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The Eternal City, a novel by Hall Caine |
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Part 1. The Holy Roman Empire - Chapter 1 |
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_ PART ONE. THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE CHAPTER I TWENTY YEARS LATER It was the last day of the century. In a Bull proclaiming a Jubilee the Pope had called his faithful children to Rome, and they had come from all quarters of the globe. To salute the coming century, and to dedicate it, in pomp and solemn ceremony, to the return of the world to the Holy Church, one and universal, the people had gathered in the great Piazza of St. Peter. Boys and women were climbing up every possible elevation, and a bright-faced girl who had conquered a high place on the base of the obelisk was chattering down at a group of her friends who were listening to their cicerone. "Yes, that is the Vatican," said the guide, pointing to a square building at the back of the colonnade, "and the apartments of the Pope are those on the third floor, just on the level of the Loggia of Raphael. The Cardinal Secretary of State used to live in the rooms below, opening on the grand staircase that leads from the Court of Damasus. There's a private way up to the Pope's apartment, and a secret passage to the Castle of St. Angelo." "Say, has the Pope got that secret passage still?" "No, sir. When the Castle went over to the King the connection with the Vatican was cut off. Ah, everything is changed since those days! The Pope used to go to St. Peter's surrounded by his Cardinals and Bishops, to the roll of drums and the roar of cannon. All that is over now. The present Pope is trying to revive the old condition seemingly, but what can he do? Even the Bull proclaiming the Jubilee laments the loss of the temporal power which would have permitted him to renew the enchantments of the Holy City." "Tell him it's just lovely as it is," said the girl on the obelisk, "and when the illuminations begin...." "Say, 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, "Garibaldi Club," "Mazzini Club," "Republican Federation," and "Republic of Man." "Your friend Antichrist," tipping a finger over his shoulder in the direction of the palace, "has been taxing bread to build more battleships, and Rossi has risen against him. But failing in the press, in Parliament and at the Quirinal, he is coming to the Pope to pray of him to let the Church play its old part of intermediary between the poor and the oppressed." "Preposterous!" "So?" "To whom is the Pope to protest? To the King of Italy who robbed him of his Holy City? Pretty thing to go down on your knees to the brigand who has stripped you! And at whose bidding is he to protest? At the bidding of his bitterest enemy? Pshaw!" "You persist that David Rossi is an enemy of the Pope?" "The deadliest enemy the Pope has in the world." _ |
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