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CELEBRATED CRIMES VOLUME 1(of 8), Part 2

By Alexander Dumas, Pere




THE CENCI

1598

Should you ever go to Rome and visit the villa Pamphili, no doubt,
after having sought under its tall pines and along its canals the
shade and freshness so rare in the capital of the Christian world,
you will descend towards the Janiculum Hill by a charming road, in
the middle of which you will find the Pauline fountain. Having
passed this monument, and having lingered a moment on the terrace of
the church of St. Peter Montorio, which commands the whole of Rome,
you will visit the cloister of Bramante, in the middle of which, sunk
a few feet below the level, is built, on the identical place where
St. Peter was crucified, a little temple, half Greek, half Christian;
you will thence ascend by a side door into the church itself. There,
the attentive cicerone will show you, in the first chapel to the
right, the Christ Scourged, by Sebastian del Piombo, and in the third
chapel to the left, an Entombment by Fiammingo; having examined these
two masterpieces at leisure, he will take you to each end of the
transverse cross, and will show you--on one side a picture by
Salviati, on slate, and on the other a work by Vasari; then, pointing
out in melancholy tones a copy of Guido's Martyrdom of St. Peter on
the high altar, he will relate to you how for three centuries the
divine Raffaelle's Transfiguration was worshipped in that spot; how
it was carried away by the French in 1809, and restored to the pope
by the Allies in 1814. As you have already in all probability
admired this masterpiece in the Vatican, allow him to expatiate, and
search at the foot of the altar for a mortuary slab, which you will
identify by a cross and the single word; Orate; under this gravestone

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