In the great church, which contains the Holy Chapel, are confessionals, where the penitents from every country of Europe may be confessed in their own language, priests being always in waiting for that purpose: each of them has a long white rod in his hand, with which he touches the heads of those to whom he thinks it proper to give absolution. They place themselves on their knees, in groupes, around the confessional chair; and when the Holy Father has touched their heads with the expiatory rod, they retire, freed from the burden of their sins, and with renewed courage to begin a fresh account. In the spacious area before this church, there is an elegant marble fountain, supplied with water from an adjoining hill, by an aqueduct. Few even of the most inconsiderable towns of Italy are without the useful ornament of a public fountain. The embellishments of sculpture and architecture are employed, with great propriety, on such works, which are continually in the people’s view; the air is refreshed, and the eye delighted, by the streams of water they pour forth; a sight peculiarly agreeable in a warm climate. In this area there is also a statue of Sixtus V., in bronze. Over the portal of the church itself, is a statue of the Virgin; and above the middle gate, is a Latin inscription, importing, that within is the House of the Mother of God, in which the Word was made flesh. The gates of the church are likewise of bronze, embellished with basso relievos, of admirable workmanship; the subjects taken partly from the Old, and partly from the New, Testament, and divided into different compartments. As the gates of this church are shut at noon, the pilgrims who arrive after that time can get no nearer the Santa Casa than these gates, which are, by this means, sometimes exposed to the first violence of that holy ardour which was designed for the Chapel itself. All the sculpture upon the gates, which is within reach of the mouths of those zealots, is, in some degree, effaced by their kisses. The murder of Abel, by his brother, is upon a level with the lips of a person of an ordinary size, when kneeling. Poor Abel has been always unfortunate; had he been placed a foot higher, or lower, on the gate, he might have remained there, in security, for ages; but, in the unlucky place that the sculptor has put him, his whole body has been almost entirely kissed away by the pilgrims; whilst Cain stands, untouched, in his original altitude, frowning and fierce as ever.