St. Veronica's handkerchief (with the impression of our Savior's face) was exposed, and the next day the spear, with a world of ceremony. On Holy Thursday, the Pope said mass, and afterward carried the Host in procession about the chapel, with an infinity of tapers. This finished, his Holiness was carried in his open chair on men's shoulders to the place where, reading the Bull In Cœnâ Domini, he both curses and blesses all in a breath; then the guns are again fired. Hence, he went to the Ducal hall of the Vatican, where he washed the feet of twelve poor men, with almost the same ceremony as it is done at Whitehall; they have clothes, a dinner, and alms, which he gives with his own hands, and serves at their table; they have also gold and silver medals, but their garments are of white woolen long robes, as we paint the Apostles. The same ceremonies are done by the Conservators and other officers of state at St. John di Lateran; and now the table on which they say our blessed Lord celebrated his last supper is set out, and the heads of the Apostles. In every famous church they are busy in dressing up their pageantries to[Pg 174] represent the Holy Sepulchre, of which we went to visit divers.
On Good Friday, we went again to St. Peter's, where the handkerchief, lance, and cross were all exposed, and worshiped together. All the confession seats were filled with devout people, and at night was a procession of several who most lamentably whipped themselves till the blood stained their clothes, for some had shirts, others upon the bare back, having visors and masks on their faces; at every three or four steps dashing the knotted and raveled whip cord over their shoulders, as hard as they could lay it on; while some of the religious orders and fraternities sung in a dismal tone, the lights and crosses going before, making all together a horrible and indeed heathenish pomp.
The next day, there was much ceremony at St. John di Laterano, so as the whole week was spent in running from church to church, all the town in busy devotion, great silence, and unimaginable superstition.
Easter day, I was awakened by the guns from St. Angelo: we went to St. Peter's, where the Pope himself celebrated mass, showed the relics before-named, and gave a public Benediction.
Monday, we went to hear music in the Chiesa Nova; and, though there were abundance of ceremonies at the other great churches, and great exposure of relics, yet being wearied with sights of this nature, and the season of the year, summer, at Rome being very dangerous, by reason of the heat minding us of returning northward, we spent the rest of our time in visiting such places as we had not yet sufficiently seen. Only I do not forget the Pope's benediction of the Gonfalone, or Standard, and giving the hallowed palms; and, on May Day, the great procession of the University and the muleteers at St. Anthony's, and their setting up a foolish May pole in the Capitol, very ridiculous. We therefore now took coach a little out of town, to visit the famous Roma Soterránea, being much like what we had seen at St. Sebastians. Here, in a cornfield, guided by two torches, we crept on our bellies into a little hole, about twenty paces, which delivered us into a large entry that led us into several streets, or alleys, a good depth in the bowels of the earth, a strange and fearful passage for divers miles, as Bosio[Pg 175] has measured and described them in his book. We ever and anon came into pretty square rooms, that seemed to be chapels with altars, and some adorned with very ordinary ancient painting. Many skeletons and bodies are placed on the sides one above the other in degrees like shelves, whereof some are shut up with a coarse flat stone, having engraven on them Pro Christo, or a cross and palms, which are supposed to have been martyrs. Here, in all likelihood, were the meetings of the Primitive Christians during the persecutions, as Pliny the Younger describes them. As I was prying about, I found a glass phial, filled (as was conjectured) with dried blood, and two lachrymatories. Many of the bodies, or rather bones (for there appeared nothing else) lay so entire, as if placed by the art of the chirurgeon, but being only touched fell all to dust. Thus, after wandering two or three miles in this subterranean meander, we returned almost blind when we came into the daylight, and even choked by the smoke of the torches. It is said that a French bishop and his retinue adventuring too far into these dens, their lights going out, were never heard of more.
We were entertained at night with an English play at the Jesuits', where we before had dined; and the next day at Prince Galicano's, who himself composed the music to a magnificent opera, where were present Cardinal Pamphilio, the Pope's nephew, the Governors of Rome, the cardinals, the ambassadors, ladies, and a number of nobility and strangers. There had been in the morning a joust and tournament of several young gentlemen on a formal defy, to which we had been invited; the prizes being distributed by the ladies, after the knight-errantry way. The lancers and swordsmen running at tilt against the barriers, with a great deal of clatter, but without any bloodshed, giving much diversion to the spectators, and was new to us travelers.
The next day Mr. Henshaw and I spent the morning in attending the entrance and cavalcade of Cardinal Medici, the ambassador from the Grand Duke of Florence, by the Via Flaminia. After dinner, we went again to the Villa Borghese, about a mile without the city; the garden is rather a park, or a Paradise, contrived and planted with walks and shades of myrtles, cypress, and other trees,[Pg 176] and groves, with abundance of fountains, statues, and bass-relievos, and several pretty murmuring rivulets. Here they had hung large nets to catch woodcocks. There was also a vivary, where, among other exotic fowls, was an ostrich; besides a most capacious aviary; and, in another inclosed part, a herd of deer. Before the palace (which might become the court of a great prince) stands a noble fountain, of white marble, enriched with statues. The outer walls of the house are encrusted with excellent antique bass-relievos, of the same marble, incornished with festoons and niches set with statues from the foundation to the roof. A stately portico joins the palace, full of statues and columns of marble, urns, and other curiosities of sculpture. In the first hall were the Twelve Cæsars, of antique marble, and the whole apartments furnished with pictures of the most celebrated masters, and two rare tables of porphyry, of great value. But of this already: for I often visited this delicious place.
This night were glorious fire-works at the palace of Cardinal Medici before the gate, and lights of several colors all about the windows through the city, which they contrive by setting the candles in little paper lanterns dyed with various colors, placing hundreds of them from story to story; which renders a gallant show.