It is thus that I judge of the series of
demonstrations which marked the spring of this year in Rome, and which
ended in the outrage of St Joseph's day. Of themselves they were less
than worthless, but as tokens of the future they possess a value of their
own. In recent Papal history they form a strange page. Let me note
their features briefly, as I wrote of them at the time.
January 28.
At last there is a break in the dull uniformity of Roman life.--There is
a ripple on the waters, whether the precursor of a tempest, or to be
followed by a dead calm, it is hard to tell. Meanwhile it is some gain
at any rate, that the old corpse-like city should show signs of life,
however transient. Feeble as those symptoms are, let us make the most of
them.
Since the Imperial occupation of Rome, the building in the Piazza
Colonna, which old Roman travellers remember as the abode of the Post
Office, has been confiscated to the service of the French army. It
forms, in fact, a sort of military head-quarter. All the bureaux of the
different departments of the service are to be found here. The office of
the electric telegraph is contained under the same roof, and the front
windows of the town-hall-looking building, lit up so brightly and so late
at night, are those of the French military "circle." The Piazza Colonna,
where stands the column of Mark Antony, opens out of the Corso, and is
perhaps the most central position in all Rome.
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