But
his heavy jaw, his long fang-like teeth, and his thick lips express
the grossest appetites. He gives you the idea of a minister grafted on
a savage. When he assists the Pope in the ceremonies of the Holy Week
he is magnificently disdainful and impertinent. He turns from time to
time in the direction of the diplomatic tribune, and looks without a
smile at the poor ambassadors, whom he cajoles from morning to night.
You admire the actor who bullies his public. But when at an evening
party he engages in close conversation with a handsome woman, the play
of his countenance shows the direction of his thoughts, and those of
the imaginative observer are imperceptibly carried to a roadside in a
lonely forest, in which the principal objects are prostrate
postilions, an overturned carriage, trembling females, and a select
party of the inhabitants of Sonnino!
He lives in the Vatican, immediately over the Pope. The Romans ask
punningly which is the uppermost, the Pope or Antonelli?
All classes of society hate him equally. Concini himself was not more
cordially detested. He is the only living man concerning whom an
entire people is agreed.
A Roman prince furnished me with some information respecting the
relative fortunes of the nobility. When he gave me the list he said,
"You will remark the names of two individuals, the amount of
whose property is described as unlimited. They are Torlonia
and Antonelli. They have both made large fortunes in a few
years,--the first by speculation, the second by power.
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