The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1910-02-12

dlnalS with triumph beamlng on MS
counten&nce. 1t had not been the first
SoOd service.
Cardinal Merry del Val.
Twenty-Five years ago or whereabouts
writes De Happ van Calava, in the St
; Joseph (Mol News-Press, a slender
swarthy youth. chiefly noticeable for a
; pair OF wonderful brown eyes, was in
: attendance at the Academia del Nobili
: Ecclesiastical in Rome. AS the result of
many pranks, he bore the nickname
of Merry Devil" BY no means bril-
liant, he was Industrious and reason
ably we'll conducted, with a remarkable
aptitude for languages, q passion for
outdoor sports, and a singularly win
ming manner Years passed, and in due
course the youth came to mans estate.
The black cassock of the student and
priest gave place in turn to the GRIM
son sash of a monsignor, TO the violet
soutaine of bishop, and to the scar
let mantaletta of a cardinal.
Today he is generally to be found in
that portion of the Vatican palace
known as the Borgia apartments. RAJ
fael Merry del Val is one of the most
remarkable figures in the Catho-
lie church today. He is as the right
hand of the Holy Father. He directs
the policy of power that has four
| hundred millions Of the most loyal sub
| jects on earth And all this at the age
of scare two score and five.
That he is eminently fitted for the
post he holds there can be no shadow
of a doubt. The son of distinguished
| diplomatist, he has spent the last TWEEN
ty years in the greatest school of diplo-
macy in the world.
Merry del Nars remarkable abilities
as linguist gave him an enormous adj
vantage from the very start. Spanish
is his mother tongue, English he speaks
like an Englishman, French like a Par
isian. OF German, he has fluent COM
mand: his Italian is so entirely free
from accent that he has come to be re-
garded almost as one of that nation
atty.
The fact that ne is the first cardinal
secretary of state who has been able to
deal with Catholics of the Anglo-SaXon
race in their own tongue was. perhaps,
a chief afctor in his appointment. Born
in London in 1866, his father, who was
then an attache of the Spanish embassy,
having descended from an Irish family
that emigrated to Spain early in the
seventeenth century, Merry del Val is
the youngest Notwithstanding of
state since the first incumbent of that
office, Carlo Borromeo, the nephew of
Pope Plus " 0559-1565), who held the
post when scarcely past his majority.
A cardinal at thirty-nine, his further
advancement came through a series of
peculiar circumstances. Leo XIII on |
his death bed, nominated as consstorial
secretary Msgr. Volpini Strangely |
enough, Volpini died a few days before |
the Holy Father, who was kept in ig-
norance of his friends death. Had Vol,
PM lived he would by virtue of his or
flee, have been secretary of the general |
congregation of the Sacred college,
which met to elect a new Pope. His
death necessitated, of course, the Sc
lection of a new secretary. The choice
of the College of Cardinals fell natural
ly enough on the young and energetic
Merry del Val, who was thus brought
into daily personal contact with Plus
X, to whom on his election as Pope
he acted as secretary of state, pend
ing the appointment of a permanent
incumbent.
He was one day leaving the Pope's
cabinet with a mass of correspondence
when Plus X called him back and hand
ed him a letter, remarking casually:
This is also for monsignor." Adding
the letter to the Others he passed out.
In due course of time it came to his at
duu, OptIllllS IL he IOuIlu II was
a notification written by the Pope's own
hand, Of his appointment as permanent
of state because of his "capa-
bility, devotion to work and absolute
So great was the
shock of this unexpected, unsought and,
perhaps, unwished-for, honor that the !
cardinal is said to have momentarily
lost consciousness.
The cardinal is an indefatigable .
worker, a frugal liver, a man of strong ,
likes and dislikes, with a hot Latin
temper that is often in evidence, but al ,
ways under control. Tall and slim of
figure, graceful of motion, showing the
highest type of the Andalusian in every
feature, his face when in repose is lit .
lie more than a mask, so utterly de-
Ioid is it of all feeling and expression. ,
But when a smile gives life to his !
'phinX-like Countenance, then, indeed, s
I'll the marvellous fascination which this :
man can exercise becomes :
apparent. :
He is a prince of the church. and :
Is such as treated with royal state in q
very country. At functions, official and +
otherwise, he takes precedence of all '
lot of the royal blood. He is an init !
nate friend of kings, emperors and r
,rinces. When twenty-five he was a +
member Of the papal embassy to Queen
jubilee in 1887, and few
nonths later he attended the funeral
f Emperor William l in similar ca
acity. In the following year he was >
imself the representative of the Holy
zee at the jubilee of Emperor Francis
oseph, a post which he likewise filled
t the coronation of Edward VII.
He has long been a close friend and y
rusted advisor of King Alfonso whom
e prepared for his confirmation, and d
n three occasions he was appointed by
he queen regent of Spain as religious y
lstructor for her daughters.
Merry del Walls chief early success,
oubtless. was won in the Manitoba "
chool controversy, which threatened to
estroy the power of the church in Can
da, and which required the most deli
ate handling. Sent by the Pope to
.udy the question on the spot, his visit b
as a noteworthy success and marked o.
n epoch in the religious history of the II
ominion. To the English-speaking Ia
opulation he appeared the cultured le
nglishman: the French found that he NJ
,oke their language quite as perfectly re
5 themselves, and at Laval university h