Page:Life in the Old World - Vol. II.djvu/449

Rh Rosalia, the young daughter of William the Good, abandoned, in the flower of her youth and beauty, a court full of delights, to live in a desolate cave, solely for prayer and intercourse with heaven, and there was lost to human sight and knowledge, until, after many hundred years, a vision of some shepherds led to the discovery of her bones, which,—so says tradition,—carried in procession through Palermo, saved the city from a desolating pestilence.

It was in rain and mist that we ascended to Monte Pellegrino, and the cave of Santa Rosalia. This therefore might perhaps be the cause that her recumbent figure, in that singularly formed grotto, the peculiar light there, and the tranquillity, whilst the rain was pouring without, produced upon us such an agreeable impression. The young girl is represented in the position in which, according to tradition, her body was found lying on the altar of the grotto. The clothing is of massive gold, and the countenance, of white marble, has an indescribable expression of innocence, goodness, and ecstatic joy, whilst she seems to be listening to heavenly music, audible alone to herself. She holds her hand behind her ear, listening, and her rich hair falls upon her arm. Lamps are kept burning around the lovely figure, and cast upon it a soft radiance, lighting up the lofty arch of the grotto and its wonderful forms. Some hunters and shepherds—wild figures—came into the grotto when we were there, and reverently knelt beside the image of Santa Rosalia. I am glad that I have seen it. A life of prayer without work, is no longer, and ought not to be, the ideal of a life of piety; but the