chath Torah, the rejoicing of the Law, the Feast of Tabernacles, terminates.

In addition to several of the above details, my friend in the Ghetto was also at first cautiously, and then frankly, discursive upon the condition of his brethren within their squalid haunts, and upon the iron hand of the ecclesiastical power that had ever kept them in the bonds of oppression. As now, thanks to Italian unity, the bitter sorrows of the Roman Jews are things of the past, a brief sketch of the condition of this maltreated race, under the various pontificates, may not be uninteresting.

The descendants of the unhappy people of Jerusalem who, both before and after the destruction of their Holy City, had been brought within the walls of Rome, and treated as slaves under the despotic rule of the heathen Cæsars, may have expected some slight improvement in their condition when Christians and the self-styled successors of St. Peter became their temporal lords. But their hopes were vain. As they had been oppressed by Caligula, by Nero, by Domitian, and by the whole line of pagan monarchs; so were they persecuted by a Eugenius, by a Paul, by a Caraffa, and more or less by the whole line of Popes,—by the very men who owed all their idolatrous glory to the fact that they assume to be the spiritual descendants of a Hebrew fisherman! Nay, the Christian Bishops of Rome even exceeded the heathen Cæsars in their cruelty and inhumanity towards this people. Decrees were passed, ordering all Roman Jews to wear shameful badges, so as to be recognized and avoided; and edicts published, prohibiting all the accursed race from holding any intercourse with the surrounding Christians during Holy Week. From the beginning of the twelfth century to the

end of the sixteenth, on the installation of every Pope, a deputation of Roman Jews were obliged to present themselves to the new Pontiff on the public-way of his procession, singing songs in his praise, "and carrying on their shoulders a copy of the Pentateuch, written on parchment, bound in gold, and covered with a veil, which on bended knees they offered to him, beseeching his protection. The successor of St. Peter took the book, read a few words from it, and then, putting it behind him, said: 'We affirm the law, but we curse the Hebrew people and their exposition of it."" Gracious words from the lips of the successor of Him who said: “See that ye love one another with a pure heart, fervently." "Honour all men love the brotherhood." "Finally be ye all of one mind, having compassion one of another." "Love as brethren: be courteous." "Add to your faith, virtue; and to godliness, brotherly-kindness; and to brotherly-kindness, charity !"

It was not till the elevation of Adrian VI. to the Papal chair that this odious custom was abolished. During the two centuries and a half that intervened between the reign of Gregory XIV. (1590) and Pius VII. (1800), at the installation of every Pope, the Roman Jews were bound to decorate with their richest tapestries, silks, and embroideries, the detested Arch of Titus (built to commemorate their own degradation, and the destruction of their Holy City), as well as the road leading thence to the Colosseum. At the beginning of this century, Pius VII. exempted the Jews from this tribute, and instead of it allowed them to present an exquisitely bound book, dedicated with Latin verses, to the Pope. The book presented to Pius IX. (the reigning Pope) cost no less than five hundred scudi.

From the elevation of Eugenius IV. (in 1431) to that of

Clement IX. (in 1667), the Roman Jews were compelled to contribute to the sport of the Carnival, by racing amongst themselves. The programme was as follows:

"First a body of Jewish elders, clothed in a shirt or doublet, preceded the cavalcade of the senators who opened the Carnival. They were then obliged to run races every day; and it was the custom to give them a rich dinner beforehand, so as to enable their bodies and spirits to sustain the trials they were to undergo. There were two classes of races: the one comprising old men, young men, and children, without reference to their nation; and the other, being of horses, asses, buffaloes, and Jews. While it was optional with the former to race or not, it was compulsory with the latter,-Jews and asses being treated as belonging to the same category." "* At this degrading sight the highest dignitaries of the Church, and even ladies of noble birth, were among the excited and applauding spectators. If we wanted a proof of how subversive of all the nobler principles of Christianity is the religion of the Papacy, we need seek it no further than in the above fact. A creed which encourages brutality, and violates the common decencies of humanity, may be Roman Catholicism, but it is certainly not Christianity. God grant that the withdrawal of the Pope's temporal power may be the precursor of the decline of his spiritual authority, and that the world may ere long be purged from the abominable tenets of the faith over which he is the head!

Under the reign of the cruel Caraffa, the condition of the Roman Jews reached its climax of misery. They were penned within the narrow limits between the Ponte Quattro

Roba di Roma, by Story.

Capi, and the Piazza del Pianto, now known as the Ghetto; and from that time until the present day, they have lived crowded together in its narrow confines. In 1566, the gates of the Ghetto were ordered to be closed at Ave Maria, after which hour no one was allowed to pass out or in. From the end of the sixteenth century to the beginning of the nineteenth, the condition of the Jews fluctuated between oppressive edicts and occasional relieving statutes, according to the character of the reigning Pontiff.

In 1740, for the first time, the Roman Jews were permitted to sell cloth that was new: until that time their traffic was limited to dealing in old iron and old clothes. On the elevation of the present Pope to the chair of St. Peter, the Jews enjoyed the benefit of his liberal policy. They were no longer compelled to listen to that hated weekly sermon in St. Angelo; they were allowed to exercise certain trades formerly prohibited; they were not forced to live in the Ghetto; and the walls of the Ghetto were levelled. But still, compared to other races, their condition, till the entrance of Victor Emmanuel into Rome, was oppressive and degrading in the extreme. They could hold no civil, political, or military office, and were prohibited from belonging to any profession, or trade of public credit; such as lawyer, manufacturer, goldsmith, etc. The only profession open to them was that of medicine; but even here they were not allowed to study at the Roman medical schools; and when they had obtained their diploma, they were commanded to confine their practice to those of their own faith. They were excluded from all colleges and foundations of public education, and also from all institutions of refuge and charity. They might not hold an acre of land, or hire a farm; and the only investments allowed them in real

estate were in the leases of their miserable houses in the Ghetto. In the courts of justice, their testimony was not admitted in civil questions, and all notarial papers signed by them were declared null and void. In criminal cases, their evidence was admissible, but only when it did not contradict that of the vilest Roman Catholic. And in addition to all these odious restrictions, they were taxed to the uttermost farthing!

Such, briefly, were the chief degrading enactments enforced against the Jews under the Papacy. Now that the Roman Jew has entered upon a new era in his history, it remains for him to show whether the past centuries of persecutions and restrictions have so eaten into his very soul, as to stupefy his intellect and render his freedom almost worthless; or whether, conscious of the privilege of his race, and of the deeds of his glorious ancestry, he determines to wipe out the degradation of the past, by proving that in moral worth and in intellectual vigour he is the equal of those who have so long made him bite the dust of ignominy and submission.