18 February.
The present has been a week of demonstrations, both Papal and anti-Papal. Last Thursday
was the Giovedi Grasso, the great people’s day of the carnival. In other years, from an early hour in the afternoon, there is a constant stream of carriages and foot-passengers setting from all parts of Rome towards the Corso. The back-streets and the ordinary promenades are almost deserted. The delight of the Romans in the carnival is so notorious, that persons long resident in Rome possessed the strongest conviction beforehand, that no human power could ever keep the natives from the Corso upon Thursday. The day, unlike its predecessors, was brilliantly bright. The Corso was decked out as gaily as hangings and awnings could make it. The sellers of bouquets and “confetti” were at their posts. A number of carriages were sent down filled with adherents of the Government, dressed in carnival attire, to act as decoy-ducks. All officials were required to take part in the festivities. The influence of the priests was exerted to beat up carnival recruits amongst their flocks, and yet the people obstinately declined coming. The revel was ready, but the revellers were wanting. The stiff-necked Romans were not content with stopping away, but insisted on going elsewhere. By one of those tacit understandings, which are always the characteristic
of a country without public life or liberty, a place of rendezvous was fixed upon. Without notice or proclamation of any kind, everybody knew somehow, though how, nobody could tell, that the road beyond the Porta Pia was the place where people were to meet on the day in question. The spot was appropriate on various grounds. Along the Via Nomentana, which leaves Rome through this gate, lies the Mons Sacer, whither the Plebs of old seceded from the city, to escape from the tyranny of their rulers. The gate too, which was commenced by Michael Angelo, was completed by the present Pontiff, and there is an irony dear to an Italian’s mind in the idea of choosing the Porta Pia for the egress of a demonstration against the Pope Pius. Perhaps, after all, the fact that the road is one of the sunniest and pleasantest near Rome may have had more to do with its selection than any abstract considerations. Be the cause what it may, one fact is certain, that from the time when the Corso ought to have been filling, a multitude of carriages and holiday-dressed people set out towards the Porta Pia. The Giovedi Grasso is a feast-day in Rome, and all the shops are shut, and their owners at liberty. All Rome, in consequence, seemed to be wending
towards the Porta Pia. From the gate to the convent of St Agnese, a distance of about a mile, there was a long string of carriages, chiefly hired vehicles, but filled with well-dressed persons. As far as I could judge, the number of private and aristocratic conveyances was small. The prince of Piombino, who is married to one of the half-English Borghese princesses, was the only Roman nobleman I heard of, as being amongst the crowd. But if the nobility were not present on the Via Nomentana, they were equally absent from the Corso. The footpaths were thronged with a dense file of orderly respectable people. There were, perhaps, half-a-dozen carriages, the owners of which had some sort of carnival-dress on, but that was all. There were no cries, no throwing of confetti, no demonstration of feeling, except in the very fact of the assemblage. As far as I could guess from my own observation, there were about 6000 people present, and from 400 to 500 carriages; though persons who ought to be well informed have told me that there were double these numbers. No attempt at interference was made on the part of the French. There were but few French soldiers about, and what there were, were evidently mere spectators. Pontifical gendarmes
passed along the road at frequent intervals, and, not being able to arrest a multitude, consoled themselves with the small piece of tyranny of closing the osterias, which, both in look and character, bear a strong resemblance to our London tea-gardens, and are a favourite resort of thirsty and dusty pedestrians. The crowd, nevertheless, remained perfectly orderly and peaceful, and as soon as the carnival-time was over, returned quietly to the city. As I came back from the gate I passed through the Corso just before the course was cleared for the races. I have never seen in Italy a rabble like that collected in the street. The crowd was much such a one as you will sometimes meet, and avoid, in the low purlieus of London on Guy Faux day. Carriages there were, some forty in all, chiefly English. One hardly met a single respectable-looking person, except foreigners, in the crowd; and I own I was not sorry when I reached my destination, and got clear of the mob. Yet the report of the police of the Pope was, that the carnival was brilliante, e brilliantissimo.
On the following day (Friday) much the same sort of demonstration took place in the Corso. There being no carnival, the whole street, from
the Piazza del Popolo to the Capitol, was filled with a line of carriages, going and returning at a foot’s pace. The balconies and windows were filled with spectators, and the rabble of the previous day was replaced by the same quiet, decent crowd I had seen at the Porta Pia. The carriages, from some cause or other, were more aristocratic in appearance; while the number of spectators was much smaller—probably because it was a working day, and not a “festa.” By seven o’clock the assemblage dispersed, and the street was empty. Meanwhile, Friday afternoon was chosen for the time of a counter-demonstration at the Vatican. All the English Roman Catholics sojourning in Rome received notice that it was proposed to present an address to the Pope, condoling with him in his afflictions. Cardinal Wiseman was the chief promoter, and framed the address. Many Roman Catholics, I understand, abstained from going, because they were not aware what the terms of the address might be, and how far the sentiments expressed in it might be consistent with their position as English subjects. The demonstration outwardly was not a very imposing one; about fifty cabs and one-horse vehicles drove up at three o’clock to the Vatican, and
altogether some 150 persons, men, women, and children, of English extraction, mustered together as representatives of Catholic England. The address was read by Cardinal Wiseman, expressing in temperate terms enough the sympathy of the meeting for the tribulations which had befallen his Holiness. The bearing of the Pope, so his admirers state, was calm, dignified, and resolute. As however, I have heard this statement made on every occasion of his appearance in public, I am disposed to think it was much what it usually is—the bearing of a good-natured, not over-wise, and somewhat shaky old man. In reply to the address, he stated that “if it was the will of God that chastisement should be inflicted upon his Church, he, as His vicar, however unworthy, must taste of the chalice;” and that, “as becomes all Christians, knowing that though we cannot penetrate the motives of God, yet that He in his wisdom permits nothing without an ulterior object, we may safely trust that this object must be good.” All persons present then advanced and kissed the Pope’s hand, or foot, if the ardour of their devotion was not contented by kissing the hand alone. When this presentation was over, the Pope requested the company to kneel, and then prayed
in Italian for the spiritual welfare of England, calling her the land of the saints, and alluding to the famous Non Angli, sed angeli. He exhorted all present “to look forward to the good time when justice and mercy should meet and embrace each other as brothers;” and finally, with faltering voice, and tears rolling down his cheeks, gave his apostolical benediction. Of course, if you can shut your eyes to facts, all this is very pretty and sentimental. If the Romans could be happy enough to possess the constitution of Thibet, and have a spiritual and a temporal Grand Llama, they could not have fixed on a more efficient candidate for the former post than the present Pope; but the crowds of French soldiers which lined the streets to coerce the chosen people, formed a strange comment on the value of pontifical piety. It is too true that the better the Pope the worse the ruler. Probably the thousands of Romans who thronged the Corso knew more about the blessings of the Papal sway than the few score strangers, who volunteered to pay the homage to the Sovereign of Rome which the Romans refuse to render.
To-day the demonstration was repeated on the Porta Pia; and the Vatican, indignant at its
powerlessness to suppress these symptoms of disaffection, is anxious to stir up the crowd to some overt act of insurrection, which may justify or, at any rate, palliate the employment of violent measures. So in order to incense the crowd, the public executioner was sent out in a cart guarded by gendarmes to excite some active expression of anger on the part of the mob. It is hard for us to understand the feeling with which the Italians, and especially the Romans, regard the carnefice. He is always a condemned murderer, whose life is spared on condition of his assuming the hated office, and, except on duty, he is never allowed to leave the quarter of St Angelo, where he dwells, as otherwise his life would be sacrificed to the indignation of the crowd, who regard his presence as a contamination.
The poor fellow looked sheepish and frightened enough, as he patrolled slowly with his escort up and down the crowded Porta Pia thoroughfare; but even this insult failed to effect its object. The device was too transparent for an Italian crowd not to detect it, and the ill-omened cortége of the “Pope’s representative,” as the Romans styled the executioner, passed by without any comment.