Tuesday of this week, the programme for this afternoon's municipal concert (Sunday, November 20) will consist of symphonic and choral items appropriate for the occasion.
St. Cecilia has long been regarded as the tutelary saint of music and musicians, but the period at which She was first so looked upon is involved in obscurity. There is a tradition that an angel by whom she was visited was attracted to earth by the charms of her singing, but when it originated is equally unknown. St. Cecilia, virgin and martyr, was a young Roman lady of noble birth, Who, being educated in the Christian faith, vowed to lead a celibate life and to devote herself to the service of religion, She was, however, compelled by her parents to marry Valerianus, a young Roman noble and a pagan, Whom she prevailed upon not only to! induce him to respect her vow, but, With his brother, to embrace the Christian faith. "Seized and brought before tue pagan authorities, and refusing: to abjure their faith, they were condemned to death, the brothers being decapitated, and the Vvirgin-wife placed in a dry bath with fire beneath, which failing to terminate her existence as rapidly as her persecutors desired, they sent an executioner to despatch her by severing her head from her body. These events occurred at Rome abo.it A. D. 229, under Alexander Severus, according to most writers, although some record them as having happened in Sicily under Marcus Aurelius between A. D. 176 and 180. Her house at Rome, where she was put to death, was converted into a church, or a church was built over it, to which in 821 her remains with those of her husband, his brother and Other martyrs, were transferred. "This church was repaired and sumptuously embellished in 1599, and a monument of the saint erected.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.