These brown-cowled gentlemen are not the only ones who carry the tin box. Along the curbstones of the public walks, and on the steps of the churches, sit blind old creatures, and shake at you a tin box, outside of which is a figure of the Madonna, and inside of which are two or three _baiocchi_, as a rattling accompaniment to an unending invocation of aid. Their dismal chant is protracted for hours and hours, increasing in loudness whenever the steps of a passer-by are heard. It is the old strophe and antistrophe of begging and blessing, and the singers are so wretched that one is often softened into charity. Those who are not blind have often a new _Diario_ or _Lunario_ to sell towards the end of the year, and at other times they vary the occupation of shaking the box by selling lives of the saints, which are sometimes wonderful enough. One sad old woman, who sits near the Quattro Fontane, and says her prayers and rattles her box, always touches my heart, there is such an air of forlornness and sweetness about her. As I was returning, last night, from a mass at San Giovanni in Laterano, an old man glared at us through great green goggles,--to which Jealousy's would have yielded in size and color,--and shook his box for a _baiocco_. "And where does this money go?" I asked. "To say masses for the souls of those who die over opposite," said he, pointing to the Hospital of San Giovanni, through the open doors of which we could see the patients lying in their beds. Nor are these the only friends of the box. Often in walking the streets one is suddenly shaken in your ear, and, turning round, you are startled to see a figure entirely clothed in white from head to foot, a rope round his waist, and a white _capuccio_ drawn over his head and face, and showing, through two round holes, a pair of sharp black eyes behind them. He says nothing, but shakes his box at you, often threateningly, and always with an air of mystery. This is a penitent _Saccone_; and as this _confraternità_ is composed solely of noblemen, he may be one of the first princes or cardinals in Rome, performing penance in expiation of his sins; or, for all you can see, it may be one of your intimate friends. The money thus collected goes to various charities. They always go in couples,--one taking one side of the street, the other the opposite,--never losing sight of each other, and never speaking. Clothed thus in secresy, these _Sacconi_ can test the generosity of any one they please with complete impunity, and they often amuse themselves with startling foreigners. Many a group of English girls, convoyed by their mother, and staring into some mosaic or cameo shop, is scared into a scream by the sudden jingle of the box, and the apparition of the spectre in white who shakes it. And many a simple old lady retains to the end of her life a confused impression, derived therefrom, of Inquisitions, stilettos, tortures, and banditti, from which it is vain to attempt to dispossess her mind.