At Rome

Spuming, plunging, bumping dolphins, the steamship Conte Biancamano rushed across the stormy Mediterranean last week with His Eminence Patrick Joseph Cardinal Hayes, Archbishop of New York priest of Sancta Maria in Via -- Rome. Cardinal Hayes had with him his entourage and the last U. S. contingent of Holy Year pilgrims, for on Christmas Eve the Holy Doors close on this year at jubilee. For that ceremony they arrived in Naples in good time but they reached Rome late by one day to attend the resplendent, the rare Public (Extraordinary Consistory at which five cardinals received their red hats; and late by five days for Cardinal Hayes to add his placet (it pleases! or yes!) to the naming of four of these in Secret (or Ordinary) Consistory.

At that Secret Consistory in the Hall of the Consistory, faced by the Sacred College of his scarlet robed Cardinals, sat white-clad Pius XI, once Achille Ratti, but since Feb. 12, 1922, His Holiness the Pope, Bishop of Rome an Vicar of Jesus Christ, Successor of Saint Peter, Prince of the Apostles, Supreme Pontiff of the Universal Church, Patriarch of the West, Primate of Italy, Archbishop and Metropolitan of the Roman Province, Sovereign of the Temporal Dominions of the Holy Roman Church.

Four names at least His Holiness spoke to his silent audience.

1) Bonaventura Cerretti, Archbishop of Corinth, now apostolic nuncio in Paris, onetime auditor of the apostolic delegation in the U. S.;

2) Enrico Gasparri, recently apostolic nuncio in Brazil, nephew of His Eminence Peter Cardinal Gasparri, Papal Secretary of State and Camerlengo, prospective administrator of certain papal functions should the Pope die;

3) Patrick O'Donnell, Archbishop of Armagh, who cleaned "poteen-(Irish moonshine) from his diocese by making penitent drinkers walk miles for absolution;

4) Alessandro Verde, Secretary of the Congregation of Rites, one of the most learned theologians of the Roman ecclesiasts.

For His Eminence Enrico Cardinal Gasparri, nephew of a living Cardinal, His Holiness had to dispense from his Church rule: "In keeping with the provisions for the promotion to the nobility, illegitimates, even when legitimated by later marriage, are ineligible, also the fathers of legitimate children, nephews of cardinals and those related to a cardinal in the first or second degree of consanguinity. Of course the Pope can occasionally dispense from these qualifying conditions.'

As the Pope named these four, each cardinal present rose in his place, lifted his scarlet biretta as sign of agreement or mayhap retained it in firm objection. Who, if any, dissented from the Pope's nomination, no outsider will ever know, for each cardinal has gone through the ceremony of the "opening and closing of the mouth" as token of his silence on papal matters.

Monday afternoon three of the nominees (Cardinal Cerretti must stay watchfully in Paris to guard the frail French-Vatican relations) were summoned to the Pope's apartments. In the antechamber a sottoguardaroba handed each his scarlet zucchetto. Capped they proceeded into the presence of His Holiness who placed on each his scarlet biretta--the four-cornered, pinched-top cap--then heard their oaths to defend conscientiously the papal bulls concerning nonalienation of the possessions of the Roman Church, nepotism, papal elections, and cardinalitial dignity. Last May 30, two Spanish prelates were elevated to the scarlet: Eustachio Ilundain y Esteban, Archbishop of Seville, and Vincenzo Casanova y Marzol, Archbishop of Granada. The day before Cardinal Hayes' arrival, before an immense throng of royalty, nobility, ambassadors and Holy Year pilgrims packed in the great basilica of St. Peter's, the five new cardinals heard Pius XI order from his raised throne: "Accipe galerum rubrum!" (Take the red hat!), and each had held over his head by a master of ceremonies the low-crowned, wide, curled-brim red hat of the cardinal. Brother cardinals caught them by the elbows and kissed them on both cheeks; the queerly plump Sistine choir sang; His Holiness departed; all cardinals adjourned to sing a Te Deum; the happy audience departed.

After the Secret Consistory, Pius XI made public his allocution to the Sacred College of Cardinals. He wrote:

"In truth, if the pilgrims can say that they were able freely and safely to circulate in the streets of this centre of Catholicism, they cannot but have noticed that the same cannot be said of the Vicar of our Lord Jesus Christ and the Father of all the Faithful, whom they were unable to approach and see except by crossing the threshold which He himself, so long as present conditions continue, neither can nor must cross."

Yet everyone knows that the Vatican is somewhat resigned to the confiscation of the Papal States by Italy; would be content if Italy would allot in fee simple, free from secular suzerainty, a narrow strip of land from Rome to the Tiber estuary, so that the Pope could have his own seaport, could travel abroad without touching Italian soil.

In his allocution he deplored civil unrest in Italy; expressed sorrow for the tenseness between the Church, and the governments of Chile; Argentina, Mexico and Czechoslovakia; rejoiced over better conditions in France, Poland and Bavaria; announced the extension of the jubilee to the 700th centenary of Saint Francis d'Assisi. In 1928, the Ecumenical Council, which Italy's union in 1870 caused to be suspended, will probably be resumed where it left off. At that time many questions on the reuniting of schismatics, possibly the "Old Catholics" and perhaps even some Anglicans, will come up for the consideration of the 2,000 bishops and their assistants who will attend.

While his brethren received their red hats, His Eminence Bonaventura Cardinal Cerretti worked hard in Paris. Not for him the splendors of the Extraordinary Consistory at Rome, nor the Kiss of Peace, nor the blessing from the Pope's own mouth. He had work to do, conciliating this one, that one; making a connection here, there; laying pipe lines; establishing the strength of the Church in France. But shortly a papal ablegate will speed to him with the princely vestments of the cardinal and in the presence of Louis Ernest Cardinal Dubois, Archbishop of Paris, of Paulinus Peter Cardinal Andrieu, Archbishop of Bordeaux, of President Doumergue of France, of many dignitaries of State and Church, with great splendor and show he will don his zucchetto, his biretta, his red hat.