This is not the place (as writers say who have not prepared themselves
with the requisite ideas at a given point) to speak of the situation in
Rome; and I meant only to note that there are more ecclesiastics than
conscripts to be seen there. Of all the varying costumes of the varying
schools, none is so pleasing, so vivid, as that of the German students
as they rush swiftly by in their flying robes of scarlet. The red
matches the ruddy health in their cheeks, and there is a sort of
gladness in their fling that wins the liking as well as the looking; so
that almost one would not mind being a German student of theology one's
self. There are other-costumes running in color from violet, and blue
with orange sashes, to unrelieved black and black trimmed with red; but
I cannot remember which nationality wears which.
I am not sure but one sees as many priests in Rome now as in the times
when they ruled it; and I am no such Protestant that I will pretend I do
not like a monsignore when I meet him, either in the street or at
afternoon tea, as one sometimes may.
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