Chapter III: The Capitoline (2)

"La ressemblance du type si fin de l'Apollon au lézard et du
charmant bronze du Capitole _le tíreur d'épine_ est trop frappante
pour qu'on puisse se refuser à voir dans celui-ci une inspiration
de Praxitèle ou de son école. C'est tout simplement un enfant
arrachant de son pied une épine qui l'a blessé, sujet naïf et
champêtre analogue au Satyre se faisant rendre ce service par un
autre Satyre. On a voulu y voir un athlète blessé par une épine
pendant sa course et qui n'en est pas moins arrivé au but; mais la
figure est trop jeune et n'a rien d'athlétique. Le moyen âge avait
donné aussi son explication et inventé sa legende. On raccontait
qu'un jeune berger, envoyé à la découverte de l'ennemi, était
revenu sans s'arrêter et ne s'était permis qu'alors d'arracher une
épine qui lui blessait le pied. Le moyen âge avait senti le charme
de cette composition qu'il interprétait à sa manière, car elle est
sculptée sur un arceau de la cathédrale de Zurich qui date du
siècle de Charlemagne."--_Ampère_, iii. 315.

Forming part of the decorations of this room are two fine pictures, a dead Christ with a monk praying, and Sta. Francesca Romana, by _Romanelli_. Near the door of exit is a bust said to be that of Junius Brutus.

"Il est permis de voir dans le buste du Capitole un vrai portrait
de Brutus; il est difficile d'en douter en le contemplant. Voilà
bien le visage farouche, la barbe _hirsute_, les cheveux roides
collés si rudement sur le front, la physiognomie inculte et
terrible du prémier consul romain; la bouche serrée respire la
détermination et l'énergie; les yeux, formés d'une matière
jaunâtre, se détachent en clair sur le bronze noirci par les
siècles et vous jettent un regard fixe et farouche. Tout près est
la louve de bronze. Brutus est de la même famille. On sent qu'il y
a du lait de cette louve dans les veines du second fondateur de
Rome, comme dans les veines du premier, et que lui aussi, pareil au
Romulus de la légende, marchera vers son but à travers le sang des
siens.

"Le buste de Brutus est placé sur un piédestal qui le met à la
hauteur du regard. Là, dans un coin sombre, j'ai passé bien des
moments face à face avec l'impitoyable fondateur de la liberté
romaine."--_Ampère, Hist. Rom._ ii. 270.

The 4th Room contains the _Fasti Consulares_, tables found near the temple of Minerva Chalcidica, and inscribed with the names of public officers from Romulus to Augustus. The 5th Room contains two bronze ducks (formerly shown as the sacred geese of the Capitol) and a female head--found in the gardens of Sallust, a bust of Medusa, by _Bernini_, and many others. The 6th, or Throne Room, hung with faded tapestry, has a frieze in fresco, by _Annibale Caracci_, representing the triumphs of Scipio Africanus. The 7th Room is painted by _Daniele da Volterra_(?) with the history of the Punic Wars. The 8th Room (now used as a passage) is a chapel, containing a lovely fresco, by _Pinturicchio_, of the Madonna and Child with Angels.

"The Madonna is seated enthroned, fronting the spectator; her large
mantle forms a grand cast of drapery; the child on her lap sleeps
in the loveliest attitude; she folds her hands and looks down,
quiet, serious, and beautiful: in the clouds are two adoring
angels."--_Kugler._

The four Evangelists are by _Caravaggio_; the pictures of Roman saints (Cecilia, Alexis, Eustachio, Francesca-Romana), by _Romanelli_.

By the same staircase, passing on the left a wonderful relief of the apotheosis of the wicked Faustina, we may arrive at the _Picture Gallery of the Capitol_ (which can also be approached by a separate staircase, entered from an alley at the back of the building), reached by two rooms inscribed with the names of the Roman Conservators from the middle of the sixteenth century. This gallery contains very few first-rate pictures, but has a beautiful St. Sebastian, by Guido, and several fine works of _Guercino_. The most noticeable pictures are--

_1st Room._--

2. Disembodied Spirit (unfinished): _Guido Reni_.
13. St. John Baptist: _Guercino_.
16. Mary Magdalene: _Guido Reni_.
20. The Cumæan Sibyl: _Domenichino_.
26. Mary Magdalene: _Tintoretto_.
27. Presentation in the Temple: _Fra. Bartolomeo_.
30. Holy Family: _Garofalo_.
52. Madonna and Saints: _Botticelli?_
61. Portrait of himself: _Guido Reni_.
78. Madonna and Saints: _F. Francia_, 1513.
80. Portrait: _Velasquez_.
87. St. Augustine: _Giovanni Bellini_.
89. Romulus and Remus: _Rubens_.

_2nd Room._--

100. Two male portraits: _Vandyke_.
104. Adoration of the Shepherds: _Mazzolino_.
106. Two Portraits: _Vandyke_.
116. St. Sebastian: _Guido Reni_.
117. Cleopatra and Augustus: _Guercino_.
119. St. Sebastian: _Lud. Caracci_.
128. Gipsy telling a fortune: _Caravaggio_.
132. Portrait: _Giovanni Bellini_.
134. Portrait of Michael Angelo: _M. Venusti?_
136. Petrarch: _Gio. Bellini?_
142. Nativity of the Virgin: _Albani_.
143. Sta. Petronilla: _Guercino_. An enormous picture, brought hither
from St. Peter's, where it has been replaced by a mosaic copy. The
composition is divided into two parts. The lower represents the
burial of Sta. Petronilla, the upper the ascension of her spirit.

"The Apostle Peter had a daughter, born in lawful wedlock, who accompanied him in his journey from the East. Petronilla was wonderfully fair; and Valerius Flaccus, a young and noble Roman, who was a heathen, became enamoured of her beauty, and sought her for his wife; and he, being very powerful, she feared to refuse him; she therefore desired him to return in three days, and promised that he should then carry her home. But she prayed earnestly to be delivered from this peril; and when Flaccus returned in three days, with great pomp, to celebrate the marriage, he found her dead. The company of nobles who attended him, carried her to the grave, in which they laid her, crowned with roses; and Flaccus lamented greatly."--_Mrs. Jameson, from the Perfetto Legendario._

199. Death and Assumption of the Virgin: _Cola della Matrice_.

"Here the death of the Virgin is treated at once in a mystical and dramatic style. Enveloped in a dark blue mantle, spangled with golden stars, she lies extended on a couch; St. Peter, in a splendid scarlet cope as bishop, reads the service; St. John, holding the palm, weeps bitterly. In front, and kneeling before the couch or bier, appear the three great Dominican saints as witnesses of the religious mystery; in the centre St. Dominic; on the left, St. Catherine of Siena; and on the right, St. Thomas Aquinas. In a compartment above is the Assumption."--_Jameson's Legends of the Madonna_, p. 315.

123. Virgin and Angels: _Paul Veronese_.
124. Rape of Europa: _Paul Veronese_.

At the head of the Capitol steps, to the right of the terrace, is the entrance to the _Palazzo Caffarelli_, the residence of the Prussian minister. It has a small but beautiful garden, and the view from the windows is magnificent.

"After dinner, Bunsen called for us, and took us first to his house
on the Capitol, the different windows of which command the
different views of ancient and modern Rome. Never shall I forget
the view of the former; we looked down on the Forum, and just
opposite were the Palatine and the Aventine, with the ruins of the
Palace of the Cæsars on the one, and houses intermixed with gardens
on the other. The mass of the Coliseum rose beyond the Forum, and
beyond all, the wide plain of the Campagna to the sea. On the left
rose the Alban hills, bright in the setting sun, which played full
upon Frescati and Albano, and the trees which edge the lake, and
further away in the distance, it lit up the old town of
Labicum."--_Arnold's Letters._

From the further end of the courtyard of the Caffarelli Palace one can look down upon part of the bare cliff of the Rupe Tarpeia. Here there existed till 1868 a small court, which is represented as the scene of the murder in Hawthorne's Marble Faun, or "Transformation." The door, the niche in the wall, and all other details mentioned in the novel, were realities. The character of the place is now changed by the removal of the boundary-wall. The part of the rock seen from here is that usually visited from below by the Via Tor de' Specchi.

To reach the principal portion of the south-eastern height of the Capitol, we must ascend the staircase beyond the Palace of the Conservators, on the right. Here we shall find ourselves upon the highest part of

"The Tarpeian rock, the citadel
Of great and glorious Rome, queen of the earth,
So far renown'd, and with the spoils enriched
Of nations."
_Paradise Regained._

"The steep
Tarpeian, fittest goal of treason's race,
The promontory whence the traitor's leap
Cured all ambition."
_Childe Harold._

The dirty lane, with its shabby houses, and grass-grown spaces, and filthy children, has little to remind one of the appearance of the hill as seen by Virgil and Propertius, who speak of the change in their time from an earlier aspect.

"Hinc ad Tarpeiam sedem, et Capitolia ducit,
Aurea nunc, olim, silvestribus horrida dumis,
Jam tum religio pavidos terrebat agrestes
Dira loci; jam tum silvam saxumque tremebant."
_Virgil, Æn._ viii. 347.

"Hoc quodcumque vides, hospes, qua maxima Roma est,
Ante Phrygem Aeneam collis et herba fuit."
_Propertius_, iv. eleg. I.

It was on this side that the different attacks were made upon the Capitol. The first was by the Sabine Herdonius at the head of a band of slaves, who scaled the heights and surprised the garrison, in B.C. 460, and from the heights of the citadel proclaimed freedom to all slaves who should join him, with abolition of debts, and defence of the plebs from their oppressors; but his offers were disregarded, and on the fourth day the Capitol was re-taken, and he was slain with nearly all his followers. The second attack was by the Gauls, who, according to the well-known story, climbed the rock near the Porta Carmentale, and had nearly reached the summit unobserved--for the dogs neglected to bark--when the cries of the sacred geese of Juno aroused an officer named Manlius, who rushed to the defence, and hurled over the precipice the first assailant, who dragged down others in his fall, and thus the Capitol was saved. In remembrance of this incident, a goose was annually carried in triumph, and a dog annually crucified upon the Capitol, between the temple of Summanus and that of Youth.[42] This was the same Manlius, the friend of the people, who was afterwards condemned by the patricians on pretext that he wished to make himself king, and thrown from the Tarpeian rock, on the same spot, in sight of the Forum, where Spurius Cassius, an ex-consul, had been thrown down before. To visit the part of the rock from which these executions must have taken place, it is necessary to enter a little garden near the German Hospital, whence there is a beautiful view of the river and the Aventine.

"Quand on veut visiter la roche Tarpéienne, on sonne à une porte de
peu d'apparence, sur laquelle sont écrits ces mots: _Rocca
Tarpeia_. Une pauvre femme arrive et vous mène dans un carré de
choux. C'est de là qu'on précipita Manlius. Je serais desolé que le
carré de choux manquât."--_Ampère, Portraits de Rome._

This side of the Intermontium is now generally known as _Monte Caprino_, a name which Ampère derives from the fact that Vejovis, the Etruscan ideal of Jupiter, was always represented with a goat.[43] On this side of the hill, the viaduct from the Palatine, built by Caligula (who affected to require it to facilitate communication with his friend Jupiter), joined the Capitoline.

We have still to examine the north-eastern height, the site of the most interesting of pagan temples, now occupied by one of the most interesting of Christian churches. The name of the famous _Church of Ara-Cœli_ is generally attributed to an altar erected by Augustus to commemorate the Delphic oracle respecting the coming of our Saviour, which is still recognised in the well-known hymn of the Church:

Teste David cum Sibylla.[44]

The altar bore the inscription "Ara Primogeniti Dei." Those who seek a more humble origin for the church, say that the name merely dates from mediæval times, when it was called "Sta, Maria in Aurocœlio." It originally belonged to the Benedictine Order, but was transferred to the Franciscans by Innocent IV. in 1252, since which time its convent has occupied an important position as the residence of the General of the Minor Franciscans (Grey-friars), and is the centre of religious life in that Order.

The staircase on the left of the Senators' palace, which leads to the side entrance of Ara-Cœli, is in itself full of historical associations. It was at its head that Valerius the consul was killed in the conflict with Herdonius for the possession of the Capitol. It was down the ancient steps on this site that Annius, the envoy of the Latins, fell (B.C. 340), and was nearly killed, after his audacious proposition in the temple of Jupiter, that the Latins and Romans should become one nation, and have a common senate and consuls. Here also,[45] in B.C. 133, Tiberius Gracchus was knocked down with the leg of a chair, and killed in front of the temple of Jupiter.

It is at the top of these steps, that the monks of Ara-Cœli, who are celebrated as dentists, perform their hideous, but useful and gratuitous operations, which may be witnessed here every morning!

Over the side entrance of Ara-Cœli is a beautiful mosaic of the Virgin and Child. This, with the ancient brick arches above, framing fragments of deep blue sky--and the worn steps below--forms a subject dear to Roman artists, and is often introduced as a background to groups of monks and peasants. The interior of the church is vast, solemn, and highly picturesque. It was here, as Gibbon himself tells us, that on the 15th of October, 1764, as he sat musing amidst the ruins of the Capitol, while the bare-footed friars were singing vespers, the idea of writing the "Decline and Fall" of the city first started to his mind.

"As we lift the great curtain and push into the church, a faint
perfume of incense salutes the nostrils. The golden sunset bursts
in as the curtain of the (west) door sways forward, illuminates the
mosaic floor, catches on the rich golden ceiling, and flashes here
and there over the crowd (gathered in Epiphany), on some brilliant
costume or closely shaven head. All sorts of people are thronging
there, some kneeling before the shrine of the Madonna, which gleams
with its hundreds of silver votive hearts, legs, and arms, some
listening to the preaching, some crowding round the chapel of the
_Presepio_. Old women, haggard and wrinkled, come tottering along
with their _scaldini_ of coals, drop down on their knees to pray,
and, as you pass, interpolate in their prayers a parenthesis of
begging. The church is not architecturally handsome, but it is
eminently picturesque, with its relics of centuries, its mosaic
pulpits and floors, its frescoes of Pinturicchio and Pesaro, its
antique columns, its rich golden ceiling, its gothic mausoleum to
the Savelli, and its mediæval tombs. A dim, dingy look is over
all--but it is the dimness of faded splendour; and one cannot stand
there, knowing the history of the church, its great antiquity, and
the varied fortunes it has known, without a peculiar sense of
interest and pleasure.

"It was here that Romulus in the grey dawning of Rome built the
temple of Jupiter Feretrius. Here the _spolia opima_ were
deposited. Here the triumphal processions of the emperors and
generals ended. Here the victors paused before making their vows,
until, from the Mamertine prisons below, the message came to
announce that their noblest prisoner and victim--while the clang of
their triumph and his defeat rose ringing in his ears, as the
procession ascended the steps--had expiated with death the crime of
being the enemy of Rome. On the steps of Ara-Cœli, nineteen
centuries ago, the first great Cæsar climbed on his knees after
his first triumph. At their base, Rienzi, the last of the Roman
tribunes, fell--and if the tradition of the Church is to be
trusted, it was on the site of the present high altar that Augustus
erected the 'Ara Primogeniti Dei,' to commemorate the Delphic
prophecy of the coming of our Saviour. Standing on a spot so
thronged with memories, the dullest imagination takes fire. The
forms and scenes of the past rise from their graves and pass before
us, and the actual and visionary are mingled together in strange
poetic confusion."--_Roba di Roma_, i. 73.

The floor of the church is of the ancient mosaic known as Opus Alexandrinum. The nave is separated from the aisles by twenty-two ancient columns, of which two are of cipollino, two of white marble, and eighteen of Egyptian granite. They are of very different forms and sizes, and have probably been collected from various pagan edifices. The inscription "A Cubiculo Augustorum" upon the third column on the left of the nave, shows that it was brought from the Palace of the Cæsars. The windows in this church are amongst the few in Rome which show traces of gothic. At the end of the nave, on either side, are two ambones, marking the position of the choir before it was extended to its present site in the sixteenth century.

The transepts are full of interesting monuments. That on the right is the burial-place of the great family of Savelli, and contains--on the left, the monument of Luca Savelli, 1266 (father of Pope Honorius IV.) and his son Pandolfo,--an ancient and richly sculptured sarcophagus, to which a gothic canopy was added by _Agostino_ and _Agnolo da Siena_ from designs of Giotto. Opposite, is the tomb of the mother of Honorius, Vana Aldobrandesca, upon which is the statue of the pope himself, removed from his monument in the old St. Peter's by Paul III.

On the left of the high altar is the tomb of Cardinal Gianbattista Savelli, ob. 1498, and near it--in the pavement, the half-effaced gravestone of Sigismondo Conti, whose features are so familiar to us from his portrait introduced into the famous picture of the Madonna di Foligno, which was painted by Raphael at his order, and presented by him to this church, where it remained over the high altar, till 1565, when his great niece Anna became a nun at the convent of the Contesse at Foligno, and was allowed to carry it away with her. In the east transept is another fine gothic tomb, that of Cardinal Matteo di Acquasparta (1302), a General of the Franciscans mentioned by Dante for his wise and moderate rule.[46] The quaint chapel in the middle of this transept, now dedicated to St. Helena, is supposed to occupy the site of the "Ara Primogeniti Dei."

Upon the pier near the ambone of the gospel is the monument of Queen Catherine of Bosnia, who died at Rome in 1478, bequeathing her states to the Roman Church on condition of their reversion to her son, who had embraced Mahommedanism, if he should return to the Catholic faith. Near this, upon the transept wall, is the tomb of Felice de Fredis, ob. 1529, upon which it is recorded that he was the finder of the Laocoon. The Chapel of the Annunciation, opening from the west isle, has a tomb to G. Crivelli, by Donatello, bearing his signature, "Opus Donatelli Florentini." The Chapel of Santa Croce is the burial-place of the Ponziani family, and was the scene of the celebrated ecstasy of the favourite Roman saint Francesca Romana.

"The mortal remains of Vanozza Ponziani (sister-in-law of
Francesca) were laid in the church of Ara-Cœli, in the chapel of
Santa Croce. The Roman people resorted there in crowds to behold
once more their loved benefactress--the mother of the poor, the
consoler of the afflicted. All strove to carry away some little
memorial of one who had gone about among them doing good, and
during the three days which preceded the interment, the concourse
did not abate. On the day of the funeral Francesca knelt on one
side of the coffin, and, in sight of all the crowd, she was wrapped
in ecstasy. They saw her body lifted from the ground, and a
seraphic expression in her uplifted face. They heard her murmur
several times with an indescribable emphasis the word 'Quando?
Quando?' When all was over, she still remained immoveable; it
seemed as if her soul had risen on the wings of prayer, and
followed Vanozza's spirit into the realms of bliss. At last her
confessor ordered her to rise and go and attend on the sick. She
instantly complied, and walked away to the hospital which she had
founded, apparently unconscious of everything about her, and only
roused from her trance by the habit of obedience, which, in or out
of ecstasy, never forsook her."--_Lady Georgiana Fullerton's Life
of Sta. Fr. Romana._

There are several good pictures over the altars in the aisles of Ara-Cœli. In the Chapel of St Margaret of Cortona are frescoes illustrative of her life by _Filippo Evangelisti_,--in that of S. Antonio, frescoes by _Nicola da Pesaro_;--but no one should omit visiting the first chapel on the right of the west door, dedicated to S. Bernardino of Siena, and painted by _Bernardino Pinturicchio_, who has put forth his best powers to do honour to his patron saint with a series of exquisite frescoes, representing his assuming the monastic habit, his preaching, his vision of the Saviour, his penitence, death, and burial.

Almost opposite this--closed except during Epiphany--is the Chapel of the _Presepio_, where the famous image of the _Santissimo Bambino d'Ara Cœli_ is shown at that season lying in a manger.

"The simple meaning of the term _Presepio_ is a manger; but it is
also used in the Church to signify a representation of the birth of
Christ. In the Ara-Cœli the whole of one of the side-chapels is
devoted to this exhibition. In the foreground is a grotto, in which
is seated the Virgin Mary, with Joseph at her side and the
miraculous Bambino in her lap. Immediately behind are an ass and an
ox. On one side kneel the shepherds and kings in adoration; and
above, God the Father is seen surrounded by crowds of cherubs and
angels playing on instruments, as in the early pictures of Raphael.
In the background is a scenic representation of a pastoral
landscape, on which all the skill of the scene-painter is expended.
Shepherds guard their flocks far away, reposing under palm-trees or
standing on green slopes which glow in the sunshine. The distances
and perspective are admirable. In the middle ground is a crystal
fountain of glass, near which sheep, preternaturally white, and
made of real wool and cotton wool, are feeding, tended by figures
of shepherds carved in wood. Still nearer come women bearing great
baskets of real oranges and other fruits on their heads. All the
nearer figures are full-sized, carved in wood, painted, and dressed
in appropriate robes. The miraculous Bambino is a painted doll
swaddled in a white dress, which is crusted over with magnificent
diamonds, emeralds, and rubies. The Virgin also wears in her ears
superb diamond pendants. The general effect of the scenic show is
admirable, and crowds flock to it and press about it all day long.

"While this is taking place on one side of the church, on the other
is a very different and quite as singular an exhibition. Around one
of the antique columns a stage is erected, from which little
maidens are reciting, with every kind of pretty gesticulation,
sermons, dialogues, and little speeches, in explanation of the
_Presepio_ opposite. Sometimes two of them are engaged in alternate
questions and answers about the mysteries of the Incarnation and
the Redemption. Sometimes the recitation is a piteous description
of the agony of the Saviour and the sufferings of the Madonna, the
greatest stress being, however, always laid upon the latter. All
these little speeches have been written for them by their priest or
some religious friend, committed to memory, and practised with
appropriate gestures over and over again at home. Their little
piping voices are sometimes guilty of such comic breaks and
changes, that the crowd about them rustles into a murmurous
laughter. Sometimes, also, one of the little preachers has a
_dispetto_, pouts, shakes her shoulders, and refuses to go on with
her part; another, however, always stands ready on the platform to
supply the vacancy, until friends have coaxed, reasoned, or
threatened the little pouter into obedience. These children are
often very beautiful and graceful, and their comical little
gestures and intonations, their clasping of hands and rolling up of
eyes, have a very amusing and interesting effect."--_Story's Roba
di Roma._

At other times the Bambino dwells in the inner Sacristy, where it can be visited by admiring pilgrims. It is a fresh-coloured doll, tightly swathed in gold and silver tissue, crowned, and sparkling with jewels. It has servants of its own, and a carriage in which it drives out with its attendants, and goes to visit the sick. Devout peasants always kneel as the blessed infant passes. Formerly it was taken to sick persons and left on their beds for some hours, in the hope that it would work a miracle. Now it is never left alone. In explanation of this, it is said that an audacious woman formed the design of appropriating to herself the holy image and its benefits. She had another doll prepared of the same size and appearance as the "Santissimo," and having feigned sickness, and obtained permission to have it left with her, she dressed the false image in its clothes, and sent it back to Ara-Cœli. The fraud was not discovered till night, when the Franciscan monks were awakened by the most furious ringing of bells and by thundering knocks at the west door of the church, and hastening thither could see nothing but a wee naked pink foot peeping in from under the door; but when they opened the door, without stood the little naked figure of the true Bambino of Ara-Cœli, shivering in the wind and the rain,--so the false baby was sent back in disgrace, and the real baby restored to its home, never to be trusted away alone any more.

In the sacristy is the following inscription relating to the Bambino:--

"Ad hoc sacellum Ara Cœli a festo nativitatis domini usque ad
festum Epiphaniæ magna populi frequentia invisitur et colitur in
presepio Christi nati infantuli simulacrum ex oleæ ligno apud
montem olivarum Hierosolymis a quodam devoto Minorita sculptum eo
animo, ut ad hoc festum celebrandum deportaretur. De quo in primis
hoc accidit, quod deficiente colore inter barbaras gentes ad
plenam infantuli figurationem et formam, devotus et anxius artifex,
professione laicus, precibus et orationibus impetravit, ut sacrum
simulacrum divinitus carneo colore perfunctum reperiretur. Cumque
navi Italiam veheretur, facto naufragio apud Tusciæ oras, simulacri
capsa Liburnum appulit. Ex quo, recognita, expectabatur, enim a
Fratribus, et jam fama illius a Hierosolymis ad nostras familiæ
partes advenerat, ad destinatam sibi Capitolii sedem devenit.
Fertur etiam, quod aliquando ex nimia devotione à quadam devota
fœmina sublatum ad suas ædes miraculosè remeaverit. Quapropter
in maxima veneratione semper est habitum a Romanis civibus, et
universo populo donatum monilibus, et jocalibus pretiosis,
liberalioribusque in dies prosequitur oblationibus."

The outer Sacristy contains a fine picture of the Holy Family by _Giulio Romano_.

The scene on the long flight of steps which leads to the west door of Ara-Cœli is very curious during Epiphany.

"If any one visit the Ara-Cœli during an afternoon in Christmas
or Epiphany, the scene is very striking. The flight of one hundred
and twenty-four steps is then thronged by merchants of Madonna
wares, who spread them out over the steps and hang them against the
walls and balustrades. Here are to be seen all sorts of curious
little coloured prints of the Madonna and Child of the most
extraordinary quality, little bags, pewter medals, and crosses
stamped with the same figures and to be worn on the neck--all
offered at once for the sum of one _baiocco_. Here also are framed
pictures of the saints, of the Nativity, and in a word of all sorts
of religious subjects appertaining to the season. Little wax dolls,
clad in cotton-wool to represent the Saviour, and sheep made of the
same materials, are also sold by the basket-full. Children and
_Contadini_ are busy buying them, and there is a deafening roar all
up and down the steps, of 'Mezzo baiocco, bello colorito, mezzo
baiocco, la Santissima Concezione Incoronata,'--'Diario Romano,
Lunario Romano nuovo,'--'Ritratto colorito, medaglia e quadruccio,
un baiocco tutti, un baiocco tutti,'--'Bambinella di cera, un
baiocco.' None of the prices are higher than one baiocco, except to
strangers, and generally several articles are held up together,
enumerated, and proffered with a loud voice for this sum. Meanwhile
men, women, children, priests, beggars, soldiers, and _villani_ are
crowding up and down, and we crowd with them."--_Roba di Roma_, i.
72.

"On the sixth of January the lofty steps of Ara-Cœli looked like
an ant-hill, so thronged were they with people. Men and boys who
sold little books (legends and prayers), rosaries, pictures of
saints, medallions, chestnuts, oranges, and other things, shouted
and made a great noise. Little boys and girls were still preaching
zealously in the church, and people of all classes were crowding
thither. Processions advanced with the thundering cheerful music of
the fire-corps. Il Bambino, a painted image of wood, covered with
jewels, and with a yellow crown on its head, was carried by a monk
in white gloves, and exhibited to the people from a kind of
altar-like erection at the top of the Ara-Cœli steps. Everybody
dropped down upon their knees; Il Bambino was shown on all sides,
the music thundered, and the smoking censers were
swung."--_Frederika Bremer._

The _Convent of Ara-Cœli_ contains much that is picturesque and interesting. S. Giovanni Capistrano was abbot here in the reign of Eugenius IV.

Let us now descend from the Capitoline Piazza towards the Forum, by the staircase on the left of the Palace of the Senator. Close to the foot of this staircase is a church, very obscure-looking, with some rude frescoes on the exterior. Yet every one must enter this building, for here are the famous _Mamertine Prisons_, excavated from the solid rock under the Capitol.

The prisons are entered through the low Church of S. Pietro in Carcere, hung round with votive offerings and blazing with lamps.

"There is an upper chamber in the Mamertine Prisons, over what is
said to have been--and very possibly may have been--the dungeon of
St. Peter. The chamber is now fitted up as an oratory, dedicated to
that saint; and it lives, as a distinct and separate place, in my
recollection, too. It is very small and low-roofed; and the dread
and gloom of the ponderous, obdurate old prison are on it, as if
they had come up in a dark mist through the floor. Hanging on the
walls, among the clustered votive offerings, are objects, at once
strangely in keeping and strangely at variance with the
place--rusty daggers, knives, pistols, clubs, divers instruments of
violence and murder, brought here, fresh from use, and hung up to
propitiate offended Heaven; as if the blood upon them would drain
off in consecrated air, and have no voice to cry with. It is all so
silent and so close, and tomblike; and the dungeons below are so
black, and stealthy, and stagnant, and naked; that this little dark
spot becomes a dream within a dream: and in the vision of great
churches which come rolling past me like a sea, it is a small wave
by itself, that melts into no other wave, and does not flow on with
the rest."--_Dickens._

Enclosed in the church, near the entrance, may be observed the outer frieze of the prison wall, with the inscription C. TIBIUS. C. F. RUFINUS. M.. COCCEIUS. NERVA. COS. EX. S. C., recording the names of two consuls of A.D. 22, who are supposed to have repaired the prison. Juvenal's description of the time when one prison was sufficient for all the criminals in Rome naturally refers to this building:

"Felices proavorum atavos, felicia dicas
Sæcula, quæ quondam sub regibus atque tribunis
Viderunt uno contentam carcere Romam."

_Sat._ iii. 312.

A modern staircase leads to the horrible dungeon of Ancus Martius, sixteen feet in height, thirty in length, and twenty-two in breadth. Originally there was no staircase, and the prisoners were let down there, and thence into the lower dungeon, through a hole in the middle of the ceiling. The large door at the side is a modern innovation, having been opened to admit the vast mass of pilgrims during the festa. The whole prison is constructed of huge blocks of tufa without cement. Some remains are shown of the _Scalæ Gemoniæ_, so called from the groans of the prisoners--by which the bodies were dragged forth to be exposed to the insults of the populace or to be thrown into the Tiber. It was by this staircase that Cicero came forth and announced the execution of the Catiline conspirators to the people in the Forum, by the single word _Vixerunt_, "they have ceased to live." Close to the exit of these stairs the Emperor Vitellius was murdered. On the wall by which you descend to the lower dungeon is a mark, kissed by the faithful, as the spot against which St. Peter's head rested. The lower prison, called _Robur_, is constructed of huge blocks of tufa, fastened together by cramps of iron and approaching horizontally to a common centre in the roof. It has been attributed from early times to Servius Tullius; but Ampère[47] argues against the idea that the lower prison was of later origin than the upper, and suggests that it is Pelasgic, and older than any other building in Rome. It is described by Livy, and by Sallust, who depicts its horrors in his account of the execution of the Catiline conspirators.[48] The spot is shown to which these victims were attached and strangled in turn. In this dungeon, at an earlier period, Appius Claudius and Oppius the decemvirs committed suicide (B.C. 449). Here Jugurtha, king of Mauritania, was starved to death by Marius. Here Julius Cæsar, during his triumph for the conquest of Gaul, caused his gallant enemy Vercingetorix to be put to death. Here Sejanus, the friend and minister of Tiberius, disgraced too late, was executed for the murder of Drusus, son of the emperor, and for an intrigue with his daughter-in-law, Livilla. Here, also, Simon Bar-Gioras, the last defender of Jerusalem, suffered during the triumph of Titus.

The spot is more interesting to the Christian world as the prison of SS. Peter and Paul, who are said to have been bound for nine months to a pillar, which is shown here. A fountain of excellent water, beneath the floor of the prison, is attributed to the prayers of St. Peter, that he might have wherewith to baptize his gaolers, Processus and Martinianus; but, unfortunately for this ecclesiastical tradition, the fountain is described by Plutarch as having existed at the time of Jugurtha's imprisonment This fountain probably gave the dungeon the name of _Tullianum_, by which it was sometimes known, _tullius_ meaning a spring.[49] This name probably gave rise to the idea of its connection with Servius Tullius.

It is hence that the Roman Catholic Church believes that St. Peter and St Paul addressed their farewells to the Christian world.

That of St. Peter:--

"Shortly I must put off this my tabernacle, even as our Lord Jesus
Christ hath showed me. Moreover I will endeavour that ye may be
able after my decease to have these things always in remembrance.
For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made
known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ....
Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and
a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness."--_2nd St. Peter._

That of St. Paul:--

"God hath not given us a spirit of fear.... Be not thou, therefore,
ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me his prisoner; but
be thou partaker of the afflictions of the gospel according to the
power of God.... I suffer trouble as an evil doer, even unto bonds;
but the word of God is not bound. Therefore I endure all things,
for the elect's sake, that they also may obtain the salvation which
is in Christ Jesus.... I charge thee by God and by the Lord Jesus
Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead ... preach the
word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort
with all long-suffering and doctrine; ... watch in all things,
endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof
of thy ministry. For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of
my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have
finished my course, I have kept the faith."--_2nd Timothy._

On July 4, the prisons are the scene of a picturesque solemnity, when they are visited at night by the religious confraternities, who first kneel and then prostrate themselves in silent devotion.

Above the Church of S. Pietro in Carcere, is that of _S. Giuseppe del Falegnami_, St. Joseph of the Carpenters.

"Pourquoi les guides et les antiquaires qui nous ont si souvent
montré la voie triomphale qui mène au Capitale et nous en ont tant
de fois énuméré les souvenirs; pourquoi aucun d'eux ne nous a-t-il
jamais parlé de ce qui survint le jour du triomphe de Titus,
là-bas, près des prisons Mamertines? Laisse-moi vous rappeler que
ce jour-là le triomphateur, au moment de monter au temple, devant
verser le sang d'une victime, s'arrêta à cette place, tandis que
l'on détachait de son cortége un captif de plus haute taille et
plus richement vêtu que les autres, et qu'on l'emmenait dans cette
prison pour y achever son supplice avec le lacet même qu'il portait
autour du cou. Ce ne fût qu'après cette immolation que le cortége
reprit sa marche et acheva de monter jusqu'au Capitole! Ce captif
dont on ne daigne nous parler, c'était Simon Bar-Gioras; c'était un
des trois derniers défenseurs de Jérusalem; c'était un de ceux qui
la défendirent jusqu'au bout, mais hélas! qui la défendirent comme
des démons maîtres d'une âme de laquelle ils ne veulent pas se
laisser chasser, et non point comme des champions héroïques d'une
cause sacrée et perdue. Aussi cette grandeur que la seule infortune
suffit souvent pour donner, elle manque à la calamité la plus
grande que le monde ait vue, et les noms attachés à cette immense
catastrophe ne demeurèrent pas même fameux! Jean de Giscala,
Eléazar, Simon Bar-Gioras; qui pense à eux aujourd'hui? L'univers
entier proclame et vénère les noms de deux pauvres juifs qui,
quatre ans auparavant, dans cette même prison, avaient eux aussi
attendu la supplice; mais le malheur, le courage, la mort tragique
des autres, ne leur ont point donné la gloire, et un dédaigneux
oubli les a effacés de la mémoire des hommes!"--_(Anne Severin)
Mrs. Augustus Craven._

"Along the sacred way
Hither the triumph came, and, winding round
With acclamation, and the martial clang
Of instruments, and cars laden with spoil,
Stopped at the sacred stair that then appeared,
Then thro' the darkness broke, ample, star-bright,
As tho' it led to heaven. 'Twas night; but now
A thousand torches, turning night to day,
Blazed, and the victor, springing from his seat,
Went up, and, kneeling as in fervent prayer,
Entered the Capitol. But what are they
Who at the foot withdraw, a mournful train
In fetters? And who, yet incredulous,
Now gazing wildly round, now on his sons,
On those so young, well pleased with all they see,
Staggers along, the last? They are the fallen,
Those who were spared to grace the chariot-wheels;
And there they parted, where the road divides,
The victor and the vanquished--there withdrew;
He to the festal board, and they to die.
"Well might the great, the mighty of the world,
They who were wont to fare deliciously
And war but for a kingdom more or less,
Shrink back, nor from their thrones endure to look,
To think that way! Well might they in their pomp
Humble themselves, and kneel and supplicate
To be delivered from a dream like this!"

_Rogers' Italy._