their chaplains stood near them, while the two men-servants hurried
forward with the bags to secure a private compartment.

The four kept complete silence, watching the busy movements of the
officials on board, staring unseeingly at the sleek, polished monster
that lay netted in steel at their feet, and the great folded fins that
would presently be cutting the thin air at a hundred and fifty miles an
hour.

Then Percy, by a sudden movement, turned from the others, went to the
open window that looked over Rome, and leaned there with his elbows on
the sill, looking.

* * * * *

It was a strange view before him.

It was darkening now towards sunset, and the sky, primrose-green
overhead, deepened to a clear tawny orange above the horizon, with a
sanguine line or two at the edge, and beneath that lay the deep evening
violet of the city, blotted here and there by the black of cypresses and
cut by the thin leafless pinnacles of a poplar grove that aspired
without the walls. But right across the picture rose the enormous dome,
of an indescribable tint; it was grey, it was violet--it was what the
eye chose to make it--and through it, giving its solidity the air of a
bubble, shone the southern sky, flushed too with faint orange. It was
this that was supreme and dominant; the serrated line of domes, spires
and pinnacles, the crowded roofs beneath, in the valley dell' Inferno,
the fairy hills far away--all were but the annexe to this mighty
tabernacle of God. Already lights were beginning to shine, as for thirty
centuries they had shone; thin straight skeins of smoke were ascending
against the darkening sky. The hum of this Mother of cities was
beginning to be still, for the keen air kept folks indoors; and the
evening peace was descending that closed another day and another year.
Beneath in the narrow streets Percy could see tiny figures, hurrying
like belated ants; the crack of a whip, the cry of a woman, the wail of
a child came up to this immense elevation like details of a murmur from
another world. They, too, would soon be quiet, and there would be peace.

A heavy bell beat faintly from far away, and the drowsy city turned to
murmur its good-night to the Mother of God. From a thousand towers came
the tiny melody, floating across the great air spaces, in a thousand
accents, the solemn bass of St. Peter's, the mellow tenor of the
Lateran, the rough cry from some old slum church, the peevish tinkle of
convents and chapel