pavement to the top of
thee l l
10
ev r oss )7, 448 3-10 feet ; and that of the crypt
b
The washing of the feet takes place in the south
with-100
feet
a napkin. or t a gs
eo Inli d
sentences basin
ences are sung by
transept ; twelvefeet poor priests are ranged
along a sort of couch down the east side. The Pope
stands first on the estrade of a throne at the south
end, and then advances them,towardusienro etuarnnds
to
ohs
throne, i
kiss-
ingi each, gives him a medal and a purplef waternosegaanyd,
mapdesdtphseamnd
his
some into
short
the choir. We now made our way over the roof
and down part of the cupola staircase to a seat
contrived in an architectural opening high up
in the wall, and affording a good view of the
Sala over the gre at portico of the Basilica, which
was densely packed with visitors to the cena. A
long table down one side was tastefully decorated
with flowers and gold ornaments, statues of the
Apostles, and an Agnus Dei in the centre ; a clear
space strongly barricaded round it, and attended
by
the
w e
l t theve poor
o r
picturesquepriests appeared
Swiss
Guard.
in
their
Presently
curious
cos-
tume, carrying their purple nosegays, and took their
places, while the cardinals and monsignori gathered
round. Then the Pope
. came, dressed in a cotta
and a scarlet cape, with a white skull-cap, and
poured water over the hands of each, a prelate
holding his nosegay the
while,
and handing it back
with a napkin. The Pope then said a short grace,
without any choral ceremony. Meantime a long
file of bishops and heads of orders had formed,
handing up the v •
arious dishes, or plates rather,
presented by the last of
the column on Ms knees
to the Pope, and handed by him in turn to poor
men at the table ; then, returning down the table,
he poured wine and water into each glass. Mean-
time the Gospel narrati •
ve of the Last Supper was
being read, and at its termination, the third course
having likewise been got through, the Pope gave
a short benediction, and retired. Two other courses
were then handed by prelates, all being tastefully
arranged and garnished. The recipients did not
seem to feel any awkwardness about their part
in the ceremony, but eat and drank, and carried
away " the fragments that remained" with perfect
ease of manner. The whole scene meals the
" upper chamber" of Jerusalem as perfectly as
it is possible for anything human to picture forth
anything Divine, and the mutual good under-
standing pervading the whole is very edifying. To
an English mind the idea of having your feet
washed and your table served by the head of the
State, and in public, would suggest a situation
appallingly awkward. Here the spirit of the Gos-
pel is understood in a different and more literal
way. Not one showed the least sign of any »iau-
raise honte, each, on the contrary, was evidently
possessed by his sense of the sublimity of the re-
presentation in which he had been selected to
take part, and made it his endeavour to be worthy
of the occasion.
It is on the evening of this day that the churches
Of Rome appear to greatest advantage from a pic-