spring, I worked my passage on board a small
trader from Genoa to Fiumicino, touching at
all the ports along the coast—and how, coming
slowly up the Tiber in a barge laden with oil
and wine, I landed one evening in March on the
Ripetta quay, in Rome;—how all these things
happened, and what physical hardships I endured
in the mean while, I have no time here to relate
in detail. My object had been, to get to Rome,
and that object was at last attained. In so
large a city, and at so great a distance from the
scene of my imprisonment, I was personally safe.
I might hope to turn my talents and education
to account. I might even find friends among the
strangers who would flock thither to the Easter
festivals. Full of hope, therefore, I sought a
humble lodging in the neighbourhood of the
quay, gave up a day or two to the enjoyment of
my liberty and of the sights of Rome, and then
set myself to find some regular employment.

Regular employment, or, indeed, employment
of any kind, was not, however, so easily to be
obtained. It was a season of distress. The
previous harvest had been a failure, and the
winter unusually severe. There had also been
disturbances in Naples, and the travellers this
spring were fewer by some thousands than  the
ordinary average. So dull a carnival had not
been known for years. The artists had sold no
paintings, and the sculptors no statues. The
cameo-cutters and mosaicists were starving. The
tradesmen, the hotel-keepers, the professional
ciceroni, were all complaining bitterly. Day
by day, my hopes faded and my prospects
darkened. Day by day, the few scudi I had
scraped together on the passage melted away.
I had thought to obtain a clerkship, or a
secretaryship, or a situation in some public
library. Before three weeks were over, I would
gladly have swept a studio. At length there
came a day when I saw nothing before me but
starvation; when my last bajocco was expended;
when my padrone (or landlord) shut the door in
my face, and I knew not where to turn for a meal
or a shelter. All that afternoon, I wandered
hopelessly about the streets. It was Good Friday,
of all days in the year. The churches were
hung with black; the bells were tolling; the
thoroughfares were crowded with people in
mourning. I went into the little church of
Santa Martina. They were chanting a miserere,
probably with no great skill, but with a pathos
that seemed to open up all the sources of my
despair.

Outcast that I was, I slept that night under a
dark arch near the theatre of Marcellus. The
morning dawned upon a glorious day, and I crept
out, shivering, into the sunshine. Lying crouched
against a bit of warm wall, I caught myself
wondering more than once how long it would
be worth while to endure the agonies of hunger,
and whether the brown waters of the Tiber
were deep enough to drown a man. It seemed
hard to die so young. My future might
have been so pleasant, so honourable. The
rough life that I had been leading of late, too,
had strengthened me in every way, physically
and mentally. I had grown taller. My muscles
were more developed. I was twice as active, as
energetic, as resolute, as I had been a year before.
And of what use were these things to me? I
must die, and they could only serve to make me
die the harder.

I got up and wandered about the streets, as I
had wandered the day before. Once I asked for
alms, and was repulsed. I followed mechanically
in the stream of carriages and foot passengers,
and found myself, by-and-by, in the midst of the
crowd that ebbs and flows continually about
Saint Peter's during Easter week. Stupified and
weary, I turned aside into the vestibule of the
Sagrestia, and cowered down in the shelter of a
doorway. Two gentlemen were reading a
printed paper wafered against a pillar close by.

"Good Heavens!" said one to the other,
"that a man should risk his neck for a few
pauls!"

"Ay, and with the knowledge that out of
eighty workmen, six or eight are dashed to
pieces every time," added his companion.

"Shocking! Why, that is an average of ten
per cent!"

"No less. It is a desperate service."

"But a fine sight," said the first speaker,
philosophically; and with this they walked
away.

I sprang to my feet, and read the placard
with avidity. It was headed "Illumination of
Saint Peter's," and announced that, eighty
workmen being required for the lighting of the
dome and cupola, and three hundred for the
cornices, pillars, colonnade, and so forth, the
amministratore was empowered, &c. &c. In
conclusion, it stated that every workman
employed on the dome and cupola should receive
in payment, a dinner and twenty-four pauls, the
wages of the rest being less than a third of that
sum.

A desperate service, it was true; but I was a
desperate man. After all, I could but die, and
I might as well die after a good dinner as from
starvation. I went at once to the amministratore,
was entered in his list, received a couple
of pauls as earnest of the contract, and engaged
to present myself punctually at eleven o'clock
on the following morning. That evening I
supped at a street stall, and, for a few bajocchi,
obtained leave to sleep on some straw, in a loft
over a stable at the back of the Via del Arco.

At eleven o'clock on the morning of Easter
Sunday, April the sixteenth, I found myself,
accordingly, in the midst of a crowd of poor
fellows, most of whom, I dare say, were as
wretched as myself, waiting at the door of the
administrator's office. The piazza in front of
the cathedral was like a moving mosaic of life
and colour. The sun was shining, the
fountains were playing, the flags were flying over
Saint Angelo. It was a glorious sight; but I
saw it for only a few moments. As the clocks
struck the hour, the folding-doors were thrown
open, and we passed, in a crowd, into a hall,
where two long tables were laid for our
accommodation. A couple of sentinels stood at the