As her whole life had been merged in this struggle which had only
conquered her overwrought heart and brain when she had felt that the
Madonna had deserted her and delivered her to the wrath of Venice, so
now, in her hallucination,--since the Madonna had brought her to
Rome,--her faith and power of speech suddenly returned, and she rallied
all her strength to fulfil her mission.
In that great and sumptuous Hall, flaunting and gay with banners which
chronicled the victories and the power of the Republic--in the
impregnable stronghold of the realm, under the astonished gaze of the
entire Venetian court and the brilliant throng of the households of
nobles and ambassadors who looked down from the circling galleries,
expectant and awestruck under the spell of so strange a vision--this
pale, slight champion of a desperate spiritual struggle, with no host to
help her save her prayers and faith, with no standard but the cross
clasped to her breast, knelt at the feet of the Patriarch, while the
sunset light through the broad western window made a radiance where she
knelt--as if Heaven at last had smiled upon her.
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