“Christmas day, went to St. Peter’s to hear mass celebrated by the Pope in person. Here were all kinds of antique costumes,--gentlemen in black velvet doublets with slashed sleeves and ruffs, other gentlemen in crimson ditto ditto, officers of the Swiss Guard in inlaid corselets, and privates of ditto in a kind of striped red and yellow barber’s pole uniform invented by Michelangelo, cardinals, bishops, ambassadors, etc., but not nearly so large a crowd as I expected. The music was good, and the whole ended by the Pope’s being carried through the Basilica blessing the people at intervals as he went along. I stood quite near and had a good view of his face. He looks like a fatter Edward Everett. This is one of the greatest ceremonies of the year. After it was over I stood in the piazza watching the equipages of the cardinals. Speaking of cardinals: I was walking the other day with an English friend, and we saw a cardinal coming toward us accompanied by his confessor and two footmen. Behind followed his carriage with a cocked-hatted coachman and another footman. Should we bow? He was old enough to deserve it, cardinal or not, so we bowed. Never did man get such percentage for an investment. First came off his Eminence’s hat. At a respectful interval came that of the confessor, at another respectful interval those of the coachman and footmen. It was like a detachment of the allied army marching on Dunsinane with a _bough_. “I have spoken rather disrespectfully of the music here, but I have heard good since I came. On New Year’s day the Jesuits have a great celebration in the church of the Gesu. I took a two hours’ slice of it in the afternoon. The music was exceedingly fine, a remarkably well-trained choir accompanied by the finest organ in Rome. The soprano was a boy with a voice that, with my eyes shut, I could not have distinguished from that of a woman. We are having also, every Tuesday, concerts by the St. Peter’s choir, with music of Palestrina, Guglielmi, Mozart, etc. The music of Palestrina has a special charm for me, reminding me more than any I ever heard of the æolian harp with its dainty unexpectedness....