We were then crossing a wide rolling plain that was almost destitute of
trees, and looked, from the moving train, like green billows of the sea
with grass growing over them. Father Dan was reading his breviary for
the following day, not knowing what he would have to do in it, when the
sun set in a great blaze of red beyond the horizon, and then suddenly a
big round black ball, like a captive balloon, seemed to rise in the
midst of the glory.
I called Father Dan's attention to this, and in a moment he was
fearfully excited.
"Don't worry, my child," he cried, while tears of joy sprang to his
eyes. "Do you know what that is? That's the dome of St. Peter's! Rome,
my child, Rome!"
It was nine o'clock when we arrived at our destination, and in the midst
of a great confusion I walked by Father Dan's side and held on to his
vertical pocket, while he carried his own bag, and a basket of mine,
down the crowded platform to an open cab outside the station.
Then Father Dan wiped his forehead with his print handkerchief and I sat
close up to him, and the driver cracked his long whip and shouted at the
pedestrians while we rattled on and on over stony streets, which seemed
to be full of statues and fountains that were lit up by a great white
light that was not moonlight and yet looked like it.
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