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who wait on them. Be this as it may, the feeding is generally the least pleasant part of the proceedings.

The post prandium on the occasion in question was very simple. Some might have felt it right, perhaps, to have added a long exhortation from the chair, on the principle that you cannot have too much of a good thing. Our country parson was not of this mind. He was content with the religious instruction he had given in church, and with the hymns and chants which had been there used. The village choir sung some glees, as village choirs are apt to sing them; and the rector made his short address. A long one was not required. Some of the babies were getting fidgetty, and uttering the " nursery music" which warned the mothers to be looking homewards. It was no wonder, as divers of them had been stuffed with pie-crust and pudding. But it did bring the proceedings to a pleasant conclusion, when the rector, after he had said grace, appealed to the people with a word of thanksgiving to God. It did sound very pleasant, when many voices responded to the assertion that a harvest home thus spent, was better than if the husbands had celebrated it, without their wives and children, at the Chequers.

There was plenty of merriment when the great business of feeding was suspended. Nothing could be more pleasant than those rows of households. Father at one end of the row, mother at the other; six children of all shapes and sizes between. True, the people brought plates of divers patterns, knives and forks of differing degrees of length and antiquity, for their food. True, it was a strange display of mugs, jugs, horns, and even tea-cups for their beer. But there was thorough freedom from restraint, plenty of good cheer, and a happy spirit everywhere.

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Upon my word, sir," said the bailiff to the rector, "what a good thing this is! A deal better, sir, than it

used to be."

"Thank God," said our country parson to himself, as he went back to his home, " for a day so spent."

We ask if there is a farmer in England, who would not agree with the bailiff; or if there is a minister in England who would not find the farmers ready and willing to co-operate with him in holding Christian harvest homes? We believe firmly that it is each man's own fault, if ever again the shouts of the labourers, when the last sheaf is carried safe to the homestead, fill his heart with sad forebodings.

THE MARTYRDOM OF AONIO PALEARIO. THE reigning pontiff belonged to the order of the Dominicans, whose enmity Aonio had incurred twentyfive years previously. He was one of the fraternity of the Holy Office, whose sentences Paleario had dared to compare to a dagger raised over every good man. The author of the "Beneficio," the eloquent orator of Siena, the professor of Milan, suspected on so many accounts of heterodoxy, could not find grace in the eyes of the inquisitor Ghislieri, now Pope Pius v. If the protection of the Medici, and the sacred rites of hospitality had not been able to save Carnesecchi from death, what prince and what magistrates would be bold enough to undertake the defence of Paleario? His celebrity and his talents were only an additional reason for persecuting him. A short respite was afforded him by the serious disputes which followed the return of Cardinal Borromeo into his diocese, and the conflicts of jurisdiction to which the application of the decrees of the

| Council of Trent gave rise in the Milanese, then subject to the jealous authority of Philip II. But for this, Paleario would not have been permitted the repose which was granted him during the first two years of the pontificate of Pius v.,-a time of quiet meditation and of preparation for the last conflict.

The occasion of the first prosecution directed against him in Milan was the publication of his letters and speeches, printed at Bâle, by Thomas Guarini, in the year 1566. On the title-page were these important words: "Edition revised by the Author." No more was needed to cause the inquisitor, Fra Angelo, of Cremona, to bring an action against Paleario for heresy, the importance of which was increased by the rigour of the time. The accused did not deceive himself as to its consequence, as is attested by the last words of his letter to Guarini: "The blow is struck! Live free and happy, leaving to their sad fate those who, on the smallest pretext, are here the victims of nameless vcxations, and can only long for death!"

Paleario had now nothing to do but to bid an adieu to his own family, in which were concentrated the sufferings of a last farewell. What he felt in these circumstances he has, so to say, himself described in one of those moments when a man who consecrates himself to a great cause foresees the storms of his destiny, and mourns prospectively over the joys and affections of home. "When I left my dwelling with the purpose of at length lifting up a free and Christian testimony, I was not ignorant of the perils and trials to which I was about to expose myself. The menaces of those pontifical anathemas which I was compelled to endure, in order to bear testimony to the truth, were indeed no light thing; for there is no peace possible between Christ and the pope. I could not deny Christ, whose word is graven in the very depths of my heart; yet to attack the Roman pontiff was to draw upon myself the rigour of the most implacable government that ever existed. I could look back, in the course of ages, on the horrible treatment inflicted on all who refused to prostrate themselves at its feet; kings and emperors bathed in blood; cities devoted to execration; entire nations numbered among the wicked, and cut off, so to speak, from the surface of the earth. If none, said I, whatever may be his rank or his virtue, has been able to believe himself secure from the fury of the Roman pontiffs, what can a man hope for who, destitute of all support, poor and obscure, dares to brave their resentment? The most melancholy pictures then presented themselves before my eyes. I saw myself alone, without other support than the Lord Jesus Christ, for whom I have always lived-stripped of all which attracts the consideration of men-disowned by illustrious friends, from whom I have received only benefits, and not one injury. I lost in one day the advantages gained by years of labour; not only the fields which provided me with food, but also my relations, my friends, my cherished wife, my tenderly-beloved children. I must become an exile from Italy, and take refuge in unknown countries, unless I preferred to die in the dungeon or at the stake. Ah! be not astonished if, at the hour of my departure, unable to conceal these melancholy prospects from those whom I love, and commending them to the pity of some friend, I have left my household plunged in mourning and tears." Before taking leave of his family, Paleario had provided as well as he could for the sad necessities of the future. It was to a much-loved home that Marietta and her children were to retire; it was at Colle that they were to await tidings

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from the husband and father who was never restored to them! Paleario could then quit Milan and travel to Rome, guarded by the agents of the inquisitor. It was a melancholy journey, of which we know not the details, but of which it is easy to foresee the result; this was in 1568. Paleario approached his sixty-sixth year; half a century had passed away since, leaving for the first time Veroli, his native place, he had entered, sanguine and free, the capital of Christendom, then resplendent with magnificence, under the pontificate of Leo X. Even then, it is true, there appeared on the horizon the signs of the storm which was soon to burst over the church, to detach one half of Europe from the throne of St. Peter, and to sow in the peninsula the seeds of disaffection and of schism, pitilessly suppressed by the Holy Office. Of the reformed Italians, some had fled to foreign lands; others, accepting the ordeal of persecution, had awaited the hour of the great sacrifice by which, sooner or later, they must seal their faith. Paleario was of the latter number. Bending under the weight of years, and accused of a capital crime, he returned a prisoner to the city where the most brilliant years of his youth had passed, but where he was now forgotten. Time, in its inflexible progress, had mown down many generations. Death had successively struck Filonardi, Bembo, Sadoleto, and Flaminio," noble spirits, left for a short time on earth, but now taken to heaven." Maffei himself, taken away in his turn, could not give to his friend even the support of a voice respected, but utterly powerless, under the inexorable pontiff who directed the government of the church. In this absolute isolation, when all seemed to have conspired against him, or to be indifferent to his fate, when no friendly hand pressed his,-Paleario raised his eyes above the world, to the mysterious regions to which prayer ascends, and from which help descends. “He endured, as seeing in. who is invisible."

Courage was more necessary to him than ever in the ordeal of the captivity which he endured, when he found himself associated with the vilest criminals. There were three prisons in Rome, besides those of the Castle of St. Angelo and of the Capitol. The first, situated on the right bank of the Tiber, in the Borgo, and specially reserved for the prisoners of the Holy Office, was that in which Paul IV. had himself installed the dismal apparatus of the Inquisition, and had said to tortures and punishments, "You shall be my servants," and which, by a just reprisal, the people in a fury demolished at his death. Rebuilt by his successors, it saddened with its shadow the Leonine city. The second prison was built in the ancient Campo di Marzio; this was the Torre Savella, communicating with the criminal tribunal, which there held its assizes. The third, and most dreaded prison, was that of the Tordinona, on the site of which now stands the theatre of Apollo, on the banks of the Tiber. The river-here imprisoned within narrow banks, which are united by the bridge of St. Angelo, and commanded by the gloomy mausoleum of Adrian-flows on a level with the damp dungeons, hollowed in the depths of the earth, a living tomb, which has more than once deprived the scaffold of its victims. This was the prison of Paleario..

The procedure commenced against him at Milan was resumed before the tribunal of the Holy Office, presided over by three cardinals, grand inquisitors of the faith. These were Scipione Reviva, archbishop of Pisa, who had displayed the most furious zeal against Carnesecchi; Francesco Pacheca, cardinal of Burgos, who exercised

his functions with the inflexibility of a Spanish prelate, formed in the school of Torquemada; and, lastly, Cardinal Gambara, bishop of Viterbo.

Standing before the terrible tribunal of the Inquisition, with no defence but his faith, his piety, and his deep knowledge of the Holy Scriptures, he openly confessed the doctrines which he had learned from them. Being pressed to retract, he replied to the imperious demands of his judges by the following words, in which the weariness of the old man and the ardour of the martyr are touchingly contrasted :-" After all the testimonies that you have brought against me, what need is there, my lords, for longer disputes? I am determined to follow the counsel of the apostle, who says, · Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow his steps: who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth: who, when he was reviled, reviled not again; when he suffered, he threatened not; but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously.' Pronounce, then, your sentence. Fulfil your office; and, by the condemnation of Aonio, overwhelm his enemies with joy." These noble and resigned words seem but a cry of rage to the historian who relates them-a sad aberration of party spirit, or rather a just punishment for the intolerance which knows no better than to outrage what merits universal respect! "When it was clearly seen," adds Laderchi, "that this son of Belial was obstinately attached to his errors, and that he could not be brought back by any means to the light, they condemned him, as he deserved, to perish in the flames, that this momentary suffering might be followed by eternal punishment."

The sentence, pronounced on the 15th October, 1569, was not carried into execution till the third of July of the following year, as is attested by the registers of the fraternity of San Giovanni Decollato. This name was given to an association formed at Rome, which was specially charged with attending on the condemned at the hour of death. Men of every profession and of all ranks were received into this society; some devoted to the austerities of the cloister, others to the amusements of the age, but all leaving either business or pleasure at a moment's notice, to perform in secret an act of charity. Julio Romano, Michel Angelo, and Benvenuto Cellini were members of this fraternity, the rules of which had been confirmed by Nicholas v. His suocessors gave them the privilege of delivering every year one prisoner condemned to death a noble right, which, however, was never exercised in favour of any one condemned for heresy. The fraternity of San Giovanni Decollato still exists. They possess archives in which many mournful narratives are preserved. Their registers, kept with the regularity of a daily journal from the fifteenth century, contain many long accounts of the last struggles of crime and of faith, of despair and of charity. But on the 3rd of July, 1570, they had nothing to narrate save the unalterable serenity of the martyr! Having been warned on the eve of this day that their services were required for one condemned by the Holy Office, and destined to die the next day, eight. members of the fraternity presented themselves at the prison of Tordinona. Having been admitted to the prisoner, they announced to him that he had but few hours to live. He received the tidings with joy. Without refusing the religious aid which was offered

*Their names are known to us. A Dominican monk, Fra Alessandro, of the Minerva, and one of the Aldobrandini family are mentioned in the fatal list preserved in the library of Siena.