w was the banner of
the Faith to be brought to the van of the movement? were the thoughts
unceasingly in his mind. The French were willing to aid the Irish, so
also were the Dutch; but the intervention would only damage the cause
the Pere cared for. Nor did he dare to confide these doubts to the
Cardinal and ask his counsel on them, since, to his Eminence he had
continually represented the case of Ireland in a totally different
light. He had taught him to believe the people all jealous for the
Faith, cruelly oppressed by England, hating the dynasty that ruled them,
and eagerly watching for the return of the Stuarts, if haply there yet
lived one to renew the traditions of that illustrious house. By dint
of instances, and no small persuasive power, he at last had so far
succeeded as to enlist the sympathies of his Eminence in the youth
personally, and was now plotting by what means he could consummate that
interest by a marriage between Gerald and the beautiful Guglia Ridolfi.

This was a project which, if often indistinctly hinted at between them,
had never yet been seriously treated, and Massoni well knew that with
Caraffa success was a mere accident, and that what he would reject one
day with scorn he would accept the next with eagerness and joy. Besides,
the gloomy tidings he constantly received from Ireland indisposed the
Pere to incur any needless hazards. If the Chevalier was not destined to
play a great part in life, the Cardinal would never forgive an alliance
that conferred neither wealth nor station. The barren honour of calling
a prince of the House of Stuart his nephew would ill requite him
for maintaining a mere pensioner and a dependant. Against these
considerations there was the calculation how far the cause of Fitzgerald
might profit by the aid such a man as Caraffa could contribute, when
once pledged to success by everything personally near and dear to
himself. Might not the great churchman, then, be led to make the cause
the main object of all his wishes?

The Cardinal was one of those men, and they are large enough to form a
class, who imagine that they owe every success they obtain in life, in
some way or other, to their own admirable skill and forethought; their
egotism blinding them against all the aid the suggestions of others have
afforded, they arrive at a self-reliance which is actually marvellous.
To turn to good account this peculiarity of disposition, Massoni now
addressed himself zealously