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rome’s holy child ii
ii
door, while the English lady returned home with
Aracoeli’s treasure. She placed it in her palace on a
marble pedestal, and was happier than she had ever
been before.
At Aracoeli, where every one was wholly ignorant
of the loss suffered, the false image of Christ was
worshiped as had been the real one, and when
Christmas came, there was built, as was customary, a
most beautiful grotto inside the church. There the
image lay, glittering like a jewel, in Mary’s lap, and
round it shepherds were arranged and angels and
wise men. And as long as the grotto remained,
children came from Rome and Campagna and were
lifted up into a little pulpit in the basilica, and they
preached about the little Christ-child’s sweetness and
kindness and greatness and power.
But the English lady lived in constant fear lest
someone should discover that she had stolen
Aracoeli’s image of Christ. Therefore she confessed to
no one that the image she had was the real one.
" It’s an imitation," she said, " as like the real one
as it can be, but it is only an imitation."
Now it happened that she had a little Italian
maid. One day, as the latter was passing through
the rooms, she stopped in front of the image and
talked to it. " Thou poor little Christ-child, who art
no Christ-child," she said. " If thou only knew how
the real one lies in splendor in the grotto in Aracoeli
and how Maria and San Guiseppe and the Shepherds
lie on their knees before it! And if thou knew how
the children stand in a little pulpit straight before it,
and how they curtesy and kiss their fingers to it
and preach to it the best they know how! "
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