HIS HOLINESS THE POPE.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXVI, Issue 5, 12 May 1913, Page 5

HIS HOLINESS THE POPE.

o The Rome corespondent of the Westminster Gazette,, writing on March 30, says;— “So many rumors have been circulating regarding tho Pope’s health that the straight truth, shorn of exaggeration, may bo of interest. Three weeks ago—to be exact, on Friday, March 7, the Pope felt a chill. On that day he did his usual work, but on Saturday, as lie was evidently suffering from an attack of influenza, he was prevailed' to go to bed and regard himself as a sick man. The influenza ran its course, as did the throat trouble that acorapauied it, and they have both long sirfoe passed. For about ten days, as always happens in Rome, the patient’s temperature rose at sunset; dropping at night, and returning to normal during the day. That has also passed, and nothing remains of the original ailment, which was never at any time complicated by’ any symptoms connected with the Pope’s enemy, the gout that caused so much anixety in the summer of 1911.

“But he is not? recovering as he ought. Ho had got over the illness, but he is not gaining strength, so that ho has not been able to resume the ordinary routine work, which is very heavy, %nd of which the public knows little, nor the round of audiences, public and private, which amount to 50,000 persons in the course of a year, exclusive of big collective audiences. The Pope will be 78 on June 2 next. His health is generally sound, except for his constitutional gouty trouble. If he were able, like any other patient cf Ids age, to take a complete rest and change for a month or two, he could get strong and well again without difficulty. This, in his case, is out of the question. He cannot leave the Vatican for a, change, and it is doubtful if in his position, and witl his sensitive disposition of mind redacting on his I tody, he can ever .get complete rest. The present is the moment of all others when he would desire to he well. Celebrations in connection with the Constantinian Centenary of the Edict of Milan, of May 313, begin to-day, to last throughout the year. Week by week pilgrimages, are anommeed to come to Rome, anc every pilgrim wants to see the Pope on May 11. There is to be a PapaChapel in St. Peter’s, at which lie should be present. “Six hundred pilgrims from Lombardy are leaving Rome to-day without having seen him. There is every reason why be should regain strength as soon as possible, and perhaps his anxiety to do so is retarding bis recovery. The doctors are not anxious, because there is no ostensible reason for the anxiety, but they are certainlj worried by the continued weakness.