The Vermont transcript. [volume] (St. Albans, Vt.) 1864-1870, 1867-03-22
No. t57.
81. Peters at Rome.

hand in nearly all movements, pc
litical and religious, FOR more tlfhti If
teen hundred Fears. Looking at tho
Building frdm the square in the front.
il does not seem to be very large, but
entering IT, you look along nave 613
feet, and Up to q golden arch 1852 feet
You see fow Of immeflse square pill
lars, make Width Of 1913 feet. This
is enough OF statistics. Beholding it,
yor rt St1ce feel that it is an immense
ediict, bnt Il is not easy to compre-
bend its magnitude till you stand be-
meath the great dome ahd look across
the transept, back along the nave and
up to the great dome-up 405 feet
almost as high again as Bunker Hill
monument The distance is so great
that the letters of the inscription at
the base of the dome, which seem to
be about foot in length, are in real
ity six feet long. Beneath the Dome
is the high altar, over which stands
an ugly shaped canopy, made of bronze
torn from the ancient Pantheon; it
seems to be about thirty feet to its
top, but the actual distance is ninety
five Compsehending these distances,
YOU can then understand that tho
building is large enough, wide enough
and high enough to take in eight or
ten of the largest churches in Boston.
stceples and all. | dare say that all
the church edifces in Newburyport-
Concord, New Hampshire or Spring,
field, might be set within its walls,
and then there would be room enough
for one or two cotton factories. This,
| am aware is not approximating very
closely TO its size, but I intend to give
you general idea of its magnitude.
You behold a marble pavement, curl
ously wrought in Mosaic, marble pi-
laster and columns, statues of the
apostles, effigies of saints, angels, Gu
pids, tombs of old popes-some of
whom were great Williams paintings,
mosaics, medalions, bronze and gold
/ gold enough, if melted and coined in
to money, to make every beggar i'll
Rome a wealthy citizen. One humid
red thousand dollars on the canopy,
or baldichino, as they are called; gold
en- lamps, candlesticks, crosses, gold
on the tombs Of the .popes, gold
on the walls, on the vaulted roof, up
the great dome, on the mitres, crowns,
golden cupids, golden palm leaves SO
lavishly displayed that it would seem
that there was no lack of the precious
metals in the treasury of the church.
You are impressed by the cost of
this edifce MS well as by its size. Two
hundred and fifty years ago, before
the Pilgrims set foot on Plymouth
rock, its estimated cost was forty-sev-
en- million dollars, Since then there
has been an unlimited expense; it is
stated that the cost at the present
time and in the present values would
amount to $225,000, 1000. Enough to
build two railroads to the Paci6g,
BY the census of 1860 the total valu--
alton of real and personal property in
the state of New Hampshire was $780,
100000, and in Vermont $l35,000
000.- Here, then, we have one church
which it is said has cost as much as
the valuation of all the property in
New Hampshire and half of that in
Vermont, Think of all the lands,
houses, factories, shops, goods, cattle,
horses, sheep, money, bonds, and
mort cages everything that can be,
reckoned by dollars and cents, owned
by nearly half a million people-turn-
ed into this one building, and you will
understand what sort of q place the
pope has for the observation of
Christmas ceremonies.
The anua, cost Of keeping the build
ing in repair, saying nothing of new
works of art is about $40, 900, in the
currency issued by the pope. 1t re-
quires a large regiment, not Of sold
iers, but of servants, to scrape up the
melted wax, dust the apostles faces,
and keep the spiders from spinning
webs over the faces of the elfigies of
the old popes. So much for the
building, not for religious service =
that is still another item of expense.
You are impressed, also, by the COM
parative uselessness of the edifce ex-
cept as n show building, theatre for
pageants The masses or religious
services are performed in the side cha
pels, except on Christmas and once
during the holy week, and perhaps
one or two other days during the
year There are between three and
four hundred churches in Rome, and
as the population is little more than
two hundred thousand, there is abFsD-
dant church accommodation for all the
people, especially MS the Roman
chuych has very few sermons preach
ed to the people.
In the Choir "A chapel so called
mass is performed every morning ans
yespers sung every evening. l have
been on several occasions during ser
vice, on Sunday and on week days,
but have never seen n crowd. There
are no seats for the people, not one
hundred sitting accommodates, in all
this vast edihce, except on special oc-
casions. The people are of little ac--
count in Rome. They can kneel mp
on the cold pavement, or stand, bat
to sit is out of the question. - Cdsftfo~
in he BOSTON ,jOurHR,
my. 4 minister once DreachiDO IN