The crowd was beyond describing. Here about us was a vast concourse of men; and as far as the eye could reach down the huge oval, and far away beyond the crowned statue, and on either side back to the Bureau on the left, and on the slopes on the right, stretched an inconceivable pavement of heads. Above us, too, on every terrace and step, back to the doors of the great basilica, we knew very well, was one seething, singing mob. A great space was kept open on the level ground beneath us--I should say one hundred by two hundred yards in area--and the inside fringe of this was composed of the sick, in litters, in chairs, standing, sitting, lying and kneeling. It was at the farther end that the procession would enter. After perhaps half an hour's waiting, during which one incessant gust of singing rolled this way and that through the crowd, the leaders of the procession appeared far away--little white or black figures, small as dolls--and the singing became general. But as the endless files rolled out, the singing ceased, and a moment later a priest, standing solitary in the great space began to pray aloud in a voice like a silver trumpet. I have never heard such passion in my life. I began to watch presently, almost mechanically, the little group beneath the _ombrellino_, in white and gold, and the movements of the monstrance blessing the sick; but again and again my eyes wandered back to the little figure in the midst, and I cried out with the crowd, sentence after sentence, following that passionate voice: "_Seigneur, nous vous adorons!_" "_Seigneur,_" came the huge response, "_nous vous adorons!_" "_Seigneur, nous vous aimons!_" cried the priest. "_Seigneur, nous vous aimons!_" answered the people. "_Sauvez-nous, Jésus; nous périssons!_" "_Sauvez-nous, Jésus; nous périssons!_" "_Jésus, Fils de Marie, ayez pitié de nous!_" "_Jésus, Fils de Marie, ayez pitié de nous!_" Then with a surge rose up the plainsong melody. "_Parce, Domine!_" sang the people. "_Parce populo tuo! Ne in aeternum irascaris nobis._" Again: "_Gloria Patri et Filio et Spiritui Sancto._" "_Sicut erat in principio et nunc et semper, et in sæcula sæculorum. Amen._" Then again the single voice and the multitudinous answer: "_Vous êtes la Résurrection et la Vie!_" And then an adjuration to her whom He gave to be our Mother. "_Mère du Sauveur, priez pour nous!_" "_Salut des Infirmes, priez pour nous!_" Then once more the singing; then the cry, more touching than all: "_Seigneur, guérissez nos malades!_" "_Seigneur, guérissez nos malades!_" Then the kindling shout that brought the blood to ten thousand faces: "_Hosanna! Hosanna au Fils de David!_" (I shook to hear it). "_Hosanna!_" cried the priest, rising from his knees with arms flung wide. "_Hosanna!_" roared the people, swift as an echo. "_Hosanna! Hosanna!_" crashed out again and again, like great artillery.