The body of the saint, clad in his episcopal robes, for he was bishop of Ancona, is preserved in a subterranean chapel, and is annually exposed, for the first eight days of the month of May, to the veneration of the people.
The legend runs, that after undergoing in the east the martyrdom of boiling lead being poured down his throat, his remains floated in a stone coffin back to the scene of his former labours.
In the duomo is also kept the famous picture of the Madonna, attested to have opened her eyes in 1795, at a moment of great peril to the State, which was overrun by the armies of the French Republic. Fifty years after, in 1845, this miracle received the confirmation of the papal authority; and the petitions from the gonfaloniere (mayor) and magistrates, the clergy and the nobility, imploring that, “as an acknowledgment of being thus privileged, they might be permitted to place Ancona under the immediate protection of the Madonna, who, by opening the eyes of her venerated image, had signally shown her favour towards it”—received a gracious response. Fireworks, processions, a general illumination, and nine days of religious ceremonies at the duomo, inaugurated this event, which at every succeeding anniversary is still commemorated with great solemnity.
It was my good fortune to hear a course of sermons delivered in honour of the holy image by a Barnabite friar, Padre G—— of Bologna, one of the most celebrated preachers of the day; and the scene presented by the illuminated church, the enthroned picture—a meek and lowly face, shaded by a dark-blue mantle, but resplendent with a star and rose of brilliants, with which it had been adorned by Pius VII.—the eager upturned countenances of the crowd, as their kindling glances wandered from the impassioned orator to the half-closed eyes of the motionless effigy he was apostrophizing—the enthusiastic appeals, the fervent action of the priest as his lofty form towered in the pulpit, and his powerful voice swelled like an organ through the aisles—all rises vividly before me, resembling some dream of enchantment, with that strange fascination that such pageants in Italy possess.
Not less remarkable than his startling eloquence was the ingenuity with which the preacher diversified nine consecutive days of discourses upon the same topic. One day he surprised his auditors by a dissertation on the invention of gunpowder, the destructive missiles employed in modern warfare, the disastrous sieges and the fearful loss of life, all attributable to this discovery. Then depicting the horrors of two or three well-known bombardments and pillages with thrilling power, he asked triumphantly whence it was that Ancona, often surrounded by hostile armies, and invested by foes as watchful as relentless, had always been preserved from a similar fate? Whence, if not by the miraculous presence of that heavenly portrait, whose modest eyelids had been raised, in moments of the greatest peril to the church, to give courage to the dejected, and faith to the wavering!
On another occasion he commenced by a vivid description of the early youth, the education, the first exploits of Napoleon. He led you on step by step in his career; he successively brought him before you as the sullen, sensitive boy at Brienne, the aspiring lieutenant of artillery, the young general of twenty-six, making Italy ring with his fame. On he went, gathering fresh ardour, more striking similes, more startling vehemence, as he dwelt on the resistless might which hurled down thrones and swept away kingdoms in a breath, till he brought him, flushed with conquest, to Ancona. “And here,” he continued—“here, beneath this venerable dome, standing before the sacred picture, prepared to scoff and ridicule its divine powers—that man, with eagle eyes and folded arms, gives one hurried glance and trembles.... Yes! The haughty brow which the fabled thunders of Jove might have encircled, is bent before that benign though reproachful gaze. His sallow cheek grows ashy pale as those heavenly orbs unclose upon him! His limbs totter; the sacrilegious hand which was stretched forth to lay hold on the venerated image is withdrawn, and he hastens away, sternly forbidding its removal or inspection!”
As a last specimen of this attractive, but certainly peculiar style of pulpit oratory, I ought to quote from a magnificent delineation, with which he opened another of his discourses, of the terror that marks the progress of the Destroying Angel, scattering pestilence from his sable wings, with desolation and mourning in his wake. But my limits forbid anything beyond a mere sketch of the subjects on which he enlarged with a graphic power, a scenic effect—if I may use the term—of which it is impossible to convey any just conception. The dread judgment on the first-born of Egypt, the plagues sent on the murmuring Israelites—the dire records of the dark ages, when cities were made desolate, and whole populations swept away by similar awful visitations—all were detailed with harrowing power. Passing on from these to modern times, he addressed himself more particularly to the feelings of his auditors, by recalling the ravages which the cholera had made a few years previous in Ancona, when, out of its then population of 25,000, 1000 were swept away; and finally bade them ascribe their own preservation—the final disappearance of the scourge—to the wondrous picture having been borne, amid the tears and supplications of the inhabitants, in solemn procession through the streets. “Give me, O Maria!” he here cried with transport, striking himself upon the breast—“give me a spring-tide of roses and hyacinths to weave in garlands for thy shrine; give me the laurel-wreath of genius, the monarch's crown of gems; give me all that earth holds beautiful or rare, to cast in tribute at thy feet. Give me eloquence to inspire, fervour to excite, persuasion to reclaim—give all to me, who yet am nothing, to be consecrated to thy service. Let me gaze on those celestial eyes which so benignly opened upon Ancona, and gather there undying ardour and unconquerable love, our only hope, our only refuge!”
After an address of this description, an approving murmur used to be discernible among the crowd, while now and then an irrepressible “bravo,” or a patronizing “bene, bene,” would be heard. But, apart from the peasants—who, as I have said, flocked in large numbers to these ceremonies—and the poor old women, whose withered lips and palsied fingers were ever busy in saying their rosary and counting its beads, I should be sorry to have to estimate how much real devotion dwelt in the hearts of the multitude which daily congregated at the duomo.
On the last evening of the Novena, I remember well the utter failure of the Chevalier V——, the * * * Consul, to elicit a spark of devotional enthusiasm. We were all standing on the duomo steps, looking at the fireworks which concluded the solemnity, when a triumph of Anconitan pyrotechnic art disclosed a star, with the initial M. At this the good man, thoroughly honest in his convictions, waved his hat in the air, and shouted to the crowd, “Let us have an Evviva for Maria;” but not a man's voice responded. There was a feeble quaver of cracked trebles and then silence. He looked sad and mortified, but did not repeat the experiment. He never discussed the subject with us; but I know that he implicitly accepted the authenticity of the miracle. He would have considered it as a sin to permit his mind to wander into any questionings on that to which the Church had set her seal.
But there were few like him in Ancona. I could count on my fingers, without passing those of one hand even, such amongst the Codino nobles as entered with any earnestness into the Novena. The dominant feeling with persons who still held belief in their religion, yet whose judgment was not denied its exercise, was profound regret at the whole proceeding; they rightly estimated it as only calculated to spread irreverence and scepticism.