Alpha Book

Those who have
heard Italian singers at their best know that thirty young Roman throats
can emit a volume of sound equal to that which a hundred men of any
other nation could produce. The stillness around them increased, too, as
the procession lengthened. The great, dark crowd stood shoulder to
shoulder, breathless with expectation, each man and woman feeling for a
few short moments that thrill of mysterious anxiety and impatience which
Orsino had felt. No one who was there can ever forget what followed.
More than forty cardinals filed out in front from the Chapel of the
Pieta. Then the hereditary assistants of the Holy See, the heads of the
Colonna and the Orsini houses, entered the nave, side by side for the
first time, I believe, in history. Immediately after them, high above
all the procession and the crowd, appeared the great chair of state, the
huge white feathered fans moving slowly on each side, and upon the
throne, the central figure of that vast display, sat the Pope, Leo the
Thirteenth.


Pages:
116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140