The processions of the popes going to the Lateran for their solemn installation, used to halt beside the arch of Titus while a Jew presented a copy of the Pentateuch, with a humble oath of fealty. This humiliating ceremony was omitted for the first time at the installation of Pius IX.
At this point it may not be inappropriate to notice two other buildings, which, though situated on the Palatine, are totally disconnected with the other objects occupying that hill.
A lane runs up to the right from the arch of Titus. On the left is a gateway, surmounted by a faded fresco of St. Sebastian. Here is the entrance to a wild and beautiful garden, possessing most lovely views of the various ruins, occupying the site of the gardens of Adonis. This is the place where St. Sebastian underwent his (so-called) martyrdom, and will call to mind the many fine pictures, scattered over Europe, of the youthful and beautiful saint, bound to a tree, and pierced with arrows. The finest of these are the Domenichino, in Sta. Maria degli Angeli, and the Sodoma at Florence. He is sometimes represented as bound to an orange tree, and sometimes, as in the Guido at Bologna, to a cypress, like those we still see on this spot. Here was an important Benedictine Convent, where Pope Boniface IV. was a monk before his election to the papacy, and where the famous abbots of Monte Casino had their Roman residence. Here, in 1118, fifty-one cardinals took refuge, and elected Gelasius II. as Pope. The only building remaining is the _Church of Sta. Maria Pallara_ or _S. Sebastiano_, containing some curious inscriptions relating to events which have occurred here, and--in the tribune, frescoes, of the Saviour in benediction with four saints, and below, two other groups representing the Virgin with saints and angels, placed, as we learn by the inscription beneath, by one Benedict--probably an abbot.
Further up the lane a "Via Crucis" leads to the _Church of S. Buonaventura_, "the seraphic doctor" (Cardinal and Bishop of Albano, ob. July 14, 1274), who in childhood was raised from the point of death (1221) by the prayers of St. Francis, who was so surprised when he came to life, that he involuntarily exclaimed, "O buona ventura"--("what a happy chance")--whence the name by which he was afterwards known.[67]