* * *
Her catholic heart rejoiced in the city of three hundred and fifty churches, eighty of which are dedicated to the Virgin. And here her knowledge surpassed mine. She gave me brief accounts of the lives of Saint Cecilia, Saint Agnes and Saint Catherine of Siena, of whom I knew nothing. The places which their deaths have sanctified derived all their meaning from these narratives. At the church of Santa Maria Maggiore she told me of the miracle of the snow which fell in the month of August, to point out to the Pope the site of the basilica. I grieved her with my ironies and doubts, whereas the miracle of her charm should have watered the barrenness of my mind like that cool snowfall itself. Then, having amused myself with the religious instruction of which she gave me the benefit, little by little I began to be annoyed by it. It seemed to me that I was reduced to second place. My vanity could not endure it. In consequence, for several days I systematically selected for the object of our walks those ancient ruins wherein I had the advantage of her.
However, I did go with her sometimes to service at Santa Maria del Popolo, and the Trinità dei Monte, which, being near the Piazza di Spagna, where we were living, were her particular churches. For Trinity, whose rose-coloured bell towers at the alluring hour of the Benediction, are beautified by the evening light, we had only to mount the staircase, from the flower market at the bottom. It is on the Road to the Pincio, where we went later.
But instead of admiring this elevation of spirit I derived bitterness from it. Did I not wish to confiscate all her powers of feeling to the profit of my love alone?
“A moment ago,” I protested once, “you were praying, and I was not in your thoughts.”
She was much surprised at my remark.
“You are always in my thoughts when I pray,” she replied. “How could it be otherwise?”
I was struggling against a happiness the perfection of which I was incapable of understanding. My wife charmed and at the same time bewildered me. I had thought to find her a docile pupil and yet sometimes my teachings seemed vain, useless and absurd, sometimes in advance of her age and preparation. I had at times, in the bottom of my heart, the instinctive feeling that she surpassed me, and perhaps without self-love I might have bowed to her nobility. But what man ever renounces his self-love? Instead of renouncing mine I hastened to pronounce her childish.
* * *
I recall one more incident at Rome in which I find our differences revealed.