Bernardino of Siena, and painted by _Bernardino Pinturicchio_, who has put forth his best powers to do honour to his patron saint with a series of exquisite frescoes, representing his assuming the monastic habit, his preaching, his vision of the Saviour, his penitence, death, and burial.

Almost opposite this--closed except during Epiphany--is the Chapel of the _Presepio_, where the famous image of the _Santissimo Bambino d'Ara Cli_ is shown at that season lying in a manger.

"The simple meaning of the term _Presepio_ is a manger; but it is also used in the Church to signify a representation of the birth of Christ. In the Ara-Cli the whole of one of the side-chapels is devoted to this exhibition. In the foreground is a grotto, in which is seated the Virgin Mary, with Joseph at her side and the miraculous Bambino in her lap. Immediately behind are an ass and an ox. On one side kneel the shepherds and kings in adoration; and above, God the Father is seen surrounded by crowds of cherubs and angels playing on instruments, as in the early pictures of Raphael.

In the background is a scenic representation of a pastoral landscape, on which all the skill of the scene-painter is expended.

Shepherds guard their flocks far away, reposing under palm-trees or standing on green slopes which glow in the sunshine. The distances and perspective are admirable. In the middle ground is a crystal fountain of glass, near which sheep, preternaturally white, and made of real wool and cotton wool, are feeding, tended by figures of shepherds carved in wood. Still nearer come women bearing great baskets of real oranges and other fruits on their heads. All the nearer figures are full-sized, carved in wood, painted, and dressed in appropriate robes. The miraculous Bambino is a painted doll swaddled in a white dress, which is crusted over with magnificent diamonds, emeralds, and rubies. The Virgin also wears in her ears superb diamond pendants. The general effect of the scenic show is admirable, and crowds flock to it and press about it all day long.

"While this is taking place on one side of the church, on the other is a very different and quite as singular an exhibition. Around one of the antique columns a stage is erected, from which little maidens are reciting, with every kind of pretty gesticulation, sermons, dialogues, and little speeches, in explanation of the _Presepio_ opposite. Sometimes two of them are engaged in alternate questions and answers about the mysteries of the Incarnation and the Redemption. Sometimes the recitation is a piteous description of the agony of the Saviour and the sufferings of the Madonna, the greatest stress being, however, always laid upon the latter. All these little speeches have been written for them by their priest or some religious friend, committed to memory, and practised with appropriate gestures over and over again at home. Their little piping voices are sometimes guilty of such comic breaks and changes, that the crowd about them rustles into a murmurous laughter. Sometimes, also, one of the little preachers has a _dispetto_, pouts, shakes her shoulders, and refuses to go on with her part; another, however, always stands ready on the platform to supply the vacancy, until friends have coaxed, reasoned, or threatened the little pouter into obedience. These children are often very beautiful and graceful, and their comical little gestures and intonations, their clasping of hands and rolling up of eyes, have a very amusing and interesting effect."--_Story's Roba di Roma._

At other times the Bambino dwells in the inner Sacristy, where it can be visited by admiring pilgrims. It is a fresh-coloured doll, tightly swathed in gold and silver tissue, crowned, and sparkling with jewels.

It has servants of its own, and a carriage in which it drives out with its attendants, and goes to visit the sick. Devout peasants always kneel as the blessed infant passes. Formerly it was taken to sick persons and left on their beds for some hours, in the hope that it would work a miracle. Now it is never left alone. In explanation of this, it is said that an audacious woman formed the design of appropriating to herself the holy image and its benefits. She had another doll prepared of the same size and appearance as the "Santissimo," and having feigned sickness, and obtained permission to have it left with her, she dressed the false image in its clothes, and sent it back to Ara-Cli. The fraud was not discovered till night, when the Franciscan monks were awakened by the most furious ringing of bells and by thundering knocks at the west door of the church, and hastening thither could see nothing but a wee naked pink foot peeping in from under the door; but when they opened the door, without stood the little naked figure of the true Bambino of Ara-Cli, shivering in the wind and the rain,--so the false baby was sent back in disgrace, and the real baby restored to its home, never to be trusted away alone any more.

In the sacristy is the following inscription relating to the Bambino:--

"Ad hoc sacellum Ara Cli a festo nativitatis domini usque ad festum Epiphaniae magna populi frequentia invisitur et colitur in presepio Christi nati infantuli simulacrum ex oleae ligno apud montem olivarum Hierosolymis a quodam devoto Minorita sculptum eo animo, ut ad hoc festum celebrandum deportaretur. De quo in primis hoc accidit, quod deficiente colore inter barbaras gentes ad plenam infantuli figurationem et formam, devotus et anxius artifex, professione laicus, precibus et orationibus impetravit, ut sacrum simulacrum divinitus carneo colore perfunctum reperiretur. Cumque navi Italiam veheretur, facto naufragio apud Tusciae oras, simulacri capsa Liburnum appulit. Ex quo, recognita, expectabatur, enim a Fratribus, et jam fama illius a Hierosolymis ad nostras familiae partes advenerat, ad destinatam sibi Capitolii sedem devenit.

Fertur etiam, quod aliquando ex nimia devotione a quadam devota fmina sublatum ad suas aedes miraculose remeaverit. Quapropter in maxima veneratione semper est habitum a Romanis civibus, et universo populo donatum monilibus, et jocalibus pretiosis, liberalioribusque in dies prosequitur oblationibus."

The outer Sacristy contains a fine picture of the Holy Family by _Giulio Romano_.

The scene on the long flight of steps which leads to the west door of Ara-Cli is very curious during Epiphany.

"If any one visit the Ara-Cli during an afternoon in Christmas or Epiphany, the scene is very striking. The flight of one hundred and twenty-four steps is then thronged by merchants of Madonna wares, who spread them out over the steps and hang them against the walls and balustrades. Here are to be seen all sorts of curious little coloured prints of the Madonna and Child of the most extraordinary quality, little bags, pewter medals, and crosses stamped with the same figures and to be worn on the neck--all offered at once for the sum of one _baiocco_. Here also are framed pictures of the saints, of the Nativity, and in a word of all sorts of religious subjects appertaining to the season. Little wax dolls, clad in cotton-wool to represent the Saviour, and sheep made of the same materials, are also sold by the basket-full. Children and _Contadini_ are busy buying them, and there is a deafening roar all up and down the steps, of 'Mezzo baiocco, bello colorito, mezzo baiocco, la Santissima Concezione Incoronata,'--'Diario Romano, Lunario Romano nuovo,'--'Ritratto colorito, medaglia e quadruccio, un baiocco tutti, un baiocco tutti,'--'Bambinella di cera, un baiocco.' None of the prices are higher than one baiocco, except to strangers, and generally several articles are held up together, enumerated, and proffered with a loud voice for this sum. Meanwhile men, women, children, priests, beggars, soldiers, and _villani_ are crowding up and down, and we crowd with them."--_Roba di Roma_, i.

72.

"On the sixth of January the lofty steps of Ara-Cli looked like an ant-hill, so thronged were they with people. Men and boys who sold little books (legends and prayers), rosaries, pictures of saints, medallions, chestnuts, oranges, and other things, shouted and made a great noise. Little boys and girls were still preaching zealously in the church, and people of all classes were crowding thither. Processions advanced with the thundering cheerful music of the fire-corps. Il Bambino, a painted image of wood, covered with jewels, and with a yellow crown on its head, was carried by a monk in white gloves, and exhibited to the people from a kind of altar-like erection at the top of the Ara-Cli steps. Everybody dropped down upon their knees; Il Bambino was shown on all sides, the music thundered, and the smoking censers were swung."--_Frederika Bremer._

The _Convent of Ara-Cli_ contains much that is picturesque and interesting. S. Giovanni Capistrano was abbot here in the reign of Eugenius IV.

Let us now descend from the Capitoline Piazza towards the Forum, by the staircase on the left of the Palace of the Senator. Close to the foot of this staircase is a church, very obscure-looking, with some rude frescoes on the exterior. Yet every one must enter this building, for here are the famous _Mamertine Prisons_, excavated from the solid rock under the Capitol.

The prisons are entered through the low Church of S. Pietro in Carcere, hung round with votive offerings and blazing with lamps.

"There is an upper chamber in the Mamertine Prisons, over what is said to have been--and very possibly may have been--the dungeon of St. Peter. The chamber is now fitted up as an oratory, dedicated to that saint; and it lives, as a distinct and separate place, in my recollection, too. It is very small and low-roofed; and the dread and gloom of the ponderous, obdurate old prison are on it, as if they had come up in a dark mist through the floor. Hanging on the walls, among the clustered votive offerings, are objects, at once strangely in keeping and strangely at variance with the place--rusty daggers, knives, pistols, clubs, divers instruments of violence and murder, brought here, fresh from use, and hung up to propitiate offended Heaven; as if the blood upon them would drain off in consecrated air, and have no voice to cry with. It is all so silent and so close, and tomblike; and the dungeons below are so black, and stealthy, and stagnant, and naked; that this little dark spot becomes a dream within a dream: and in the vision of great churches which come rolling past me like a sea, it is a small wave by itself, that melts into no other wave, and does not flow on with the rest."--_Dickens._

Enclosed in the church, near the entrance, may be observed the outer frieze of the prison wall, with the inscription C. TIBIUS. C. F.

RUFINUS. M.. COCCEIUS. NERVA. COS. EX. S. C., recording the names of two consuls of A.D. 22, who are supposed to have repaired the prison.

Juvenal's description of the time when one prison was sufficient for all the criminals in Rome naturally refers to this building:

"Felices proavorum atavos, felicia dicas Saecula, quae quondam sub regibus atque tribunis Viderunt uno contentam carcere Romam."

_Sat._ iii. 312.

A modern staircase leads to the horrible dungeon of Ancus Martius, sixteen feet in height, thirty in length, and twenty-two in breadth.

Originally there was no staircase, and the prisoners were let down there, and thence into the lower dungeon, through a hole in the middle of the ceiling. The large door at the side is a modern innovation, having been opened to admit the vast mass of pilgrims during the festa.

The whole prison is constructed of huge blocks of tufa without cement.

Some remains are shown of the _Scalae Gemoniae_, so called from the groans of the prisoners--by which the bodies were dragged forth to be exposed to the insults of the populace or to be thrown into the Tiber. It was by this staircase that Cicero came forth and announced the execution of the Catiline conspirators to the people in the Forum, by the single word _Vixerunt_, "they have ceased to live." Close to the exit of these stairs the Emperor Vitellius was murdered. On the wall by which you descend to the lower dungeon is a mark, kissed by the faithful, as the spot against which St. Peter's head rested. The lower prison, called _Robur_, is constructed of huge blocks of tufa, fastened together by cramps of iron and approaching horizontally to a common centre in the roof. It has been attributed from early times to Servius Tullius; but Ampere[47] argues against the idea that the lower prison was of later origin than the upper, and suggests that it is Pelasgic, and older than any other building in Rome. It is described by Livy, and by Sallust, who depicts its horrors in his account of the execution of the Catiline conspirators.[48] The spot is shown to which these victims were attached and strangled in turn. In this dungeon, at an earlier period, Appius Claudius and Oppius the decemvirs committed suicide (B.C. 449). Here Jugurtha, king of Mauritania, was starved to death by Marius. Here Julius Caesar, during his triumph for the conquest of Gaul, caused his gallant enemy Vercingetorix to be put to death. Here Sejanus, the friend and minister of Tiberius, disgraced too late, was executed for the murder of Drusus, son of the emperor, and for an intrigue with his daughter-in-law, Livilla. Here, also, Simon Bar-Gioras, the last defender of Jerusalem, suffered during the triumph of Titus.

The spot is more interesting to the Christian world as the prison of SS.

Peter and Paul, who are said to have been bound for nine months to a pillar, which is shown here. A fountain of excellent water, beneath the floor of the prison, is attributed to the prayers of St. Peter, that he might have wherewith to baptize his gaolers, Processus and Martinianus; but, unfortunately for this ecclesiastical tradition, the fountain is described by Plutarch as having existed at the time of Jugurtha's imprisonment This fountain probably gave the dungeon the name of _Tullianum_, by which it was sometimes known, _tullius_ meaning a spring.[49] This name probably gave rise to the idea of its connection with Servius Tullius.

It is hence that the Roman Catholic Church believes that St. Peter and St Paul addressed their farewells to the Christian world.

That of St. Peter:--

"Shortly I must put off this my tabernacle, even as our Lord Jesus Christ hath showed me. Moreover I will endeavour that ye may be able after my decease to have these things always in remembrance.

For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ....

Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness."--_2nd St. Peter._

That of St. Paul:--

"God hath not given us a spirit of fear.... Be not thou, therefore, ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me his prisoner; but be thou partaker of the afflictions of the gospel according to the power of God.... I suffer trouble as an evil doer, even unto bonds; but the word of God is not bound. Therefore I endure all things, for the elect's sake, that they also may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus.... I charge thee by God and by the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead ... preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long-suffering and doctrine; ... watch in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry. For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith."--_2nd Timothy._

On July 4, the prisons are the scene of a picturesque solemnity, when they are visited at night by the religious confraternities, who first kneel and then prostrate themselves in silent devotion.

Above the Church of S. Pietro in Carcere, is that of _S. Giuseppe del Falegnami_, St. Joseph of the Carpenters.

"Pourquoi les guides et les antiquaires qui nous ont si souvent montre la voie triomphale qui mene au Capitale et nous en ont tant de fois enumere les souvenirs; pourquoi aucun d'eux ne nous a-t-il jamais parle de ce qui survint le jour du triomphe de Titus, la-bas, pres des prisons Mamertines? Laisse-moi vous rappeler que ce jour-la le triomphateur, au moment de monter au temple, devant verser le sang d'une victime, s'arreta a cette place, tandis que l'on detachait de son cortege un captif de plus haute taille et plus richement vetu que les autres, et qu'on l'emmenait dans cette prison pour y achever son supplice avec le lacet meme qu'il portait autour du cou. Ce ne fut qu'apres cette immolation que le cortege reprit sa marche et acheva de monter jusqu'au Capitole! Ce captif dont on ne daigne nous parler, c'etait Simon Bar-Gioras; c'etait un des trois derniers defenseurs de Jerusalem; c'etait un de ceux qui la defendirent jusqu'au bout, mais helas! qui la defendirent comme des demons maitres d'une ame de laquelle ils ne veulent pas se laisser chasser, et non point comme des champions heroques d'une cause sacree et perdue. Aussi cette grandeur que la seule infortune suffit souvent pour donner, elle manque a la calamite la plus grande que le monde ait vue, et les noms attaches a cette immense catastrophe ne demeurerent pas meme fameux! Jean de Giscala, Eleazar, Simon Bar-Gioras; qui pense a eux aujourd'hui? L'univers entier proclame et venere les noms de deux pauvres juifs qui, quatre ans auparavant, dans cette meme prison, avaient eux aussi attendu la supplice; mais le malheur, le courage, la mort tragique des autres, ne leur ont point donne la gloire, et un dedaigneux oubli les a effaces de la memoire des hommes!"--_(Anne Severin) Mrs. Augustus Craven._

"Along the sacred way Hither the triumph came, and, winding round With acclamation, and the martial clang Of instruments, and cars laden with spoil, Stopped at the sacred stair that then appeared, Then thro' the darkness broke, ample, star-bright, As tho' it led to heaven. 'Twas night; but now A thousand torches, turning night to day, Blazed, and the victor, springing from his seat, Went up, and, kneeling as in fervent prayer, Entered the Capitol. But what are they Who at the foot withdraw, a mournful train In fetters? And who, yet incredulous, Now gazing wildly round, now on his sons, On those so young, well pleased with all they see, Staggers along, the last? They are the fallen, Those who were spared to grace the chariot-wheels; And there they parted, where the road divides, The victor and the vanquished--there withdrew; He to the festal board, and they to die.

"Well might the great, the mighty of the world, They who were wont to fare deliciously And war but for a kingdom more or less, Shrink back, nor from their thrones endure to look, To think that way! Well might they in their pomp Humble themselves, and kneel and supplicate To be delivered from a dream like this!"

_Rogers' Italy._

CHAPTER IV.

THE FORUMS AND THE COLISEUM.

Forum of Trajan--(Sta. Maria di Loreto)--Temple of Mars Ultor--Forum of Augustus--Forum of Nerva--Forum of Julius Caesar--(Academy of St. Luke)--Forum Romanum--Tribune--Comitium --Vulcanal--Temple of Concord--Temple of Vespasian--Temple of Saturn--Arch of Septimius Severus--Temple of Castor and Pollux--Pillar of Phocas--Temple of Antoninus and Faustina--Basilica of Constantine--(Sta. Martina--S. Adriano--Sta.

Maria--Liberatrice, SS. Cosmo and Damian--Sta. Francesca Romana)--Temple of Venus and Rome--Arch of Titus--(Sta. Maria Pallara--S. Buonaventura)--Meta Sudans--Arch of Constantine--Coliseum.

Following the Corso to its end at the Ripresa dei Barberi, and turning to the left, we find ourselves at once amid the remains of the _Forum of Trajan_, erected by the architect Apollodorus for the Emperor Trajan on his return from the wars of the Danube. This forum now presents the appearance of a ravine between the Capitoline and Quirinal, but is an artificial hollow, excavated to facilitate the circulation of life within the city. An inscription over the door of the column, which overtops the other ruins, shows that it was raised in order to mark the depth of earth which was removed to construct the forum. The earth was formerly as high as the top of the column, which reaches, 100 Roman feet, to the level of the Palatine Hill. The forum was sometimes called the "Ulpian," from one of the names of the emperor.

"Before the year A.D. 107 the splendours of the city and the Campus beyond it were still separated by a narrow isthmus, thronged perhaps by the squalid cabins of the poor, and surmounted by the remains of the Servian wall which ran along its summit. Step by step the earlier emperors had approached with their new forums to the foot of this obstruction. Domitian was the first to contemplate and commence its removal. Nerva had the fortune to consecrate and to give his own name to a portion of his predecessor's construction; but Trajan undertook to complete the bold design, and the genius of his architect triumphed over all obstacles, and executed a work which exceeded in extent and splendour any previous achievement of the kind. He swept away every building on the site, levelled the spot on which they had stood, and laid out a vast area of columnar galleries, connecting halls and chambers for public use and recreation. The new forum was adorned with two libraries, one for Greek, the other for Roman volumes, and it was bounded on the west by a basilica of magnificent dimensions. Beyond this basilica, and within the limits of the Campus, the same architect (Apollodorus) erected a temple for the worship of Trajan himself; but this work probably belonged to the reign of Trajan's successor, and no doubt the Ulpian forum, with all its adjuncts, occupied many years in building. The area was adorned with numerous statues, in which the figure of Trajan was frequently repeated, and among its decorations were groups in bronze or marble, representing his most illustrious actions. The balustrades and cornices of the whole mass of buildings flamed with gilded images of arms and horses. Here stood the great equestrian statue of the emperor; here was the triumphal arch decreed him by the senate, adorned with sculpture, which Constantine, two centuries later, transferred without a blush to his own, a barbarous act of this first Christian emperor, to which however we probably owe their preservation to this day from more barbarous spoliation."--_Merivale, Romans under the Empire_, ch. lxiii.

The beautiful _Column of Trajan_ was erected by the senate and people of Rome, A.D. 114. It is composed of thirty-four blocks of marble, and is covered with a spiral band of bas-reliefs illustrative of the Dacian wars, and increasing in size as it nears the top, so that it preserves throughout the same proportion when seen from below. It was formerly crowned by a statue of Trajan, holding a gilt globe, which latter is still preserved in the Hall of Bronzes in the Capitol. This statue had fallen from its pedestal long before Sixtus V. replaced it by the existing figure of St. Peter. At the foot of the column was a sepulchral chamber, intended to receive the imperial ashes, which were however preserved in a golden urn, upon an altar in front of it.

"And apostolic statues climb To crush the imperial urn, whose ashes slept sublime."

_Childe Harold_, cx.

It was while walking in this forum, that Gregory the Great, observing one of the marble groups which told of a good and great action of Trajan, lamented bitterly that the soul of so noble a man should be lost, and prayed earnestly for the salvation of the heathen emperor. He was told that the soul of Trajan should be saved, but that to ensure this he must either himself undergo the pains of purgatory for three days, or suffer earthly pain and sickness for the rest of his life. He chose the latter, and never after was in health. This incident is narrated by his three biographers, John and Paul Diaconus, and John of Salisbury.[50]

The forum of Trajan was partly uncovered by Pope Paul III. in the sixteenth century, but excavated in its present form by the French in 1812. There is much still buried under the streets and neighbouring houses.

"All over the surface of what once was Rome it seems to be the effort of Time to bury up the ancient city, as it were a corpse, and he the sexton; so that, in eighteen centuries, the soil over its grave has grown very deep, by the slow scattering of dust, and the accumulation of more modern decay upon older ruin.