“This statement had been previously translated into French by Bishop O’Gorman and Colonel Porter, and you will remember there were some things about Bishop O’Gorman’s French which did not meet with the entire approval of Colonel Porter. Whether you arbitrated the matter and selected the appropriate phrase which should have been used I do not know, but I do know that at one time there was danger of the severance of the friendly relations which had theretofore prevailed between the good Bishop and the good old Colonel.

“My recollection of the Holy Father is that his face was like transparent parchment, that he had the brilliant eyes of a young man and that he was wonderfully alert of mind, although bent over by the weight of years.

“Of course, none of us could forget Cardinal Rampolla⁠—tall, slender, straight, vigorous in both mind and body, impenetrable, and cold as fate. A man evidently of wonderful intellect and fully equal to any demands that might be put upon him as the diplomat of the Vatican.”

I might add that the first part of my husband’s speech, a copy of which I have, consisted of a few remarks appropriate to the presentation of a gift from President Roosevelt to the Pope. This gift was a specially bound set of Mr. Roosevelt’s own works.

When the formal interview was at an end the Pope came down from the dais on which he sat and indulged in a fifteen or twenty minute personal conversation with the members of the Commission. “He asked for the pleasure of shaking my hand,” writes my husband to his brother Charles, in the usual vein of humour which obtains between them, adding, “a privilege which I very graciously accorded him.” He also joked about Mr. Taft’s proportions, saying that he had understood he had been very ill, but from observation he saw no reason to suppose that the illness had been serious. He poked gentle fun at Bishop O’Gorman and made kindly inquiries of Judge Smith and Major Porter; then he walked with the party to the door and bowed them out, a courtesy which I believe was unprecedented.