Chapter II: The Corso and Its Neighbourhood (3)

"Ignace, François Borgia, ont passé par ici. Leur souvenir plane,
comme un encouragement et une bénédiction, sur ces salles où ils
présidèrent aux études, sur ces chaires où peut-être retentit leur
parole, sur ces modestes cellules qu'ils ont habitées. A la fin du
seizième siècle, les élèves du collége Romain perdirent un de leurs
condisciples que sa douce aménité et ses vertus angéliques avaient
rendu l'objet d'un affectueux respect. Ce jeune homme avait été
page de Philippe II.; il était allié aux maisons royales
d'Autriche, de Bourbon et de Lorraine. Mais au milieu de ces
illusions d'une grande vie, sous ce brillant costume de cour qui
semblait lui promettre honneurs et fortune, il ne voyait jamais que
la pieuse figure de sa mère agenouillée au pied des autels, et
priant pour lui. A peine âgé de seize ans, il s'échappe de Madrid,
il vient frapper à la porte du collége Romain, et demande place, au
dortoir et à l'étude, pour Louis Gonzague, fils du comte de
Castiglione. Pendant sept ans, Louis donna dans cette maison le
touchant exemple d'une vie céleste; puis ses jours _déclinèrent_,
comme parle l'Ecriture; il avait assez vécu."--_Gournerie_, _Rome
Chrétienne_, ii. 211.

We now reach (on right) the _Church of Sta. Maria in Via Lata_, which was founded by Sergius I., in the eighth century, but twice rebuilt, the second time under Alexander VII., in 1662, when the façade was added by Pietro da Cortona.

In this church "they still show a little chapel in which, as hath
been handed down from the first ages, St. Luke the Evangelist
wrote, and painted the effigy of the Virgin Mother of God."--_See
Jameson's Sacred Art_, p. 155.

The subterranean church is shown as the actual house in which St. Paul lodged when he was in Rome.

"And when we came to Rome, the centurion delivered the prisoners to
the captain of the guard: but Paul was suffered to dwell by himself
with a soldier that kept him."

"And when they had appointed him a day, there came many to him into
his lodging; to whom he expounded and testified the kingdom of God,
persuading them concerning Jesus, both out of the law of Moses, and
out of the prophets, from morning till evening." ...

"And Paul dwelt two whole years in his own hired house, and
received all that came in unto him, preaching the kingdom of God,
and teaching those things which concern the Lord Jesus Christ, with
all confidence, no man forbidding him."--_Acts_ xxviii. 16, 23, 30,
31.

"St. Paul after his arrival at Rome, having made his usual effort,
in the first place, for the salvation of his own countrymen, and as
usual, having found it vain, turned to the Gentiles, and during two
whole years, in which he was a prisoner, received all that came to
him, preaching the kingdom of God. It was thus that God overruled
his imprisonment for the furtherance of the gospel, so that his
bonds in Christ were manifest in the palace, and in all other
places, and many of the brethren in the Lord, waxing confident by
his bonds, were much more bold to speak the word without fear. Even
in the palace of Nero, the most noxious atmosphere, as we should
have concluded, for the growth of divine truth, his bonds were
manifest, the Lord Jesus was preached, and, more than this, was
received to the saving of many souls; for we find the Apostle
writing to his Philippian converts: 'All the saints salute you,
chiefly they which are of Cæsar's household.' The whole Church of
Christ has abundant reason to bless God for the dispensation which,
during the most matured period of St. Paul's Christian life,
detained him a close prisoner in the imperial city. Had he, to the
end of his course, been at large, occupied, as he had long been,
'in labours most abundant,' he would, humanly speaking, never have
found time to pen those epistles which are among the most blessed
portion of the Church's inheritance. It was from within the walls
of a prison, probably chained hand to hand to the soldier who kept
him, that St. Paul indited the Epistles to the Ephesians,
Philippians, Colossians, and Hebrews."--_Blunt's Lectures on St.
Paul._

"In writing to Philemon, Paul chooses to speak of himself as the
captive of Jesus Christ. Yet he went whither he would, and was free
to receive those who came to him. It is interesting to remember
amid these solemn vaults, the different events of St. Paul's
apostolate, during the two years that he lived here. It was here
that he converted Onesimus, that he received the presents of the
Philippians, brought by Epaphroditus; it was hence that he wrote to
Philemon, to Titus, to the inhabitants of Philippi and of Colosse;
it was here that he preached devotion to the cross with that
glowing eagerness, with that startling eloquence, which gained
fresh power from contest and which inspiration rendered sublime.

"Peter addressed himself to the Circumcised; Paul to the
Gentiles,[13]--to their silence that he might confound it, to their
reason that he might humble it. Had he not already converted the
proconsul Sergius Paulus and Dionysius the Areopagite? At Rome his
word is equally powerful, and among the courtiers of Nero, perhaps
even amongst his relations, are those who yield to the power of
God, who reveals himself in each of the teachings of his
servant.[14] Around the Apostle his eager disciples group
themselves--Onesiphorus of Ephesus, who was not ashamed of his
chain;[15] Epaphras of Colosse, who was captive with him,
_concaptivus meus_;[16] Timothy, who was one with his master in a
holy union of every thought, and who was attached to him like a
son, _sicut patri filius_;[17] Hermas, Aristarchus, Marcus,
Demas--and Luke the physician, the faithful companion of the
Apostle, his well-beloved disciple--'Lucas medicus
carissimus.'"--_From Gournerie, Rome Chrétienne._

"I honour Rome for this reason; for though I could celebrate her
praises on many other accounts--for her greatness, for her beauty,
for her power, for her wealth, and for her warlike exploits,--yet,
passing over all these things, I glorify her on this account, that
Paul in his lifetime wrote to the Romans, and loved them, and was
present with and conversed with them, and ended his life amongst
them. Wherefore the city is on this account renowned more than on
all others--on this account I admire her, not on account of her
gold, her columns, or her other splendid decorations."--_St. John
Chrysostom, Homily on the Ep. to the Romans._

"The Roman Jews expressed a wish to hear from St. Paul himself a
statement of his religious sentiments, adding that the Christian
sect was everywhere spoken against.... A day was fixed for the
meeting at his private lodging.

"The Jews came in great numbers at the appointed time. Then
followed an impressive scene, like that at Troas (Acts xxi.)--the
Apostle pleading long and earnestly,--bearing testimony concerning
the kingdom of God,--and endeavouring to persuade them by arguments
drawn from their own Scriptures,--'from morning till evening.' The
result was a division among the auditors--'not peace, but a
sword,'--the division which has resulted ever since, when the Truth
of God has encountered, side by side, earnest conviction with
worldly indifference, honest investigation with bigoted prejudice,
trustful faith with the pride of scepticism. After a long and
stormy discussion, the unbelieving portion departed; but not until
St. Paul had warned them, in one last address, that they were
bringing upon themselves that awful doom of judicial blindness,
which was denounced in their own Scriptures against obstinate
unbelievers; that the salvation which they rejected would be
withdrawn from them, and the inheritance they renounced would be
given to the Gentiles. The sentence with which he gave emphasis to
this solemn warning was that passage in Isaiah, which recurring
thus with solemn force at the very close of the Apostolic history,
seems to bring very strikingly together the Old Dispensation and
the New, and to connect the ministry of Our Lord with that of His
Apostles:--'Go unto this people and say: Hearing ye shall hear and
shall not understand, and seeing ye shall see and shall not
perceive: for the heart of this people is waxed gross, and their
ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes have they closed; lest
they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and
understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should
heal them.'

" ... During the long delay of his trial St. Paul was not reduced,
as he had been at Cæsarea, to a forced inactivity. On the contrary,
he was permitted the freest intercourse with his friends, and was
allowed to reside in a house of sufficient size to accommodate the
congregation which flocked together to listen to his teaching. The
freest scope was given to his labours, consistent with the military
custody under which he was placed. We are told, in language
peculiarly emphatic, that his preaching was subjected to no
restraint whatever. And that which seemed at first to impede, must
really have deepened the impression of his eloquence; for who could
see without emotion that venerable form subjected by iron links to
the coarse control of the soldier who stood beside him? how often
must the tears of the assembly have been called forth by the
upraising of that fettered hand, and the clanking of the chain
which checked its energetic action.

"We shall see hereafter that these labours of the imprisoned
Confessor were not fruitless; in his own words, he 'begot many
children in his chains.' Meanwhile, he had a wider sphere of action
than even the metropolis of the world. Not only 'the crowd which
pressed upon him daily,' but also 'the care of all the churches'
demanded his constant vigilance and exertion.... To enable him to
maintain this superintendence, he manifestly needed many faithful
messengers; men who (as he says of one of them) 'rendered him
profitable service'; and by some of whom he seems to have been
constantly accompanied, wheresoever he went. Accordingly we find
him, during this Roman imprisonment, surrounded by many of his
oldest and most valued attendants. Luke, his fellow-traveller,
remained with him during his bondage; Timotheus, his beloved son in
the faith, ministered to him at Rome, as he had done in Asia, in
Macedonia, and in Achaia. Tychicus, who had formerly borne him
company from Corinth to Ephesus, is now at hand to carry his
letters to the shores which they had visited together. But there
are two names amongst his Roman companions which excite a peculiar
interest, though from opposite reasons,--the names of Demas and of
Mark. The latter, when last we heard of him, was the unhappy cause
of the separation of Barnabas and Paul. He was rejected by Paul, as
unworthy to attend him, because he had previously abandoned the
work of the Gospel out of timidity or indolence. It is delightful
to find him now ministering obediently to the very Apostle who had
then repudiated his services; still more to know that he
persevered in this fidelity even to the end, and was sent for by
St. Paul to cheer his dying hours. Demas, on the other hand, is now
a faithful 'fellow-labourer' of the Apostle but in a few years we
shall find that he had 'forsaken' him, having 'loved this present
world.'

"Amongst the rest of St. Paul's companions at this time, there were
two whom he distinguishes by the honourable title of his
'fellow-prisoners.' One of these is Aristarchus, the other
Epaphras. With regard to the former, we know that he was a
Macedonian of Thessalonica, one of 'Paul's companions in travel,'
whose life was endangered by the mob at Ephesus, and who embarked
with St. Paul at Cæsarea when he set sail for Rome. The other,
Epaphras, was a Colossian, who must not be identified with the
Philippian Epaphroditus, another of St. Paul's fellow-labourers
during this time. It is not easy to say in what exact sense these
two disciples were peculiarly _fellow-prisoners_ of St. Paul.
Perhaps it only implies that they dwelt in his house, which was
also his prison.

"But of all the disciples now ministering to St. Paul at Rome, none
has a greater interest than the fugitive Asiatic slave Onesimus. He
belonged to a Christian named Philemon, a member of the Colossian
Church. But he had robbed his master, and fled from Colosse, and at
last found his way to Rome. Here he was converted to the faith of
Christ, and had confessed to St. Paul his sins against his
master."--_Conybeare and Howson, Life of St. Paul._

A fountain in the crypt is shown, as having miraculously sprung up in answer to the prayers of St. Paul, that he might have wherewithal to baptize his disciples. At the end of the crypt are some large blocks of peperino, said to be remains of the arch erected by the senate in honour of the Emperor Gordian III., and destroyed by Innocent VIII.

Far along the right side of the Corso now extends the façade of the immense _Palazzo Doria_, built by Valvasori (the front towards the Collegio Romano being by Pietro da Cortona, and that towards the Piazza Venezia by Amati). Entering the courtyard, one must turn left to reach the _Picture Gallery_ (which is open on Tuesdays and Fridays, from ten till two)--a vast collection, which contains some grand portraits and a few other fine paintings.

The _1st Room_ entered is a great hall--to which pictures are removed for copying. It contains four fine sarcophagi, with reliefs of the Hunt of Meleager, the Story of Marsyas, Endymion and Diana, and a Bacchic procession. Of two ancient circular altars, one serves as the pedestal of a bearded Dionysus. The pictures are chiefly landscapes, of the school of Poussin and Salvator Rosa,--that of the Deluge is by _Ippolito Scarsellino_.

_2nd Room._--In the centre a Centaur (restored), of basalt and rosso-antico. On either side groups of boys playing.

_Pictures:_--

4. Caritas Romana: _Valentin_.

5. Circumcision: _Giov. Bellini?_

7. Madonna and Saints: _Basaiti_.

15. Temptations of St. Anthony: _Scuola di Mantegna_.

19. St. John in the Desert: _Guercino?_

35. Birth of St. John: _Vittore Pisanello_.

21. Spozalizio: _V. Pisanello_.

23. St. Sylvester before Maximin II.: _Pesellino_.

24. Madonna and Child: _F. Francia?_

28. Annunciation: _Fil. Lippi_.

29. St. Sylvester and the Dragon: _Pesellino_ (see the account of
Sta. Maria Liberatrice).

33. St. Agnes on the burning pile: _Guercino_.

37. Magdalen: _Copy of the Titian in the Pitti Palace_.

_4th Room._--

A bust of Innocent X. (with whose ill-acquired wealth this palace
was built) in rosso-antico, with a bronze head: _Bernini_.

_5th Room._--

17. The Money-changers: _Quentin Matsys_.

25. St. Joseph: _Guercino_. In the centre, a group of Jacob
wrestling with the Angel: _School of Bernini_.

_6th Room._--

8. Portrait of Olympia Maldacchini, the sister-in-law of Innocent
X., who ruled Rome in his time.

13. Madonna: _Carlo Maratta_.

30. Sketch of a Boy: _Incognito_.

From this room we enter a small cabinet, hung with pictures of _Breughel_ and _Fiammingo_, and containing a bust by _Algardi_, of Olympia Maldacchini-Pamfili, who built the Villa Doria Pamfili for her son.

_7th Room._--

8. Belisarius in the desert: _Salvator Rosa_.

19. Slaughter of the Innocents: _Mazzolino_.

We now enter the Galleries--which begin towards the left--

_1st Gallery._--

2. Holy Family in glory, and two Franciscan Saints adoring:
_Garofalo_.

3. Magdalen: _Annibale Caracci_.

8. Two Heads: _Quentin Matsys_.

9. Holy Family: _Sassoferrato_.

10. Story of the conversion of S. Eustachio (see the description of
his church): _School of Albert Durer_.

14. A Portrait: _Titian_.

15. Holy Family: _Andrea del Sarto_.

20. The Three Ages of Man: _Titian_.*

21. Return of the Prodigal Son: _Guercino_.

25. Landscape with the Flight into Egypt: _Claude Lorraine_.

26. The meeting of Mary and Elizabeth: _Garofalo_.

38. Copy of the "Nozze Aldobrandini:" _Poussin_.

45. Madonna: _Guido Reni_.

50. Holy Family: _Giulio Romano, from Raphael_.

_2nd Gallery._--

6. Madonna: _Fran. Francia_.

14. "Bartolo and Baldo:" _Raphael_.*

17. Portrait: _Titian_.

21. Portrait of a Widow: _Vandyke_.

24. Three Heads, called Calvin, Luther, and Catherine: _Giorgione_.

26. Sacrifice of Isaac: _Titian_.

33. Portrait of a Pamfili: _Vandyke_.

40. Herodias with the Head of John the Baptist: _Pordenone_. A
grand bust of Andrew Doria.

50. "The Confessor:" _Rubens_.

53. Joanna of Arragon: _School of Leonardo da Vinci_.*

56. Magdalene: _School of Titian_.

61. Adoration of the Infant Jesus: _Gio. Batt. Benvenuti_
('_l'Ortolano_').

66. Holy Family: _Garofalo_.

69. Glory crowning Virtue (a sketch): _Correggio_.

80. Portrait of Titian and his Wife: _Titian_. Also a number of
pictures of the Creation: _Breughel_.

_3rd Gallery._--

1, 6, 28, 34. Landscapes (with figures introduced): _Ann. Caracci_.

5. Landscape, with Mercury stealing cattle: _Claude Lorraine_.

10. Titian's Wife: _Titian_.

11. "Niccolaus Macchiavellus Historiar. Scriptor:" _Bronzino_.

12. "The Mill:" _Claude Lorraine_.*

"The foreground of the picture of 'the Mill' is a piece of very
lovely and perfect forest scenery, with a dance of peasants by a
brook-side; quite enough subject to form, in the hands of a master,
an impressive and complete picture. On the other side of the brook,
however, we have a piece of pastoral life; a man with some bulls
and goats tumbling head foremost into the water, owing to some
sudden paralytic affection of all their legs. Even this group is
one too many; the shepherd had no business to drive his flock so
near the dancers, and the dancers will certainly frighten the
cattle. But when we look farther into the picture, our feelings
receive a sudden and violent shock, by the unexpected appearance,
amidst things pastoral and musical, of the military; a number of
Roman soldiers riding in on hobby-horses, with a leader on foot,
apparently encouraging them to make an immediate and decisive
charge on the musicians. Beyond the soldiers is a circular temple,
in exceedingly bad repair; and close beside it, built against its
very walls, a neat water-mill in full work; by the mill flows a
large river with a weir across it.... At an inconvenient distance
from the water-side stands a city, composed of twenty-five round
towers and a pyramid. Beyond the city is a handsome bridge; beyond
the bridge, part of the Campagna, with fragments of aqueducts;
beyond the Campagna the chain of the Alps; on the left, the
cascades of Tivoli.

"This is a fair example of what is commonly called an 'ideal'
landscape; _i.e._ a group of the artist's studies from nature,
individually spoiled, selected with such opposition of character as
may insure their neutralizing each other's effect, and united with
sufficient unnaturalness and violence of association to insure
their producing a general sensation of the impossible."--_Ruskin's
Modern Painters._

"Many painters take a particular spot, and sketch it to perfection;
but Claude was convinced that taking nature as he found it, seldom
produced beauty. Neither did he like exhibiting in his pictures
accidents of nature. He professed to pourtray the style of general
nature, and so his pictures were a composition of the various
draughts which he had previously made from beautiful scenes and
prospects."--_Sir J. Reynolds._

18. Pietà: _Ann. Caracci_.

23. Landscape, with the Temple of Apollo: _Claude Lorraine_.

26. Portrait: _Mazzolino_.

27. Portrait: _Giorgione_.

33. Landscape, with Diana hunting: _Claude Lorraine_.

At the end of this gallery is a small cabinet, containing the gems of the collection:--

1. Portrait of a "Letterato:" _Lucas V. Leyden?_*

2. Portrait of Andrea Doria: _Sebastian del Piombo_.*

3. Portrait of Giannetto Doria: _Bronzino_.*

4. Portrait of S. Filippo Neri, as a boy: _Barocci_.

5. Portrait of Innocent X.; Gio. Battista Pamfili (1644--55):
_Velasquez_.*

6. Entombment: _John Emelingk_.*

Here, also, is the bust of the late beloved Princess Doria (Lady Mary Talbot), which has always been veiled in crape since her death.

The _4th Gallery_ is decorated with mirrors, and with statues of no especial merit.

"In the whole immense range of rooms of the Palazzo Doria, I saw
but a single fire-place, and that so deep in the wall that no
amount of blaze would raise the atmosphere of the room ten degrees.
If the builder of the palace, or any of his successors, have
committed crimes worthy of Tophet, it would be a still worse
punishment to him to wander perpetually through this suite of
rooms, on the cold floors of polished brick tiles, or marble, or
mosaic, growing a little chiller and chiller through every moment
of eternity--or at least, till the palace crumbles down upon
him."--_Hawthorne, Notes on Italy._

Opposite the Palazzo Doria is the _Palazzo Salviati_. The next two streets on the left lead into the long narrow square called _Piazza Santi Apostoli_, containing several handsome palaces. That on the right is the _Palazzo Odescalchi_, built by Bernini, in 1660, for Cardinal Fabio Chigi, to whose family it formerly belonged. It has some fine painted and carved wooden ceilings. This palace is supposed to be the scene of the latest miracle of the Roman Catholic Church. The present Princess Odescalchi had long been bedridden, and was apparently dying of a hopeless disease, when, while her family were watching what they considered her last moments, the pope (Pius IX.) sent, by the hands of a nun, a little loaf (panetello), which he desired her to swallow. With terrible effort, the sick woman obeyed, and was immediately healed, and on the following day the astonished Romans saw her go in person to the pope, at the Vatican, to return thanks for her restoration!

The building at the end of the square is the _Palazzo Valentini_, which once contained a collection of antiquities.

Near this, on the left, but separated from the piazza by a courtyard, is the vast _Palazzo Colonna_, begun, in the fifteenth century, by Martin V., and continued at various later periods. Julius II. at one time made it his residence, and also Cardinal (afterwards San Carlo) Borromeo. Part of it is now the residence of the French ambassadors. The palace is built very near the site of the ancient fortress of the Colonna family--so celebrated in times of mediæval warfare with the Orsini--of which one lofty tower still remains, in a street leading up to the Quirinal.

The _Gallery_ is shown every day, except Sundays and holidays, from 11 to 3. It is entered by the left wing. The first room is a fine, gloomy old hall, containing the family dais, and hung with decaying Colonna portraits. Then come three rooms covered with tapestries, the last containing a pretty statue of a girl, sometimes called Niobe. Hence we reach the pictures. The _1st Room_ has an interesting collection of the early schools, including Madonnas of _Filippo Lippi_; _Luca Longhi_; _Botticelli_; _Gentile da Fabriano_; _Innocenza da Imola_; a curious Crucifixion, by _Jacopo d'Avanzo_; and a portrait by _Giovanni Sanzio_, father of Raphael.

The ceiling of the _3rd Room_ has a fresco, by _Battoni_ and _Luti_, of the apotheosis of Martin V. (Oddone Colonna, 1417--24). Among its pictures, are St. Bernard, _Giovanni Bellini_; Onuphrius Pavinius, _Titian_; Holy Family, _Bronzino_; Peasant dining, _Annibale Caracci_; St. Jerome, _Spagna_; Portrait, _Paul Veronese_; Holy Family, _Bonifazio_.

Hence we enter the _Great Hall_, a truly grand room, hung with mirrors and painted with flowers by _Mario de' Fiori_, and with genii by _Maratta_. The statues here are unimportant. The ceiling is adorned with paintings, by _Coli_ and _Gherardi_, of the battle of Lepanto, Oct. 8, 1571, which Marc-Antonio Colonna assisted in gaining. The best pictures are the family portraits:--Federigo Colonna, _Sustermanns_; Don Carlo Colonna, _Vandyke_; Card. Pompeio Colonna, _Lorenzo Lotto_; Vittoria Colonna, _Muziano_; Lucrezia Colonna, _Vandyke_; Pompeio Colonna, _Agostino Caracci_; Giacomo Sciarra Colonna, _Giorgione_. We may also notice an extraordinary picture of the Madonna rescuing a child from a demon, by _Niccolo d'Alunno_, with a double portrait, by _Tintoret_, on the right wall, and a Holy Family of _Palma Vecchio_ at the end of the gallery. Near the entrance are some glorious old cabinets, inlaid with ivory and lapis-lazuli. On the steps leading to the upper end of the hall is a bomb left on the spot where it fell during the siege of Rome in 1848.

(Through the palace access may be obtained to the beautiful Colonna Gardens; but as they are generally visited from the Quirinal, they will be noticed in the description of that hill.)

"On parle d'un Pierre Colonna, dépouillé de tous ses biens en 1100
par le pape Pascal II. Il fallait que la famille fût déjà
passablement ancienne, car les grandes fortunes ne s'élèvent pas en
un jour."--_About._

"Si n'etoit le différent des Ursins et des Colonnois (Orsini and
Colonna) la terre de l'Eglise seroit la plus heureuse habitation
pour les subjects, qui soit en tout le monde."--_Philippe de
Comines._ 1500.

"Gloriosa Colonna, in cui s' appoggia
Nostra speranza, e'l gran nome Latino,
Ch'ancor non torte del vero cammino
L'ira di Giove per ventosa pioggia."

_Petrarca, Sonnetto_ X.

Adjoining the Palazzo Colonna is the fine _Church of the Santi Apostoli_, founded in the sixth century, rebuilt by Martin V., in 1420, and modernized, _c._ 1602, by Fontana. The portico contains a magnificent bas-relief of an eagle and an oak-wreath (frequently copied and introduced in architectural designs).

"Entrez sous la portique de l'église des Saints-Apôtres, et vous
trouverez là, encadré par hasard dans le mur, un aigle qu'entoure
une couronne d'un magnifique travail. Vous reconnaîtrez facilement
dans cet aigle et cette couronne la représentation d'une ensigne
romaine, telle que les bas-reliefs de la colonne Trajane vous en
ont montré plusieurs; seulement ce qui était là en petit est ici en
grand."--_Ampère, Emp._ ii. 168.

Also in the portico, is a monument, by _Canova_, to Volpato, the engraver. Over the sacristy door is the tomb of Pope Clement XIV. (Giov. Antonio Ganganelli, 1769-74), also by Canova, executed in his twenty-fifth year.

"La mort de Clément XIV. est du 22 Septembre, 1774. A cette époque,
Alphonse de Liguori était évêque de Sainte-Agathe des Goths, au
royaume de Naples. Le 22 Septembre, au matin, l'évêque tomba dans
une espèce de sommeil léthargique après avoir dit la messe, et,
pendant vingt-quatre heures, il demeura sans mouvement dans son
fauteuil. Ses serviteurs s'étonnant de cet état, le lendemain, avec
lui:--'Vous ne savez pas, leur dit-il, que j'ai assisté le pape qui
vient de mourir.' Peu après, la nouvelle du décès de Clément arriva
à Sainte Agathe."--_Gournerie, Rome Chrétienne_, ii. 362.

In 1873 the traditional grave of St. Philip and St. James, the "Apostoli" to whom this church is dedicated, was opened during its restoration. Two bodies were found, enclosed in a sarcophagus of beautiful transparent marble, and have been duly enshrined. In the choir are monuments of the fifteenth century, to two relations of Pope Sixtus IV., Pietro Riario, and Cardinal Raffaelo Riario. To the right is the tomb of the Chevalier Girard, brother-in-law of Pope Julius II., and maître d'hôtel to Charles VIII. and Louis XII. of France. The tomb of Cardinal Bessarion was removed from the church, in 1702, to the cloisters of the adjoining Convent, which is the residence of the General of the Order of "Minori Conventuali" (Black Friars). The altar-piece represents the martyrdom of SS. Philip and James, by _Muratori_.

The heart of Maria Clementina Sobieski (buried in St. Peter's), wife of James III., called the First Pretender, is also preserved here, as is shown by a Latin inscription.

"Le roi d'Angleterre est devot a l'excès; sa matinée se passe en
prières aux Saints-Apôtres, près du tombeau de sa femme."--_De
Brosses_, 1739.

In 1552 this church was remarkable for the sermons of the monk Felix Peretti, afterwards Sixtus V.

"Suivant un manuscrit de la bibliothèque Alfieri, un jour, pendant
qu'il était dans la chaire des Saints-Apôtres, un billet cacheté
lui fut remis; Frère Félix l'ouvre et y lit, en face d'un certain
nombre de propositions que l'on disait être extraites de ses
discours, ce mot écrit en gros caractères: MENTIRIS (tu mens). Le
fougueux orateur eut peine à contenir son émotion; il termina son
sermon en quelques paroles, et courut au palais de l'Inquisition
présenter le billet mystérieux, et demander qu'on examinât
scrupuleusement sa doctrine. Cet examen lui fut favorable, et il
lui valut l'amitié du grand inquisiteur, Michael Ghislieri, qui
comprit aussitôt tout le parti qu'on pouvait tirer d'un homme dont
les moindres actions étaient empreintes d'une inébranlable force de
caractère."--_Gournerie._

In this church is buried the young Countess Savorelli, the story of whose love, misfortunes, and death, has been celebrated by About, under the name of _Tolla_ (the Lello of the story having been one of the Doria-Pamfili family).

"The convent which Tolla had sanctified by her death sent three
embassies in turn to beg to preserve her relics: already the people
spoke of her as a saint. But Count Feraldi (Savorelli) considered
that it was due to his honour and to his vengeance to bear her
remains with pomp to the tomb of his family. He had sufficient
influence to obtain that for which permission is not granted once
in ten years: the right of transporting her uncovered, upon a bed
of white velvet, and of sparing her the horrors of a coffin. The
beloved remains were wrapped in the white muslin robe which she
wore in the garden on the day when she exchanged her sweet vows
with Lello. The Marchesa Trasimeni, ill and wasted as she was, came
herself to arrange her hair in the manner she loved. Every garden
in Rome despoiled itself to send her its flowers; it was only
necessary to choose. The funeral procession quitted the church of
S. Antonio Abbate on Thursday evening at 7.30 for the Santi
Apostoli, where the Feraldis are buried. The body was preceded by a
long file of the black and white confraternities, each bearing its
banner. The red light of the torches played upon the countenance of
the beautiful dead, and seemed to animate her afresh. The piazza
was filled with a dense and closely packed but dumb crowd; no
discordant sound troubled the grief of the relations and friends of
Tolla, who wept together at the Palazzo Feraldi....

"The Church of the Apostoli and the tomb of the poor loving girl,
became at certain days of the year an object of pilgrimage, and
more than one young Roman maiden adds to her evening litany the
words, 'St. Tolla, virgin and martyr, pray for us.'"--_About._

Just beyond the church is the _Palazzo Muto-Savorelli_ (the home of Tolla, "Palazzo Feraldi") long the residence of Prince Charles Edward ("the last Pretender"), who died here in 1788. Hence the _Via delle Vergini_, with its dismal lines of latticed convent-windows, leads to the Fountain of Trevi.

Returning to the Corso, we pass (right) _Palazzo Buonaparte_, built by Giovanni dei Rossi in 1660. Here Lætitia Buonaparte--"Madame Mère"--the mother of Napoleon I., died February 2nd, 1836. The present head of the family is Cardinal Lucien-Louis Buonaparte, son of Prince Charles (son of Lucien) and of Princess Zénaïde, daughter of King Joseph of Spain. His only surviving brother is Prince Napoleon Buonaparte.

This palace forms one corner of the _Piazza di Venezia_, which contains the ancient castellated _Palace_ of the Republic of Venice, built in 1468 by Giuliano da Majano (with materials plundered from the Coliseum) for Paul II., who was of Venetian birth. On the ruin of the republic the palace fell into the hands of Austria, and is still the residence of the Austrian ambassador, to whom it was specially reserved on the cession of Venice to Italy.

Opposite this, on a line with the Corso, is the _Palazzo Torlonia_, built by Fontana in 1650, for the Bolognetti family.

"Nobility is certainly more the fruit of wealth in Italy than in
England. Here, where a title and estate are sold together, a man
who can buy the one secures the other. From the station of a
lacquey, an Italian who can amass riches, may rise to that of duke.
Thus Torlonia, the Roman banker, purchased the title and estate of
the Duca di Bracciano, fitted up the 'Palazzo Nuovo di Torlonia'
with all the magnificence that wealth commands; and a marble
gallery, with its polished floors, modern statues, painted
ceilings, and gilded furniture, far outshines the faded splendour
of the halls of the old Roman nobility."--_Eaton's Rome._

"Un ancien domestique de place, devenu spéculateur et banquier,
achète un marquisat, puis une principauté. Il crée un majorat pour
son fils aîné et une seconde géniture en faveur de l'autre. L'un
épouse une Sforza-Cesarini et marie ses deux fils à une Chigi et
une Ruspoli; l'autre obtient pour femme une Colonna-Doria. C'est
ainsi que la famille Torlonia, par la puissance de l'argent et la
faveur du saint-père, s'est élevée presque subitement à la hauteur
des plus grands maisons népotiques et féodales."--_About._

The most interesting of the antiquities preserved in this palace is a bas-relief, representing a combat between men and animals, brought hither from the Palazzo Orsini, and probably pourtraying the famous dedication of the theatre of Marcellus on that site, celebrated by the slaughter of six hundred animals.

The end of the Corso--narrowed by a projecting wing of the Venetian Palace--is known as the _Ripresa dei Barberi_, because there the horses, which run in the races during the Carnival, are caught in large folds of drapery let down across the street to prevent their dashing themselves to pieces against the opposite wall.

Close to the end of this street, built into the wall of a house in the Via di Marforio, is one of the few relics of republican times in the city,--a Doric _Tomb_, bearing an inscription which states that it was erected by order of the people on land granted by the Senate to Caius Publicius Bibulus, the plebeian ædile, and his posterity. Petrarch mentions in one of his letters that he wrote one of his sonnets leaning against the tomb of Bibulus.

This tomb has a secondary interest as marking the commencement of the Via Flaminia, as it stood just outside the Porta Ratumena from whence that road issued. There are some obscure remains of another tomb on the other side of the street. The Via Flaminia, like the Via Appia, was once fringed with tombs.

From the Ripresa dei Barberi, a street passing under an arch on the right, leads to the back of the Venetian Palace, where is the _Church of S. Marco_, originally founded in the time of Constantine, but rebuilt in 833, and modernized by Cardinal Quirini in 1744. Its portico, which is lined with early Christian inscriptions, contains a fine fifteenth century doorway, surmounted by a figure of St. Mark. The interior is in the form of a basilica, its naves and aisles separated by twenty columns, and ending in an apse. The best pictures are S. Marco, "a pope enthroned, by _Carlo Crivelli_, resembling in sharpness of finish and individuality the works of Bartolomeo Viviani,"[18] and a Resurrection by _Palma Giovane_.

"The mosaics of S. Marco, executed under Pope Gregory IV. (A.D.
827--844), with all their splendour, exhibit the utmost poverty of
expression. Above the tribune, in circular compartments, is the
portrait of Christ between the symbols of the Evangelists, and
further below SS. Peter and Paul (or two prophets) with scrolls;
within the tribune, beneath a hand extended with a wreath, is the
standing figure of Christ with an open book, and on either side, S.
Angelo and Pope Gregory IV. Further on, but still belonging to the
dome, are the thirteen lambs, forming a second and quite uneven
circle round the figures. The execution is here especially rude,
and of true Byzantine rigidity, while, as if the artist knew that
his long lean figures were anything but secure upon their feet, he
has given them each a separate little pedestal. The lines of the
drapery are chiefly straight and parallel, while, with all this
rudeness, a certain play of colour has been contrived by the
introduction of high lights of another colour."--_Kugler._

This church is said to have been originally founded in honour of the Evangelist in 337 by Pope Marco, but this pope, being himself canonized, is also honoured here, and is buried under the high altar. On April 25th, St. Mark's Day, a grand procession of clergy starts from this church. It was for the most part rebuilt under Gregory IV. in 838.

Behind the Palazzo Venezia is the vast _Church of Il Gesù_, begun in 1568 by the celebrated Vignola, but the cupola and façade completed in 1575 by his scholar Giacomo della Porta. In the interior is the monument of Cardinal Bellarmin, and various pictures representing events in the lives or deaths of the Jesuit saints,--that of the death of St. Francis Xavier is by _Carlo Maratta_. The high altar, by Giacomo della Porta, has fine columns of giallo-antico. The altar of St. Ignatius at the end of the left transept is of gaudy magnificence. It was designed by Padre Pozzi, the group of the Trinity being by Bernardino Ludovisi; the globe in the hand of the Almighty is said to be the largest piece of lapis-lazuli in existence. Beneath this altar, and his silver statue, lies the body of St. Ignatius Loyola, in an urn of gilt bronze, adorned with precious stones. A great ceremony takes place in this church on July 31st, the feast of St. Ignatius, and on December 31st a Te Deum is sung here for the mercies of the past year, in the presence of the pope, cardinals, and the people of Rome,--a really solemn and impressive service.

The _Convent of the Gesù_ is the residence of the General of the Jesuits ("His Paternity"), and the centre of religious life in their Order. The rooms in which St. Ignatius lived and died are of the deepest historic interest. They consist of four chambers. The first, now a chapel, is that in which he wrote his "Constitutions." The second, also a chapel, is that in which he died. It contains the altar at which he daily celebrated mass, and the autograph engagement to live under the same laws of obedience, poverty, and chastity, signed by Laynez, Francis Xavier, and Ignatius Loyola. On its walls are two portraits of Ignatius Loyola, one as a young knight, the other as a Jesuit father, and portraits of S. Carlo Borromeo and S. Filippo Neri. It was in this chamber also that St. Francis Borgia died. The third room was that of the attendant monk of St. Ignatius; the fourth is now a kind of museum of relics containing portions of his robes and small articles which belonged to him and to other saints of the Order.

Facing the Church of the Gesù is the _Palazzo Altieri_, built by Cardinal Altieri in 1670, from designs of Giov. Antonio Rossi.

"Quand le palais Altieri fut achevé, les Altieri, neveux de Clément
X., invitèrent leur oncle à le venir voir. Il s'y fit porter, et
d'aussi loin qu'il aperçut la magnificence et l'étendue de cette
superbe fabrique, il reboussa chemin le cœur serré, sans dire un
seul mot, et mourut peu après."--_De Brosses._

"On the staircase of the Palazzo Altieri, is an ancient colossal
marble _finger_, of such extraordinary size, that it is really
worth a visit."--_Eaton's Rome._

This palace was the residence of the late noble-hearted vicar-general, Cardinal Altieri, who died a martyr to his devotion to his flock (as Bishop of Albano) during the terrible visitation of cholera at Albano in 1867.

The _Piazza del Gesù_ is considered to be the most draughty place in Rome. The legend runs that the devil and the wind were one day taking a walk together. When they came to this square, the devil, who seemed to be very devout, said to the wind, "Just wait a minute, mio caro, while I go into this church." So the wind promised, and the devil went into the Gesù, and has never come out again--and the wind is blowing about in the Piazza del Gesù to this day.