Mr. Hare, Mrs. Clement, and Mrs. Jameson all give pleasing versions of the St. Cecilia story, Mrs. Jameson's being much the fullest account of the various representations of Cecilia in art. In the fourth century," says he, "ap- | St. Cecily, the Rev. Alban Butler delivers peared a Greek religious romance on the himself of a quaint little homily-that loves of Cecilia and Valerian, written, from some pens would read like broad like those of Chrysanthus and Daria, Ju- humor-warning the young from the eflian and Basilissa, in glorification of the fects of "soft, effeminate music, which bevirginal life, with the purpose of taking witches the senses, dissipates the mind, the place of the sensual romances of Daph- alienates it from serious studies, is the nis and Chloe, Chereas and Callirhoe, etc., corrupter of the heart, and the poison of which were then popular. There may virtue!" have been foundation of fact on which the story was built up, but the Roman calendar of the fourth century, and the Carthaginian calendar of the fifth, make no mention of Cecilia. It is said, however, that there was a church dedicated to St. Cecilia in Rome in the fifth century, in which Pope Symmachus held a council' in 500. But Symmachus held no council in that year!....But Pope Paschal I. dreamed that the body of the saint lay in the cemetery of St. Calixtus, along with that of her husband Valerian. He accordingly looked for them, and found them, or some bodies-as was probable in the catacombs-which he was pleased to regard as those of Cecilia and Valerian, and he translated these relics to the Church of St. Cecilia, and founded a monastery in their honor." St. Cecilia's chroniclers differ in opinion as to the date of her appearance. Usuardus," says Baring-Gould, "makes Cecilia suffer under Commodus, and Molanus transfers the martyrdom to the reign of Aurelius." After the time of Pope Paschal the Church of St. Cecilia again sank into ruin, but in 1599 Cardinal Sfondrati had it carefully repaired and redecorated. On this occasion the tomb was re-opened, the robe of gold tissue in which the embalmed body was first shrouded still remained, together with the linen cloths steeped in her blood and wrapped around her feet. Touched by the pathetic grace of the recumbent figure, Sfondrati sent for Stephano Maderno, a sculptor of celebrated skill, and ordered him to represent it in marble. This work, entitled "Cecilia Lying Dead," is perhaps the most perfect and beautiful of all bearing her name, and is thus described by Sir Charles Bell: "The body lies on its side, the limbs a little drawn up; the hands are delicate and fine; they are not locked, but crossed at the wrist; the arms are stretched out. The drapery is beautifully modelled, and modestly covers the limbs.... It is the statue of a lady perfect in form, and affecting from the resemblance to reality in the drapery of white marble, and the unspotted appearance of the statue altogether. It lies as no living body could lie, and yet correctly, as the dead when left to expire The "Lives of the Saints, collected from Authentick Records of Church History: The Whole Interpreted with suitable Reflections"- -an interesting old tome, printed in Gray's Inn, London, in 1750-states that several authors, considering how much that Prince (Alexander Severus). favour'd the Christians, date St. Cecily's Death in the Reign of Marcus Aurelius-I mean in the gravitation of the limbs." and Commodus, joint Emperors from 176 to 180. The Grecians are persuaded she suffered in Diocletian's Persecutions, and keep her Festival on the same day with the Latins." The Rev. Alban Butler, in his Lives of the Saints, gives no account of the manner of St. Cecilia's martyrdom, but alludes to the dream of Paschal by which her original burial-place was discovered, and mentions that St. Cecily's Church is called "in Trastevere," or Beyond the Tiber, to distinguish it from the two other churches in Rome bearing her name. After acknowledging the rare musical gift of The yearly festa of St. Cecilia occurs on the anniversary of her martyrdom, November 22, in her church of St. Cecilia in Trastevere, which is then thronged with the worshipful and music-loving of Rome. The papal choir assemble, and respond to each other in these antiphons: "And Cecilia, Thy servant, serves Thee, O Lord, even as the bee that is never idle. Christ, for through Thy Son the fire hath been quenched round about me. "I bless Thee, O Father of my Lord Jesus "I asked of the Lord a respite of three days, that I might consecrate my house as a church. "O Valeriau, I have a secret to tell thee: 1 Then follows the anthem: "While the instruments of music were playing, Cecilia sang unto the Lord, and said, Let my heart be undefiled, that I may never be confounded. "And Valerianus found Cecilia praying in her chamber with an angel." 66 The Church of St. Cecilia has not been materially altered since its rebuilding by Sfondrati in 1599, though in 1725 Cardinal Doria added certain modern decorations, which do not seem to be regarded as improvements. The church stands at the extremity of the Trastevere, near the Quay of La Ripa Grande." A picturesque house in the style of the Middle Ages stands opposite. The frieze of the portico has mosaic arabesques, with crude portraits of St. Cecilia and pictures of other saints, which, together with the mosaics in the Tribune--a part of the church not touched since Paschal's time--are supposed to date from the ninth century. Her body since the time Maderno made his expressive copy of it has lain in the confession, which is directly under the high altar. The tomb of Cardinal Adam of Hertford, a prelate who figured in the opposition to Urban VI., is near the entrance of the church, to the right. He was the only one saved from a cruel death after the triumph of that Pope, England interfering in his behalf. His tomb is adorned with the English arms-three leopards and a fleur-de-lis quartered. The beautiful urn of Cardinal Fortiguerra stands also near the entrance, to the left. The mosaics in the church ceiling represent Christ surrounded by the saints Cecilia, Paschal, and Paul, Valerian, Peter, and Agata, with appropriate symbols. Behind the altar is a picture of St. Cecilia's martyrdom, supposed to be the work of Guido. The painting at the extremity of the right aisle represents St. Cecilia appearing in a beautiful garment wrought with jewels, and showing the slumbering Pope Urban where he will find her body. This is believed to have been painted in the ninth century; it is the last in a series of fine frescoes which were destroyed in the seventeenth century, and were supposed to be the work of Byzantine artists. under the direction of Pope Paschal. Fortunately a copy of the entire series is preserved in the Barberini Palace Library, and forms a dramatic pictorial account of the main incidents of Cecilia's life and martyrdom. Mrs. Jameson is undecided as to the trayed her and her story on canvas and in marble in some of the most beautiful work to which their names attach. clothed with almost severe simplicity; with a rich turban, or with the celestial red and white roses on her head, or with Some idea of the surpassing merits of a slender aureole faintly raying upon her the Cecilia art memorials by the last six hair; with the organ at her side or at her of the above-mentioned artists may be feet, while she looks upward in rapture to gained by a study of the exquisite outline the descending angels. Sometimes a copies of them in the plates of Le Musée dramatic feeling has been given,. . . . as de Peinture et de Sculpture, par Reveil. where St. Cecilia is playing to the Virgin, Says Louis Viardot, in his Les Mer- and St. Antony of Padua is listening, in veilles de la Peinture: Among Ra- Garofalo's work. Or as in a picture by phaels, we must not omit to mention | Giulio Campi, where St. Cecilia is seated 66 66 what is and always will be the pearl of the museum at Bologna-the St. Cecilia. .... He has represented her in an ecstasy, listening to celestial music, and letting fall from her hands a little portable organ on which she has begun the concert finished by the angels. . . . This St. Cecilia was ordered of Raphael in 1515 by a lady of Bologna named Elena dall' Olio Duglioli, of the house of Bentivoglio, who was subsequently canonized; thus the picture came to Bologna, where it has since remained." The copies by Carracci and Guido have made this beautiful work widely known. Viardot remarks that people educated to admire the dazzle, splendor, and wonderful effect of Guido, Guercino, and Domenichino, do not at first receive the full impression of Raphael's coloring, so much more subdued, but so deep and so full of meaning that it comes at last, by a real growth in the observer's mind, to impress as the supreme in art. In connection with adherence to certain fixed emblems, there is much versatility of treatment in the St. Cecilia paintings. Sometimes she is represented in rich, even before an organ, attired in the rich Florentine costume of the sixteenth century; near her stands St. Catherine, listening to the heavenly strains." In her many fine descriptions of the St. Cecilia pictures, Mrs. Jameson gives the following: "She is very seldom represented in the devotional pictures as the virgin martyr only, but I remember one striking example; it is in a picture by Giulio Procaccino. She leans back, dying, in the arms of an angel, her hands bound, her hair dishevelled, the countenance, raised to heaven, full of tender, enthusiastic faith; one angel draws the weapon from her breast; another, weeping, holds the palm and a wreath of roses. This picture was evidently painted for a particular locality, being on a high, narrow panel, the figure larger than life, and the management of the space and the foreshortening very skillful and fine. I know not any picture of St. Cecilia sleeping except Alfred Tennyson's: There, in a clear walled city on the sea, regally gorgeous, apparelling, and again But the roses brought from paradise |