“Never,” said I.  “Without it I am lost to Tuscany.”

“With it,” replied the officer, “you are lost to the world for some time.  This indecent profession of opinion—­What! a wooden cross as big as a dagger!  Give it to me at once, and follow me to the tribunal of the police.”

I confess that I grew cold before such irrational tyranny.  “You are going the way to work, sir,” I said, “to make me an atheist.  I shall yield only to force.”

Vain protest!  “Have it as you will,” said the officer, and signed to the sbirri, who came forward at once, cleaving the crowd with their drawn swords.  “This young man is illuminated,” said the officer; “take him to the tribunal, and look into his papers.”  I saw that submission was my only course, and took it.  The police led me away.

A much more severe scrutiny of my miserable passport than had taken place at Ferrara followed upon this.  Nothing but the “assured manner” of Issachar was allowed to stand up for me.  My nose was fatally straight, my hair fatally out of curl.  I was asked was I a Jew? and had I dared to pretend it, I know not to what extremes they might not have proceeded.  But I had never learned to lie; I admitted at once that I had bought the passport.  Instant action was taken upon this.  My crucifix was burnt, the passport confiscated.  I was given six hours in which to leave Bologna, and did not take three.  I departed in a towering rage, which perhaps did me good, and devoured the leagues between the city and the mountains at a pace which I am sure did me credit.  The lengthening shadows of these engulfed and sobered me.  Late at night I reached a village at the foot of the mountains, whose name I don’t know, and sought out the only inn the place boasted—­if any place could have been assured enough to boast of so miserable a shelter.  By this time I had walked off my fury and a great part of my piety.  I shall only add of Bologna, which I have never revisited, that, if it is the duty of a city of the Church to freeze the faith out of the heart of a son of the Church, then that haughty seat may boast of having fulfilled it.

My inn was full of French and Savoyard soldiers, recruiting, it was evident, for their cause or their pockets.  War was said to be threatening between the Holy See and the Grand Duchy:  these were the Pope’s allies, roaring, drinking, carding, wenching, and impressing all travellers who could not pay their way out.  Saturnian revels!  The landlord was playing Bacchus, much against his will; the landlady and a tattered maid were Venus and Hebe by turns; for my own part, shunning to be Ganymede, I slunk into an outhouse and shared its privacy with some scared fowls and a drover of the Garfagnana, who, taking me at first for a crimp, ran at me gibbering with a knife.  I pacified him, luckily, before it was too late, and crouched with him until daylight, expecting discovery at every outcry.  Not until then did the house