A Year in Europe

by Walter W. Moore

The Hardness of St. Peter's Head.

In the Mamertine Prisons, which are also quite close to the Forum, a depression on the stone wall by which we descend to the lower dungeon is shown as the spot against which St. Peter's head rested, though our guide had just told us that these stairs were not in existence then and prisoners were let down into the dungeon through the hole in the middle of the stone floor. Such trifling discrepancies do not seem to trouble the average Italian mind.

St. Peter and St. Paul are said to have been bound in this prison 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" here, long before the time of St. Peter.

Another miraculous spring, still flowing, is shown in the Church of SS. Cosmo and Damiano as that which burst forth in answer to the prayers of Felix IV., that he might have water to baptize his disciples.

What the Head of St. Paul Did.

But the most interesting of all the miraculous springs in or around Rome are the three fountains, about two miles from the city, where the Apostle Paul was executed. When his head was severed from his body it bounded from the earth three times, crying out thrice, "Jesus! Jesus! Jesus!" A fountain burst from the ground at each of the three spots where the severed head struck. It is asserted, in proof of this origin of the fountains, that the water of the first is still warm, of the second tepid, and of the third cold, but we drank of them one after another without being able to detect any difference in temperature. The apostle's head is shown in bas relief upon the three altars above the fountains. In the church which has been built over them we were shown the pillar to which he was bound, and the block of marble upon which he was decapitated, and, in the vault of another church hard by, the prison in which he was placed just before his execution.

We could not help asking the priest who was our escort whether this extraordinary story was still believed. His answer was: "Certainly! There is no reason whatever to doubt it. The facts have been handed down in an unbroken succession from eye-witnesses," a position which he proceeded to defend at length and with great warmth when one of our party in particular manifested much slowness to believe.

St. Paul's Use of Plautilla's Veil.

Furthermore, the opening of these three fountains was not the only miracle wrought by the apostle after his death. Mrs. Jameson says: "The legend of his death relates that a certain Roman matron named Plautilla, one of the converts of S. Peter, placed herself on the road by which S. Paul passed to his martyrdom, to behold him for the last time; and when she saw him she wept greatly and besought his blessing. The apostle then, seeing her faith, turned to her, and begged that she would give him her veil to blind his eyes when he should be beheaded, promising to return it to her after his death. The attendants mocked at such a promise; but Plautilla, with a woman's faith and charity, taking off her veil, presented it to him. After his martyrdom, S. Paul appeared to her and restored the veil, stained with his blood. In the ancient representations of the martyrdom of S. Paul, the legend of Plautilla is seldom omitted. In the picture by Giotto in the Sacristy of S. Peter's, Plautilla is seen on an eminence in the background, receiving the veil from the hands of S. Paul, who appears in the clouds above; the same representation, but little varied, is executed in bas-relief on the bronze doors of St. Peter's."