n of Sheba, and Pius IX. to King Solomon. Whatever may
be thought of the figures, the sentiments expressed in the speech were
appropriate and affecting. The Pope replied by assuring the Ambassador
that he was anxious to cultivate friendly relations with the Sultan, his
master. Three days later Chekif Effendi took his departure from Rome,
bearing with him on his breast, as a _nishun_ (decoration), the portrait
of the Holy Father.

This Embassy was more than mere show--more than an interchange of friendly
sentiments. It enabled the Pope to adopt a measure which was calculated to
be highly beneficial to the Christians of the East. The Latin Patriarchate
of Jerusalem was restored. And thus was accomplished a wonderful
revolution in European diplomacy as regarded the Eastern world. At the
request of the Porte, the Latin Patriarch became bound to reside in the
city of Jerusalem. In the confidential position which he held there, he
was the natural protector of the Catholic subjects of the Sultan. In
addition to the duties of his sacred office, he was, as a consul,
appointed by the Holy See to watch over the interests of
religion--interests as important, surely, as those of trade and worldly
policy. The first whom the Pope named to the dignity of Latin Patriarch
was Monsignore Valergo, who had formerly been a missionary at Paris.

There appears to have been something irresistibly attractive in the
character of Pius IX. That illustrious champion of Ireland and of liberty,
Daniel O'Connell, resolved, towards the close of his days, to visit Rome
and pay the homage of a kindred spirit to the Holy Father. Not only was he
anxious to be enriched with the choicest heavenly benedictions, whilst
kneeling reverently at the shrine of the Apostles, but he desired also,
with a fervor which finds place only in the most nobly-moulded souls,
whose love of liberty and whose patriotism are unfeigned and pure, to hold
communion with one who was, no less than himself, a friend of liberty, and
whose exalted station, and whose high duties towards mankind at large,
hindered him not from laboring, as did Ireland's patriot, to liberate his
country, not, indeed, from such cruel bondage as that under which the land
of O'Connell had for so many ages groaned, but from the no less dangerous
tyranny of abuses which, like weeds that grow most luxuriantly in the
richest soil, it becomes necessary, in due season, to extirpate.

It was not, however, appointed th