ch again. The era of
individualities is not gone by, as some pretend. Men of middle age have
seen in a lifetime Cavour, Louis Napoleon, Garibaldi, Disraeli,
Bismarck, Leo the Thirteenth--and the young Emperor of Germany. With
the possible exception of Cavour, who died, poisoned as some say, before
he had lived out his life, few will deny that of all these the present
Pope possesses, in many respects, the most evenly balanced and
stubbornly sane disposition. That fact alone speaks highly for the
judgment of the men who elected him, in Italy's half-crazed days,
immediately after the death of Victor Emmanuel.

At all events, there he stands, at the head of the Holy Roman Catholic
and Apostolic Church, as wise a leader as any who in our day has wielded
power; as skilled, in his own manner, as any who hold the pen; and
better than all that, as straightly simple and honest a Christian man as
ever fought a great battle for his faith's sake.

Straight-minded, honest and simple he is, yet keen, sensitive and nobly
cautious; for there is no nobility in him who risks a cause for the
vanity of his own courage, and who, in blind hatred of his enemies,
squanders the devotion of those who love him. In a sense, today, the
greater the man the greater the peacemaker, and Leo the Thirteenth ranks
highest among those who have helped the cause of peace in this century.

In spite of his great age, the Holy Father enjoys excellent health, and
leads a life full of occupations from morning till night. He rises very
early, and when, at about six o'clock in the morning, his valet, Pio
Centra, enters his little bedroom, he more often finds the Pope risen
than asleep. He is accustomed to sleep little--not more than four or
five hours at night, though he rests a short time after dinner. We are
told that sometimes he has been found asleep in his chair at his
writing-table at dawn, not having been to bed at all. Of late he
frequently says mass in a chapel in his private apartments, and the mass
is served by Pio Centra. On Sundays and feast-days he says it in another
chapel preceding the throne-room. The little chapel is of small
dimensions, but by opening the door into the neighbouring room a number
of persons can assist at the mass. The permission, when given, is
obtained on application to the 'Maestro di Camera,' and is generally
conceded only to distinguished foreign persons. After saying mass
himself, the Holy Father immediately hears a second o