"The Pope made no reply; only it appeared to me that the idea of seeing the French in Italy filled him with no sort of fear. Every one is weary of the inquisition of the Court of Vienna, of its cavilling, of its continual encroachments and of its little plots to unite the peoples which detest the Austrian yoke into a confederation against France. "This, monsieur le comte, is a summary of my long conversation with His Holiness. I do not know that any one has ever been in a position to know more thoroughly the inner sentiments of the Pope, that any one has ever heard a prince who governs the Christian world express himself so plainly on subjects so vast and so far removed from the narrow circle of diplomatic commonplaces. Here there was no intermediary between the Sovereign Pontiff and myself and it was easy to see that Leo XII., thanks to his candid character and the impulse of a familiar conversation, dissimulated nothing and in no way sought to deceive. "The leanings and wishes of the Pope are evidently towards France: when he assumed the Keys of St. Peter, he belonged to the faction of the _zelanti_; to-day he has sought his strength in moderation: that is what the habit of power always teaches. For this reason he is not beloved by the faction of cardinals which he has quitted. Finding no man of talent in the secular clergy, he has chosen his chief advisers among the regular clergy; hence it comes that the monks are on his side, while the prelates and the simple priests make a sort of opposition to him. The latter, when I arrived in Rome, all had their minds more or less infected with the lies of our congregation; they are now infinitely more reasonable; they all, generally speaking, blame the rising in arms of our clergy. It is curious to remark that the Jesuits have as many enemies here as in France: they have as their special adversaries the other religious and the heads of Orders. They had formed a plan by means of which they would have seized upon the public instruction in Rome to the exclusion of the others: the Dominicans have foiled that plan. The Pope is not very popular, because he administers well. His little army consists of old soldiers of Bonaparte, who have a very military bearing and keep excellent order on the high-roads. If material Rome has lost in picturesqueness, it has gained in cleanliness and healthiness. His Holiness plants trees and arrests hermits and beggars: another subject of complaint for the populace. Leo XII. is a great worker; he sleeps little and eats scarcely at all. Only one taste remains to him of his youth, that of sport, an exercise necessary to his health, which, for that matter, seems to be improving. He has a few shots with a fowling-piece in the vast enclosure of the Gardens of the Vatican. The