CHAPTER XXXVI.

PIUS IX.-ANTONELLI.

THE mission confided to me by Count Cavour was arduous, difficult, dangerous even in an ultra-clerical city, where the Sanfedists had their headquarters.

On my arrival in the Eternal City I carried to Cardinal Milesi, formerly Legate at Bologna, the letter which his colleague, Cardinal Viale, had given me in that town, as will be remembered. At sight of his friend's recommendation, Cardinal Milesi, a nephew and former minister of Pius IX., received me with much kindness, assuring me that I was welcome in Rome, and that the Holy Father and the Cardinals had often spoken of the man who had saved the Cardinal-Archbishop from the hands of the revolutionists. He offered to present me to Antonelli, who would be delighted to see me.

I thanked the Sovereign Pontiff's nephew without accepting his offer, and went to visit the tombs of

the Apostles; then I returned home. A young man had followed me throughout my walk.

Next day I went to the Pincio, where a magnificent view of the seven hills of the Eternal City can be obtained, and was again followed by the same young man. He was an agent of Antonelli, to whom Cardinal Milesi had announced my arrival, and who, on learning that I had refused to see him, had grown somewhat defiant, and hastened to put me in the hands of one of his bloodhounds.

But there is a proverb which says: "Two linings don't make a coat." Spy against spy; if one of them finds out the other, that other will be beaten. That I might better deceive Antonelli's agent, my first visit was to the tomb of the Apostles Peter and Paul; then I went through the churches. I avoided crowds, and if, on occasion, I entered into conversation with anyone whilst walking or visiting the churches, or at the café, I at once began to praise the Roman Government, and pitilessly lashed the Piedmontese Consuls.

After a week of this play I received one morning an order to present myself at the Place Montecitorio, where lived the Governor, or Prefect of Police. The functionary who had summoned me was Monsieur Porqualoni, chief of the Pope's police. He received me with friendliness, made me sit down near him, and asked to see my papers.

"Pure formality," said he, "because we know that if you have not come to serve the Holy Father, at any rate you have not come to do him ill.”

"Would to Heaven I were only twenty years old!" cried I; "I should not have waited until today to adopt the Papal uniform. Your cause is mine, and that of all other honest men, Catholic or otherwise."

Whilst I was speaking there entered without knocking a man of about fifty, very ugly, very fat, and afflicted with two terrible ruptures, which prevented him from walking with ease.

"Monsignor," said the Chief of Police to the new-comer, "I have the honour to present to you Monsieur Griscelli, the man of whom we have sometimes spoken."

Knowing that I was in the presence of a Roman dignitary, I bowed low. Monsieur Matteucci

examined me from head to foot, then said —

"You do not appear to be curious. Being a Corsican, you must be a Catholic also. No man comes to Rome without a wish to speak with His Holiness; they offer to conduct you to him, and you refuse!"

"I refused because I have nothing to offer, and nothing to ask. I would be grieved to make the Vicar of Jesus Christ lose a single moment on my account when he might be with those who can give and receive."

"Nevertheless, you must come with me to the Cardinal, who desires to see you."

"If His Excellency requires me I will go at once."

Cardinal Antonelli receives officially at the Vatican, where his apartments are situated beneath those of the Holy Father, but he obligingly sees people at his own house, opposite the Quirinal. It was, therefore, in the latter mansion that I had the honour of being presented to him for the first time by the Prefect of Police. He rose at our approach, looked at me carefully from head to foot, and asked me what had brought me to Rome.

"The wish to see the seat of Catholicity, her Ministers, and His Holiness," I replied.

"And if the Holy Father needed your services would you refuse them?"

"I do not know, your Eminence, what services I could perform for the Holy Father. I am too old to enlist with the Pontifical zouaves."

"It is not a question of making you a soldier. Your experience, your energy, and the place you filled near Napoleon III. have made you an extraordinary agent of the secret police; such, at least, are the reports which we have received from Paris. It is this experience which we should like to make use of against our enemies, who are also yours, as you said at the Governor's. If you will engage

"My experience and devotion are yours, your Eminence; dispose of me at all times for the service. of the Holy Father."

"For several months a vile newspaper has been published in Rome, in which the editors, with diabolical wit, tear to pieces the Roman Government, the Vicar of Christ, his Ministers, his employés, the Holy Church, and so forth. Nothing is held in respect by these sons of Satan. It is this paper which we are trying to seize, and cannot find. We want to ask you to look to it, as we feel certain beforehand that you will succeed."

"I thank your Eminence for your good opinion," said I, "but I am in Rome for the first time, and know no one here. As yet I am only acquainted with the Dome and the Pont St. Ange. What day is this newspaper issued ?"

comes.

Every Wednesday we receive one by post, without knowing either where it is printed or whence it The Governor thinks that it is printed in the Transtevere, but not one of our fifteen hundred agents has been able to find it out," replied the Cardinal.

"Before it has appeared twice more your Excellency shall have a copy that has not been posted." "That is impossible," exclaimed the Prefect of Police. "My agents have explored the Transteveria, house by house, and have found nothing!"

P