resulted in the decisive addition of nine to his former numbers; Lambruschini's eight proving faithful to the last. The gain was therefore on the floating portion of the constituency; and it is believed that Pius IX. owed his election to the adhesion of Cardinal Acton, who is credited with having commanded nine votes, which at this crowning moment he carried to Cardinal Mastai Ferretti. The day following divers Cardinals arrived, and amongst these was Cardinal Gaysruck, with those secret instructions from his Court which would have arrested this momentous election had they only been in Rome twelve hours earlier. The whole duration of the Conclave was not more than fifty hours, and the last of these were marked by a singular incident. In the afternoon of the 16th June, it transpired that the Cardinals were on the point of proclaiming a Pope, and the report spread through the city with the rapidity of electricity; but till midnight the population, and even the highest and best informed personages, remained under the firm conviction that the Pope was to be Cardinal Gizzi. When therefore the error was exploded, the announcement of a name so little known
