The company was on the grass in the area; the music at one end; boxes filled with the handsome Roman women occupied the other sides.

It was a new thing here, this popular dinner, and the Romans greeted it in an intoxication of hope and pleasure.

Sterbini, author of "The Vestal," presided: many others, like him, long time exiled and restored to their country by the present Pope, were at the tables.

The Colosseum, and triumphal arches were in sight; an effigy of the Roman wolf with her royal nursling was erected on high; the guests, with shouts and music, congratulated themselves on the possession, in Pius IX., of a new and nobler founder for another state.

Among the speeches that of the Marquis d'Azeglio, a man of literary note in Italy, and son-in-law of Manzoni, contained this passage (he was sketching the past history of Italy):-- "The crown passed to the head of a German monarch; but he wore it not to the benefit, but the injury, of Christianity,--of the world.