In the morning about ten o’clock, we all went down to St. Peter’s, to hear high mass.  The absence of the Pope (who is still extremely ill) detracted from the interest and dignity of the ceremony:  there was no general benediction from the balcony of St. Peter’s; and nothing pleased me, except the general coup d’oeil; which in truth was splendid.  The theatrical dresses of the mitred priests, the countless multitude congregated from every part of Christendom, in every variety of national costume, the immensity and magnificence of the church, and the glorious sunshine—­all these enchanted the eye; but I could have fancied myself in a theatre.  I saw no devotion, and I felt none.  The whole appeared more like a triumphal pageant acted in honour of a heathen deity, than an act of worship and thanksgiving to the Great Father of all.

I observed an immense number of pilgrims, male and female, who had come from various parts of Italy to visit the shrine of St. Peter on this grand occasion.  I longed to talk to a man who stood near me, with a very singular and expressive countenance, whose cape and looped hat were entirely covered with scallop shells and reliques, and his long staff surmounted by a death’s head.

I was restrained by a feeling which I now think rather ridiculous:  I feared, lest by conversing with him, I should diminish the effect his romantic and picturesque figure had made on my imagination.

The exposition of the relics was from a balcony half way up the dome, so high and distant that I could distinguish nothing but the impression of our Saviour’s face on the handkerchief of St. Veronica, richly framed—­at the sight whereof the whole multitude prostrated themselves to the earth:  the other relics I forget, but they were all equally marvellous and equally credible.

We returned after a long fatiguing morning to an early dinner; and then drove again to the Piazza of St. Peter’s, to see the far-famed illumination of the church.  We had to wait a considerable time; but the scene was so novel and beautiful, that I found ample amusement in my own thoughts and observations.  The twilight rapidly closed round us:  the long lines of statues along the roof and balustrades, faintly defined against the evening sky, looked like spirits come down to gaze; a prodigious crowd of carriages, and people on foot, filled every avenue:  but all was still, except when a half-suppressed murmur of impatience broke through the hushed silence of suspense and expectation.  At length, on a signal, which was given by the firing of a cannon, the whole of the immense facade and dome, even up to the cross on the summit, and the semicircular colonnades in front, burst into a blaze, as if at the touch of an enchanter’s wand; adding the pleasure of surprise to that of delight and wonder.  The carriages now began to drive rapidly round the piazza, each with a train of running footmen, flinging their torches round and dashing them against the ground.  The shouts and acclamations of the crowd, the stupendous building with all its architectural outlines and projections, defined in lines of living flame, the universal light, the sparkling of the magnificent fountains—­produced an effect far beyond any thing I could have anticipated, and more like the gorgeous fictions of the Arabian Nights, than any earthy reality.