ITALY IN 1848. (From M.Farlane's Glance at Revolutionised Italy.)

New Zealander, Volume 5, Issue 346, 25 August 1849, Page 4

ITALY IN 1848. (From M.Farlane's Glance at Revolutionised Italy.)

Mh. MacFaim v^'k joined lho ce who assembled at tin door of the Cluiim.il to see His Iloliniss come oui, and \\.m sketches I'iub the Ninth, as he was m tb< suinirpi' of IS4B— "•Now ii the time,' sad our attentive Swiss,' go up to the door, Biid you will get a near view of the Santo Padre, and see him come out and enter hU coach.' We walked up the colonmde, but hesi'ated to make too close an approach, until we saw three 01 four old women and a ftw men of (he poorest order of the people %o stinight up to the cairiage and the palace steps without being challenged or mienuptecf by any one. In a few seconds Pius IX. came slowly out of the palace in the midst of a number of prelates, who hung close round him. On the upper step he raised his hand in sign of the usual benediction ; but few, indeed, were those on whom the blessing fell. One of the old women knelt down and held up a petition. This occasioned a brief s<op, and the stopping caused an evident alarm among, those who were in the rear 01 inside the hall. One of the secretaries took the paper; then Pius made almost a rush into the carrijge, the secretary and two other gentlemen got in aftei him, and presently, aid in mournful silence, the procession slowly moved across the sqime, His Holiness being preceded by thie*» carriages, and followed by a like nnmber. It might have h<c» taken for a funeral procession. We reached the outer gate of the palace before the rarri-ig's, and saw them roll across the plateau of Mngno Cavullo There was hardly a soul in that Piazza which, a few months before, used to be crowded from morning till night by people eager to see the Pope and to shout' Viva Fio Nor.o" whenever he appeared. Now there was no 'Viva:' none siid * God bless him. 1 Of the lew juesciir, some sneeicd ; the leiit showed the most compete iudiffeience —all but one old mnn, whose eyes moistened and lips quivered; he would have s*id 'Viva,' but dared not do it. The movuved guard hung closely touud the Pope's carriage, sabre in lif-nd : a thin, pale, dark ecclesiastic, in bldcV— resembling one ol Titian's wellknown portraits of an old Venetian priest—looked anxiously out at the cariiuge window. In the street which leads from the Quirinal Mount there were some Roman citizens and national guardsmen, of whom hardly a man had the grace to touch his hat. On entering that street, the carriages were driven on with unecclesiastical speed, and the Pope's vehicle disappeared from our sight in thr midst of fishing swords. Sic ti ansit.' We thought both the person and countenance of the Sovereign Pontiff—who, if not a remarkable man, is a mnn of remarkable adventures —somewhat 'coarse, heavy, and plebeian. His face is very like his nudils and medallions, and the common plaster casts and lithographs; but in the best of the medals the countenance is idealised and improved. They fay that when he is animated bis countenance c'eari up and becomes very expressive. As we saw it it was certainly dull and common. The face was fat and sallow ; not the good, deep, rich Italian olive, but Tather of the colour of the oil press. Bh form was obese, and, as he stepped into the cai riage, he exhibited n broad fat foot in white satin shoes, and a pair of ancles of portentous dimensions. The Pope looked dropsical. The llomans said that he was in bud health, and subject to epileptic fits. His robes teem to hang about him as if they did not belong to him, or had not been made for him. How different the Ninth from the Seventh Pius I" In Florence he observed that the fraternities were for the moment learning more about arms than about arts— «' In the Church of Santa Maria Novella [-ays Mr. MacFarlane] when we were looking for the greatest picture of Cunabue, people came flocking in, the silver bell rang, end maps commenced in two or three parts of the church. Not to offend any religious feeling, we gave up our search, and walked out into the nearest of the several cloistered squares of the monastery. But we had been there a very few seconds ere we were startled by a loud rattle of drum?, which mubt have been nearly as audible to these who remained ai the mass as to us, for a side-door of the church was wide open, and so were some of the windows. One of the Dominican monks passed "hurriedly through the cloisters. We askrd what that noise meant, but he was gloomy and (acilurn, and would give us no answer. The tinklo of the mass bell was heard upon one side and the loud drumming continued on the other We walked out of those cloisters and through a lon£ passage and other cloisteis (where tome of the monks were chanting the offices), arid came upon a more spacious quadrangle, on the four sides of which were other cloisters, nnd over the cloisters the cells of the monks. In the open space there weie between fifty and Bixty ' hopes ot the country'"learning to march to the sound of the drum. The greater pirt of these hopefuls were mere children, but they had two solemnly bearded men acting as instructing officers, and they had two of the most strenuous and loudest of drummers. The exercise consisted solely in marching or moving and trying to keep step, the last being 6ome. thing which veiy few of the little urchins could do at al', having never practised their ' goose-Btep.' I\.rma» tions, or even a plain 6ing'e line, weie quite out of the question : yet this child's play was the only species of military exerci«e we ever witnessed among the citizen soldiers. One would have thought that they might have played at soldiers elsewhere and at a different time from that of mass on a Sabbath morning. One ■would have fancied that they would have been altogether ashamed of such a cancatuieof the art military, but such exhibitions were warmly promoted by the patriots, and the journalists quoted them as knockdown proofs of the martial ardour which was pervading the Tußcan people. In the midst of the area round which these little beys were moving, there was a fine statue of il Beato Giovanni, or John the Beatified, the founder of the house, whose arm was outstrelehed as if in the act oi preaching. That solemn figure and outstretched arm seemed to reproach the authors of this profanation, and to warn back the childish actors in it. But rat-a-tat-tat went the drums, and away went the urelrns treating on one another's heels and. laughing A sombre old Dominican, in his white robe and cowl, citme down from his cell, probably being unable to bear that noise and clatter any longer. As he passed us in the cloisters we spoke to him, but he scarcely made a reply, and glided on and vanished There came down another monk, hut he was still more surly or discomposed. In the Spezzieria or Faimacia, a very important and widely-famed part of this ancient monastic establishme it, we found tsvo of the Dominicans who were somewhat less desperate or mote selfpossessed. ' This,' said I, ' is a 6tiange place tochocse for these exeicises.' —'Ah,' said one of the friars, • you 9ee to what we and this ancient and holy house aie reduced I But thfse are strange times.' We askel whether, among all the many piazze and other open places in Florence, they conld not find some more suitable place for e.\ercibing ? 'They could find plenty,' baitl the monk, ' but they like better to disturb us! They a prelercnce to our cloisters and courts —they do aa they like—this is nn awful s'gn of the times!' —'And our 1* is uot the only quhtmonssleiy that is thus invaded,' said the other monk ; • ev<ry Sim day morning several ichgioushouscain the city are uubject to the nme nnir yauce— lie same profanation ! Dove v« fin ire ? On lo tii !' "