Surrounded by this inconceivable wealth of splendor, rises a baldacchino surmounted by a dome, supported by four pillars of red alabaster, also the gift of the Turkish Pacha. An angel stands at each corner of the canopy. Within this miniature temple is another, and an older, being the altar-canopy, saved from the fire that, in 1823, destroyed the greater portion of the ancient building. Under this, again, is the marble altar—crimson and emerald—enshrining it is said, the bones of St. Paul. The inscription runs along the four sides of the baldacchino:
“Tu es vas electionis.
Sancte Paule Apostole.
Prædicator veritatis.
In universo mundo.”
A railing, inclosing an area of perhaps a dozen yards, prevents too close an approach to the altar.
“You must first have a permesso from the Pope, or, at least, from a Cardinal,” said a passing verger to whom we communicated our desire to go in. Discovering, upon trial, that the gate was not locked, we felt strongly inclined to make an independent sally, but were withheld by a principle to which we endeavored to be uniformly true,—namely,—obedience to law, and what the usages of the time and place decreed to be order. A priest, belonging, we guessed from his dress, to a higher order than most of those we had encountered in our tour of the building, knelt on the low step surrounding the railing, and while my companions strolled on, I loitered near the forbidden gate, one eye upon him who prayed at the shrine of “Sancte Paule Apostole.” When he arose, I accosted him, having had leisure in which to study a diplomatic address. I chanced to have in the pocket of my cloak a box of Roman pearls and other trinkets I had bought that forenoon. Producing this, as a prefatory measure, and beginning with the conventional, “Pardon, Monsieur!” I informed him in the best French at my command, that I was a stranger and an American—facts he must have gleaned before I had dropped three words;—that, although not a Roman Catholic, I desired to lay these trifles upon the tomb of St. Paul. Not out of custom or superstition, but as I might pick a flower from, or touch, in greeting, the grave of a friend.
He had a noble, gentle face and hearkened kindly to my petition.
“I comprehend!” he said, taking the beads from my hand, and, beckoning up a sacristan, motioned him to open the gate.
“You can enter, Madame!” he continued, with a courteous inclination of the head.