Omaha daily bee., 1873-03-19
holy WEEK At ROME.

The influx bogins during Holy
Week, when the great hospital of the
Holy Trinity is opened for the pill
grims, who are there fed and housed
by thousands, by the Papal govern
ment. a confraternity of ladies and
gentlemen, both Roman and foreign,
have the management of this charity,
and wear q distinctive costume while
engaged in these h%ospitable duties.
This consists Of a scarlet apron of
common twill with a cross on the
shoulder, the garment covering the
figure entirely in its spreading folds,
and resembling a dressing gown in
shape and amplitude. Men and
women alike yea this, and so ar
rayed, serve their guests in separate
wards in the vast building. During
the day they may be seen guiding
them to the different shrines of the
city, and in the vast and gloomy re,
cesscs of st. Peters, where in three
days the most magnificent church
pageant in the world will be held and
the silver trumpets will ring forth the
march which is only repeated twice a
year. In the great balcony looking
down upon the confession" Or shrine
of the apostles, the stranger will find
long, silent files of pilgrims visiting
the seven affairs of the basilica. They
cone from the mountains, from far
off valleys, some from Hungary,
Germany, Bohemia, or Poland,
and they come not to see
but TO worship, not to be
amused but to be blessed. They
have inherited the faith that prompt
cd the crusades, and while progress"
has cast forth from our practical
lives all that was left of beauty,
poetry, and tenderness in the moral
world, they, the simple and the un-
u~nlearned, have garnered in their
customs and never.interrupted
traditions all that the wise and great
ones of the world have lost. Aud so
it is that the long s%erpentine lines of
peasants, crossing and r~ecrossing the
shadowy depths Of the great basilica,
and forming Rembrandt-like groups
of unexpected beauty when the glare
of the resin torches placed at inter
walls against the huge pilasters falls
suddenly upon them, are a more
welcome and suggestive sight than
the equally numerous, but not equal
ly earnest crowds that block up the
Sistine chapel.
Every evening the scene at the
hospital is the same, but only the
newly arrived pilgrims are admitted
to the "washing of the feet" This
custom, which many visitors to Rome
will remember, is very ancient, and
used to be much more extensively
carried on in former times. Even in
our day, at least during Holy Week,
its observance involves no ~sinecure.
The pilgrims, of course, have made
all or the greater part Of their journey
on foot, aud the chdussu,e of many Of
them is extremely primitive, such
modern Improvements as slo's and
stockings being replaced by long
linen bands swarthed about the feet
in coils full twenty or thirty yards
long, until II sufficient thick
ness is reached to protect the
flesh against the inequalities of
Italian mountain roads. Still these
mummy-like swathings are not who'll
ly proof against the continued fric-
ton of stones and sticks, so that when
the wayfarers arrive at the hospital
these rags are often soaked in blood
and clotted dust. The pilgrims are i'm.
mediately led TO q basement room
furnished with a low continuous
wooden settle skirting the wall, and
numberless wash>basins, with coarse
soap and strong towels to each. The
members of the confraturnity accom-
pany them, and removing their BAN
dages carefully wash their sore and
bleeding feet in warm water. The
old pilgrims meanwhile receive this
token of what in u more fastidious
lands we should call unparalleled at
tention, with the quiet dignity and
unpurtable simplicity of the natural
man, or rather we should say of the
perfect Christian. TO them the BIZ
bical stories of wayside hospitality
are still realities, and they feel no
wonder and no embarrassment at
seeing princes and mobiles do to them
what the King of kings once did to
his sinful creatures. Equality, in
the Christian sense OF the word, has a
truer exposition in their conduct
than it often has in other countries
and under other circumstances, where
a mixture of assumed arrogance and
OF real %servility passes among certain
people for proper "self-respect.'-
Wanderings," by Lady Blanche Mur-
PLY, IN AprH GALAXY.