THE HOLY FATHER.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume III, Issue 135, 3 December 1875, Page 8

THE HOLY FATHER.

The Feast of the Assumption of Our Blessed Lady, passed off very quietly this year. The Holy Father celebrated mass in his private chapel at seven o'clock, and about a hundred members of his household were present and received Holy Communion from his hands. The Camerieri of inferior rank, the Swiss guai'd, and the gendarmes communicated in the Pauline chapel. In the evening great crowds attended vespers in St. Paul's outside the walls, where a precious relic of our Lady was exposed to their veneration. This was the famous fragment of her robe which in olden times used to be venerated in the basilica of the Lateran, but which was removed hither many centuries since. High Mass in Santa Maria Maggiore was also attended, notwithstanding- the intense heat, by a multitude of Romans, for there are now very few foreigners in the city. In the evening most of tho houses and buildings were illuminated. The heat has been perfectly tropical here for some weeks past. As a consequence, the receptions at the Vatican are almost wholly suspended, and the Pope is enjoying a slight rest. Still, even now, • the amount of work he transacts is very considerable, and would fatigue a much younger man. Daily he accords interviews to cardinals, archbishops, bishops, heads of ordersj and to many private individuals who are either visiting Rome on pleasure or business, and who wish to consult him or receive his blessing. His ; Holiness is in very good health, and appears scarcely to feel the | heat.