The Eternal City | Page 6

friend," said her parent again, "Rome belonged to the Pope--yes?
Then the Italians came in and took it and made it the capital of
Italy--so?"
"Just so, and ever since then the Holy Father has been a prisoner in the
Vatican, going into it as a cardinal and coming out of it as a corpse, and
to-day will be the first time a Pope has set foot in the streets of Rome!"
"My! And shall we see him in his prison clothes?"
"Lilian Martha! Don't you know enough for that? Perhaps you expect to
see his chains and a straw of his bed in the cell? The Pope is a king and
has a court--that's the way I am figuring it."
"True, the Pope is a sovereign still, and he is surrounded by his officers
of state--Cardinal Secretary, Majordomo, Master of Ceremonies,
Steward, Chief of Police, Swiss Guards, Noble Guard and Palatine
Guard, as well as the Papal Guard who live in the garden and patrol the

precincts night and day."
"Then where the nation ... prisoner, you say?"
"Prisoner indeed! Not even able to look out of his windows on to this
piazza on the 20th of September without the risk of insult and
outrage--and Heaven knows what will happen when he ventures out
to-day!"
"Well! this goes clear ahead of me!"
Beyond the outer cordon of troops many carriages were drawn up in
positions likely to be favourable for a view of the procession. In one of
these sat a Frenchman in a coat covered with medals, a florid,
fiery-eyed old soldier with bristling white hair. Standing by his carriage
door was a typical young Roman, fashionable, faultlessly dressed,
pallid, with strong lower jaw, dark watchful eyes, twirled-up moustache
and cropped black mane.
"Ah, yes," said the old Frenchman. "Much water has run under the
bridge since then, sir. Changed since I was here? Rome? You're right,
sir. 'When Rome falls, falls the world;' but it can alter for all that, and
even this square has seen its transformations. Holy Office stands where
it did, the yellow building behind there, but this palace, for
instance--this one with the people in the balcony...."
The Frenchman pointed to the travertine walls of a prison-like house on
the farther side of the piazza.
"Do you know whose palace that is?"
"Baron Bonelli's, President of the Council and Minister of the Interior."
"Precisely! But do you know whose palace it used to be?"
"Belonged to the English Wolsey, didn't it, in the days when he wanted
the Papacy?"
"Belonged in my time to the father of the Pope, sir--old Baron Leone!"

"Leone! That's the family name of the Pope, isn't it?"
"Yes, sir, and the old Baron was a banker and a cripple. One foot in the
grave, and all his hopes centred in his son. 'My son,' he used to say,
'will be the richest man in Rome some day--richer than all their Roman
princes, and it will be his own fault if he doesn't make himself Pope.'"
"He has, apparently."
"Not that way, though. When his father died, he sold up everything, and
having no relations looking to him, he gave away every penny to the
poor. That's how the old banker's palace fell into the hands of the Prime
Minister of Italy--an infidel, an Antichrist."
"So the Pope is a good man, is he?"
"Good man, sir? He's not a man at all, he's an angel! Only two aims in
life--the glory of the Church and the welfare of the rising generation.
Gave away half his inheritance founding homes all over the world for
poor boys. Boys--that's the Pope's tender point, sir! Tell him anything
tender about a boy and he breaks up like an old swordcut."
The eyes of the young Roman were straying away from the Frenchman
to a rather shabby single-horse hackney carriage which had just come
into the square and taken up its position in the shadow of the grim old
palace. It had one occupant only--a man in a soft black hat. He was
quite without a sign of a decoration, but his arrival had created a
general commotion, and all faces were turning toward him.
"Do you happen to know who that is?" said the gay Roman. "That man
in the cab under the balcony full of ladies? Can it be David Rossi?"
"David Rossi, the anarchist?"
"Some people call him so. Do you know him?"
"I know nothing about the man except that he is an enemy of his
Holiness."

"He intends to present a petition to the Pope this morning,
nevertheless."
"Impossible!"
"Haven't you heard of it? These are his followers with the banners and
badges."
He pointed to the line of working-men who had ranged themselves
about the cab, with banners inscribed variously,