406 PIETRO GIANNONE. 



without taking the oath of allegiance to the pope ? I 

 hold not only all thefe as indubitable, but alio heartily 

 agree that the pope can ordain as many bifhops as he 

 pleafes over the face of the whole earth, can raife or 

 degrade them as he thinks fit, diveft. them of their an- 

 tient privileges, and reduce them to the loweft offices, 

 not only about his moil holy perfon, but likewife to- 

 wards the cardinals, who, at prefent, are the firft fe- 

 nators of the general court of the univerfe, as cardinal 

 Palavicini has plainly fhewn. 



X. I am now no longer furprifed at the folemniry 

 of the ceremonies prefcribed by the Pontificate to be 

 obferved at the election and coronation of fo nighty 

 a monarch, the king of kings and lord of lords. 

 They undoubtedly are due to him. As foon as he is 

 elecled he repairs to the church of St. Peter, and the 

 cardinal-deacons, who walk by his fide, bear up the 

 ikirts of his mantle. And who has the honour to hold 

 up the train of this mantle [the pluvial] ? The em- 

 peror, if he be there ; or, in his abfence, a king, if 

 one of that majefty be then at Rome ; but other wife 

 the principal laic of the nobility ; and eight other no- 

 blemen or ambaffadors of princes bear the eight fbives 

 of the baldaquin or canopy under which the pontif 

 marches *; The acclamation of the people is then the, 

 fame as that wherewith Charlemagne was formerly fa- 

 luted emperor, Carolo Augufio, they then called out, 



* Caudam autern pluvialis portabit nobilior laicus, qui crit iix 

 curia, etiamfi erit imperafor vel rex; fupra eum oclo nobiles five 

 oratores portant umbreiiam haftalibus o£to fuftentatam, quam hodie 

 baldacchinum appellant, Ceremon. pontific. 



a Dea 



