St. Angelo. But this was no
immediate concern of his. "Nothing can be more unlikely," he wrote to
Acton (Sept. 11), "than that I should meddle with the prisons, or anything
else of the kind. The case of Rome in 1866 is very different from that of
Naples in 1850, when the whole royal government was nothing but one gross
and flagrant illegality. I have seen Archbishop Manning repeatedly," he
continues, "and my impression is that he speaks to me after having sought
and received his cue from Rome. He is to put me in communication with
Cardinal Antonelli and others. I consider myself bound to good conduct in
a very strict sense of the word." We now know that the archbishop took
pains to warn his friends at Rome to show their visitor all the kindness
possible. "Gladstone," he wrote, "does not come as an enemy, and may be
made friendly, or he might become on his return most dangerous." The
liberals would be very jealous of him on the subject of the temporal power
of the pope. Meanwhile Gladstone fully held that the Holy Father must be
independent. "Towards us in England," said Manning, "and towards Ireland
he is the most just and forgiving of all our public men. He is very
susceptible of any kindness, and his sympathies and respect religiously
are all with us."(149)

_To the Duchess of Sutherland._

_Rome, Oct. 13._--We had for five days together last week, I will
not say a surfeit or a glut, for these imply excess and satiety,
but a continuous feast of fine scenery; all the way from
Pontarlier by Neuchatel to Lucerne, and then by the St. Gothard to
Como. Since then we have had only the passage of the Apennines by
the railway from Ancona to Rome. This is much finer than the old
road, according to my recollection. It has three grand stages, one
of them rising from the north and east, the others through close
defiles from Foligno to Terni, and from Spoleto to Narni, where we
went close by the old bridge. As to the St. Gothard I think it the
finest in scenery of all the Alpine passes I have seen, and I have
seen all those commonly traversed from the Stelvio downwards (in
height) to the Brenner, except the Bernardina. A part of the
ascent on the Italian side may perhaps compete with the Via Mala
which it somewhat resembles. We were also intensely delighted with
the Lake of Lugano, which I had never seen before, and which
appeared to me the most beautiful of