AN AUDIENCE OF THE POPE.

King Country Chronicle, Volume V, Issue 307, 29 October 1910, Page 2

AN AUDIENCE OF THE POPE.

A sound of footsteps. Monsignor Bisleti is waiting on the threshold of a little door. '"Come," he says.

The door opens. At first I see nothing but books, numberless books, all around an immense room, which the light enters in floods. Beyond the open windows on the left, Rome, with her hills and steeples, lies slumbering in a blue haze ; on the right a screen cuts off and conceals a. portion of the. room.

Monsignor Bisleti beckons us. I pass round the screen, and see His Holiness Pius X. standing erect in the imposing purity of his white cassock.

His strongly-marked features are plainly defined in the broad light. The stature is powerful, the shoulders broad, the chin masterful, the mouth singularly expressive ; but the gentleness of the glance, the crystal clearness of the kindly eyes, soften the haughty outline. ; A plentiful crown of ash-coloured hair encircles the little white silk skull-cap which the Sovereign Pontiff wears thrust on the back of his head ; his plump and energetic hands are beautifully shaped ; his voice is grave, senorous, and distinct. Formerly, the etiquette was that whoso had the honour of being admitted to an audience of the Pope should make three genuflections as he entered ; the first on the threshold, the second a little further, the third at the feet of the Pope, whose slipper, moreover, he was obliged to kiss. Leo XIII. made only the rarest exceptions to this rule : Pius X. has abolished it. He does not wish you to talk to him on your knees, and, when you still make a slight genuflexion on entering and leaving, he hastens to raise you up, and his friendly simplicity—l was almost saying his cordiality—at once puts you at your ease.

With a simple gesture of the hand he invites my wife and me to take a seat on either side of him, He himself has sat down in a wide armchair in front of his desk.

The Pope appears to me to be exceedingly well informed as regards the intellectual powers of foreign statesmen ; he has formed a definite opinion of each of them ; and this opinion reveals a great subtlety of appreciation, combined with a serene and placid philosophy. We talk of Italy, of its artistic beauties. ... I call the Holy

Father's attention to the wonderful panorama that stretches beneath his windows, and I permit myself to ask him if he does not feel a profound regret at being now separated for ever from all those marvels.

"I suffered greatly at first," he says, speaking slowly ; '"now I am resigned." / • At a given moment I bring up the memory of Venice. * When he hears that magic name his eyes light up,, his features glow with animation. He speaks to me with real emotion of the town in which he spent the happiest hours of his life. Summoned to the conclave at Rome when he left Venice, one blazing morning in July, greeted by the prophetic cry of "Long live the Pope !" he not for a moment doubted that he should' return.

"So little did I think that I should never see Venice again," he says, with a smile, "that I took a 'biglietto d'anadata e ritorno." He long kept this return ticket. Wealthy collectors strove by every means in their power to become its purchaser. . . he invariably refused. Last year the King of Greece, in the course of a visit which he paid to the Pope, expressed a keen desire to possess this little piece of cardboard which has become for all time historical —and the Pope gave it him. On the other hand, there is one humble relic with which nothing will ever induce him to part. This relic is his watch, a little cheap nickel watch. "It marked the minutes of my mother's death-struggles," he says, '"and the hour of my definite separation from the outer world, from space and liberty. It has marked all the sad, all the joyous, all the solemn moments of my life. What jewel could be more precious to me?'

He carries it fastened to a white silk cord in the broad sash which he wears round his waist ; and he did not hesitate to offend against the etiquette which hitherto had obliged the Pope, when he wished to know the time, to apply to one o* his prelates in waiting. This extreme simplicity is to him as much a matter of principle as of habit. It governs all the actions of his life, and is in admirable keeping with his instinctive, sovereign, and triumphant kindness. His contempt for forms and ceremonies makes it much easier for him to exercise that charity which was always his ruling virtue.

But the precious moments arc flyins. A chamberlain had discreetly entered the rooms. Thereupon Pius X. rises from his chair, signs for us to stay where we are, and walks down the whole length of the library. Coming to a writing-desk which stands in a dark corner of the room, he takes a little 'Rev, stoops down to the floor, opens a drawer, fumbles in it for a second or two, and at last returns to us, holding in his hands a red case stamped with his arms. "This," he explains, giving the case to my wife, "is a small keepsake which the Pope sends to your little daughter. It is a medal of the Madonna. I have blessed it, I hope that it will always bring her happiness." After this kind thought, this charming act, our audience comes to an end.—Rene Lara, in the "Fortnightly Review."