Now the question as to the real aspect of the Papal pageantry, and the effects produced by it upon the minds, not of controversialists, but of ordinary spectators, is by no means an unimportant one with reference to the future prospects of Italy and the Papacy. Let me try then, not irreverently or depreciatingly, but as speaking of plain matters of fact, to tell you what you really do see and hear at the greatest and grandest of the Roman ceremonies. Of all the Holy Week services none have a more European fame, or have been more written or sung about, than the Misereres in the Sistine Chapel. Now to be present at these services you have to start at about one o'clock, or midday, in full evening costume, dress-coat and black trowsers. Any man who has ever had to walk out in evening attire in the broad daylight, will agree with me that the sensation of the general shabbiness and duskiness of your whole appearance is so strong as to overcome all other considerations, not to mention your devotional feelings. In this attire you have to stand for a couple of hours amongst a perspiring and ill-tempered crowd, composed of tourists and priests, for the Italians are too wise to trouble themselves for such an object. During these two mortal hours you are pushed forward constantly by energetic ladies bent on being placed, and pushed back by the Swedish guards, who defend the entrance. The conversation you hear around you, and perforce engage in, is equally unedifying, both religiously and intellectually, a sort of _rechauffe_ of Murray's handbook, flavoured with discussions on last Sunday's sermon. When you are reduced to such a frame of mind and body as is the natural result of time so employed, the doors of the chapel are opened, and you have literally to fight your way in amidst a crowd of ladies hustling, screaming, and fainting. If you are lucky, you get standing room in a sort of open pen, whence, if you are tall, you can catch a sight of the Pope's tiara in the distance; or, if you belong to the softer sex, you get a place behind the screen, where you cannot see, but, what is much better, can sit. The atmosphere of the candle-lighted, crammed chapel is overpowering, and occupation you have none, except trying in the dim light to decipher the frescoes on the roof, with your head turned backwards. For three long hours you have a succession of dreary monotonous strains, forming portions of a chant, to you unintelligible, broken at intervals by a passage of intonation. There is no organ or instrumental music, and the absence of contralto voices is poorly compensated for by the unnatural accents of the Papal substitutes for female vocalists.