If they had told me I could not return without cutting off my right arm, I would have cut it off.
The Pope signed my pardon, and then published my name in the newspapers, so that none might be ignorant of his clemency.
But I am interdicted from resuming my practice at the Bar, and a man can hardly gain a livelihood by teaching Italian in a country where everybody speaks it." As he concluded, the neighbouring church-bells began to sound the _Ave Maria_.

He turned pale, seized his hat, and rushed out of my room, exclaiming, "I knew not it was so late! Should the police arrive at my house before I can reach it, I am a lost man!" His friends explained to me the cause of his sudden alarm: the poor man is subject to the police regulation termed the _Precetto_.
He must always return to his abode at sunset, and he is then shut in till the next morning.

The police may force their way in at any time during the night, for the purpose of ascertaining that he is there.

He cannot leave the city under any pretence whatever, even in broad day.
The slightest infraction of these rules exposes him to imprisonment, or to a new exile.
The Pontifical States are full of men subject to the _Precetto_: some are criminals who are watched in their homes, for want of prison accommodation; others are _suspected persons_.

The number of these unfortunate beings is not given in the statistical tables, but I know, from an official source, that in Viterbo, a town of fourteen thousand souls, there are no less than two hundred.
The want of prison accommodation explains many things, and, among others, the freedom of speech which exists throughout the country.