Under date March Ist a correspondent from Rome cabled to American papers : — I learn that the Government has made a number of preparations with a view to the possibility of the Pope's demise, and there have been no less than threo Cabinet councils held to-day. The troops are consigned to barracks, and from the moment that the Pope's demise is known military cordons will be stretched across the Angels Bridge, as well as all the streets leading to the Vatican, while the square of St, Peter is to be occupied by a couple of regiments of infantry. I hear on excellent authority that confidential communications have passed to-day between theGovernmentandtheVatican.and that the Premier, General Pelloux, whose two sons have been educated at the Jesuit college here, has given assurances that there will be no attempt on the part of the Italian Government to interfere with_ the conclave or to influence the election, providing a prelate of Italian nationality is chosen. The Italian Government will not, however, tolerate ,the election of a foreign Cardinal, and would in the event of the election of an alien occupy the Vatican and force the papacy to transfer its headquarters elsewhere, for the Italian Government holds that it is impossible to allow a foreigner, the citizen of a country possibly hostile to Italy, to establish himself aB Pope in the very centre of Rome. General Pelloux is likewise reported to have intimated that in the event of the conclave being held elsewhere than in Rome, the Italian Government would see therein an act of distrust and defiance, and would im-' mediately proceed to occupy the Vatican. Meanwhile the gates of the Vatican are hermetically closed. Strangers and visitors to the museum are no longer admitted, and so strictly are the doors guarded that the Pope might be dead for several hours before any of the outside world, or even the Italian Government, were made aware of the fact.
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Bibliographic details
Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 11217, 6 May 1899, Page 4
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323Untitled Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 11217, 6 May 1899, Page 4
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