Chapter XI: A Morning with St. Peter (1)

As the day approached for their visit to the crypt of St. Peter, Mr. Vane absented himself very much from the house, and the last day was spent entirely away, from early in the morning till late in the evening. They understood that he was to make his First Communion with them, but asked no questions, leaving him entirely free, and he gave no explanation. The Signora and the two daughters made a Triduum for him in the mornings; and so deeply did they feel the event for him that they looked forward to their own Communion almost as if it were to be their first, and lived as though in retreat for two or three days.

“I feel,” Bianca said, “as if I had been having clandestine interviews with some one outside the house, and that now papa were going to invite him home, and make a feast in his honor. Dear papa! how very good he is; how much better than his daughters!”

She would have been quite shocked and alarmed had any one told her that she entertained such a sentiment, but there was, in fact, in her heart an undercurrent of pride in her father’s piety, and a feeling that the Lord would certainly be particularly pleased with him.

At length the day dawned, the sweet bells of Santa Maria Maggiore, the slipshod bells of Sant’ Antonino, all the bells in hearing, ringing their three, four, five, and one out of the white silence of the aurora.

The Signora smiled to hear, through the open doors, Isabel start awake at the sound, and exclaim in her clear voice: “The angel of the Lord declared unto Mary.”

“I really must not have such a preference for Bianca,” she said to herself, “especially now when Bianca has a lover. Isabel is very honest and earnest.”

The Alba turned to a rosy silver, the silver deepened to gold, the north and west were Tyrian purple, and the sun was on the eastern horizon, painting the long lines of the aqueducts, and the billows of the Campagna, and the towers, high roofs, and cupolas of the city with a fiery pencil. A flock of goats pattered by in the street, to be milked at the doors; hand-carts piled with fruit were dragged slowly in from some garden near the walls; three men walked slowly past, in single file, with large baskets on their heads piled with rich flowers. The perfume of them came up to the window as the Signora leaned out. A wine-cart came slowly down from the Esquiline piazza, laden high with small barrels and half and quarter barrels, brought in by night to the Roman shops from cool grottoes in the Castelli Romani, set here or there on the beautiful mountains that were now a velvety blue under the eastern sky. At the back of this cart was perched high the little white dog, with his nose on his paws, and his eyes half shut, but all ready to start up with a sharp bark if any one but looked hard at his precious load. In front, under the side awning, slept the driver. The horse dreamed along through the morning, and the little bunch of bells slung to the cart jingled softly as they went.

“It is certainly earth, but a most beautiful earth,” the Signora thought, sighing with content, as she went out to fasten the girls’ veils on for them.

“There is no need of putting on gloves,” she said, seeing Isabel drawing hers on. “Didn’t you know, child, that one should not wear gloves when going to Communion?”

“Live and learn,” said Isabel, and took her gloves off again. “I have had a doubt on the subject, but I never knew.”

“Another little item you may not know,” the Signora said. “The _canonico_ being a bishop, you have to kiss his ring before receiving. He will himself touch it to your lips after he has taken the Host in his finger and thumb to give you. When I first came here, I was embarrassed by many of these customs, which everybody here takes for granted, you know.”

Nothing could be pleasanter than Mr. Vane’s manner that morning—serious and quiet, but less grave, even, than usual. Seeing Isabel’s eyes fixed anxiously on him while the Signora spoke, he smiled and said: “I am glad your education is not quite finished, my dear. I am still more ignorant, and you must all teach me. I wish, Signora, that you would be so good as to stay by me this morning, so that, if I should be in doubt, I may look at you. I think you would be more correct and prompt than the children here.”

“Certainly,” she said, “I will be near you.”

The porter had sprinkled and swept the stairs just before they went down, and the place was shaded, fresh, and cool. Carlin was whistling to his baby while his wife prepared breakfast—a whistling as soft and clear as the song of a bobolink. The other birds adopted him, and answered him back from the garden, a little surprised, it may be, at the length and smoothness of his carol. The air was so richly scented with orange-flowers that one might almost have thought worth while to bottle it, and there was a rustling sound, exquisitely cool and pervading, of falling water. In a shady corner near the door of the porter’s room was a tiny brazier with a handful of glowing coals in it, and over this Augusto was making his early cup of coffee. Out doors everything shone with a golden color—the light, the houses, the streets—and in that frame the sky was set like a gem, so blue that it could be compared to nothing, and nothing could approach it.

They did not look about as they drove slowly through the city, but, leaning back silent, had a mingled sense of Rome and heaven. It was impossible for any of them to imagine anything more perfect, or to ask for any addition to their happiness. Earth and heaven had united to bless them, and every gift of earth worth the taking was theirs. To have been sovereigns would have oppressed them; to have had millions at their disposal would have been a care and annoyance. They had enough, and their cup was running over.

The narrow streets were beginning to stir as they passed, and some were dim, and all were in shade. Not a ray of sunshine touched them, except in the piazzas, till they reached the bridge of Sant’ Angelo. Then all was light, for the sun shot straight on through the Borgo, and all the piazza of St. Peter’s was in a blaze. They were almost faint with the heat as they walked up the ascent; but in a few minutes they were inside the sacred door, where, before entering, summer and winter meet to give the kiss of peace on the threshold, and the one quenches her fiery arrows, and the other warms his frosty breath.

Not a person was in sight as they went in, but they heard, faintly and far away, the mingled voices of the choir coming and going. The circle of ever-burning lamps twinkled like a constellation before them, and invited their steps. Half way up they paused before the chapel of the Blessed Sacrament, which is an exception to the cheerful grandeur of St. Peter’s. For this dim chapel gives a sense of remoteness and mystery, and the inner chamber, from which the eyes can see no outlet, seems to lead to some edifice still more vast; as though St. Peter’s were life and day, but here was the way to death and night, yet a way not gloomy and dreadful, but only solemn and mysterious. The Baptistery is merely dark, and produces no such impression.

When they reached the bronze statue, the ladies kissed the foot and passed on, but Mr. Vane stood thoughtfully there for some time before following. And even then he did not pay the accustomed homage to the venerable image. His soul had saluted it, may be; but he was of a different sort from those who have the act of reverence always ready, whether the heart move or not; who will kiss the relic between the kisses of the shameless, and touch what is holy with lips that have just lied, and which are prompt to lie again. This man’s outward devotion was ever the blossom of a plant that grew in his heart, and filled it so that the act was an overflowing.

Marion was already waiting for them at the grand altar. They recognized each other silently, and seated themselves on the steps to wait, being early. The Signora placed herself beside Mr. Vane, and, noticing that he drew a deep breath, and looked about with a glance that took in their position there in the centre of that immense cross, she pointed upward where the dome, glorious with light and color, rested on the legend that had turned the face of the world: “_Thou art Peter, and on this rock I will build my church. And I will give thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven._” The legend ran in a circle of gigantic letters rimmed with gold, and the circle and the dome were as the ring and mitre of the church let down from heaven, and hovering in air over the ashes of the first pontiff.

A Mass was being said at the altar directly before them, at the end of the south transept, but not a sound of it reached them. They saw indistinctly the priest, and the mosaic crucifixion of St. Peter over the altar. They heard the _coro_, now swelling loudly in a brave, manly chant as the whole chapter joined, now sinking in a cadence, now fine with a boy’s clear treble. The bronze canopy above them glittered in every gilded point, the twisted columns that supported it soaring like flame and smoke entwined. The wreath of lamps about the confession was as bright as the ever-burning flames within them, and the polished marble answered them back, blaze for blaze. Below—a frozen prayer—knelt the guardian statue, its face turned to the screen behind which rest the relics of St. Peter. Two or three persons, entering the church, looked small as mice down the nave, and intensified the sense of magnificent solitude about them. All this light and splendor seemed so independent of, so superior to, human presence that human beings appeared to be only permitted, not invited, to come. It was a temple for the invisible God.

“There is no outward difference,” the Signora said to Mr. Vane, “between Catholicity and Protestantism which strikes me more than our ways of going to church, and the reasons for going. Protestants go to hear a man talk, and the man goes to talk to them. The affair is a failure if either is missing; for the minister needs the people, and the people need him. On the contrary, one person alone in a Catholic church may accomplish a perfect act of worship. When the priest has offered up a Mass, though no one assist, the world is better for it; and when a worshipper has prayed all alone in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament, he has performed a supreme act of piety. There is all the difference between the dwelling-house of God and the house where people go to talk about God.”

“I always felt as if there were too much wind in Protestantism,” Mr. Vane said.

Presently a little company appeared coming out of the sacristy—two boys in white _cotte_, the _canonico’s_ chaplain and another priest, also in _cotte_, and, lastly, monsignor the _canonico_ himself, in a purple silk soutane of a color so bright that it was almost red. They passed across the basilica toward the pier of Veronica, and paused there at the altar-rail till the Signora and her friends joined them. A pleasant salutation was exchanged, and the Signora managed to whisper to the _canonico_ that Mr. Vane was to make his First Communion that morning. The beautiful face of the prelate brightened with a pleased surprise, and he turned again and cordially offered his hand to the new convert, who, to the delight of the ladies, bent and kissed the ring on it.

Then the boys lighted their wax tapers, and the party went in behind the altar, down the narrow stair, and through the circling corridor, and found themselves in the heart of St. Peter’s.

This chapel is a tiny place in comparison to the church above, but capable of accommodating many more than the five who are permitted to visit it at a time. Two persons could kneel abreast at each side of the central passage, and four or five ranks, may be, might find room. The end next the screen, visible in the confession from above, is open, the altar being at the upper end, and the whole has not a ray of daylight. From this chapel one can look back and see through the screen Canova’s marble pontiff, and the ring of golden lamps on the railing of the confession, and, perhaps, some worshippers kneeling outside the sanctuary which one has had the privilege of entering. Directly overhead are the grand altar and the dome.

The Signora took a _prie-dieu_ near the altar, motioning Mr. Vane to a place beside her; the sisters knelt behind them at either side the chapel; and Marion, quite apart, and behind the rest, leaned in a chair and hid his face in his hands. He had been surprised into the situation, and, though he had tried sincerely to do his best, was still a little alarmed by it. Shaken out of his usual artistic mood, which regarded first what appeared, and then peeped inside from without, he found himself suddenly whirled into the centre, where, either from darkness or from too much light—he knew not which—he could not see. It was one of those moments of fear in persons who communicate seldom but sincerely, which presently give place to the most perfect reassurance and peace.

The Mass was over. Monsignor laid aside his vestments, and knelt at a _prie-dieu_ reserved for him; his chaplain placed a book on the desk before him, and withdrew, and there was silence.

The church could do no more for them. She had brought them to St. Peter’s tomb, and given them the Bread of angels.

It was impossible that the mind should not shake off the present and go back to the time when the dust in the shrine before them lived, and moved, and spoke, and when the invisible Lord in their breasts was the visible Lord in the flesh, teaching, persuading, and suffering. The Lord in their hearts said to the apostle in the shrine: “Wilt thou also go away?” And the apostle answered him: “Lord, to whom shall we go?” And again Peter said: “Lord, thou shalt never wash my feet.” And Jesus answered him: “If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me.” The Lord in their hearts was he who stood in the palace of the high-priest, bound and smitten upon the cheek, and Peter, standing by, denied that he knew him. The pallid lamps shone on the face of the Master turned for one reproachful look, and the red light of the coals burned up, as if the very fire blushed, in the face of the cowardly follower. They saw the seaside, where the risen Lord stood and called, and Peter, no longer a coward, but on fire with love and joy, flung himself into the sea to go to him. And yet again, in this memory which had become a presence and a voice, the Lord spoke to Peter: “Lovest thou me?” And Peter answered him once, and again, and, grieving, yet again: “Thou knowest that I love thee.” And Jesus said to him: “Feed my lambs. Feed my sheep.”

O perfection of power and of obedience; for within this hour, which memory, unrolling again her shrunken scroll, showed to be eighteen centuries distant—within this hour both the sheep and the lambs had been fed!

“I feel as though I had a garden in my heart,” Marion said to the _canonico_ as they went up into the church again.

The two were walking slowly and last, and in speaking Marion bent and kissed the prelate’s hand.

The hand held his a moment closely, and the _canonico_ replied: “Where the Tree of Life is, there is always a garden.”

This conversation they had listened to between the Master and Peter followed them down the church, whose splendors seemed rather like virtues made visible than like any work of the hands of man. If they should ever be so lost and ungrateful as to leave this fold, to whom, indeed, should they go? And unless the Lord washed them from their sins, surely they could have no part with him. They still saw the lessening vision of the high-priest’s dim and solemn house as they passed down the church and out through the first portal; then the second fell behind them, and an Italian summer day caught them to its glowing breast.

“It seems to me,” the Signora said, “as if we had just been ordained, and were being sent out as missionaries. Of course you go home to breakfast with us, Marion,” she added.

“I was thinking of Fra Egidio this morning,” said Bianca softly, as they drove home through the hot sunshine. “He used to say, instead of 'I believe in God,’ 'I _know_ God.’”

“That blessed Fra Egidio!” struck in Isabel, who had lately been reading about him. “He used to go into ecstasies, papa, whenever he heard the names of God or of heaven. And when he went into the street, sometimes people would call out, 'Fra Egidio, paradiso! paradiso!’ and instantly he would be rapt into an ecstasy, and perhaps be lifted up into the air. Why doesn’t some one go into ecstasies now at the thought of heaven?”

“Nobody prevents you, my dear,” her father said. “If you will be so lost to the world and so given to God that the mere hearing his name will lift you from the earth, so much the better.”

“You are quite right, papa,” she answered gently. “I had better look to myself.”

He smiled and laid his hand tenderly on hers.

“I was particularly pleased with the account of the interview between Fra Egidio and St. Louis,” the Signora said. “The king came incognito to visit the ecstatic, and went to the convent in Perugia where he was living. Fra Egidio, knowing supernaturally that he was there, and who he was, went out to meet him. They fell on their knees on the threshold, and embraced each other, and, after remaining for some time in that silent embrace, rose and separated, without having uttered a word. That was truly a heavenly meeting.”

Their attention was here attracted to a clergyman who walked slowly along the shady side of their street, accompanied by his chaplain. This prelate, the patriarch of Antioch, was of a venerable age, and wore a long beard. He alone, perhaps, of all the prelates in Rome, appeared in the street with the distinguishing marks of his rank—the chain and cross, the red-purple stockings, sash, and buttons, and the green tassel on his hat.

A little boy on the sidewalk caught sight of him, and instantly snatched his cap off and ran to kiss the patriarch’s hand. The action was perfectly natural and simple, and performed with a charming mixture of reverence and confidence.

“How pretty it is!” exclaimed Isabel. “And there is another.”

A little girl had left her mother’s side, and run also to kiss the patriarch’s hand as he passed. No idea seemed to have entered her curly head that she was approaching too nearly a grand personage, or that he would be annoyed or interrupted by her homage, any more than a crucifix or a picture of Maria Santissima would have been.

“The Roman clergy have the sweetest manners with the poor,” the Signora said; “and the highest dignitaries, when they are in public, are approached with a facility which I found, at first, astonishing. I recollect going to St. Agatha’s, the church of the Irish College, to the Forty Hours, shortly after I came here. It is in a populous neighborhood, as you know, and the streets swarm with children. A clergyman came into the church and knelt at a _prie-dieu_ just in front of me. There were a dozen or so children wandering about, and presently they collected at this _prie-dieu_, and, sitting on the step or standing at the desk, almost leaning on the priest’s shoulder, they stared at the people and whispered to each other. I expected to see him send them away or go away himself; but he only put his hands over his face and remained immovable. I had almost a mind, for a minute, to go and speak to the children, but, fortunately, did not. After a while, nervous, impatient Yankee though I am, with a passion for an orderliness which strikes the eyes, I began to see the beauty and true piety of this gentle behavior, and to find something more edifying in that priest who suffered the little ones to come near him, and near the Lord, than I should have found if he had gone into an ecstasy before the Blessed Sacrament. It was the sweetest charity. Indeed, much of that which seems to us to be cowardice in the Romans is nothing but a spirit of gentleness fostered by religion. They are non-combatants. The church found them a fiery and warlike people, constantly committing deeds of violence, fond of conquest, and impatient of control, and she has subdued them to children. If they are too submissive to usurpation, that is better than the other extreme. The lion has become the lamb, and the lamb is ever the victim. And now here we are at home.”

Annunciata and Adriano had conspired to make the breakfast as festal as possible, and had succeeded perfectly. But for the light west wind that fluttered in at the still open windows, the air of the rooms would have been too fragrant; and but for the long morning fast and drive, the breakfast would have been too profuse. It was, in fact, both breakfast and dinner, it being nearly noon when they sat down; and they sat two hours talking before they separated. Just before they rose from the table Annunciata came in, bearing a large dish covered with green leaves, a smile of triumph on her face. She placed the dish in the centre of the table, and looked at her mistress.

“_Brava!_” exclaimed the Signora. “Now, children, do you recognize that leaf?” lifting one from the dish, and holding it up between a thumb and finger. “Do you know what tree grows a hand for a leaf? Do you see the shape?”

“'In the name of the prophet, figs!’” quoted Isabel.

“Yes, the first figs of the season, and perfect; just soft enough to flatten on the plate and against each other, yet firm; and, withal, sweeter than honey. You should see the woman who brings them to me—a rosy, russet creature, with eyes as black as sloes, and pounds of gold on her neck and hands. That gold she wears always. It is their way. She has four gold chains, one hanging below the other, and each bearing a medallion. Through these shines a large gold brooch. Her earrings are immense hoops, and she wears gold rings on every finger, piled up to the joints. She was once so ill that they thought best to give her Extreme Unction, and, when the priest came to administer the sacrament, he found her lying, pale and speechless, but with all her rings and lockets on. These people do not value stones, but they glory in pure, solid gold.”

“Might it not be their dowry?” Mr. Vane asked.

“Very likely; sometimes it certainly is. Sometimes the dowry is in pearls, and a _contadina_ will have strings and strings of them. I am told, however, that the common people in Rome have a saying that pearls are for butchers’ wives. I don’t know why, and one has been pointed out to me as owning half a dozen strings of them. They are not a good investment, however, for they are easy to spoil and easy to steal. A very safe and sensible way for providing a girl’s dowry exists in one of the towns near Rome. All along the river-bank is level land divided into small lots. When a girl is born, the father buys one of these, if he is able, and plants it full of a sort of tree that grows rapidly, and is much used for certain kinds of wood-work. While the girl grows her dowry grows; and when she marries, the trees are cut down and sold. I have often wished that American fathers of families would make some provision for their children when they are born, setting aside a sum, if it should be ever so small, to increase with their years, and be a help in giving them a start in the world. It seems a sin that parents should bring a family of children into the world, all dependent on one life, and, if that life be cut off, be thrown out helpless and unprovided for. How often we see, by the death of a father whose labor or salary maintained his family in comfort, the whole family plunged in distress and left homeless! How would Bianca, here, like to have her dowry in pearls?”

“She has a mouth full of them,” said Marion hastily. He could not bear that his lady should be thought in want of a dowry, when she was a fortune in herself. “And those are not her only jewels.” He reached, and, taking her hand, gathered together the little pink finger-tips like a bunch of rosebuds. “She has ten rubies fit for a crown,” he said, and touched his lips to the clustered fingers, while the girl laughed and blushed.

Mr. Vane seemed to be struck with a sudden recollection. He put his hand to his forehead and considered, then rose from his chair. “Wait a minute,” he said, and went into his own room, where they heard him opening his trunk, and searching about in it. Presently he returned with a tiny morocco case. “It is the merest chance in the world that I did not leave this in America,” he said. “I did not dream of bringing it. Bianca’s mother left a pair of ear-rings for the girl who should marry first.”

He opened the case and took them out—two large, pear-shaped pearls, of exquisite lustre, hanging from a gold leaf, on which a small, pure diamond glistened like a speck of water.

“And you could have such a treasure with you, and never say anything about it!” the Signora exclaimed. “O the insensibility of men! And these girls never saw the pearls before!”

She fastened the jewels in the pretty ears they were destined for. “These are two gems you forgot in your enumeration, Marion,” she said. “And, by the way, how fitting it is that, when the ears are shells, there should be pearls hung in them!”

“I’m glad you think them so pretty,” Mr. Vane said with compunction. “I really never did think of them before. Perhaps it was very stupid of me.”

“On the contrary, it was very wise of you, papa,” Isabel said. “They are a great pleasure to us all now; but if we had known of them, I should now feel as if they had been taken away from me.”

“When you are engaged, you shall have a pair as pretty, if they are to be found,” her father said.

They drank Bianca’s health; and, the talk still running on gems, Marion told an incident of a ring which a friend of his had lost in the snow, in some part of Germany, as he stood looking down on the town from a hill outside. Several months afterward, going to the same spot, he saw the ring at the top of a little plant. The first sprout had come up inside it as it lay on the ground, and, growing, had lifted it, till it stood almost a foot high, glistening round the green stem.

“What a disappointed little plant it must have been when its gold crown was taken off!” the Signora said regretfully.

“It no doubt grew better without it,” Mr. Vane replied. “Besides, the ring did not belong to it.”

It was the tiniest little intimation of a correction, and the Signora was highly pleased. He saw the smile with which she received it, and was content. Nothing can express more kindness than a gentle reproof, and nothing can show more affection than to take pleasure in such a reproof.

When they had separated, the Signora went into the kitchen to give a private and special commendation to Annunciata for her well-doing that morning, and to glance at that part of her domain. She never omitted this word of praise, and the faithful servant counted herself well paid for any pains she could take when she had been assured that what she had done had given pleasure.

This Roman kitchen was as little as possible like the New England kitchen. Closets and pantries there were none; the single stone walls did not admit of them. Two large cases of covered shelves took their place. Instead of the trim range with its one fire-place, was a row of five little furnaces, over each of which a dish could be set. A sheet-iron screen extended out over these, like the hood of a chaise. All the side of the chimney, where it extended into the room, shone with bright copper and tin cooking vessels, hanging in rows. Underneath were two baskets, one with charcoal, another with _carbonella_—the charred little twigs from the baker’s furnaces, that can be kindled at a lamp. One of the furnaces still had a glow of coals within it, and near by was the feather fan that had been used to kindle and keep it bright. The brick floor was as clean as sprinkling and sweeping could make it. They never wash a floor in Rome, and only the fine marbles and mosaics ever get anything better than that sprinkling and sweeping. The one window looked across the court to the Agostinian convent attached to Sant’ Antonino, and to the little belfry with the two bells that never could be made to strike the right number of times, and into the garden of the _frati_, where rows of well-kept vegetables were drinking in the sun as if it were wine.

This kitchen was quite deserted, except for the cat, who was standing, with a very mild and innocent expression of countenance, close to the closed door of a cupboard where meat was kept. She glanced calmly at the Signora, and walked away slowly and with dignity.

“Where is Annunciata, Signor Abate?” inquired the Signora.

The cat turned and mewed with great politeness, but in an interrogative tone, as who should say, “I beg your pardon?”

And then a splashing and bubbling of water from without reminded the _padrona_ that her handmaiden was washing that day—was “at the fountain,” as they express it.

“Why should I not go down for once and see how it seems there?” she thought. “After all, this girl is dependent on me, lives with me, serves me in everything, is at my call night and day, and I do not touch her life except at certain points—the table, the cleanliness and order of the house, and the errands she does for me outside. I don’t know much about her, after all.”

She opened a door that she had never passed in the years she had lived in that apartment, and descended a narrow stone stair that wound in a steep spiral, lighted at each turn by a small hole pierced in the outer wall. Down and down—it seemed interminable, but was, in reality, two stories and a half. The landing was in a dim store-room a little below the ground level, and used as a cellar. From this a passage and door led into a small court enclosed between an angle of the house and a high wall, like a room with the ceiling taken off. Here a spout of water flowed into a double fountain-basin, where the girl stood washing and beating linen on the stone border. As she worked, steadily, and too much absorbed to see her mistress standing near her, tears rolled down her face, and dropped one by one on the clothes in her hands.

The Signora looked a moment, astonished and shocked. Was this the girl who had come and gone from early morning cheerfully at her bidding, and who had smiled as she served the table within half an hour? She stood awhile looking at her, then quietly withdrew, and, going up-stairs again, rang a hand-bell from the window. Annunciata came up immediately, quite as usual, with no sign of tears in her face, except a slight flush of the eyelids, and made her usual inquiry: “_Che vuole?_”—What does she wish for?

“I have several things to say,” her mistress replied. “I came out first to thank you for having given us such a beautiful breakfast. Everything was well done. I forgot you were at the fountain.”

The smile came readily, and with it the ready word: “It pleased her?”—always the ceremonious third person.

“And now I want to ask you something,” the Signora went on kindly. “Sit down. If you do not like to tell me, you need not. But I should be very sorry if you had any trouble, especially anything in which I could help you, and did not let me know. You have been crying. Are you willing to tell me what is the matter?”

The girl looked as startled as if she had been caught in a crime, and began to stammer.

“If it is something you do not want to tell me, I will not say any more about it,” her mistress went on. “You have a right to your privacy, as I have to mine. But if there is anything I can do for you, tell me freely.”

There was a momentary struggle, then the tears started again, and all the story came out. Annunciata had received, three days before, news of the death of her only brother, who had died of fever in some little town a day’s journey from Rome, and was already buried when she learned first that he was sick.

The Signora listened with astonishment and compunction. For three days this girl had gone about with a bitter grief hidden in her heart, missing no duty, submitting, perhaps, to a little fault-finding now and then, and weeping only when she believed herself unobserved, and all the time, while she suffered, ministering to and witnessing the pleasures of others.

“My poor girl, why did you not tell me at first?” she asked gently.

“Oh! why should I?” was the reply. “You were all so happy and you could not bring the dead back.”

“I could have sympathized with you, and given you a few days’ rest,” the Signora said. “I would not have allowed you to work.”

“It was better for me to work,” the girl replied, wiping her eyes. “I should only have cried and worried the more, if I had been idle.”

There seemed nothing that could be done. That class of poor do not adorn the resting-places of their dead, or the Signora would have paid the cost; they do not wear mourning, or, again, she would have paid for it; and this girl had no family to visit and mourn with. In her brother she had lost all. The only service possible—and that she accepted gratefully—was to have Masses said for the dead. That settled, the Signora dismissed her to her work again, and shut herself into her chamber, but not to sleep.

“O the unconscious, pathetic heroism of the suffering poor!” she thought. “Where in the world have I a friend who would cover such a grief with smiles rather than disturb my pleasure? Where in the world does one see such patience under pain and hardship as is shown by the poor? They sigh, but they seldom cry out in rebellion. They accept the cross as their birthright, and both they and we grow to think that it does not hurt them as it would hurt us. How clearly it comes upon me now and then, why our Lord lived and sympathized with the poor, and why he said it would be so hard for the rich to enter heaven!”

She was looking so serious and unrefreshed when the family gathered again that they at once inquired the cause, and she told them.

“I feel as though I must have been lacking in some way,” she concluded, “or a servant who has been with me so long, and who has no nearer friend in the world than I am, would have come to me at once with her troubles. If the relations between servants and employers are what they should be, the servants should go to the master or mistress with all their joys and sorrows, just as children go to their parents. I have been thinking that there is one reason why, the world over, people are complaining of their servants. They have contented themselves with simply paying their wages and exacting their labor. There has been no sympathy. The association has been simply like that of fish and fowl, instead of that of the same creatures in different circumstances.”

“I have always thought that in America,” Mr. Vane said. “There is not a country in the world, probably, where families have been, as a rule, more disagreeable toward their servants, and servants so troublesome, in consequence, to their employers. But I believe it is very seldom that a good mistress or master does not make a good servant, so far as the will goes.”

Seeing her still look downcast and troubled, he added: “You should not reproach yourself. It is rather your kindness toward this girl which has won such a devotion from her. If you had lacked in kindness and sympathy toward her, she would have been far more likely to have shown her trouble, and made it an excuse for not attending to her work as usual.”

“Do you think so?” she asked, brightening; and thought in her own mind, “How very pleasant it is to be reassured when one is distressed about things!”

And then later, when they heard Annunciata in the kitchen, the sisters went out and spoke each a kind and pitying word to her, touching her hard hand softly with their delicate ones; and when she came in later to perform some service, Mr. Vane had also a word of sympathy. But, greatest comfort of all, the Signora and Bianca went up to the Basilica and arranged that a Mass should be said the next morning for the dead, and Annunciata was told that she should go with them to hear it.

That evening the servants were instructed to deny the family to every one but Marion, and, when the sun was low, they all went out on the _loggia_ to see the night come in, and breathe the sweet freshness that still came with it. For it is only in dog-days that the Italian nights are too warm for comfort, and not always then. The great heat comes and goes with the sun.

As they went into the _loggia_, there was a rustling noise in the garden underneath, and out from the trees leaning against the wall flew clouds of sparrows, and dispersed themselves in every direction. It would appear that every twig must have held a bird.

“I am sorry we have disturbed their nap,” Mr. Vane remarked. “How disgusted they must be with our curious nocturnal habits!”

They did not wish to talk, but only to think and see, and speak a word as the mood took them. The miraculous shadow of St. Peter still hovered above their spirits. They sat in silence, receiving any impression that the scene might make.

Flocks of birds flew in from the seaward, all hastening to some nest or tree-home, their bodies clear and dark, their swift wings twinkling against the topaz sky. The evening star, at first softly visible, like a diamond against another gem, began to grow splendid, while the glowing west changed by imperceptible degrees to a silvery whiteness, and took on an exquisite hint of violet, as if it thought, rather than was, the color. The flowers disappeared in masses of dark green, the gray towers and roofs deepened to black, the pure air was delicious and beaded with coolness, like a summer drift sprinkled with snow. The _Ave Maria_ began to sound here and there, echoed from one church to another. Now and then some bell, besides the Angelus, rang out with a festal clangor for five minutes, a musical chorus coming in from the southward.

“What a grand procession of saints walk for ever through the Roman days!” the Signora exclaimed. “It would be something dazzling to the mind, if one could live on a central height, and hear the bells announce the different _festas_ as they come, singly or in groups, and know who and what each saint is. For example, this evening we hear from the Aventine the rejoicing announcement that to-morrow is the _festa_ of St. Alexis in his church, and from another church is called out the name of St. Leo IV., and from another St. Marcellina, the sister of St. Ambrose, and twelve martyrs will be celebrated in another church. If we should go to-morrow to either of those, we should find them adorned, sprinkled with green out into the very street, High Mass or Vespers going on, and the relics exposed on the altars. To-morrow night other bells will ring in other saints and martyrs. The night after, from a church in Monte Citorio will come the call, _Ecco_ St. Vincent of Paul! and the secular missions and the Sisters of Charity will be doing their best in his honor, and there will be cardinals, and pontifical vespers, and a panegyric. Four or five churches will celebrate their special saints the next day, and the next will be St. Praxides, on the Esquiline here; and the day after we shall be invited to pay our respects to St. Mary Magdalen. And then on to St. James the Great, which will be a great day; and the day after comes St. Anna, the mother of the Blessed Virgin; and, a little later, St. Ignatius marches by. What it would be to set the world aside, sit aloft on some tower there, listen to the announcements rung out from belfry after belfry, meditate, and look with the eyes of faith on what comes! What faces of young maidens, delicate spouses of Christ, bent like clusters of living flowers to listen to the voices that praise them, turned again heavenward to ask for blessings on their clients! What queenly women incline their crowned heads, when the Sacrifice goes up in their name, to see who of those who offer it is worthy and sincere! What glorious men, strong and shining, gaze down into the battle-field where their triumph was won, to read in the upturned faces of the combatants how the fight goes, and who needs their aid! I sometimes think that the saints look only when they are called by name, but that the Blessed Mother looks always. It is the mother who goes after the child who forgets, and watches over it while it sleeps.”

The flocks of sparrows that had fled at their approach, weary of waiting for them to go away, after peeping and reconnoitring the situation, began to come back and flutter in under the foliage again. For a few minutes the trees stirred all through with them, as if with a breeze; then the little heads were tucked under the tired wings, and they all went to sleep, and, perhaps, dreamed.

The family smiled and hushed themselves, not to disturb their rest. Each heart was softly touched by the nearness of so many tiny sleepers. Peace seemed to float silently out from under the thronged branches and laden twigs of those motionless trees, in which no passer-by would have detected a sign of life.

“I think,” the Signora said softly after a while, “that when the priest comes next Holy Saturday to bless my house, I would like to have him bless these trees too, that no net or trap may be thrown over them by night, and no rifle be fired into them by day. The trees and their tenants belong to my household.”

“Your house is blessed every year?” Mr. Vane asked.

“Yes. On Holy Saturday the priest goes round through every parish, a little boy with him bearing holy water, and blesses all the houses, if the people desire it. The custom is, too, to have ready on a table a dish of boiled eggs, an ornamented loaf of cake, and a plate of sausages. These are blessed, to be eaten Easter Sunday. I am not sure, but I fancy that the custom is a remnant of times when the Lenten fast was, perhaps, more strictly and universally observed than now. Now, whether from a deterioration of health or of faith, very few persons consider themselves strong enough to observe the regulations perfectly. Modern civilization seems to be very weakening in every way.”

“I am inclined to think that good comes, or will come, out of all these changes and seeming failures,” Mr. Vane observed. “If the races have become weaker physically, their passions have also become weaker; and it may be that, in order to tame them, it was necessary to reduce their physical strength. We do so sometimes with wild animals. Perhaps when we shall have learned better how to live, and, after running the circle of follies, grown soberer and wiser, the increasing vitality will go more in the intellectual and spiritual ways than it did before. I am hopeful of the human race, from the very fact that it is so uneasy about itself. The audacious boldness of some nations seems to me to spring from desperation rather than confidence. There is no confidence anywhere. Fear rules the world. Everywhere strong, or even desperate, remedies are proposed, and philanthropic doctors abound.

“Malgré les tyrans,
Tout réussira,”

sing the communists; and I believe that things will come out right in spite of every difficulty, and be more secure because of the difficulties past. When we shall have looked about in vain in every other direction, we shall at last learn to look upward for the solution. But excuse me for talking so long in this beautiful silence. Your Easter eggs were not meant to hatch such a sermon, Signora.“

They rose, presently, to go into the house, and, as they loitered slowly along the passages, Mr. Vane remarked to the Signora: “I observe that the natural direction of your eyes is upward.”

“Is it?” she asked. “Come to think of it, I believe you are right. It is always cramping for me to look down. I recollect that, when I was a child, if I dropped my eyes on being a little embarrassed, it was almost an impossibility for me to raise them again.”

Going in past the kitchen, they found Adriano in chase of a cockroach that had dared to show itself there, and they stopped to learn the result, feeling that it interested them. It was not successful, and the man rose from his knees very much vexed.

“These _bagarozzi_ don’t know what Ascension day is nowadays, or they would hide themselves,” he said.

Mr. Vane asked what connection there was between _bagarozzi_ and Ascension day, and the servant-man, albeit a little ashamed of having committed himself to tell a story, explained:

“When I was young, it was a custom among the Roman boys, on the vigil of the Ascension, to go down into our cellars, or those of our neighbors, and catch as many _bagarozzi_ as we could. When evening came, we fixed to the back of each one a bit of wax taper, melting the end to make it stick. Half an hour or so after _Ave Maria_ we marshalled our bugs, lighted the tapers on their backs, and sent them off in a procession. While they went we sang a song we had. It was a pretty sight to see the little tapers scampering off through the dark.”

“Why! I should think it would have scorched them!” Bianca exclaimed with surprise.

The man laughed at her simplicity. “Who knows?” he said, with a shrug. “They never came back to tell us.”

Isabel inquired what the song was to which this novel procession marched.

The man laughed again and repeated the doggerel:

“'Corri, corri, bagarone;
Che dimane è l’Ascensione;
L’Ascension delle pagnotte:
Corri, corri, bagarozzi.’”

Which might be rendered: “Run, run, my noble roach; for to-morrow is Ascension day—Ascension day of the little loaves. Run, roach, run.”

“What demons of cruelty children can be!” remarked Isabel as the family went on.

Adriano laughed as he looked after them. “How queer these _forestieri_ are!” he said. “They want to see everything and know the name of everything. The signorine here ask me the name of every tree and flower in the garden, and every bird and bug that moves. How should I know? My niece, Giovannina, says there’s an English-woman going about getting the poor old women to tell her fables, and ghost-stories, and all sorts of nonsense; and they say that she prints it in a book. They must be in great need of books to read. Then the _padrona_ will stand and look at the moon as if she never saw nor heard of it before, and expected it to drop down into the garden and break into golden _scudi_. I saw her one day this spring, on _Monte Cavallo_, stand half an hour and stare at the sky, just because it was red where the sun went down. The sky is always red when the sun sets in clouds. Two or three _signori_ thought she was stopping to be noticed, and they walked about her, and one of them leaned on the railing close to her, staring at her all the time, and by and by spoke to her. I went up behind her, but she didn’t know I was there. She hadn’t seen any one till she heard the man say good-evening to her. You should have seen the way she looked at him. Then she caught sight of me. 'Adriano,’ she said, 'I’ll give you a hundred lire to fling that fellow over the terrace head first.’ I told her that it would cost me more than a hundred lire to do it. She put out her lips—I suppose she thought I was a coward—and muttered a word in English. Then she said to me, as she turned her back on the man, loud enough for him to hear: 'How dare such rascals come up when the sun shines!’ But she wouldn’t let me walk beside her, but made me follow her all the way home. And she was so mad that, when I started to say something as we reached the door, she stopped me. 'When I want you to speak, I shall ask you a question,’ she said.”

“The Signora is very kind,” Annunciata said.

“I didn’t say she wasn’t,” the man replied dogmatically. “But it doesn’t become ladies to go into the street alone, nor to stop to look at anything, nor to glance about them.”