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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of From the Oak to the Olive, by Julia Ward Howe
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: From the Oak to the Olive
+       A Plain record of a Pleasant Journey
+
+Author: Julia Ward Howe
+
+Release Date: November 24, 2011 [EBook #38127]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FROM THE OAK TO THE OLIVE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was
+produced from images available at The Internet
+Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+FROM THE
+
+OAK TO THE OLIVE.
+
+A PLAIN RECORD OF A PLEASANT JOURNEY.
+
+BY
+JULIA WARD HOWE
+
+BOSTON:
+LEE AND SHEPARD.
+1868.
+
+Entered, according to Act of Congress, In the year 1868, by
+
+JULIA WARD HOWE,
+
+In the Clerk's Office of the District Court
+of the District of Massachusetts.
+
+STEREOTYPED AT THE
+BOSTON STEREOTYPE FOUNDRY,
+19 Spring Lane.
+
+
+
+
+TO
+
+S. G. H.,
+
+_THE STRENUOUS CHAMPION OF GREEK LIBERTY
+AND OF HUMAN RIGHTS_,
+
+IS OFFERED SUCH SMALL HOMAGE AS THE
+DEDICATION OF THIS VOLUME
+CAN CONFER.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+                                   PAGE
+
+PRELIMINARIES.                        1
+
+THE VOYAGE.                           3
+
+LIVERPOOL.                            9
+
+CHESTER--LICHFIELD.                  11
+
+LONDON.                              17
+
+ST. PAUL'S--THE JAPANESE.            23
+
+SOCIETY.                             28
+
+THE CHANNEL.                         36
+
+PARIS AND THENCE.                    37
+
+MARSEILLES.                          42
+
+ROME.                                45
+
+ST. PETER'S.                         50
+
+SUPPER OF THE PILGRIMS.              55
+
+EASTER.                              58
+
+WORKS OF ART.                        60
+
+PIAZZA NAVONA--THE TOMBOLA.          65
+
+SUNDAYS IN ROME.                     70
+
+CATACOMBS.                           74
+
+VIA APPIA AND THE COLUMBARIA.        81
+
+NAPLES--THE JOURNEY.                 88
+
+THE MUSEUM.                          92
+
+NAPLES--EXCURSIONS.                  96
+
+THE CAPUCHIN.                       102
+
+BAJA.                               106
+
+CAPRI.                              110
+
+SORRENTO.                           119
+
+FLORENCE.                           122
+
+PALAZZO PITTI.                      124
+
+VENICE.                             133
+
+GREECE AND THE VOYAGE THITHER.      153
+
+SYRA.                               164
+
+PIRÆUS--ATHENS.                     169
+
+EXPEDITIONS--NAUPLIA.               175
+
+ARGOS.                              183
+
+EGINA.                              196
+
+DAYS IN ATHENS.                     198
+
+EXCURSIONS.                         205
+
+HYMETTUS.                           214
+
+ITEMS.                              221
+
+THE PALACE.                         222
+
+THE CATHEDRAL.                      227
+
+THE MISSIONARIES.                   231
+
+THE PIAZZA.                         234
+
+DEPARTURE.                          237
+
+RETURN VOYAGE.                      239
+
+FARTHER.                            249
+
+FRAGMENTS.                          253
+
+FLYING FOOTSTEPS.                   270
+
+MUNICH.                             275
+
+SWITZERLAND.                        284
+
+THE GREAT EXPOSITION.               290
+
+PICTURES IN ANTWERP.                299
+
+
+
+
+FROM THE OAK TO THE OLIVE.
+
+
+
+
+PRELIMINARIES.
+
+
+Not being, at this moment, in the pay of any press, whether foreign or
+domestic, I will not, at this my third landing in English country, be in
+haste to accomplish the correspondent's office of extroversion, and to
+expose all the inner processes of thought and of nature to the gaze of
+an imaginary public, often, alas! a delusory one, and difficult to be
+met with. No individual editor, nor joint stock company, bespoke my
+emotions before my departure. I am, therefore, under no obligation to
+furnish for the market, with the elements of time and of postage
+unhandsomely curtailed. Instead, then, of that breathless steeple chase
+after the butterfly of the moment, with whose risks and hurry I am
+intimately acquainted, I feel myself enabled to look around me at every
+step which I shall take on paper, and to represent, in my small literary
+operations, the three dimensions of time, instead of the flat disc of
+the present.
+
+And first as to my pronoun. The augmentative _We_ is essential for
+newspaper writing, because people are liable to be horsewhipped for what
+they put in the sacred columns of a daily journal. _We_ may represent a
+vague number of individuals, less inviting to, and safer from, the
+cowhide, than the provoking _egomet ipse_. Or perhaps the _We_ derives
+from the New Testament incorporation of devils, whose name was legion,
+for we are many. In the Fichtean philosophy, also, there are three
+pronouns comprised in the personal unity whose corporeal effort applies
+this pen to this paper, to wit, the _I_ absolute, the _I_ limited, and
+the _I_ resulting from the union of these two. So that a philosopher may
+say _we_ as well as a monarch or a penny-a-liner. Yet I, at the present
+moment, incline to fall back upon my record of baptism, and to confront
+the white sheet, whose blankness I trust to overcome, in the character
+of an agent one and indivisible.
+
+Nor let it be supposed that these preliminary remarks undervalue the
+merits and dignity of those who write for ready money, whose meals and
+travels are at the expense of mysterious corporations, the very cocktail
+which fringes their daily experience being thrown in as a brightener of
+their wits and fancies. Thus would I, too, have written, had anybody
+ordered me to do so. I can hurry up my hot cakes like another, when
+there is any one to pay for them. But, leisure being accorded me, I
+shall stand with my tablets in the marketplace, hoping in the end to
+receive my penny, upon a footing of equality with those who have borne
+the burden and heat of the day.
+
+With the rights of translation, however, already arranged for in the
+Russian, Sclavonian, Hindustanee, and Fijian dialects, I reserve to
+myself the right to convert my pronoun, and to write a chapter in _we_
+whenever the individual _I_ shall seem to be insufficient. With these
+little points agreed upon beforehand, to prevent mistakes,--since a book
+always represents a bargain,--I will enter, without further delay, upon
+what I intend as a very brief but cogent chronicle of a third visit to
+Europe, the first two having attained no personal record.
+
+
+
+
+THE VOYAGE.
+
+The steamer voyage is now become a fact so trite and familiar as to call
+for no special illustration at these or any other hands. Yet voyages and
+lives resemble each other in many particulars, and differ in as many
+others. Ours proves almost unprecedented for smoothness, as well as for
+safety. We start on the fatal Wednesday, as twice before, expecting the
+fatal pang. Our last vicarious purchase on shore was a box of that
+energetic mustard, so useful as a counter-irritant in cases of internal
+commotion. The bitter partings are over, the dear ones heartily
+commended to Heaven, we see, as in a dream, the figure of command
+mounted upon the paddle-box. We cling to a camp stool near the red
+smoke-stack, and cruelly murmur to the two rosy neophytes who are our
+companions, "In five minutes you will be more unhappy than you ever were
+or ever dreamed of being." They reply with sweet, unconscious looks of
+wonder, that ignorance of danger which the recruit carries into his
+first battle, or which carries him into it. But five minutes pass, and
+twelve times five, and the moment for going below does not come. In the
+expected shape, in fact, it does not arrive at all. We do not resolve
+upon locomotion, nor venture into the dining saloon; but leaning back
+upon a borrowed _chaise longue_, we receive hurried and fragmentary
+instalments of victuals, and discuss with an improvised acquaintance the
+aspects of foreign and domestic travel. The plunge into the state-room
+at bedtime, and the crawl into the narrow berth, are not without their
+direr features, which the sea-smells and confined air aggravate. We hear
+bad accounts of A, B, and C, but our neophytes patrol the deck to the
+last moment, and rise from their dive, on the second morning, fresher
+than ever.
+
+Our steamer is an old one, but a favorite, and as steady as a
+Massachusetts matron of forty. Our captain is a kindly old sea-dog, who
+understands his business, and does not mind much else. To the innocent
+flatteries of the neophytes he opposes a resolute front. They will
+forget him, he says, as soon as they touch land. They protest that they
+will not, and assure him that he shall breakfast, dine, and sup with
+them in Boston, six months hence, and that he shall always remain their
+sole, single, and ideal captain; at all of which he laughs as grimly as
+Jove is said to do at lovers' perjuries.
+
+Our company is a small one, after the debarkation at Halifax, where
+sixty-five passengers leave us,--among whom are some of the most
+strenuous _euchreists_. The remaining thirty-six are composed partly of
+our own country people,--of whom praise or blame would be impertinent in
+this connection,--partly of the Anglo-Saxon of the day, in the
+pre-puritan variety. Of the latter, as of the former, we will waive all
+discriminating mention, having porrigated to them the dexter of
+good-will, with no hint of aboriginal tomahawks to be exhumed hereafter.
+Some traits, however, of the _Anglais de voyage_, as seen on his return
+from an American trip, may be vaguely given, without personality or fear
+of offence.
+
+The higher in grade the culture of the European traveller in America,
+the more reverently does he speak of what he has seen and learned. To
+the gentle-hearted, childhood and its defects are no less sacred than
+age and its decrepitude; withal, much dearer, because full of hope and
+of promise. The French barber sneezes out "Paris" at every step taken on
+the new land. That is the utmost his ratiocination can do; he can
+perceive that Boston, Washington, Chicago, are not Paris. The French
+exquisite flirts, flatters the individual, and depreciates the
+commonwealth. The English bagman hazards the glibbest sentences as to
+the falsity of the whole American foundation. Not much behind him lags
+the fox-hunting squire. The folly and uselessness of our late war supply
+the theme of diatribes as eloquent as twenty-_five_ letters can make
+them. Obliging _aperçus_ of the degradation and misery in store for us
+are vouchsafed at every opportunity. But it is when primogeniture is
+touched upon, or the neutrality of England in the late war criticised,
+that the bellowing of the sacred bulls becomes a brazen thunder. After
+listening to their voluminous complaints of the shortcomings of western
+civilization, we are tempted to go back to a set of questions asked and
+answered many centuries ago.
+
+"What went ye out into the wilderness for to see? A man clothed in soft
+raiment? Behold, they that live delicately dwell in kings' houses. But
+what went ye out for to see? A prophet? Yea, I say unto you, And more
+than a prophet." For the prophet only foretells what is to be, but the
+prophetic nation is working out and fulfilling the prophet's future.
+
+Peace, however, peace between us and them. Let the bagman return to his
+business, the squire to his five-barred gate. We wish them nothing worse
+than to stay at home, once they have got there. Not thus do the Goldwin
+Smiths, the Liulph Stanleys, take the altitude of things under a new
+horizon. They have those tools and appliances of scientific thought
+which build just theories and strait conclusions. The imperfection and
+the value of human phenomena are too well understood by them to allow
+them to place all of the values in the old world, and all of the
+imperfections in the new. And, _apropos_ of this, we have an antidote to
+all the poison of gratuitous malignity in the shape of M. Auguste
+Laugel's thorough and appreciative treatise entitled The United States
+during the War. From depths of misconception which we cannot fathom we
+turn to his pages, and see the truths of our record and of our
+conviction set forth with a simplicity and elegance which should give
+his work a permanent value. To Americans it must be dear as a righteous
+judgment; to Europeans as a vindication of their power of judging.
+
+It must not, however, be supposed that our whole _traversée_ is a
+squabble, open or suppressed, between nationalities which should contend
+only in good will. The dreamy sea-days bring, on the contrary, much
+social chat and comfort. Two of the Britons exercise hospitality of tea,
+of fresh butter, of drinks cunningly compounded. One of these glows at
+night like a smelting furnace, and goes about humming in privileged
+ears, "The great brew is about to begin." For this same great brew he
+ties a white apron before his stout person, breaks ten eggs into a bowl,
+inflicting flagellation on the same, empties as many bottles of ale in a
+tin pan, and flies off to the galley, whence he returns with a smoking,
+frothing mixture, which is dispensed in tumblers, and much appreciated
+by the recipients. In good fellowship these two Britons are not
+deficient, and the restriction of the alphabet, dimly alluded to above,
+does not lie at their door.
+
+After rocking, and dreaming, and tumbling; after drowsy attempts to get
+hold of other people's ideas and to disentangle your own; after a week's
+wonder over the hot suppers of such as dine copiously at four P. M., and
+the morning cocktails of those who drink whiskey in all its varieties
+before we separate for the night; after repeated experiments, which end
+by suiting our gait and diet to an ever-mobile existence, in which our
+prejudices are the only stable points, our personal restraints the only
+fixed facts,--we fairly reach the other side. The earliest terrene
+object which we behold is a light-house some sixty miles out at sea,
+whose occupants, we hope, are not resolutely bent upon social enjoyment.
+Here the sending up of blue lights and rockets gives us a cheerful sense
+of some one besides ourselves. Queenstown, our next point, is made at
+two A. M., and left after weary waiting for the pilot, but still before
+convenient hours for being up. Some hours later we heave the lead, and
+enjoy the sight of as much _terra firma_ as can be fished up on the
+greased end of the same. Our last day on board is marred by a heavy and
+penetrating fog. We are in the Channel, but can see neither shore. In
+the early morning we arrive at Liverpool, and, after one more of those
+good breakfasts, and a mild encounter with the custom-house officers, we
+part from our late home, its mingled associations and associates to be
+recalled hereafter with various shades of regard and regret. The good
+captain, having been without sleep for two nights, does not come to take
+leave of us--a neglect which almost moves the neophytes to tears. The
+two veterans console them, however; and now all parties are in the
+little lighter which carries the steamer's passengers and luggage to the
+dock. Here, three shillings' worth of cab and horse convey us and ours,
+a respectable show of trunks, to the hotel of our choice--the
+Washington by name. We commend this cheapness of conveyance, a novel
+feature in American experience. At the hotel we find a comfortable
+parlor, and, for the first time in many days, part from our wrappings.
+After losing ourselves among the Egyptian china of our toilet set,
+wondering at the width of beds and warmth of carpets, we descend to the
+coffee-room, order dinner, and feel that we have again taken possession
+of ourselves.
+
+
+
+
+LIVERPOOL.
+
+
+A good deal of our time here is spent in the prosaic but vital
+occupation of getting something to eat. If Nature abhors a vacuum, she
+does so especially when, after twelve days of a fluctuating and
+predatory existence, the well-shaken traveller at last finds a stable
+foundation for self and victuals. The Washington being announced as
+organized on the American plan, we descend to the coffee-room with the
+same happy confidence which would characterize our first appearance at
+the buffet of the Tremont House or Fifth Avenue Hotel. But here no
+waiter takes possession of you and your wants, hastening to administer
+both to the mutual advantage of guest and landlord. You sit long
+unnoticed; you attract attention only by a desperate effort. Having at
+length secured the medium through which a dinner may be ordered, the
+minister (he wears a black dress coat and white trimmings) disappears
+with an air of "Will you have it now, or wait till you can get it?"
+which our subsequent experience entirely justifies. We learn later that
+a meal ordered half an hour beforehand will be punctually served.
+
+And here, except in cases of absolute starvation, we shall dismiss the
+meal question altogether, and devote ourselves to nobler themes. We
+ransack the smoky and commercial city in search of objects of interest.
+The weather being incessantly showery, we lay the foundation of our
+English liberty in the purchase of two umbrellas, capable each of
+protecting two heads. Of clothes we must henceforward be regardless. In
+the streets, barefooted beggary strikes us, running along in the wet,
+whining and coaxing. We visit the boasted St. George's Hall, where,
+among other statues, is one of the distinguished Stephenson, of railroad
+memory. Here the court is in session for the assizes. The wigs and gowns
+astound the neophytes. The ushers in green and orange livery shriek
+"Silence!" through every sentence of judge or counsel. No one can hear
+what is going on. Probably all is known beforehand. At the hotel, the
+Greek committee wait upon the veteran, with asseverations and
+hiccoughings of to us incomprehensible emotions. We resist the theatre,
+with the programme of "Lost in London," expecting soon to experience the
+sensation without artistic intervention. We sleep, missing the cradle of
+the deep, and on the morrow, by means of an uncanny little ferry-boat,
+reach the Birkenhead station, and are booked for Chester.
+
+
+
+
+CHESTER--LICHFIELD.
+
+
+The Grosvenor Inn receives us, not at all in the fashion of the hostelry
+of twenty years ago. A new and spacious building forming a quadrangle
+around a small open garden, the style highly architectural and somewhat
+inconvenient; waiters got up after fashion plates; chambermaids with
+apologetic caps, not smaller than a dime nor larger than a dinner plate;
+a handsome sitting-room, difficult to warm; airy sleeping-rooms; a
+coffee-room in which our hunger and cold seek food and shelter; a
+housekeeper in a striped silk gown,--these are the first features with
+which we become familiar at the Grosvenor. The veteran falling ill
+detains us there for the better part of two days; and we employ the
+interim of his and our necessities in exploring the curious old town,
+with its many relics of times long distant. The neophytes here see their
+first cathedral, and are in raptures with nothing so much as with its
+dilapidation. We happen in during the afternoon hour of cathedral
+service, and the sexton, finding that we do not ask for seats, fastens
+upon us with the zeal of a starved leech upon a fresh patient, and leads
+us as weary a dance as Puck led the Athenian clowns. This chase after
+antiquity proves to have something unsubstantial about it. The object is
+really long dead and done with. These ancient buildings are only its
+external skeleton, the empty shell of the tortoise. No effort of
+imagination can show us how people felt when these dark passages and
+deserted enclosures were full of the arterial warmth and current of
+human life. The monumental tablets tell an impossible tale. The immortal
+spirit of things, which is past, present, and future, dwells not in
+these relics, but lives in the descent of noble thoughts, in the
+perpetuity of moral effort which makes man human. We make these
+reflections shivering, while the neophytes explore nave and transept,
+gallery and crypt. A long tale does the old sexton tell, to which they
+listen with ever-wondering expectation. Meantime the cold cathedral
+service has ended. Canon, precentor, and choir have departed, with the
+very slender lay attendance. In a commodious apartment, by a bright
+fire, we recover our frozen joints a little. Here stands a full-length
+portrait of his most gracious etc., etc. The sexton, preparing for a
+huge jest, says to us, "Ladies, this represents the last king of
+America." The most curious thing we see in the cathedral is the room in
+which the ecclesiastical court held its sittings. The judges' seat and
+the high-backed benches still form a quadrangular enclosure within a
+room of the same shape. Across one corner of this enclosure is mounted a
+chair, on which the prisoner, accused of the intangible offence of
+heresy or witchcraft, was perforce seated. I seem to see there a face
+and figure not unlike my own, the brow seamed with cabalistic wrinkles.
+Add a little queerness to the travelling dress, a pinch or two to the
+black bonnet, and how easy were it to make a witch out of the sibyl of
+these present leaves! The march from one of these types to the other is
+one of those retrograde steps whose contrast only attests the world's
+progress. The sibylline was an excellent career for a queer and
+unexplained old woman. To make her a sorceress was an ingenious device
+for getting rid of a much-decried element of the social variety. Poor
+Kepler's years of solitary glory and poverty were made more wretched by
+the danger which constantly threatened his aged mother, who was in
+imminent danger of burning, on account of her supposed occult
+intelligences with the powers of darkness.
+
+After a long and chilly wandering, we dismiss our voluble guide with a
+guerdon which certainly sends him home to keep a silver wedding with his
+ancient wife. The next day, the veteran's illness detained us within the
+ancient city, and we contemplated at some leisure its quaint old houses,
+which in Boston would not stand five days. They have been much propped
+and cherished, and the new architecture of the town does its best to
+continue the traditions of the old. The Guide to Chester, in which we
+regretfully invest a shilling, presents a list of objects of interest
+which a week would not more than exhaust. One of these--the Roodeye--is
+an extensive meadow with a silly legend, and is now utilized as a
+race-course. We see the winning post, the graduated seats, the track.
+For the rest,--
+
+    "The Spanish fleet thou canst not see, because
+     It is not yet in sight."
+
+We visit the outside of a tiny church of ancient renown,--St.
+Olave's,--but, dreading the eternal sexton with the eternal story, we do
+not attempt to effect an entrance. The much-famed Roman bath we find in
+connection with a shop at which newspapers are sold. We descend a narrow
+staircase, and view much rubbish in a small space. For description, see
+Chester Guide. One of our party gets into the bath, and comes out none
+the cleaner. Spleen apart, however, the ruin is probably authentic, with
+its deep spring and worn arches. Near the Grosvenor Hotel is a curious
+arcade, built in a part of the old wall--for Chester was a fortified
+place. A portion of the old castle still stands, but we fail to visit
+its interior. The third morning sees us depart, having been quite
+comfortably entertained at the Grosvenor, even to the indulgence of
+sweetmeats with our tea, which American extravagance we propose speedily
+to abjure. Our national sins, however, still cling to us.
+
+Although the servants are "put in the bill," the cringing civility with
+which they follow us to the coach leads me to suspect that the nimble
+sixpence might find its way to their acceptance without too severe a
+gymnastic. _En route_, now, in a comfortable compartment, with hot water
+to our feet, according to the European custom. Our way to Lichfield lies
+through an agricultural region, and the fine English mutton appear to be
+forward. Small lambs cuddle near magnificent fat mothers. The wide
+domains lie open to the view. Everything attests the concentration of
+landed property in the hands of the few. We stop at Lichfield, attracted
+by the famous cathedral. The Swan Inn receives, but cannot make us
+comfortable, a violent wind sweeping through walls and windows. Having
+eaten and drunk, we implore our way to the cathedral, St. Chadde, which
+we find beautiful without, and magnificently restored within. Many
+monuments, ancient and modern, adorn it, with epitaphs of Latin in every
+stage of plagiarism. A costly monument to some hero of the Sutlej war
+challenges attention, with its tame and polished modern sphinxes. Tombs
+of ancient abbots we also find, and one recumbent carving of a starved
+and shrunken figure, whose leanness attests some ascetic period not
+famous in sculpture. The pulpit is adorned with shining brass and
+stones, principally cornelians and agates. The organ discoursed a sonata
+of Beethoven for the practice of the organist, but secondarily for our
+delectation. A box with an inscription invites us to contribute our mite
+to the restoration of the cathedral, which may easily cost as much as
+the original structure. Carving, gilding, inlaid work, stained glass--no
+one circumstance of ecclesiastical gewgawry is spared or omitted; and
+trusting that some to us unknown centre of sanctification exists, to
+make the result of the whole something other than idol worship, we
+comply with the gratifying suggestion of our wealth and generosity.
+After satisfying ourselves with the cathedral, we look round wonderingly
+for the recipient of some further fee. He appears in the shape of a
+one-eyed man who invites us to ascend the tower. Guided by a small boy,
+Neophyte No. 1 executes this ascent, and of course reports a wonderful
+prospect, which we are content to take on hearsay. Leaving the
+cathedral, we seek the house in which Dr. Johnson is said to have been
+born. It is, strange to say, much like other houses, the lower story
+having been turned into a furnishing shop, where we buy a pincushion
+tidy for remembrance. In an open space, in front of the house, sits a
+statue of the renowned and redoubted doctor, supported by a pedestal
+with biographical bas-reliefs. Below one of these is inscribed, "He
+hears Sacheverell." The design represents a small child in a father's
+arms, presented before a wiggy divine, who can, of course, be none other
+than the one in question. While these simple undertakings are planned
+and executed, the veteran and elder neophyte engage a one-horse vehicle,
+and madly fly to visit an insane asylum. We shiver till dinner in the
+chilly parlor of the inn, and inter ourselves at an early hour in the
+recesses of a huge feather-bed, where the precious jewel, sleep, is
+easily found. And the next morning sees us _en route_ for London.
+
+At one of the stations between Lichfield and London, we encounter a
+group whose chief figure is that of a pretty little lady, blithe as a
+golden butterfly, apparelled for the chase. Her dress consists of a
+narrow-skirted habit, of moderate length, beneath which we perceive a
+pair of stout boots, of a description not strictly feminine. A black
+plush paletot corresponds with her black skirt. A shining stove-pipe
+crowns her yellow tresses. As she emerges from the railway carriage, a
+young man of elegant aspect approaches her. He wears white hunting
+trousers, high black boots, a black plush coat, and carries a hunting
+whip. The similarity of color in the costumes leads us to suppose that
+the wearers belong to some hunting association. He is at least Sir
+Charles, she, Lady Arabella. He accosts her with evident pleasure, and
+is allowed a shake of the hand. An elderly relative in the background, a
+servant in top boots, who touches his hat as if it could cure the
+plague,--these complete the picture.
+
+At the same station we descry another huntsman in white breeches,
+scarlet cap, and overcoat. We learn that there are two _meets_ to-day in
+this region, but our interests are with the black and white party.
+Farewell, Sir Charles and Lady Arabella. Joyous be your gallop, light
+your leap over five-barred gates. The sly fox Cupid may be chasing you,
+while you chase poor Renard. _Prosit_.
+
+
+
+
+LONDON.
+
+
+"Charing Cross Hotel? 'Ere you are, sir;" and a small four-wheeled cab,
+with a diminutive horse and beer-tinted driver, has us up at the door of
+the same. In front, within the precincts of the hotel court, stands the
+ancient cross, or that which replaces it, and around radiate cook-shops
+and book-shops, jewellers and victuallers and milliners. The human river
+of the Strand fluxes and refluxes before this central spot, and
+Trafalgar Square, and Waterloo Place, and Westminster Abbey, and the
+Houses of Parliament are near. Cabs spring up like daisies and primroses
+beneath the footsteps of spring. At the hotel they make a gratifying
+fuss about us. They seize upon all of us but our persons; the lift,
+(_Americane_--elevator) does that, and noiselessly lodges us on the
+second floor, where we occupy a decent sitting-room, with bedrooms _en
+suite_. A fire of soft coal soon glows in the grate. A smart chambermaid
+takes our orders. We get out our address-book, rub up our recollections,
+enclose and send our cards, then run out and take a dip in the Strand,
+and expand to the full consciousness that we are in the mighty city
+which cannot fall because there is no hollow deep enough to hold it.
+
+We have a quiet day and a half at the hotel before we receive the echo
+of our cards. This interval we improve by visits to the houses of
+Parliament and Westminster Abbey, where we pay our full price, and visit
+the royal chapels with their many tombs. At the recumbent figures of
+Mary Stuart and Elizabeth we pause to think of the dramatic ghosts which
+will not allow them to rest in their graves. Poetry is resurrection, and
+for us who have seen Rachel and Ristori, Mary and Elizabeth are still
+living and speaking lessons of human passion and misfortune. These
+marbles hold their crumbling bones, but we have seen them in far
+America, doing a night's royalty before a democratic audience, and
+demanding to be largely paid for the same.
+
+The frescoes and statues in the long corridors of the Houses of
+Parliament deserve a more minute study than we are able to give them.
+The former show considerable progress in the pictorial art during the
+seventeen years which divide our present from our past observations.
+They represent noted events in English history, the last sleep of
+Argyle, the execution of Montrose, and so on. Among them we see the
+departure of the May Flower, but not the battle of Bunker Hill. The
+statues perpetuate the memories of public men, including a great variety
+both as to opinion and as to service. The solidity of all these
+adornments and arrangements well deserves the praise with which English
+authorities have been wont to comment upon them. A little sombre and
+sober in their tone, they are expressive of the taste and feeling of the
+nation. Parliament is now in session, and various interesting measures
+and reforms are under contemplation. Among these are the extension of
+the elective franchise, the abolition of flogging in the army, and the
+change of the whole long-transmitted system by which commissions in the
+latter are conferred or purchased. The last is perhaps a more democratic
+measure than is dreamed of. Throw open the military and church benefices
+to the competition of the most able and deserving, and the younger sons
+of houses esteemed noble will stand no better chance than others. They
+will then simply earn their bread where they can get it. Then, down
+comes primogeniture, then the union of state and church, then the
+prestige of royalty. This last we think to be greatly on the wane. The
+English prefer an hereditary to an elective symbol of supreme power. The
+permitted descent in the female line prevents the inconvenient issues to
+which the failure of an heir male might give rise. The Georges rose to
+great respectability in the third person, and sank to a disreputable
+level in the fourth. The present queen is an excellently behaved woman,
+and has adhered strictly to her public and private duties. Her long and
+strict widowhood is a little carped at by people in general, the
+personal sentiment having seemed to encroach upon the public career and
+office. But the Prince of Wales will be held to strict and sensible
+behavior, and, failing of it, will be severely dealt with. The English
+people will endure no second season of Carlton House, no letting down of
+manly reserve and womanly character by the spectacle of royal favorites,
+bankrupt at the fireside, but current in the world. All this John Bull
+will not put up with again. Nor will any Christendom, save that Frankish
+and monkeyish one which has yet to learn that true freedom of thought is
+not to be had without purity of conscience, and which, in its desire to
+be polite, holds the door wider open to bad manners than to good ones.
+
+Rash words! What noble, thoughtful Frenchmen have not we known, and the
+world with us! Shall boastful Secesh and blustering Yankee, or the
+sordid, shining shoddy fool stand for the American? Yet these are the
+figures with which Europe is most familiar. So let us fling no smallest
+pebble at the nation of Des Cartes, Montesquieu, Pascal, and De
+Tocqueville. It is not in one, but in all countries that extremes meet.
+And in this connection a word.
+
+The less we know about a thing, the easier to write about it. To give
+quite an assured and fluent account of a country, we should lose no time
+on our first arrival. The first impression is the strongest. Familiarity
+constantly wears off the edge of observation. The face of the new region
+astonishes us once, and once only. We soon grow used to it, and forget
+to describe it. The first day of our arrival in Liverpool or in London
+gave us volumes to write, which have proved as evanescent as the
+pictures of a swift panorama, vanishing to return no more. For now we
+are seated in London as though we had always lived there. We may sooner
+astonish it with our western accent, unconsidered costume, and wild
+coiffure, than it can rivet our attention with its splendors and its
+queernesses, its squares, fountains, equipages, cabmen, well-dressed and
+well-mannered circles. This for the features, for the surface. But for
+the depth and spirit of things, the longer we explore, the less sanguine
+do we feel of being able to exhaust them. We sink our deepest shaft, and
+write upon it, "Thus far our abilities and opportunities; far more
+remains than we can ever bring to light."
+
+And, _apropos_ of this terrible familiarity with things once discerned,
+let me say that when we shall have been two days in heaven, we shall not
+know it any longer, which is one reason why we must always be getting
+there, but never arrive. Pope's old-fashioned line, "always to be
+blest," expresses profoundly this philosophical necessity, although he
+saw it in a simply didactic light, and stated it accordingly. The line
+none the less takes its place in the stately train of the ideal
+philosophy, to which those have best contributed who have been least
+aware of the fact of their having done so. "Lord, when saw I thee naked
+and an hungered," etc., etc. On some smallest, obscurest occasion
+probably, when, the recognized form and the ignored spirit presenting
+themselves together, thy hospitable bosom received the one, and left the
+other to take care of itself.
+
+Our neophytes take this great Babel with the charming _at-homeness_ to
+which our paragraph alludes. They devour London as if it were the
+perpetual bread and butter which their father's house keeps always cut
+and spread for them; cab hire, great dinners, distinguished company, the
+lofty friend's equipage and livery, lent for precious occasions,--all
+this seems as much a matter of course as Lindley Murray's rules, or the
+Creed and the Commandments. Joachim? Of course they will hear Joachim,
+and the Opera, if it be good enough, and Mr. Dickens. Lady ----, Duke of
+So and so. Very well in their way. Presented at court? They wouldn't
+mind, provided it were not too tedious. Mr. Carlyle? Herbert Spencer?
+Yes, they have heard tell of them.
+
+Happy season of youth, which can find nothing more reverend than its
+possibilities, more glorious than its unwasted powers! In spite of all
+the new views and theories, I say, let children be born, and let women
+nurse them and bring them up, and let us have young people to take our
+work where we leave it, laughing at our limitations, and excelling us
+with noble strides; to pause some day, and remember our lessons, and
+weep over our pains, not the less, O God of the future, surpassing us!
+So let children continue to be born, and let no one attempt to
+reconstruct society at the expense of one hair of the head of these
+little ones, ourselves in hope as well as in memory.
+
+
+
+
+ST. PAUL'S--THE JAPANESE.
+
+
+The first feature of novelty in visiting St. Paul's Cathedral is the
+facility for going thither afforded by the city railways,--one of which
+swiftly deposits us in Cannon Street, whence, with the Cathedral in full
+sight, we beg our way to the entrance, so far as information goes,--one
+only of its several doors being open to the public at all times. The
+second is the crypt occupied and solemnized by the ponderous funereal
+pomps of the late Duke of Wellington. In conjunction with these must be
+mentioned the Nelson monument. These two men have been the great
+deliverers of England in modern times, and there is, no doubt, a certain
+heartiness in the gratitude that attends their memory. The duke's
+mausoleum is of solid porphyry, highly polished, in a quadrangular
+enclosure, at each of whose four corners flames a gas-jet, fixed on a
+porphyry shaft. Behind this a large space is filled by the huge funereal
+car which bore the hero to this place of rest. It is of cast iron,
+furnished by the cannon taken in his victories. In it are harnessed
+effigies of the six horses that dragged it, in the veritable trappings
+worn on the occasion. The heavy black draperies of the car are edged
+with a colored border, representing the orders worn by the duke. And
+here the care of England will, no doubt, preserve them, with the nodding
+hearse-plumes, and all the monuments of that holiday of woe, to moulder
+as long as such things can possibly hold together. For there is a point
+at which the most illustrious antiquity degenerates into dirt. And in
+England the past and present will yet have some awkward controversies to
+settle; for the small island cannot always have room for both, and to
+cramp and crowd the one for the heraldic display of the other will not
+be good housekeeping, according to the theories of to-day. So, when the
+fox-hunting squire tells us that his chief public aim and occupation
+will be to keep his county conservative, we think that this should mean
+to cheat the honest and laborious peasantry out of their eye teeth;
+though how they should be ignorant enough to be outwitted by him, is a
+question which makes us pause as over an unexplored abyss of
+knownothingism.
+
+St. Paul's is clearly organized for the extortion of shillings and
+sixpences. So much for seeing the bell, clock, and whispering gallery;
+so much for the crypt. You are pressed, too, at every turn, to purchase
+guide-books, each more authentic than the last. There, as elsewhere, we
+go about spilling our small change at every step, and wondering where it
+will all end. We remember the debtors' prisons which still abound in
+England, and endeavor to view the younger neophyte in the sober livery
+of Little Dorrit.
+
+The only occasion of public amusement that we improve, after the one
+happy hearing of Joachim, is an evening performance of the Japanese
+jugglers, which remains fresh and vivid in our recollections, with all
+its barbaric smoothness and perfection.
+
+The first spectacle which we behold is that of a chattering and
+shrieking monkey of a man, who, squatting on his haunches, visibly
+fills a tea-cup with water, inverts it upon a pile of papers without
+spilling a drop, and pulls out layer after layer of those papers, all
+perfectly dry, which he waves at us with a childish joy. By and by, he
+restores the cup to its original position, and then empties its contents
+into another vessel before our eyes. Another, a top-spinning savage,
+continually whirls his top into that state which the boys call "sleep,"
+and spins it, thus impelled, along the sharp edge of a steel sword, up
+to the point and back again, and along the border of a paper fan, with
+other deeds which it were tedious to enumerate. While these feats go on,
+two funny little Japanese children, oddly bundled up according to the
+patterns of the two sexes, toddle about and chatter with the elders,
+probably for the purpose of illustrating the features of family life in
+Japan. A young creature, said to be the wife of six unpronounceable
+syllables, strums on a monotonous stringed instrument, and screeches,
+sometimes striking an octave, but successfully dodging every other
+interval. Both in speech and in song the tones of these people betray an
+utter want of command over the inflections of the voice. Every elevation
+is a scream, every depression, _con rispetto_, a grunt. And when, in
+addition to the song and strumming, the little ones lustily beat a large
+wooden tea-box with wooden weapons, we begin to waver a little about the
+old proverb, _De gustibus non disputandum est_. The beautiful butterfly
+trick, however, consoles our eyes for what our ears have suffered. The
+conjurer twists first one, then two, butterflies out of a bit of white
+paper, and, by means of a fan, causes them to fly and poise as if they
+were coquetting with July breezes. When, at last, he presents a basket
+of flowers, the illusion is perfect. They settle, fly again, and hover
+round, in true coleopteric fashion.
+
+But the acrobatic exhibition is that which beggars all that our
+overworked sensibilities have endured at the hands of rope-dancer or
+equestrian. Blondin himself, Hanlon in the flying trapeze, are less
+perfect and less terrible. Acrobat No. 1 appears in an athlete's costume
+of white linen. He binds a stout silken tie around his head--a
+precaution whose object is later understood. He then gets into a small
+metal triangle with a running cord attached, and is swung up to the
+neighborhood of the high, arched ceiling, where various cross-pieces,
+slight in appearance, are attached. To one of these he directs his
+venturous flight, and letting his triangle depart, he takes his station
+with his legs firmly closed upon the cross-piece, his head hanging down,
+his hands free. Acrobat No. 2 now comes upon the scene. Mounting in a
+second triangle, he is swung to a certain height at a distance of some
+twenty or more feet from the first performer. A bamboo pole is here
+handed him, of which he manages to convey the upper end within the grasp
+of the latter. And now, swinging loose from his triangle, he hangs at
+the lower end of the bamboo, his steadfast colleague holding fast the
+upper end. And this mere straight line, with only the natural jointings
+of the cane, becomes to him a domain, a palace of ease. Now he clings to
+it apparently with one finger, throwing out the other hand and both
+feet. Now he clings by one foot, his head being down, and his hands
+occupied with a fan. There is, in fact, no name for the singularities
+with which he amazes us for at least a quarter of an hour. No. 1 always
+holds on like grim death. No. 2 seems at times to hold on by nothing.
+All the while one of their number chatters volubly in the Japanese
+dialect, directing attention to the achievements of the two pendent
+heroes. Our thoughts recurred forcibly to a dialogue long familiar in
+our own country:--
+
+"Wat's dat darkening up de hole?" asks Cuffee in the she bear's den to
+Cuffee without, who is forcibly detaining the returned she bear by one
+extremity.
+
+"If de tail slips through my fingers, you'll find out," is the curt
+reply, and end of the story.
+
+But the pole did not slip through, and, finally, the second triangle was
+swung towards acrobat No. 2, who relinquished his hold of the bamboo,
+and intwining his legs about it, pleasantly made his descent with his
+head downwards, afterwards setting himself to rights with one shake.
+Acrobat No. 1 now condescends to come down from his high position, also
+with his head down, and a cool and consummate demeanor. But he walks off
+from the stage as if his late inverted view of it had given him
+something to think of. And in all this, not one jerk, one hasty snatch,
+one fall and recovery. All goes with the rounded smoothness of
+machinery. These gymnasts have perfected the mechanism of the body, but
+they have given it nothing to do that is worth doing.
+
+
+
+
+SOCIETY.
+
+
+We bite at the tempting bait of London society a little eagerly. In our
+case, as veterans, it is like returning to a delicious element from
+which we have long been weaned. The cheerfulness with which English
+people respond to the modest presentment of a card _well-motived_, the
+cordiality with which they welcome an old friend, once truly a friend,
+may well offset the reserve with which they respond to advances made at
+random, and the resolute self-defence of the British _Lion_ in
+particular against all vague and vagabond enthusiasms. Carlyle's wrath
+at the Americans who homaged and tormented him prompted a grandiose
+vengeance. He called them a nation of hyperbores. Not for this do we now
+vigorously let him alone, but because his spleeny literary utterances
+these many years attest the precise moment in which bright Apollo left
+him. The most brilliant genius should beware of the infirmity of the
+fireside and admiring few, whose friendship applauds his poorest
+sayings, and, at the utmost, shrugs its shoulders where praise is out of
+the question.
+
+Our remembrance of the London of twenty-four years ago is, indeed
+hyperdelightful, and of that description which one does not ask to have
+repeated, so perfect is it in the first instance. A second visit was
+less social and more secluded in its opportunities. But now--for what
+reason it matters not; would it were that of our superior merit--we find
+the old delightful account reopened, the friendly visits frequent, and
+the luxurious invitations to dinner occupy every evening of our short
+week in London, crowding out theatres and opera,--the latter now just in
+the bud. To these dissipations a new one has been added, and the
+afternoon tea is now a recognized institution. Less formal and expensive
+than a New York afternoon reception, it answers the same purpose of a
+final object and rest for the day's visiting. In some instances, it
+continues through the season; in others, invitations are given for a
+single occasion only. You go, if invited, in spruce morning dress, with
+as much or as little display of train and bonnet as may suit with your
+views. You find a cheerful and broken-up assemblage--people conversing
+in twos, or, at most, in threes. And here is the Very Reverend the Dean.
+And here is the Catholic Archbishop, renowned for the rank and number of
+his proselytes. And here is Sir Charles--not he of the hunting-whip and
+breeches, but one renowned in science, and making a practical as well as
+a theoretical approximation to the antiquity of man. And here is Sir
+Samuel, who has finally discovered those parent lakes of the Nile which
+have been among the lost arts of geography for so many centuries. In
+this society, no man sees or shows a full-length portrait. A word is
+given, a phrase exchanged, and "_tout est dit_." What it all may amount
+to must be made out in another book than mine.
+
+Well, having been more or less introduced, you take a cup of tea, with
+the option of bread and butter or a fragment of sponge cake. Having
+finished this, you vanish; you have shown yourself, reported yourself;
+more was not expected of you.
+
+A graver and more important institution is the London dinner, commencing
+at half past seven, with good evening clothes--a white neckcloth and
+black vest for gentlemen; for _nous autres_, evening dress, not
+resplendent. The dinners we attend have perhaps the edge of state a
+little taken off, being given at short notice; but we observe female
+attire to be less showy than in our recollections of twenty-four years
+previous, and our one evening dress, devised to answer for dinner,
+evening party, and ball, proves a little over, rather than under, the
+golden mean of average appearance. As one dinner is like all, the
+briefest sketch of a single possible occasion may suffice. If you have
+been at afternoon tea before dinner, your toilet has been perforce a
+very hurried one. If it is your first appearance, the _annonce_ of a
+French hair-dresser in the upper floor of your hotel may have inspired
+you with the insane idea of submitting your precious brain-case to his
+manipulations. Having you once in his dreadful seat, he imposes upon you
+at his pleasure. You must accept his hair-string, his pins, his rats, at
+a price at which angola cats were dear. You are palpitating with haste,
+he with the conceit of his character and profession. Fain would he add
+swindle to swindle, and perfidy to perfidy. "Don't you want a little
+crayon to darken the hair?" and hide the ravages of age; "it is true it
+colors a little, since it is made on purpose." You desire it not. "A
+cream? a pomade? a hair-wash?" None of all this; only in Heaven's name
+to have done with him! He capers behind you, puffing your sober head
+with curls, as if he had the breath of Æolus, according to Flaxman's
+illustration. Finally he dismisses you at large and unwarranted cost;
+but in your imagination he capers at your back for a week to come.
+
+This prelude, which gives to
+
+                "_hairy_ nothing
+    A local habitation and a name,"
+
+leaves little time for further adornment. A hired cab takes your
+splendors to the door of the inviting mansion, and leaves them there.
+When you depart, you request the servant of the house which feeds you to
+call another cab, which he does with the air of rendering a familiar
+service.
+
+I have no intention of giving a detailed portrait of the entertainment
+that follows. Its few characteristic features can be briefly given.
+Introductions are not general; and even in case the occasion should have
+been invoked and invited for you, the greater part of your fellow-guests
+may not directly make your acquaintance. Servants are graver than
+senators with us. Dishes follow each other in bewildering and rather
+oppressive variety. You could be very happy with any one of them alone,
+but with a dozen you fear even to touch and taste. Conversation is not
+loud nor general, scarcely audible across the table. As in marriage,
+your partner is your fate. One would be very glad to present one brick
+so that another could be laid on top of it, or even to attempt an angle
+and a corner adjustment. But this conversation is not architectonic. It
+aims at nothing more than the requisite small change. If by chance the
+society be assembled at an informal house, and composed of artists and
+authors, we shall hear jests and laughter, but the themes of these will
+scarcely go beyond the most familiar matters. Having told thus much we
+have told all, except that ice is not served, as with us, upon the
+table, in picturesque variety of form and color, but is usually bestowed
+in spoonfuls, one of either kind to each person, the quality being
+excellent, and the quantity, after all else that has been offered, quite
+sufficient. It is here one of the most expensive articles of
+_luxe_--costing thrice its Yankee prices. The ladies leave the table a
+little before the gentlemen; but these arrive with no symptoms of
+inordinate drinking. The latter, as is well known, is long gone out of
+fashion, and with it, we imagine, the description of wit and anecdote,
+whose special enjoyment used to be reserved for the time "after the
+ladies had left the table." This is all that can be told of the dinner,
+which is the _ne plus ultra_ of English social enjoyments; for balls
+everywhere are stale affairs, save to the dancing neophytes, and the
+enjoyment to be had at them is either official or gymnastic. At a
+"select" _soirée_ following a state dinner, we hear Mr. Ap Thomas, the
+renowned harpist, whose execution is indeed brilliant and remarkable.
+The harp, however, is an instrument that owes its prestige partly to its
+beauty of form, partly to the romance of its traditions, from King David
+to the Welsh bards. In tone and temper it remains greatly inferior to
+the piano-forte, the finger governing the strings far better with than
+without the intervention of the keys and hammers.
+
+But while we thankfully accept the offered opportunities of meeting
+those whom we desire to see, we are forced, as hygienists and
+economists, to enter our protest against the English dinner--this last
+joint in the back-bone of luxury. After hearty luncheon and social tea,
+it would seem to be a mere superfluity, not needed, a danger if partaken
+of, a mockery if neglected. So let New England cherish while she can the
+early dinner; for with the extended areas of business and society,
+dinner grows ever later, and the man and his family wider apart. By the
+time that tea and coffee are got through with, it may well be half past
+ten o'clock, and by eleven, at latest, unless there should be music or
+some special after-entertainment, you take leave.
+
+Hoping to revisit more fully this ancestral isle before the tocsin of
+depart for home, we will now, with a little more of our sketchiness,
+take leave of it, which we should do with heartier regret but for the
+prospect of a not distant return.
+
+In philosophy, England at the present day does not seem to go beyond
+Mill on the one hand, and Stewart on the other. The word "science" is
+still used, as it was ten years ago with us, to express the rules and
+observances of physical and mathematical study. Science, as the mother
+of the rules of thought, generating logic, building metaphysics, and
+devising the rules of coherence by which human cogitation is at once
+promoted and measured,--this conception of science I did not recognize
+in those with whom I spoke, unless I except Rev. H. Martineau, with whom
+I had only general conversation, but whose intellectual position is at
+once without the walls of form, and within the sanctuary of freedom. I
+was referred to Jowett and his friends as the authorities under this
+head, but this was not the moment in which to find them. In religion,
+Miss Cobbe leads the van, her partial method assuming as an original
+conception what the Germans have done, and much better done, before her.
+Theodore Parker is, I gather, her great man; and in her case, as in his,
+largeness of nature, force and geniality of temperament, take the place
+of scientific construction and responsible labor. Mr. Martineau's
+position is well known, and is for us New Englanders beyond controversy.
+The broad church is best known to us by Kingsley and Maurice. To those
+who still stand within the limits of an absolute authority in spiritual
+matters, its achievements may appear worthy of surprise and of
+gratulation. To those who have passed that barrier they present no
+intellectual feature worth remarking.
+
+I well remember to-day my childish astonishment when I first learned
+that I and my fellows were outside the earth's crust, not within it. In
+connection with this came also the fact of a mysterious force binding us
+to the surface of the planet, so that, in its voyages and revolutions,
+it can lose nothing of its own.
+
+Something akin to this may be the discovery of believers that they and
+those whom they follow are, so far as concerns actual opportunity of
+knowledge, on the outside of the world of ideal truth. Eye hath not
+seen, nor ear heard, nor heart conceived, any absolute form of its
+manifestation. A divine, mysterious force binds us to our place on its
+smiling borders. Of what lies beyond we construe as we can--Moses
+according to his ability, Christ and Paul according to theirs. Unseen
+and unmanifested it must ever remain; for though men say that God has
+done so and so, God has never said so. Of this we become sure: religion
+spiritualizes, inspires, and consoles us. The strait gate and narrow
+path are blessed for all who find them, and are the same for all who
+seek them. But this oneness of morals is learned experimentally; it
+cannot be taught dogmatically.
+
+Proposing to return to this theme, and to see more of the broad church
+before I decide upon its position, I take leave of it and of its domain
+together. Farewell, England! farewell, London! For three months to come
+thou wilt contain the regalia of all wits, of all capabilities. Fain
+would we have lingered beside the hospitable tables, and around the
+ancient monuments, considering also the steadfast and slowly-developing
+institutions. But the chief veteran is in haste for Greece, and on the
+very Sunday on which we should have heard Martineau in the forenoon, and
+Dean Stanley in the afternoon, with delightful social recreation in the
+evening, we break loose from our moorings, reach Folkstone, and embark
+for its French antithesis, _Boulogne sur mer_.
+
+
+
+
+THE CHANNEL.
+
+
+If the devil is not so black as he is painted, it must be because he has
+an occasional day of good humor. Some such wondrous interval is hinted
+at by people who profess to have seen the Channel sea smooth and calm.
+We remember it piled with mountains of anguish--one's poor head
+swimming, one's heart sinking, while an organ more important than either
+in this connection underwent a sort of turning inside out which seemed
+to wrench the very strings of life. But on this broken Sabbath our
+wonderful luck still pursues us. It is in favor of the neophytes that
+this new dispensation has been granted. The monsters of the deep respect
+their innocence, and cannot visit on them the vulgar offences of their
+progenitors. They bind the waves with a garland of roses and lilies,
+whose freshness proves a spell of peace. We, the elders, embark,
+expecting the usual speedy prostration; but, placing ourselves against
+the mast, we determine, like Ulysses, to maintain the integrity of our
+position. And it so happens that we do. While a few sensitive mortals
+about us execute the irregular symphony of despair, we rest in a calm
+and upright silence. Never was the Channel so quiet! We were not
+uproarious, certainly, but contemplative. A wretch tucked us up with a
+tarpaulin, for which he afterwards demanded a trifle. If civility is
+sold for its weight in silver anywhere, it is on English soil and in
+English dependencies. We, the veterans, took our quiet ferriage in mute
+amazement; the neophytes took it as a thing of course.
+
+Arrived, we rush to the _buffet_ of the railroad station, where every
+one speaks French-English. Here a very limited dinner costs us five
+francs a head. We accept the imposition with melancholy thoughtfulness.
+Then comes the whistle of the locomotive. "_En voiture, messieurs!_" And
+away, with a shriek, and a groan, and a rattle,--to borrow Mr. Dickens's
+refrain, now that he has done with it,--_en route_ for Paris.
+
+
+
+
+PARIS AND THENCE.
+
+
+In Paris the fate of Greece still pursues us. Two days the rigid veteran
+will grant; no more--the rest promised when the Eastern business shall
+have been settled. But those two days suffice to undo our immortal souls
+so far as shop windows can do this. The shining sins and vanities of the
+world are so insidiously set forth in this Jesuits' college of Satan,
+that you catch the contagion of folly and extravagance as you pace the
+streets, or saunter through the brilliant arcades. Your purveyor makes a
+Sybarite of you, through the inevitable instrumentality of breakfast and
+dinner. Your clothier, from boots to bonnet, seduces you into putting
+the agreeable before the useful. For if you purchase the latter, you
+will be moved to buy by the former, and use becomes an after-thought to
+your itching desire and disturbed conscience. Paris is a sweating
+furnace in which human beings would turn life everlasting into gold,
+provided it were a negotiable value. You, who escape its allurements
+solvent, with a franc or two in your pocket, and your resources for a
+year to come not mortgaged, should after your own manner cause _Te
+Deum_ to be sung or celebrated. Strongly impressed at the time, moved
+towards every acquisitive villany, not excluding shop-lifting nor the
+picking of pockets, I now regard with a sort of indignation those silken
+snares, those diamond, jet, and crystal allurements, which so nearly
+brought my self-restraint, and with it my self-respect, to ruin.
+Everything in Paris said to me, "Shine, dye your hair, rouge your
+cheeks, beggar your purse with real diamonds, or your pride with false
+ones. But shine, and, if necessary, beg or steal." Nothing said, "Be
+sober, be vigilant, because your adversary, like a roaring lion," etc.,
+etc. What a deliverer was therefore the stern Crete-bound veteran, who
+cut the Gordian knot of enchantment with, "Pack and begone." And having
+ended that inevitable protest against his barbarity with which women
+requite the offices of true friendship, I now turn my wrath against
+false, fair Paris, and cry, "Avoid thee, _scelestissima_! Away from me,
+_nequissima_! I will none of thee; not a franc, not an obolus. Avoid
+thee! _Nolo ornari!_"
+
+Touching our journey from Paris to Marseilles, I will only give the
+scarce-needed advice that those who have this route to make should
+inflict upon themselves a little extra fatigue, and stop only at Lyons,
+if at all, rather than risk the damp rooms and musty accommodations of
+the smaller places which lie upon the route, offering to the traveller
+few objects of interest, or none. For it often happens in travelling
+that a choice only of inconveniences is presented to us, and in our
+opinion a prolonged day's journey in a luxurious car is far less
+grievous to be borne than a succession of stoppages, unpackings, and
+plungings into unknown inns and unaired beds. To this opinion, however,
+our Greece-bound veteran suffers not himself to be converted, and,
+accordingly, we, leaving Paris on the Wednesday at ten A. M., do not
+reach Marseilles until four o'clock of the Friday afternoon following.
+
+The features of our first day's journey are those of a country whose
+landed possessions are subdivided into the smallest portions cultivable.
+Plains and hill-sides are alike covered with the stripes which denote
+the limits of property. Fruit trees in blossom abound every where, but
+the villages, built of rough stone and lime, are distant from each
+other. As we go southward, the vine becomes more apparent, and before we
+reach Lyons we see much of that contested gift of God. The trains that
+pass us are often loaded with barrels whose precious contents cannot be
+bought pure for any money, on the other side of the Atlantic, or even of
+the Straits of Dover. To this the procession of the jolly god has come
+at last. He leers at us through the two red eyes of the locomotive; its
+stout cylinder represents his _embonpoint_. Instead of frantic
+Bacchantes, the rattling cars dance after him, and "_Ohe evohe!_"
+degenerates into the shrill whew, whew of the engine. At the _buffets_
+and hotels _en route_ his mysteries are celebrated. These must be sought
+in the labyrinthine state of mind of those who have drunken frequently
+and freely. They utter words unintelligible to the sober and uninspired,
+sentences of prophetic madness which the prose of modern physiology
+condenses into those two words--gout and delirium tremens. Yet these two
+dire diseases are rare among the temperate French. They export the
+producing medium _au profit de l'étranger_.
+
+We stop the first night at Macon, and sleep in an imposing, chilly room,
+without carpets, under down coverlets. The second day's journey brings
+us to Lyons an hour before noon. We engage a _fiacre_, drive around the
+town, whose growth and improvement in the interval of sixteen years do
+not fail to strike us. Fine public squares adorn it, themselves
+embellished with bronze statues, among which we observe an equestrian
+figure of the first and only Napoleon. The shops are as tormenting as
+those of Paris, the Café Casati, where we dine, as elegant. Re-embarking
+at four P. M., we reach Valence in about four hours.
+
+The worst of it is, that, arriving at these quaint little places after
+dark, you see none of their features, and taste only of their
+discomforts. At Valence our inn was so dreary, that, having bestowed the
+neophytes in sound slumber, the veteran and I sallied forth in quest of
+any pastime whatever, without being at all fastidious as to its source
+and character. Passing along the quiet streets, we observe what would
+seem to be a theatre, on the other side of the way. Entering, we find a
+youthful guardian, who tells us that there is up stairs a "_confèrence
+de philosophie_." We enter, and find a very respectable assemblage,
+listening attentively to an indistinct orator, who rhapsodizes upon the
+poets of modern France, with quotations and personal anecdotes. What he
+says has little originality, but is delivered with good taste and
+feeling. He speaks without notes; for, indeed, such a _causerie_ spins
+itself, like a sailor's yarn, though out of finer materials.
+
+Returning to our hostelry, we sleep with open window in a musty room,
+and catch cold. The next day's journey still conducts us through a
+vine-growing region, in a more and more advanced condition. The constant
+presence of the _morus multicaulis_ also makes us aware of the presence
+of the silk-worm--so far, only in the egg-condition; for that prime
+minister of vanity is not hatched yet. We learn that the disease which
+has for some years devastated the worm is on the decline. The world with
+us, meanwhile has become somewhat weaned from the absolute necessity of
+the article, and the friendly sheep and alpaca have made great progress
+in the æsthetics of the toilet. As we approach Marseilles, we cross a
+dreary flat of wide extent, covered with stones and saltish grass, and
+said to produce the finest cattle in France. The olive, too, makes his
+stiff bow to us as we pass, well remembering his dusty green. The olive
+trees seem very small, and are, indeed, of comparatively recent growth;
+all the larger ones having been killed by a frost, rare in these
+latitudes, whose epoch we are inclined to state as posterior to our last
+presence in these parts. Our informant places it at twenty years ago.
+After three days of piecemeal travelling, the arrival at Marseilles
+seems quite a relief.
+
+
+
+
+MARSEILLES.
+
+
+At Marseilles we find a quasi tropical aspect--long streets, handsome
+and well-shaded, tempting shops, luxurious hotels, a motley company,
+and, above all, a friend, one of our own countrymen, divided between the
+glitter of the new life and the homesick weaning of the old. Half, he
+assumes the cicerone, and guides our ignorance about. Half, he sits to
+learn, and we expound to him what has befallen at home, so far as we are
+conscious of it. We take half a day for resting, the next day for
+sight-seeing. On the third, we must sail, for finding that Holy Week is
+still to be, we determine to make our reluctant sacrifice to the
+Mediterranean, and to trust our precious comfort and delicate
+equilibrium to that blue imposture, that sunniest of humbugs.
+
+On the second day, we climb the steep ascent that leads to the chapel of
+La Bonne Mère de la Garde. This hot and panting ascent is not made by us
+without many pauses for recovered breath and energy. At every convenient
+stopping-place in the steep ascent are stationed elderly women presiding
+over small booths, who urgently invite us to purchase candles to give to
+the Madonna, medals, rosaries, and photographs, to all of whom we oppose
+a steadfast resistance. We have twice in our lives brought home from
+Europe boat-loads of trash, and we think that, as Paul says, the time
+past of our lives may suffice us. Finally, with a degree of perspiration
+more than salutary, we reach the top, and enjoy first the view of the
+Mediterranean, including a bird's-eye prospect of the town, which looks
+so parched and arid as to make the remembrance of London in the rain
+soothing and pleasant. A palace is pointed out which was built in the
+expectation of a night's sojourn of the emperor, but to which, they tell
+us, he never came. Our point of view is the top of one of the towers of
+the church. Going inside, we look down upon the aisles and altars from a
+lofty gallery. The silver robes of the Madonna glisten, reflecting the
+many wax-lights that devotees have kindled around her. The first sight
+of these material expressions of devotion is imposing, the second
+instructive, the third, commonplace and wearisome. We are at the last
+clause, and gaze at these things with the eyes of people who have seen
+enough of them.
+
+The remainder of the disposable day we employ in a drive to the Prado,
+the fashionable region for the display of equipage and toilet. This is
+not, however, the fashionable day, and we meet only a few grumpy-looking
+dowagers in all stages of fatitude. The road is planted with double rows
+of lindens, and is skirted by country residences and villas to let. We
+stop and alight at the Musée, a spacious and handsome building, erected
+and owned by a noble of great wealth, long since dead, who committed
+celibacy, and left no personal heir. It is now the property of the city
+of Marseilles. The hall is fine. Among the spacious salons, the largest
+is used as a gallery of pictures, mostly by artists of this
+neighborhood, and of very humble merit. In another we find a very good
+collection of Egyptian antiquities, while in yet another the old state
+furniture is retained, the rich crimson hangings, long divan of gobelin,
+and chairs covered with fine worsted needle-work. Beyond is a pretty
+Chinese cabinet, with a full-length _squatue_ of Buddh, gayly gilded and
+painted. Above stairs, the state bed and hangings are shown, the latter
+matching a handsome landscape chintz, with which the walls are covered.
+This museum has in it a good deal of instructive and entertaining
+matter, and is kept in first-rate order. Returning, we drive around the
+outer skirts of the town, and see something of the summer bathing
+hotels, the great storehouses, and the streets frequented by the working
+and seafaring portion of the community.
+
+In the evening we walk through the streets, which are brilliant with
+gas, and visit the cafés, where ices, coffee, and lemonade are enjoyed.
+We finally seat ourselves in a casino, a sort of mixed café and theatre,
+where the most motley groups of people are coming, going, and sitting.
+At one end is a small stage, with a curtain, which falls at the end of
+each separate performance. Here songs and dances succeed each other,
+only half heeded by the public, who drink, smoke, and chatter without
+stint. After a hornpipe, a dreadful woman in white, with a blue peplum,
+hoarsely shouts a song without music, accompanied by drums and barbaric
+cymbals. She makes at last a vile courtesy, matching the insufficiency
+of her dress below by its utter absence above the waist, and we take
+flight. The next morning witnesses our early departure from Marseilles.
+
+
+
+
+ROME.
+
+
+With feelings much mingled, I approach, for the third time, the city of
+Rome. I pause to collect the experience of sixteen years, the period
+intervening between my second visit and the present. I left Rome, after
+those days, with entire determination, but with infinite reluctance.
+America seemed the place of exile, Rome the home of sympathy and
+comfort. To console myself for the termination of my travels, I
+undertook a mental pilgrimage, which unfolded to me something of the
+spirit of that older world, of which I had found the form so congenial.
+To the course of private experience were added great public lessons.
+Among these I may name the sublime failure of John Brown, the sorrow and
+success of the late war. And now I must confess that, after so many
+intense and vivid pages of life, this visit to Rome, once a theme of
+fervent and solemn desire, becomes a mere page of embellishment in a
+serious and instructive volume. So, while my countrymen and women, and
+the Roman world in general, hang intent upon the pages of the
+picture-book, let me resume my graver argument, and ask and answer such
+questions of the present as may seem useful and not ungenial.
+
+The Roman problem has for the American thinker two clauses: first, that
+of state and society; secondly, that of his personal relation to the
+same. Arriving here, and becoming in some degree acquainted with things
+as they are, he asks, first, What is the theory of this society, and how
+long will it continue? secondly, What do my countrymen who consent to
+pass their lives here gain? what do they give up? I cannot answer either
+of these questions exhaustively. The first would lead me far into social
+theorizing; the second into some ungracious criticism. So a word, a
+friendly one must stand for good intentions where wisdom is at fault.
+
+The theory of this society in policy and religion is that of a symbolism
+whose remote significance has long been lost sight of and forgotten.
+Here the rulers, whose derived power should represent the _consensus_ of
+the people, affect to be greater than those who constitute them, and the
+petty statue, raised by the great artist for the convenience and
+instruction of the crowd, spurns at the solid basis of the heaven-born
+planet, without which it could not stand. Rank here is not a mere
+convenience and classification for the encouragement of virtue and
+promotion of order. Rank here takes the place of virtue, and repression,
+its tool, takes the place of order. A paralysis of thought characterizes
+the whole community, for thought deprived of its legitimate results is
+like the human race debarred from its productive functions--it becomes
+effete, and soon extinct.
+
+Abject poverty and rudeness characterize the lower class (_basso ceto_),
+bad taste and want of education the middle, utter arrogance and
+superficiality the upper class. The distinctions between one set of
+human beings and another are held to be absolute, and the inferiority of
+opportunity, carefully preserved and exaggerated, is regarded as
+intrinsic, not accidental. Vain is it to plead the democratic allowances
+of the Catholic church. The equality of man before God is here purely
+abstract and disembodied. The name of God, on the contrary, is invoked
+to authorize the most flagrant inequalization that ignorance can prepare
+and institutions uphold. The finest churches, the fairest galleries, you
+will say, are open to the poorest as to the richest. This is true. But
+the man's mind is the castle and edifice of his life. Look at these
+rough and ragged people, unwashed, uncombed, untaught. See how little
+sensible they are of the decencies and amenities of life. Search their
+faces for an intelligent smile, a glance that recognizes beauty or
+fitness in any of the stately circumstances that surround them. They are
+kept like human cattle, and have been so kept for centuries. And their
+dominants suppose themselves to be of one sort, and these of another.
+But give us absolutism, and take away education, even in rich and roomy
+America, and what shall we have? The cruel and arrogant slaveholder, the
+vulgar and miserable poor white, the wronged and degraded negro. The
+three classes of men exist in all constituted society. Absolutism allows
+them to exist only in this false form.
+
+This race is not a poor, but a robust and kindly one. Inclining more to
+artistic illustration than to abstract thought, its gifts, in the
+hierarchy of the nations, are eminent and precious. Like the modern
+Greek, the modern Celt, and the modern negro, the Italian peasant asks a
+century or two of education towards modern ideas. And all that can be
+said of his want of comprehension only makes it the more evident that
+the sooner we begin, the better.
+
+It should not need, to Americans or Englishmen, to set out any formal
+argument against absolutism. Among them it has long since been tried and
+judged. Enough of its advocacy only remains to present that opposition
+which is the necessary basis of action. And yet a word to my countrymen
+and countrywomen, who, lingering on the edge of the vase, are lured by
+its sweets, and fall into its imprisonment. It is a false, false
+superiority to which you are striving to join yourself. A prince of
+puppets is not a prince, but a puppet; a superfluous duke is no dux; a
+titular count does not count. Dresses, jewels, and equipages of
+tasteless extravagance; the sickly smile of disdain for simple people;
+the clinging together, by turns eager and haughty, of a clique that
+becomes daily smaller in intention, and whose true decline consists in
+its numerical increase,--do not dream that these lift you in any time
+way--in any true sense. For Italians to believe that it does, is
+natural; for Englishmen to believe it, is discreditable; for Americans,
+disgraceful.
+
+Leaving philosophy for the moment, I must renew my sketchy pictures of
+the scenes I pass through, lest treacherous memory should relinquish
+their best traits unpreserved. Arrived in Rome, at a very prosaic and
+commonplace station, I had some difficulty in recognizing the front of
+Villa Negroni, an old papal residence belonging to the Massimi family,
+in whose wide walls the relatives I now visit had formerly built their
+nest. A cosy and pleasant one it was, with the view of the distant
+hills, a large _entourage_ of gardens, a fine orange grove, and the
+neighborhood of some interesting ruins and churches. With all the
+cordiality of the old time these relatives now met me. My labors of
+baggage and conveyance were ended. One leads me to the carriage, where
+another waits to receive me. Time has been indulgent, we think, to both
+of us, for each finds the other little changed.
+
+And now we begin in earnest to tread the fairy land of dreams. Here are
+the Quattro Fontane, there is the Quirinal, yonder the dome of domes. We
+thread the streets in which I used to hunt for small jewelry and
+pictures at a bargain, enacting the part of the prodigal son, and
+providing a dinner of husks for the sake of a feast of gewgaws. A
+certain salutary tingling of shame visits my cheeks at the remembrance
+of the same. I find the personage of those days poor and trivial. But
+here is the Forum of Trajan, and soon we drive within a palatial
+doorway, and our guides lead us up a stately marble staircase--a long
+ascent; but we pause finally, and a great door opens, and they say,
+Welcome! We are now at home.
+
+Through a long hall we go, and through a sweep of apartments unmatchable
+in Fifth Avenue, at least in architectural dignity, seconded by rich and
+measured taste--green parlor, crimson parlor, drab parlor, the lady's
+room, the signore's room, the children's room. And in the guest-chamber
+I confronted my small and dusty self in the glass--small, not especially
+in my human proportions. But the whole of my modest house in B. Place
+would easily, as to solid contents, lodge in the largest of those lofty
+rooms. The Place itself would equally lodge in the palace. I regard my
+re-found friends with wonder, and expect to see them execute some large
+and stately manoeuvre, indicating their possession of all this space.
+
+And now, dinner served in irreproachable style, and waited on by two
+young men whose air and deportment would amply justify their appearance
+at Papanti's Hall on any state occasion. We soon grow used to their
+polite services; but at first Mario and Giuseppe somewhat intimidate us.
+
+And after dinner, talk of old times and old friends, question of this
+region and the other, the cold limbo as to weather, whence we come. Long
+and familiar is our interchange of facts, and sleep comes too soon, yet
+is welcome.
+
+
+
+
+ST. PETER'S.
+
+
+The first day in Rome sees us pursuing the phantom of the St. Peter
+ceremonies, for all of which, tickets have been secured for us. Solid
+fact as the performance of the _functions_ remains, for us it assumes a
+forcible unreality, through the impeding intervention of black dresses
+and veils, with what should be women under them. But as these creatures
+push like battering-rams, and caper like he-goats, we shall prefer to
+adjourn the question of their humanity, and to give it the benefit of a
+doubt. We must except, however, our countrywomen from dear Boston, who
+were not seen otherwise than decently and in order. Into the
+well-remembered _palco_ we now drag the trembling neophyte, dished up
+in black in a manner altogether astonishing to herself. And we push her
+youthful head this way and that. "See, there are the cardinals; there is
+the pope; there, in white-capped row, sit the pilgrims. Now, the pope's
+mitre being removed, he proceeds with great state to wash the pilgrims'
+feet." But she, like sister Anne in the Blue Beard controversy, might
+reply, "I see only a flock of black dresses, heaped helter-skelter, the
+one above the other." Some bits of the picture she does get, certainly,
+which may thus be catalogued: "Pope's nose, black dress, ditto
+skull-cap, black dress, a touch of cardinal's back, black dress--and
+now? Bla--ck dre--ss, for the rest of the time. But what is this
+commotion?" For now the he-goats begin to jump in the most extraordinary
+way, racing out of the tribune as eagerly as they had pressed into it.
+Their haste is to see the _tavola_, or pilgrims' table, up stairs, where
+the pope and cardinals are to wait upon the twelve elect, whose
+foot-washing we have just tried to see. Silence, decency, decorum--all
+are forgotten. One in diamonds calls to a friend in the crowd outside,
+"Hollo, Hollo! Come along with us!" and at the top of her voice. If "the
+devil take the hindmost" be the moving cause of this gymnastic, I would
+humbly suggest that, on these occasions, the devil certainly seems to be
+in the foremost. With a little suppressed grumbling, we tumble out of
+the tribune, and descend to the body of the church, where the double
+line of Swiss guards detains us so long as to render our tickets for the
+_cupola_, where the pilgrims' feast takes place, nearly useless. This
+detention seems to be entirely arbitrary; for when, after endless
+entreaty, we are allowed to reach the door, an easy ingress is allowed
+us. And here, bit by bit, the neophyte puzzles out the significance of
+the scene before her--a table set with massive golden ornaments (silver
+gilt at best), the twelve white caps behind; the great church
+dignitaries handing plates of fish, vegetables, and fruit towards the
+table; the pope hidden behind some black dress or other, and a chanting
+of prayers or texts, we know not what. The whole is much like the stage
+banquet in Macbeth, the part of Banquo's ghost being played by the
+spirit of the Christian religion.
+
+And now away, away! to the door of the Sistine Chapel, where the
+_Miserere_ will be sung at six of the clock, it now being one of the
+same. So, in profane haste, we reach that door, already occupied by a
+small mob of women of the politer sort, and others. Here one maintains
+one's position till two o'clock, when the door opens, and, in shocking
+disorder, the mob enter. Those who keep the door exclaim, "Do not push
+so, ladies; there is room for all." But the savageness of the
+Anglo-Saxon race has full scope to-day, not being on its good behavior,
+as at home. So the abler-bodied jam and cram the less athletic without
+stint. After falling harmlessly on my face, I breathe freely, and obtain
+an end seat on the long benches reserved for the unreserved ladies.
+
+And here passed three weary hours before the office began, and another
+hour after that before the musical _bonne bouche_, coveted by these
+people, and little appreciated by many of them, was offered to their
+tired acceptance. The first interval was mostly employed in the
+resuscitating process of _chawing_ upon such victuals as had not proved
+contraband for such an occasion. And here were exchanged some little
+amenities which revived our sinking hopes of the race. Biscuits,
+sandwiches, and chocolate pastilles were shared. "Muffin from the Hotel
+de Russie" was offered by a face not unknown. Munching thereon with
+thankfulness, we interrogate, and find with joy a Boston woman. O
+comfort! be my friend; and when the next black rush doth come, if
+fisticuffs should become general and dangerous, be so good as to belabor
+the woman who belabors me.
+
+The office begins at five. It consists mostly of linked sameness long
+drawn out. The chapel is by this time well filled with ceremonial
+amateurs in every sort and quality. Men of all nationalities, in
+gentlemen's dress, fill the seats and throng the aisle. Priests,
+_militaires_, and even Sisters of Charity, vary the monotony of the
+strict coat and pantaloon. Upon an upright triangle, as is well known,
+are spiked the fifteen burning candles, of which all, save one, must be
+quenched before we can enjoy our dear-bought _Miserere_. Much of our
+attendant zeal is concentrated upon the progress visible in their
+decline. The effect of the chanting is as square and monotonous as would
+be the laying down of so many musical paving-stones. We tried to peep at
+the Latin text of a book of prayers in the hand of a priest on our left;
+but the pitiless Swiss guard caused him and his Breviary to move on, and
+this resource was lost. About half way through the office, a pause came
+over matters, very unwelcome to our hurry. A door on the left of the
+altar opened, and the pope entered, preceded by his guard. He walked to
+his throne on the right of the altar, and the chanting was resumed. Some
+time before this, however, the _treni_ or lamentations were sung. These
+were chanted in a high voice, neither fresh nor exact, and did not make
+on me the impression of sixteen years ago. The extinguishing of the
+candles was a slow agony, the intervals appearing endless. Finally, all
+the lights were out. The one burning taper which represented Christ was
+removed out of sight, the pope sank upon his knees before the altar, and
+the verses of the _Miserere_ were sung. Twilight and fixed attention
+prevailed through the chapel, whose vaulted roof lends a certain magic
+of its own to the weird chant. Yet, with the remembrance of sixteen
+years since, and with present judgment, I am inclined to consider the
+supremacy of the _Miserere_ a musical superstition. I know not what
+critical convictions its literal study would develop, but, as I heard
+it, much of it seemed out of tune, and deformed by other than musical
+discords. The _soprani_, without exception, were husky, and strained
+their voices to meet the highest effects. The vaulted roof, indeed,
+gives a lovely scope to such melody as there is. The dim, majestic
+frescos, which you still feel, though you see them no longer,--the
+brilliancy and variety of the company, its temporary stillness,--all
+these circumstances in this _ne plus ultra_ of the Roman æsthetic
+combine to impress you. But the kneeling pontiff and his cardinals did
+not appear to me invested with any true priesthood. I could feel no
+religious sympathy with their movements, which seemed a show, and part
+of a show--nothing more. And when the verses were all sung, and the
+shuffling of feet at the end got through with, I staid not to see the
+procession into the Pauline Chapel, nor the adoration of the relics, nor
+the mopping of St. Peter's altar. I had seen enough of such sights, and,
+quietly wrapping the twilight about my discontent, I thankfully went
+where kindred voices and a kindred faith allowed me to claim the shelter
+of home.
+
+
+
+
+SUPPER OF THE PILGRIMS.
+
+
+Faster go these shows than one can describe them. On Good Friday evening
+we attempted only to see the supper of the female pilgrims at the
+Trinità dei Pellegrini. This again I undertook for the neophytes' sake,
+having myself once witnessed the august ceremony. Here, as everywhere at
+this time, we found a crowd of black dresses, with and without veils,
+which, on this occasion, are optional. Another mob of women, small but
+energetic; another rush to see what, under other circumstances, we
+should hold to be but a sorry sight. The pilgrims are waited upon by an
+association of ladies, who wear a sort of feminine overall in scarlet
+cotton, nearly concealing a dress, usually black, of ordinary wear. They
+are also distinguished by a pictorial badge, representing, I think, the
+Easter Lamb, in some connection. Some of these ladies are of princely
+family, others of rank merely civic. Princess Massimo, of first-rate
+pretensions, keeps the inner entrance to the rites, and accords it only
+to a limited number in turn. We tumble down the dividing stairs in the
+usual indecorous manner, and walk through two rooms, in each of which
+the pilgrims sit with their feet in tubs of water, the attendant ladies
+being employed either in scrubbing them clean, or in wiping them dry.
+All were working women from the country, their faces mostly empty of
+thought and rude with toil. Some of the heads were not without
+character, and would easily have made, with their folded head-dresses, a
+_genre_ picture. In general, they and their attire were as rough and
+uninteresting as women and their belongings can be. A number of them
+carried infants, whose appearance also invited the cleansing
+ministration, which did not include them. In either room an ecclesiastic
+recited prayers in Latin, and a pretty young lady at intervals rattled a
+box, the signal for the participants to make the sign of the cross,
+which they did in a business-like manner. From this _lavanda_ we passed
+to other rooms, in which the supper tables were in process of
+preparation. The materials for the meal were divided into portions. To
+each one was allotted a plate of salad and sardines, one of _bacala_, or
+fried salt fish, two small loaves of bread, and a little pitcher of
+wine, together with figs and oranges. The red-gowned ministrants
+bestirred themselves in dividing and arranging these portions, with much
+apparent good nature. Many of them wore diamond earrings, and one young
+lady, whom we did not see at work, was adorned as to the neck with a
+rich collar of jewelled lockets, an article of the latest fashion. All
+of these ladies are supposed to be princesses, but several of them
+talked house-gossip in homely Italian. To us the time seemed long, but
+at length arrived the _minestra_ in a huge kettle. This universal
+Italian dish is a watery soup, containing a paste akin to macaroni. And
+now the pilgrims, having had all the washing they could endure, came in
+to take possession of the goods prepared for them. Those of the same
+family tried to sit together, but did not always manage to do so. For
+every babe a double portion is allowed, and the coin (ten cents)
+received at departure is also doubled. We had feared lest the pilgrims
+might have found the presence of numbers a source of embarrassment. But
+it did not prove so. They attacked their victuals with the most
+practical and evident enjoyment. The babies were fed with _minestra_,
+fish, salad, and wine. Of these one was two weeks old, and its mother
+had walked four days to get to Rome. Each pilgrim carried either a
+bottle or a tin canteen, into which the superior waiting-women decanted
+the wine allowed, that they might carry it home with them. A Latin grace
+was rehearsed before they fell to. Cardinals and _monsignori_ were seen,
+here and there, talking with friends among the spectators. Observing
+that pilgrims eat much like other people, we left them still at table,
+and came away, to find the Prince Massimo in pink cotton, at the bottom
+of the staircase, and a stupid Swiss, with ill-managed bayonet, guarding
+the outer entrance. He, a raw recruit, carried his weapon as carelessly
+as a lady waves a bouquet. Close to the eye of the neophyte he thrusts
+it, through inattention. A scream from me makes her aware of the danger,
+but affects him not. Under the weight of my objurgation he falters not,
+but makes a vehement pass at a harmless dog, which runs by unhurt. And
+my reflections upon his sheer brutishness were the closing ones of the
+day.
+
+
+
+
+EASTER.
+
+
+St. Peter's on Easter called us with the magical summons of the silver
+trumpets, blown at the elevation of the host, and remembered by me
+through these sixteen years. To the tribunes, however, I did not betake
+myself, but, armed with a camp stool, wandered about the church, getting
+now a _coup d'oeil_, now a whiff of harmony. The neophytes had our
+tickets, and beheld the ceremonies, which, once seen, are of little
+interest to those to whom they are not matters of religion. The pope and
+cardinals officiate at high mass, with the music of the Sistine singers.
+The pope drinks of the consecrated cup through a golden tube, the cup
+itself having previously been tasted of by one commissioned for the
+purpose. This feature clearly indicates the recognized possibility of
+poison. It is probably not observed by most of those present, who have,
+after all, but a glimpse of what passes. The effect of the trumpets is
+certainly magical. The public has no knowledge of their whereabouts, and
+the sound seems to fall from some higher region. Having enjoyed this
+æsthetic moment, one hurries out into the piazza in front of the church,
+where a great assemblage waits to receive the papal benediction. Here
+seats and balconies can be hired, and a wretched boy screeches, "_Ecco
+luoghi_," for half an hour, as if he had a watchman's rattle in his
+head. At last the blessed father in his palanquin is borne to that upper
+window of the church, over which the white canopy rests: his mitres are
+all arranged before him. The triple crown, glittering with jewels, is on
+his head. On either side of him flutter the peacock fans. Cannons clear
+the way for his utterance, and holding up two fingers, he recites the
+apostolic benediction in a voice of remarkable distinctness and power.
+It is received by good Catholics on their knees. Another cannon shot
+closes the performance, and at the same moment two or three papers,
+containing indulgences, fall from the pontiff's hand. Then the crowd
+disperses, and you yourself, having witnessed "the most impressive
+ceremony in the world," become chiefly occupied with the getting home,
+the crowd of carriages being very great, and the bridge of St. Angelo
+reserved for the passage of the _legni privilegiati_. And on the way,
+query as to this impressiveness. If one could suppose that the pope had
+any special blessing to bestow, or that he thought he had, one would
+certainly be desirous and grateful to share in it. If one could consider
+him as consecrated by anything better than a superstition for anything
+better than the priestly maintenance of an absolute rule, one might look
+in his kindly old face with a feeling stronger than that of personal
+good-will or indifference. But I, standing to see and hear him, was in
+the position of Macbeth.
+
+    "I had most need of blessing, but Amen
+     Stuck in my throat."
+
+And I concluded that common sense, common justice, and civil and
+religious liberty,--the noblest gifts of the past and promises of the
+future,--had been quite long enough
+
+    "Butchered to make a Roman holiday."
+
+As for the evening illumination, it was just as I remember it on two
+former occasions, separated from this and from each other by long
+intervals. A magical and unique spectacle it certainly is, with the
+well-known change from the paper lanterns to the flaring _lampions_.
+Costly is it of human labor, and perilous to human life. And when I
+remembered that those employed in it receive the sacrament beforehand,
+in order that imminent death may not find them out of a state of grace,
+I thought that its beauty did not so much signify.
+
+We have a dome, too, in Washington. The Genius of Liberty poises on its
+top; the pediment below it is adorned with the emblems of honest thrift
+and civic prosperity. May that dome perish ere it be lit at the risk of
+human life, and lit, like this, to make the social darkness around it
+more evident by its momentary aureole.
+
+
+
+
+WORKS OF ART.
+
+
+Enough of shows. Galleries and studios are better. Rome is rich in both,
+and with a sort of studious contentment, one embraces one's Murray,
+picks out the palace that unfolds its art treasures to-day, and travels
+up the stairs, and along the marble corridors, to wonderful suites of
+apartments, in which the pasteboard programmes lie about waiting for
+you, while the still drama of the pictures acts itself upon the
+thronged wall, yourself their small public, and they giving their
+color-eloquence, whether any one gives heed or not.
+
+They are precious, the Colonna, Doria, Sciarra, Borghese, and we have
+seen them. We have picked out our old favorites, and have carried the
+neophytes before them, saying, "I saw this, dear, before you were born."
+But this past, whose reflex fold inwraps us, does not exist for the
+neophytes, who look at it as out of a moment's puzzle, and then conclude
+to begin their own business on their own responsibility, without any
+reference to these outstanding credits of ours.
+
+Of the pictures it is little useful to speak. Your description enables
+no one to see them, and the narration of the feelings they excite in you
+is as likely to be tedious as interesting to those who cultivate
+feelings of their own. Copies and engravings have done here what you
+cannot do, and the best subjects are familiar to art students and lovers
+in all countries. A little sigh of pleasure may be allowed you at this,
+your third sight of the Francias, the Raphaels, Titian's Bella, Claude's
+landscapes, and the scientific Leonardo's heavily-labored heads and
+groups. But do not therefore put the trumpet to your lips, and blow that
+sigh across the ocean, to claim the attention of ears that invite the
+lesson for the day. The lesson for this day is not written on canvas,
+and though it may be read everywhere in the world, you will scarcely
+find its clearest type in Rome.
+
+And here, perhaps, I may as well carry further the philosophizing which
+I began a week ago with regard to the objects and resources of Roman
+life, and their compatibility with the thoughts and pursuits most dear
+and valuable to Americans.
+
+Art is, of course, the only solid object which an American can bring
+forward to justify a prolonged residence in Rome. Art, health, and
+official duty, are among the valid reasons which bring our countrymen
+abroad. Two of these admit of no argument. The sick have a right, other
+things permitting, to go where they can be bettered; a duty perhaps, to
+go where the sum of their waning years and wasting activities admits of
+multiplication. Those who live abroad as ministers and consuls have a
+twofold opportunity of benefiting their country. If honest and able,
+they may benefit her by their presence in foreign lands; if unworthy and
+incompetent, by their absence from home. But our artists are those whose
+expatriation gives us most to think about. They take leave of us either
+in the first bloom or in the full maturity of their powers. The ease of
+living in Southern Europe, the abundance of models and of works of art,
+the picturesque charms of nature and of scenery, detain them forever
+from us, and, save for an abstract sentiment, which itself weakens with
+every year, the sacred tie of country is severed. Its sensibilities play
+no part in these lives devoted to painting and modelling.
+
+Now, an eminent gift for art is an exceptional circumstance. He who has
+it weds his profession, leaves father and mother, and goes where his
+slowly-unfolding destiny seems to call him. Against such a course we
+have no word to say. It presents itself as a necessary conclusion to
+earnest and noble men, who love not their native country less, but their
+votive country more. Of the first and its customs they would still
+say,--
+
+    "I cannot but remember such things were
+     That were most precious to me."
+
+Yet of this career, so often coveted by those to whom its attainment
+does not open, I cannot speak in terms of supreme recognition. The
+office of art is always as precious as its true ministers are rare. But
+the relative importance of sculptural and pictorial art is not to-day
+what it was in days of less thought, of smaller culture. Every one who
+likes the Bible to-day, likes it best without illustrations. Were Christ
+here to speak anew, he would speak without parables. In ruder times,
+heavenly fancies could only be illustrated on the one hand, received on
+the other, through the mediation of a personal embodiment. Only through
+human sympathy was the assent to divine truth obtained. The necessity
+which added a feminine personality to the worship of Christ, and
+completed the divided Godhead by making it female as well as male, was a
+philosophical one, but not recognized as such. The device of the Virgin
+was its practical result, counterbalancing the partiality of the
+one-sided personal _culte_ of the Savior. Modern religious thought gets
+far beyond this, makes in spiritual things no distinction of male and
+female, and does not apply sex to the Divine, save in the most vague and
+poetic sense. The inner convictions of heart and conscience may now be
+spoken in plain prose, or sung in ringing verse. The _vates_, prophet
+or reformer, may proclaim his system and publish his belief; and his
+audience will best apprehend it in its simplest and most direct form.
+The wide spaces of the new continent allow room for the most precious
+practical experimentation; and speculative and theoretical liberty keep
+pace with liberty of action. The only absolute restraint, the best one,
+is a moral one. "Thou shalt not" applies only to what is intrinsically
+inhuman and profane. And now, there is no need to puzzle simple souls
+with a marble gospel. Faith needs not to digest whole side-walls of
+saints and madonnas, who once stood for something, no one now knows
+what. The Italian school was to art what the Greek school was to
+literature--an original creation and beginning. But life has surpassed
+Plato and Aristotle. We are forced to piece their short experiences, and
+to say to both, "You are matchless, but insufficient." And so, though
+Raphael's art remains immortal and unsurpassed, we are forced to say of
+his thought, "It is too small." No one can settle, govern, or moralize a
+country by it. It will not even suffice to reform Italy. The golden
+transfigurations hang quiet on the walls, and let pope and cardinal do
+their worst. We want a world peopled with faithful and intelligent men
+and women. The Prometheus of the present day is needed rather to animate
+statues than to make them.
+
+
+
+
+PIAZZA NAVONA--THE TOMBOLA.
+
+
+When, O, when does the bee make his honey? Not while he is sipping from
+flower to flower, levying his dainty tribute as lightly as
+love--enriching the world with what the flower does not miss, and
+cannot.
+
+This question suggests itself in the course of these busy days in Rome,
+where pleasures are offered oftener than sensibilities can ripen, and
+the edge of appetite is blunted with sweets, instead of rusting with
+disuse. In these scarce three weeks how much have we seen, how little
+recorded and described! So sweet has been the fable, that the intended
+moral has passed like an act in a dream--a thing of illusion and
+intention, not of fact. Impotent am I, indeed, to describe the riches of
+this Roman world,--its treasures, its pleasures, its flatteries, its
+lessons. Of so much that one receives, one can give again but the
+smallest shred,--a leaf of each flower, a scrap of each garment, a
+proverb for a sermon, a stave for a song. So be it; so, perhaps, is it
+best.
+
+Last Sunday I attended a Tombola at Piazza Navona--not a state lottery,
+but a private enterprise brought to issue in the most public manner. I
+know the Piazza of old. Sixteen years since I made many a pilgrimage
+thither, in search of Roman trash. I was not then past the poor
+amusement of spending money for the sake of spending it. The foolish
+things I brought home moved the laughter of my little Roman public. I
+appeared in public with some forlorn brooch or dilapidated earring; the
+giddy laughed outright, and the polite gazed quietly. My rooms were the
+refuge of all broken-down vases and halting candelabra. I lived on the
+third floor of a modest lodging, and all the wrecks of art that neither
+first, second, nor fourth would buy, found their way into my parlor, and
+staid there at my expense. I recall some of these adornments to-day. Two
+heroes, in painted wood, stood in my dark little entry. A gouty Cupid in
+bas-relief encumbered my mantel-piece. Two forlorn figures in black and
+white glass recalled the auction whose unlucky prize they had been. And
+Horace Wallace, coming to talk of art and poetry, on my red sofa,
+sometimes saluted me with a paroxysm of merriment, provoked by the sight
+of my last purchase. Those days are not now. Of their accumulations I
+retain but a fragment or two. Of their delights remain a tender memory,
+a childish wonder at my own childishness. To-day, in heathen Rome, I can
+find better amusements than those shards and rags were ever able to
+represent.
+
+Going now to Piazza Navona with a sober and reasonable companion, I
+scarcely recognize it. At the Braschi Palace, which borders it, we
+pause, and enter to observe the square hall and the fine staircase of
+polished marble. This palace is now offered in a lottery, at five francs
+the ticket; and all orders in Rome, no doubt, participate in the venture
+it presents. The immense piazza is so filled and thronged with people
+that its distinctive features are quite lost. Its numerous balconies are
+crowded with that doubtful community comprehended in the title of the
+"better class." From many of its windows hang the red cotton draperies,
+edged with gilt lace, which supply so much of the color in Roman
+_festas_. Soldiers are everywhere mingled with the crowd, so skilfully
+as to present no contrast with them, but so effectually that any popular
+disorder would be instantly suppressed. The dragoons, mounted and
+bearing sabres, are seen here and there in the streets leading to the
+piazza. These constitute the police of Rome; and where with us a civil
+man with a badge interposes himself and says, "No entrance here, sir,"
+in Rome an arbitrary, ignorant beast, mounted upon a lesser brute, waves
+his sabre at you, shrieks unintelligible threats and orders, and has the
+pleasure of bringing your common sense to a fault, and of making all
+understanding of what is or is not to be done impossible. Their greatest
+glory, however, culminates on public _festas_, when there are foreigners
+as well as Romans to be intimidated. At the Tombola they are only an _en
+cas_.
+
+Well, the office of the Tombola is solemnized upon a raised stage,
+whereon stand divers officials, two seedy trumpeters, and a small boy in
+fancy costume, whose duty soon becomes apparent. Before him rests a
+rotatory machine, composed of two disks of glass, bound together by a
+band of brass: this urn of fate revolves upon a pivot, and is provided
+with an opening, through which the papers bearing the numbers are put
+in, to be drawn out, one by one, after certain revolutions of the
+machine. Not quite so fast, however, with your drawing. The numbers are
+not all in yet. A grave man, in a black coat, holds up each number to
+the public view, calls it in his loudest tones, and then hands it to
+another, who folds and slips it into the receptacle. When all of the
+numbers have been verified and deposited, the opening is closed up, the
+trumpeters sound a bar or two, the wheel revolves, the fancy boy paws
+the air with his right hand, puts the hand into the opening, and draws
+forth a number, which the second black coat presents to the first, who
+unfolds it, and announces it to the multitude. At the same moment, a
+huge card, some two feet square in dimensions, is placed in a frame, and
+upon this we read the number just drawn out. The number is also shown
+upon several large wooden frames in other parts of the square. Upon
+these it remains, so that the whole count of the drawing may be apparent
+to the eager public. This course of action is repeated until a stir in
+one part of the piazza announces a candidate for one of the smaller
+prizes. A white flag, repeated at all the counting frames, arrests the
+public attention. The candidate brings forward his ticket and is
+examined. Finally, a _quaterna_ is announced, formed by the agreement of
+four numbers on a ticket with four in the order of the drawing. The
+crowd applaud, the trumpets sound again, and the drawing proceeds.
+Unhappily, at one moment the persons on duty forget to close the valve
+through which the numbers are taken out. The omission is not perceived
+until several rotations have shaken out many of the precious papers. A
+roar of indignation is heard from the populace; the wheel is arrested,
+the numbers eagerly sought, counted, and replaced, under the jealous
+scrutiny of the public eye. Meanwhile, one of two copious brass bands,
+provided with five ophicleides each, and cornets, etc., to match,
+discoursed tarantellas and polkas. And we see the _quinquina_ (formed by
+five numbers) drawn, and then the first Tombola, and the second. And lo!
+there are four tombolas: but we await them not. But in all this crowd,
+busy with emotion and reeking with tobacco and Roman filth in all its
+varieties, who shall interest us like the _limonaro_ with his basket of
+fruit, his bottles of water, his lemon squeezer, and his eager thrifty
+countenance? A father of family, surely, he loves no plays as thou dost,
+Anthony. Pale, in shirt sleeves, he keeps the sharpest lookout for a
+customer, and in voice whose measure is not to be given, hammers out his
+endless sentence, "_Chi vuol bere? Ecco, il limonaro._" To the most
+doubtful order he responds, carrying his glasses into the thickest of
+the throng, and thundering, "_Chi ha comandato questo limone?_" For half
+a _bajoco_ he gives a quarter of a lemon, wrung out in a glass of tepid
+water, which his customers absorb with relish. Sometimes he varies this
+procedure by the sale of an _orzata_, produced by pouring a few drops of
+a milky fluid into a glass of water. On our way from the piazza we
+encounter other _limonari_,--dark, sleepy, Italian, not trenchant nor
+incisive in their offers. But our man, a blond, yet remains a picture to
+us, with his business zeal and economy of time. A thread of good blood
+he possibly has. We adopt and pity him as a misplaced Yankee.
+
+
+
+
+SUNDAYS IN ROME.
+
+
+Our first Sunday in Rome was Easter, in St. Peter's, of which we have
+elsewhere given a sufficient description. Our second was divided between
+the Tombola just described, in the afternoon, and the quiet of the
+American Chapel in the morning. We found this an upper chamber, quietly
+and appropriately furnished, with a pleasant and well-dressed attendance
+of friends and fellow country-people. The prayers of the Episcopal
+service were simply read, with no extra formality or aping of more
+traditional forms. It was pleasant to find ourselves called upon once
+more to pray for the President of the United States, although in our own
+country he is considered as past praying for. Still, we remembered the
+old adage, "while there is life there is hope," and were able, with a
+good conscience, to beseech that he might be plenteously endowed with
+heavenly grace, although the reception of such a gift might seriously
+compromise him with his own party. The sermon, like others we have heard
+of late, shows a certain progress and liberalization even in the holding
+of the absolute tenets which constitute what has been hitherto held as
+orthodoxy. In our youth, the Episcopal church, like the orthodox
+dissenters, preached atonement, atonement, atonement, wrath of God,
+birth in sin,--position of sentimental reprobation towards the one fact,
+of unavailing repentance concerning the other. The doctrine of atonement
+in those days was as literal in the Protestant church as in the
+Catholic, while the possibility of profiting by it was hedged about and
+encumbered by frightful perils and intangible difficulties. But to-day,
+while these doctrines are not repudiated by the denominations which then
+held them, they are comparatively set out of sight. The charity and
+diligence of Paul are preached, and even the sublime theistic simplicity
+of Jesus is not altogether contraband; though he, alas! is as little
+understood in doctrine as followed in example. For he has hitherto been
+like a beautiful figure set to point out a certain way, and people at
+large have been so entranced with worshipping the figure, that they have
+neglected to follow the direction it indicates.
+
+Well, our American sermon was dry, but sensible and conscientious. It
+did not congratulate those who had accepted the mysterious atonement,
+nor threaten those who had neglected to do so. But it exhorted all men
+towards a reasonable, religious, and diligent life, and thus afforded
+the commonplace man a basis for effort, and a possible gradual
+amelioration of his moral condition. One little old-fashioned phrase,
+however, the preacher let slip. He cast a slight slur upon the moral, as
+distinguished from the religious man. Now, modern ethics do not
+recognize this distinction. For it, true morals are religion. He who
+exemplifies the standard does it more honor than he who praises, and
+pursues it not. And he who prays and plunders is less a saint than he
+who does neither. We passed this, however, and went away in peace.
+
+Our third Sunday morning was passed in _S. Andrea delta Valle_, a large
+and sumptuous church, where we had been promised a fine _messa-cantata_,
+i.e., a mass performed principally in music. Mustafa, of the pope's
+choir, was there, with some ten other vocalists, who put into their
+_Kyrie_, _Miserere_, and so on, as much operatic emphasis and cadence as
+the bars could hold. The organ was harsh, loud, and overpowering, the
+music utterly uninteresting. Mustafa's renowned voice, which has
+suffered by time and use, has something nasal and _criard_ in it, with
+all its power. He still takes and holds A and B with firmness and
+persistence, but his middle notes are unequal and husky. Although the
+sopranos of to-day are merely falsetto tenors, and their unsexed voices
+a fiction, they yet acquire in process of time a tone of old-woman
+quality, which contrasts strangely with their usually robust appearance.
+On this occasion we did not conjecture whose might be the music to which
+we listened. It had a mongrel paternity, and hailed from no noble race
+of compositions. Having, however, our comfortable chairs, and being out
+of the murderous direct reverberation of the organ, we sat and saw as
+outsiders the flux and reflux of life which passed through the church.
+It was obviously, this morning, a place of fashionable resort; and many
+were the good dresses and comfortable family groups that first appeared,
+and then were absorbed among its crowded chairs and their occupants. The
+well-dressed people were mostly, I thought, of _medio ceto_,--middling
+class,--which in Rome is a term of strict reprobation, and answers to
+what we used to call Bowery in New York. Their devotion had mostly a
+business-like aspect. They hired their chair, brought it, sat down, made
+their crosses and courtesies, accompanied the priest with their books,
+went down on their knees at the elevation of the host, had benediction,
+and went. Mass was taking place at various side altars, and people were
+coming and going, as their devotions were past or future. Dirty and
+shabby figures mingled with the others; a group of little children from
+the street, holding each other by the hand; a crippled old woman,
+hobbling on two crutches, who, wonderfully, did not beg, of us at least;
+an elderly dwarf, of composed aspect, some thirty-eight inches high, who
+took a chair, but could not get into it, so squatted down beside it, and
+stared at us. A loud bell was rung, and one in yellow satin bore an
+object under yellow satin across the church. This was the sacrament,
+going to one of the altars for the beginning of the mass. Having mused
+sufficiently on the music and on the crowd, we desired to hear a Puritan
+sermon, and, there being none to be had, we went away.
+
+Away to the Farnesina Palace, lovely with Raphael's frescos of Galatea
+and the story of Psyche, with Michael Angelo's grim charcoal head
+looming in the distance. The Psyche series has suffered much by
+restorations; and though the gracious outline and designs remain, the
+coloring, one thinks, is far other than that of the master. The Galatea
+has faded less, and has been less restored. The lovely Sodoma fresco up
+stairs--the family of Darius--was undergoing repairs, and could not be
+seen. The palace belongs to the ex-king of Naples. It was formerly
+visible at all times, but may now be seen only on Sunday. He himself now
+lives in Rome, and perhaps chooses to tread its banquet halls deserted,
+which possibly accounts for the present restriction. In the afternoon we
+were bidden to see the embalmed remains of an ancient pontiff,--Pius
+V.,--who should be happy to make himself useful to Catholic institutions
+at a period so remote from the intentions of Nature. The old body is
+shown in a glass case, upon an altar of Santa Maria Maggiore. He lies on
+his side, his darkened face adorned by a new white beard composed of
+lamb's wool. His hands are concealed by muslin gloves; his garments are
+white, and he wears a brilliant mitre. And the devout crowd the church
+to touch and kiss the glass case in which he resides. There is,
+moreover, a procession of the crucifix, and vespers are sung in pleasing
+style by a tolerable choir; and many _pauls_ and _bajocs_ are dropped
+hither and thither in pious receptacles by the pious in heart. So, I
+repeat it, the mummied pope, sainted also, is of use.
+
+
+
+
+CATACOMBS.
+
+
+Of all that befell us in the catacombs we may not tell. We betook
+ourselves to the neighborhood of St. Calixtus one afternoon. A noted
+ecclesiastic of the Romish church soon joined our party, with various of
+our countrymen and countrywomen. He wore a white woollen gown and a
+black hat. Before descending, he ranged us in a circle, and harangued us
+much as follows:--
+
+"You will ask me the meaning of the word 'catacomb,' and I shall tell
+you that it is derived from two Greek words--_cata_, hidden, and
+_cumba_, tomb. You have doubtless heard that the whole city of Rome is
+undermined with catacombs; but this is not true. The American
+Encyclopædia says this. I have read the article. But intramural burials
+were not allowed in Rome; therefore the catacombs commence outside the
+walls. They are, moreover, limited to an irregular extent of some three
+miles. Why is this? It is because they were possible only in the tufa
+formation. Why only in the tufa? Because it cuts easily and crumbles
+easily, hardening afterwards. And as the burials of the Christians were
+necessarily concealed, it was important for them to deal with a material
+easily worked and easily disposed of. The solid contents of the
+catacombs of Rome could be included within a square mile; their series,
+if arranged at full length, would not measure less than five hundred
+miles. In some places there are no less than seven strata of tombs, one
+below the other." All of this, with more repetitions than I can possibly
+signify, was delivered under the cogent stimulus of a roasting afternoon
+sun of the full Roman power. Being quite calcined as to the head and
+shoulders, we somewhat thankfully undertook the descent. The extreme
+contrast, however, between the outer heat and the inner chill and damp,
+proved an unwelcome alternative to most of us. Had we been allowed a
+somewhat brisk motion, we should have dreaded less its effects. But
+Father ---- fought his ground inch by inch, and continued to carry on a
+stringent controversy with imaginary antagonists. We will not endeavor
+to transcribe the catechism, at once tedious and amusing, with which he
+held captive a dozen of Yankees prepared to sell their lives dearly, but
+uncertain how to deal with his mode of warfare. He kept us long in the
+crypt of the pontiffs, where are found two fragments of marble tablets
+bearing names in mingled Latin and Greek character. One inscription
+records, "_Anteros episcopus_." The other is of another
+name--"_episcopus et martyr_." The father now led us into a narrow
+crypt, where his stout form wedged us all as closely as possible
+together. He showed us on the walls two time-worn frescos, one of
+which--Jonah and the whale--represented the resurrection, while the
+other depicted that farewell banquet at Emmaus in which Peter received
+the thrice-repeated charge, "Feed my sheep." To this symbolical
+expression the father added one later and more puzzling. The fish which
+appeared in one of the dishes represented, he told us, the anagram of
+Christ in the Greek language--_icthus_, the fish, _Jesus Christos
+theos_--I forget the rest. The fish was the only hint of the presence of
+Christ on this occasion, and its significance could be apprehended only
+with this explanation. These pictures, he insisted, sufficiently showed
+us that the early Christians had religious images--a point of great
+authority and significance in the Catholic church, for us how easily
+disposed of! The pictures and the symbolism of the primitive church are
+both alike features of its time. In periods when culture is rare and
+limited, the picture and the parable have their indispensable office.
+The one preserves and presents to the eye much that would otherwise be
+overlooked and forgotten; the other presents to the mind that which
+could not otherwise be apprehended. The painted Christs, Madonnas, and
+so on, were in their time a gospel to the common people. Even in
+Raphael's period, even in the Italy of to-day, how few of the populace
+at large are able to save their souls by reading the New Testament! The
+paintings undoubtedly answered a useful purpose, as all men must
+acknowledge; but the Catholic system, carried out in its completeness,
+would give a melancholy perpetuity to the class of people who cannot
+read otherwise than in pictures. Even where it teaches to read, it
+withholds the power of interpretation. Protestantism means direct and
+general instruction. It gives to the symbolism of the Bible its plainest
+and most practical interpretation, without building upon it a labyrinth
+of types whose threading asks the study of a lifetime.
+
+The fear and danger of early times had, no doubt, much to do with the
+growth of symbolism, both in pictures and in language. The intercourse
+of the early Christians was limited and insecure. It was guarded by
+watchwords. Its bodily presence took refuge in pits and caves. Its
+thought buried itself in similitudes and allusions. But now, when
+Christianity has become the paramount demand of the world, this
+obscurity is no longer needed nor legitimate.
+
+The parables of Christ may be supposed to have had a double object. The
+most usually recognized is that of popular instruction, in the form best
+suited to the comprehension of his hearers. Many of his sayings,
+however, point to another meaning; viz., the discrimination between
+those who were fitted to receive his doctrine, and those who were not.
+How many, among the multitudes who heard him, can we suppose to have
+been anxious about the moral lessons intended by his illustrious fables?
+Few indeed; and those few alone would be able to understand his
+teaching, and, in turn, to teach according to his method. So he
+represents the kingdom of heaven which he preached as a net thrown into
+the sea. His sermons were such castings of the net; he made his
+disciples fishers of men. The Christian church, like the Jewish, rapidly
+degenerated into a tissue of legends and observances--at first
+representative of morality, soon cumbrous, finally inimical to it.
+
+All this time, however, we are standing wedged by Father ---- in a narrow
+compass, and, while the thought of one undertakes this long, swift
+retrospect, the temper of the others becomes irritated--not without
+reason. So we insist upon breaking out of the small quadrangle, and are
+led into the crypt in which were found the remains of St. Cecilia. Here
+tradition again holds a long parley with the representatives of modern
+thought. St. Cecilia, a noble Roman lady, was beheaded, but survived the
+stroke of the executioner three days, which she occupied in describing
+and explaining the doctrine of the trinity. (This, therefore, is the
+doctrine of those who have lost their head.) For this purpose she
+employed two fingers of the right hand and one of the left. All of this
+passes without controversy. Her body was found lying on its face, in an
+attitude perpetuated by the well-known statue in the church in
+Trastevere. But in this crypt are the relics of an altar, erected over
+the remains of another saint. The early Christian altars, our guide
+says, were always erected above the burial-place of some saint. Hence,
+no Catholic church is allowed to dispense with the presence of
+consecrated bones. Other graves, moreover, cluster around that which is
+supposed to have consecrated this altar: sums of money were paid for the
+privilege of interment in this proximity. This clearly shows the early
+Christians to have supposed that the saint himself had the power to
+benefit them, and the right of intercession. This we concede as quite
+possible; but does this go to show, O father, that the saint _had_ any
+such power? Let us go back after this fashion in other things. Fingers
+were made before knives and forks, skins were worn before tissues, and
+nakedness is of earlier authority than either. A predatory existence has
+older precedent than agriculture or commerce. Let us go backward like a
+crab, if you will, but let us be consistent.
+
+In another crypt we are shown two marble sarcophagi, well carved, in
+each of which lies a mouldering human figure once embalmed, and now
+black, without features, and with only a dim outline of form. Elsewhere
+we are shown a large marble slab handsomely engraved, with the record of
+a Christian martyr on one side, and with an inscription concerning the
+Emperor Hadrian on the other, presenting the economic expedient of a
+second-hand tombstone. We passed also through various dark galleries,
+and down one staircase. Some chambers of the catacomb had a
+_luminarium_, or light from the top; many of them were entirely dark.
+Father ----'s style of explanation threatening to prolong itself till
+midnight, impatience became general, and one of our party ventured a
+remonstrance, which was made and met something after the following
+fashion:--
+
+_Mr. F._ Hem--hem! Sir, I am old and infirm, and--
+
+_Father ----._ O, sir, ask any questions you like. The more you ask, the
+better I can explain myself. (Repeated over some three times.)
+
+_Mr. F._ But, sir, I do not wish to ask any questions. I only wish--
+
+_Father ----._ Don't make any excuses, sir. I shall be very glad to have
+you ask any questions. I am very ready to answer and explain everything.
+(Several repetitions.)
+
+After a number of efforts, the senior member of the party at length
+obtained the floor, and succeeded in expressing himself to the effect
+that he feared to take death of cold in the catacomb, and would gladly
+be piloted out by the commonplace youth who followed Father ---- as
+attendant, without views of any kind, except as to a possible _buona
+mano_. This suggestion of the elder met with so hearty a response from
+the remainder of the party as to bring the present exploration to an
+end, and Father ---- and his public simultaneously dispersed to carriages
+and horses. In view of the whole expedition, I would advise people in
+general to read up on the subject of the catacombs, but not to visit
+them in company with one intent on developing theories of any kind. The
+underground chill is unwholesome in warm weather, and a conversion made
+in these dark galleries and windings would be much akin to baptism at
+the sword's point. Meet, therefore, the theorist above ground, and on
+equal terms; and for the subterraneous proceeding, elect the society of
+swift and prosaic silence.
+
+
+
+
+VIA APPIA AND THE COLUMBARIA.
+
+
+Since my last visit to Rome, more progress has been made under ground
+than above it. Rome is the true antipodes of America. Our business is to
+build--her business is to excavate. The tombs on Via Appia are among the
+interesting objects which the spade and mattock, during the last
+seventeen years, have brought to view. I remember well the beginning of
+this work, and the marble tombs and sarcophagi which it brought to
+light. I also remember, in those unconscientious days, a marble head, in
+exceedingly flat relief, which was desired by me, and stolen for me by
+the faithful servant of a friend. At the commencement of the diggings,
+we descended from our carriage, and easily walked to the end of the way
+then opened. Via Appia now affords a long drive, set with tombs on
+either side. Many of these are in brick, and of large dimensions. Most
+of the marbles have, however, been removed to the Museum of the Vatican.
+
+On this road, if I mistake not, are the two _columbaria_ discovered and
+excavated some seven years ago. They stand in a vineyard, which I saw in
+its spring bloom. The proprietor, a civil man, answers the little bell
+at the gate, and taking down a bunch of keys, unlocks for you the door
+of the small building erected over the vault. The original roof has
+fallen. All else looks as if it might have been used the day before for
+burial. The descent is by a steep, narrow stairway, of at least thirty
+steps, each of which is paved with a single lamina of coarse brick. The
+walls are honeycombed with small parallelogrammatic niches, in each of
+which was set a funeral vase or box. Over some of these places are such
+inscriptions as, "_Non tangite vestes mortales_," "_Vencrare deos
+manes_." There are many names, of which I have preserved but one,
+"_Castus Germanicus Cæsaris_." This _columbarium_ belonged to the
+Flavian family. It has about it an indescribable gloom, like that of a
+family vault in our own time, but, it must be confessed, more æsthetic.
+One felt the bitter partings that death had made here, the tears, the
+unavailing desire to heap all the remaining goods of life upon the altar
+of departed friendship. Time healed these wounds then, no doubt, as he
+does to-day. The tears were dried, the goods enjoyed again; but, while
+Christianity has certainly lightened the dead weight of such sorrows,
+the anguish of the first blow remains what it was all those dim
+centuries ago. A glance into the _columbarium_ makes you feel this.
+
+The second _columbarium_ is much like the first, excepting that the
+stair is not so well preserved. On emerging, the proprietor invited us
+to visit an upper room in his own house, in which were a number of
+objects, taken, he averred, from the two _columbaria_. These were mostly
+vases, tear-bottles, and engraved gems. But I doubted their genuineness
+too much to make any purchases from among them. The trade in antiquities
+is too cheap and easy a thing in Italy to allow faith in unattested
+relics.
+
+Not very far beyond the _columbaria_ stand the catacombs of the ancient
+Hebrews, much resembling in general arrangement those of the Christians.
+We found in several places the image of the seven-branched candlestick
+impressed upon the tufa. In one of the rooms were some remains of
+fresco. At each of its corners was painted a date-palm with its fruit.
+In two other rooms the frescos were in good preservation. Some of the
+graves were sunk in the earth, the head and feet at right angles with
+the others. We were shown the graves of two masters of synagogues. The
+frescos are not unlike those in the Christian and pagan tombs, though as
+I remember them, the Christian paintings are the rudest of all, as
+respects artistic merit.
+
+The subjects were usually genii, peacocks, the cock, fruits, garlands,
+the latter sometimes painted from end to end of the wall. Some of the
+small tombs were still sealed with a marble slab. An entire skeleton was
+here shown us, and a number of sarcophagi. Of these, one was sunk into
+the ground, and several graves were grouped around it, much after the
+fashion of those in the Christian catacombs, from which Dr. Smith
+inferred so largely, both concerning the sanctity of the saint's body
+and the post-mortem power of the saint.
+
+We were taken also to see some interesting tombs in the Via Latina.
+These were recently brought to light from their long concealment in a
+tract of the Campagna, belonging to the Barberini family. Descending a
+flight of stone steps, the custode admitted us into two fine vaulted
+chambers, decorated each after its own manner. The ceiling of the first
+was adorned with miniature bas-reliefs in stucco. The small figures,
+beautifully modelled, were enclosed in alternate squares and octagons.
+The designs were exhibitions of genii, griffins, and of centaurs,
+bearing female figures on their backs. The sculptured sarcophagi found
+in this tomb were removed to the Lateran Museum.
+
+In the second tomb the walls and ceilings were adorned with miniature
+frescos, also enclosed in small compartments. Many of these represented
+landscapes, sometimes including a water view, with boats. These were
+rather faint in style, but very good. Peacocks, also, were frequent; and
+in one compartment was painted a glass dessert vase, with the fruit
+showing through its transparency. This design amazed us, both as to its
+subject and execution. Some panels in this tomb bore stucco reliefs on
+grounds of brilliant red and blue. In its centre was found hanging a
+fine bronze lamp, which is now at the Barberini Palace. A large
+sarcophagus of stone still remains here, nearly entire, with a pointed
+lid. On looking through a small break in one side of it, we perceived
+two skeletons, lying side by side, supposed, the custode told us, to
+have been husband and wife. These tombs certainly belong to a period
+other than that of the _columbaria_ before described. The presence of
+sarcophagi, and of these skeletons, attests the burial of the dead in
+accordance with the usage of modern society, while the great elegance
+and finish of the ornamentation point to a time of wealth and luxury. I
+have heard no conjecture as to the original proprietorship of these
+tombs. They contain no military or civil emblems, and probably belonged
+to wealthy contractors or merchants. That day, no doubt, had its shoddy,
+and of the tricks practised upon the government one may read some
+account in Titus Livy, who, to be sure, wrote of an earlier time, but
+not a more vicious one.
+
+Rome now boasts an archæological society, not indeed of Romans, but
+composed of foreign residents, mostly of British origin. The well-known
+artist Shakspear Wood is one of its most energetic members. At his
+invitation I attended a lecture given by Mr. Charles Hemans, on the
+subject of the ancient churches and mosaics of the city. Complementary
+to this lecture was an expedition of the society to several of these
+churches, which I very gladly joined. Our first and principal object of
+interest was the old Church of San Clementi, a building dating from the
+eleventh or twelfth century. Here Mr. Hemans first led us to observe an
+ancient fresco in the apsis, which represents the twelve apostles in the
+guise of twelve lambs, a thirteenth lamb, in the middle of the row, and
+crowned with a nimbus, representing Christ. Here we saw also an ancient
+marble chair, a marble altar screen, and a pavement in the ribbon
+mosaic, of which archæologues have so much to say. This mosaic is so
+named from the strips of colored stones which form its various patterns
+on the white marble of the pavement.
+
+The church itself, however, occupied us but briefly. Beneath the church
+has recently been discovered and excavated a very extensive basilica, of
+a date far more ancient. This crypt was now lighted for us. Its original
+proportions are marred by walls of masonry built between its long rows
+of columns, and essential to the support of the church above. These
+walls are adorned by curious paintings of saints, popes, martyrs, and
+miracles. Among them is a very rude crucifixion; also a picture of
+Christ giving benediction after the fashion of the Greek church, and of
+a pontiff in the same act. Upon these things Mr. Hemans made many
+interesting comments. From the crypt we descended yet farther into a
+house supposed to date back at least to the empire, if not to the
+republic. It is a small but heavily-built enclosure, of two chambers,
+and contains a curious bas-relief in marble, representing a pagan
+sacrifice. In the narrow descent that led to it Mr. Wood showed me in
+three consecutive strata the tufa of the time of the kingdom, travertine
+of the republic, and brick of the empire.
+
+The presence of the ancient basilica below the ancient church was
+suggested to one of the priests of the latter by the presence of a
+capital, rising just above the pavement of the church, and not accounted
+for by any circumstance in its architecture. This capital belonged to
+one of the columns of the basilica; but before so much could be
+ascertained, a long and laborious series of excavations had to be
+instituted. Father ----, the priest who first conjectured of the presence
+of this under building, has been indefatigable in following up the hint
+given by the capital, which he alone, in a succession of centuries, was
+clever enough to interpret. Most of the expense of this work has been
+borne by him.
+
+From San Clementi the worshipful society went to the church of Santi
+Quattro. The object of interest here was a small chapel filled with
+curious old frescos, one series of which represents the conversion of
+Constantine. We see first depicted a dream, in which Sts. Peter and Paul
+appear to Constantine, warning him to desist from the murder of innocent
+children, whose blood was supposed to be a cure for his leprosy. Not
+disobedient to the heavenly vision, Constantine relinquishes the
+blood-bath, and releases the children. He sends for St. Sylvester, the
+happy possessor of an authentic portrait of the two apostles. The fresco
+shows us Sylvester responding to this summons, and bringing in his hand
+the portrait, which the emperor immediately recognizes. Farther on we
+see Sylvester riding in papal triumph, the emperor leading his
+palfrey--a haughty device for those days. Another fresco records the
+finding of the true cross by St. Helena. Coming at one time upon the
+three crosses she applied each of them in succession to the body of a
+dying person, who was healed at once by the contact of the true one.
+
+The archæological society also explores the interesting neighborhoods of
+Rome, the villas of emperors, statesmen, and poets. Thus life springs
+out from decay, and the crumbling relics of the past incite new
+activities in minds that cling, like the ivy, about relics and ruins.
+This society, ancient as are the facts about which it occupies itself,
+seemed to me one of the most modern features of Rome, especially as it
+travels by rail, and carries its luncheon with it. I was not fortunate
+enough to join its visits to the environs of the Eternal City, but I
+wish that on one of its excursions it would take with it the oldest
+nuisance of modern society, and forget to bring it back. There is room
+enough outside of Rome for that which, shut within its walls, crowds out
+every new impulse of life and progress. No harm to the old man; no
+violence to his representative immunity; only let him remember that the
+world has room for him, and that Rome has not.
+
+
+
+
+NAPLES--THE JOURNEY.
+
+
+From these brief, sombre notes of Rome, we slide at once to Naples and
+her brilliant surroundings. Here, taking the seven colors as the
+equivalents of the seven notes, we are at the upper end of the octave of
+color. Rome is painted in purple, gold, olive, and bistre--its shadows
+all in the latter pigment. Naples is clear red, white, and yellow.
+Orange tawny is its deepest shade. The sounds of Rome awaken memories
+of devotion. They call to prayer, although the forms now be empty, and
+the religious spirit resident elsewhere. The voice of Naples trills,
+shrieks, scolds, mingling laughter, wail, and entreaty, in a new and
+confused symphony. Little piano-fortes, played like a barrel organ, go
+about the streets, giving a pulse to the quick rhythm of life. The
+common people are pictures, the aristocracy caricatures. When you rise
+above low life, Italian taste is too splendid for good effects in
+costume. The most ill-married colors, the most ill-assorted ornaments,
+deform the pale olive faces, and contradict the dignity of the dark eyes
+and massive hair. This is somewhat the case in Rome, much more in
+Naples. The continual _crescendo_ of glare, as you go southward, points
+to the African crisis of orange and crimson, after which the negro
+nakedness presents an enforced pause, saying, "I can no more."
+
+This land is the antipodes of the Puritan country. There all is
+concentration, inward energy, interior. Here all is external glow and
+glitter. If there be any interior, it can only belong to one of these
+three--passion, superstition, avarice. Every one who deals with you
+speculates upon your credulity. "Will you give four times the value of a
+thing, or five, or only twice?" is the question which the seller's eyes
+put to the buyer, however the tongue of the one may respond to that of
+the other. And here is a sad deforming of the Scripture parable; and he
+who has five in value gets ten in money for it, he who has three gets
+six, while the one talent, honesty,--the fundamental gift of God to
+man,--is indeed ignominiously buried in a dirty napkin, and laid nobody
+knows where. And while New England energy is a hundred-armed giant that
+labors, Italian sloth is a hundred-handed lazzaro that begs. If this is
+the result of the loveliest climate, the most brilliant nature, give me
+our snow and ice, ay, the east wind and all.
+
+The journey from Rome to Naples at this season is hot, oppressive.
+Railway carriages, even as administered in Europe, make you acquainted
+with strange way-fellows. We chance upon a Neapolitan prince, with an
+English wife, returning to his own country and possessions after an
+absence of six years, the time elapsed since the inauguration of the new
+rule. He obviously regrets the changes over which the rest of the
+civilized world rejoices. In person, however, he and his partner are
+simple and courteous. Our car confines also a female nondescript
+carrying a dog, herself quite decently got up, but with an extraordinary
+smile, that is either lunatic or wicked, we cannot determine which. A
+certain steadiness and self-possession incline us to the latter theory,
+but we hold it subject to correction at a later day. She is obviously of
+Irish or low English extraction, and may be anything, from a discarded
+lady's maid to a reigning mistress. As we approach Naples, our princely
+friend begins to take notice. Here is Caserta, here its battle-field,
+where poor Francesco would certainly have had the victory, had not the
+French and Piedmontese interfered. "_Oh Richard, oh mon Roi!_" But we
+remember another saying: "And I tell you, if these had held their peace,
+the very stones would have cried out." Ay, those very stones, volcanic
+lava and tufa, worn by the chariot wheels of the wicked, from Tiberius
+to Napoleon and after, would have sobbed, "Let the feet of the messenger
+of peace, the beautiful feet, at last pass this way!" Arrived at the
+station, no warning can have taught you what to expect. It costs you
+forty cents to have your moderate effects transported from the cars to
+the omnibus of the hotel,--this not through any system, but because
+various people meddle with them, and shriek after you for recompense. At
+the Hotel de Rome, you are shown up many stairs into a dingy little
+room, a sort of spider's web. This will not do. You try the Hotel de
+Russie, opposite. Here you are forced to take an apartment much too fine
+for your means and intentions. The choice being this or none, you shut
+your eyes upon consequences, and blindly issue orders for tea and meats.
+To-morrow you will surely get a cheaper apartment. But to-morrow you do
+not.
+
+The hotel book looks discouraging. Names of your countrymen are in it,
+not of your friends. Better remain apart than run the risk of ungenial
+society, and enforced fellowship. But the dull waters soon break into
+the sparkle of special providences. A bright little Briton, with a mild
+husband, hospitably makes your acquaintance. She is from Ireland, and
+has not the "thorough-bred British stare." All the more of a lady do we
+deem and find her. To her pleasant company is soon added that of an
+American of the sincere kind. He accepts us without fear or condition,
+and while we remain under the same roof with him, we have no cause to
+complain for want of sympathy or of countenance.
+
+
+
+
+THE MUSEUM.
+
+
+In the Museum we spend two laborious days. The first we give to the
+world-renowned marbles, finding again with delight our favorites of
+twenty years' standing. Prominent among these are the Amore Delfino, and
+the Faun bearing the infant Bacchus.
+
+The Farnese Bull and the Farnese Hercules are admirable for their
+execution, but their subject has no special interest for us. We observe
+the Atlas, the Athletes, and the Venuses, one of whom is world-famous,
+but inexcusable. Here, too, is the quadriform relic of the Psyche, well
+known by copies, and the whole Balbo family on horseback. These marble
+knights once guarded the Forum of Pompeii. There is a certain melancholy
+in their present aspect, whether of fact or imagination we will not
+determine. One of the most interesting objects, from the vicissitudes
+through which it has passed, is the statue of Caligula, destroyed by the
+people with all other mementos of him after his death, the head having
+served, even in modern times, to steady the wheels of carriages in a
+ferry boat. The Naples Museum does not rival the Vatican in the merit of
+its nude marbles; but in draped statues it is far richer, as well as in
+statues of personal historical interest. The belief of the past has the
+most stately illustration in Rome, its life the most vivid record in
+Naples.
+
+Many new treasures have been added to the collection during these years
+of our absence. Among them are some exquisite small bronzes, and three
+statuettes in marble, of which the eyes are colored blue, and the hair
+of a reddish tint. One of them is very pretty. It represents the seated
+figure of a little boy, and almost reconciles us to the strictly
+inadmissible invasion of color into the abstract domain of sculpture.
+Each art has, indeed, its abstraction. Sculpture dispenses with color,
+painting with the materiality of form. The one is to the other as
+philosophy to poetry.
+
+From the marbles we flit to the Pompeian bronzes and mosaics, rich in
+number and in interest. Two tablets in mosaic especially detain us, from
+their representation of theatrical subjects. One of these shows the
+manager surrounded by several of his actors, to whom he dispenses the
+various implements of their art. At his feet, in a basket, lie the comic
+and tragic masks. Of the personages around him, one is pulling on his
+garment, another is trying the double tubes of a wind instrument. The
+second mosaic presents a group of three closely-draped figures. Actor is
+written on their faces, though we know not the scene they enact. The
+bronzes are numerous and admirable. Miniature art seems to have been
+held in great esteem among the Pompeians. Most of these figures are of
+small size, and suggest a florid and detailed style of adornment. Among
+other objects, we are shown the semicircular model of a Pompeian bath,
+on which are arranged the ornaments and water-fixtures just as they were
+found. One of these imitates a rampant lion standing on his hind legs,
+and delivering water from his mouth; another a serpent nearly upright.
+In the upper story of the Museum we see whole rooms floored with mosaic
+pavements removed entire from houses in Pompeii. The patterns are mostly
+in black and white, but of an endless variety. The contents of these
+rooms match well in interest with their pavements. Here, in glass cases,
+are carefully ranged and presented the tools and implements of Pompeian
+life; the loaves that never left the baker's shop, still fresh and puffy
+in outline, although calcined in substance; the jewels and silver
+vessels of the wealthy, the painter's colors, the workman's needles and
+thread: baths and braziers, armor in bronze and in iron, scarcely more
+barbaric than that of the middle ages; helmets, with clumsy metal
+network guarding the spaces for the eyes; spades, cooking utensils in
+great variety, fruits and provisions as various. Among the bronze
+utensils is a pretty and economical arrangement which furnishes at once
+hot water, a fire of coals to heat the room, with the convenience of
+performing at the same time the solemn rites of cookery. Hot water, both
+for bathing and drinking, seems to have been a great desideratum with
+the Pompeians. The stone cameos and engraved gems are shown in rows
+under glass cases. This Museum contains a well-known tazza, or flat cup,
+of onyx entire, elaborately carved in cameo on either side. It also
+possesses a vase of double glass, of which the outer or white layer has
+been cut, like a cameo, into the most delicate and elaborate designs.
+The latter is an object of unique interest and value, as is shown by
+the magnificence with which it has been mounted on a base of solid
+silver, the whole being placed under glass.
+
+The Cumæan collection is less rich in objects of interest than the
+Pompeian. Its treasures are mostly Etruscan. It possesses many vases,
+Etruscan and Greek, many rude Etruscan sculptures, with household
+articles of various descriptions. It occupies a separate set of rooms,
+and is the gift of the Prince of Carignano.
+
+Among the Pompeian remains we forgot to mention a mosaic tablet
+representing a cock-fight. One cock already bleeds and droops; above him
+the figure of his genius turns desponding away. The genius of the
+victorious cock, on the contrary, bears a crown and palm. The design is
+worthy of the Island of Cuba at the present day.
+
+The frescos brought and transferred from Pompeii are beautiful and
+interesting. One of them shows thirteen dancing figures, all of which
+are frequently copied. Many inscriptions in marble are also preserved,
+but to decipher them would ask much time. We were interested in a small
+painted model of a Pompeian dwelling, called the House of the Poet. It
+shows the quadriform arrangement of the dark chambers around the open
+courts, of which one is the _atrium_, one the _peristylium_. The
+window-panes of the house of Diomed are shown,--not of glass, but talc,
+and only translucent. Windows, however, were rare in Pompeii. Perhaps
+the most pathetic relic that we observe is the skull of the sentinel in
+his helmet, as it was found.
+
+We have here given only the most hurried and imperfect indication of the
+mines of wealth which this institution offers to the student of art and
+of history. A detailed account of its contents will be found in the
+valuable but prosaic Murray, and would here be superfluous. Its
+guardians, the custodi, are civil, and are not allowed to ask or receive
+any compensation from visitors. Several of them, nevertheless, manage to
+suggest that they would be glad to wait on you at your hotel, with
+books, objects of antiquity, and other small merchandise, which you
+hurriedly decline. You will be fortunate to get out of Naples in any
+state short of utter bankruptcy. How you are ever to get home to
+America, with temptations and expenses multiplying so frightfully upon
+you, sometimes threatens to become a serious question.
+
+
+
+
+NAPLES--EXCURSIONS.
+
+
+You have been two days in Naples, the hotel expenses and temptations of
+the street eating into your little capital. For value received your
+intellects have nothing to show. Your eyes and ears have been full, your
+brain passive and empty. You rouse yourself, and determine upon an
+investment. To learn something, you must spend something. These
+cherished napoleons must decrease, and you must, if possible, increase.
+
+The first attempt is scarcely a success. Having heard marvels of the
+conventual church of San Martino, formerly belonging to the Cistercian
+brotherhood, you consult the porter of the hotel, and engage, for seven
+francs, a carriage to transport you thither. The drive is one immense
+climb under the heat of the afternoon sun. When you have gained the
+difficult ascent, your driver coolly informs you that the church is
+always closed at four P. M., the present time being 5.30. "Why did you
+not tell me so?" is the natural but useless question. "Because I could
+not in that case have got seven francs from you," would be the real
+answer. The driver shrugs his shoulders, and expects a scolding, which
+you are too indignant to give.
+
+But you are not to be defeated in this way. A second expedition is
+planned and executed. To the gates of Pompeii you fly, partly by steam,
+and partly by horse-aid. You alight from your cloud of dust, demand a
+guide. "Yes; you can have the guide by paying also for the litter. This
+being Sunday, the entrance is free, and the government supplies no
+guide. You must have the _portantina_, or blunder about alone." The
+litter, with its pink gingham frill and cushion, looks hateful to you.
+You remember it twenty-three years ago with dislike. The sun of noon is
+hot upon you. The men are unpersuadable. Red and fierce as lava, you
+storm through the deserted streets of the ancient capital of seaside
+luxury. Like the lava, you soon cool, as to your temper--the rest of you
+continuing at 120 Fahrenheit. There are two of your party: one finds the
+litter convenient; the other also gives way, and you ride and tie, as
+the saying is, in very amicable style, and encourage the guide to tell
+you all he knows; but he, alas! has cropped but the very top of the
+clover. The fragments of history which he is able to give you, measure
+only his own ignorance and yours.
+
+"Here is the Forum in which the Balbo statues were found. At the upper
+end were the court and seat of justice,--for a figure was found there
+bearing a balance; underneath were the prisons." Ah, the broken columns!
+Stately did they stand around the mounted statues, that expected to ride
+into perpetual fame on their marble horses--now most famous because so
+long forgotten. "Wherever four streets met, madam, stood a fountain. The
+Exchange stood also in the Forum. Here is the street of abundance, in
+which was found a marble bust bearing a horn of plenty. Here is the
+Temple of Isis. By this secret staircase the priest ascended and stood
+unseen behind the goddess, making the sounds which she was supposed to
+utter. Here was the bakery; behold the ovens. This was found filled with
+newly baked loaves. [Yes; for I myself beheld them in the Museum at
+Naples.] Ah, madam! the baths, with hot water and cold, and vapor. In
+those niches running around the wall were placed the vases with
+unguents. Here is the House of the Poet; here that of the Faun. See the
+frescos. What forms! what colors! Here is a newly excavated house, large
+and richly appointed. Each of these marble columns surrounding the inner
+court contains a leaden water-pipe with a faucet, so that from all at
+once water might flow to cool the extreme heats of summer. Here still
+stand two fine dragons carved in white marble, which must formerly have
+supported a marble slab. See what a garden this house had! What a
+fish-pond! Climb this stair, madam, if you would see the theatre. This
+larger one was for day performances. Yonder was the stage. There are
+still the grooves for the scenes to slide in. There was the orchestra
+[mostly flutes and fiddles]. Here sat the nobles, here the citizens,
+here the plebeians. From this eminence you can look over into the
+smaller theatre close at hand, in which night performances were given."
+And the stately dames, with those jewels which you saw stored at the
+Museo, and dressed and undressed like the frescos we have seen to-day,
+sat on their cushioned benches, and wafted their perfumes far and wide.
+
+Here was the house of Diomed, rich and very extensive. The skeleton of
+Diomed (as is supposed) was found at the garden gate, with the key of
+the house and a purse of money. In one of the subterranean rooms is
+shown the impression of his wife's figure, merely a darker mark on a
+dark wall. Seventeen similar impressions were found. I think it is in
+this house that the walls of one of the rooms have an under-coating of
+lead to keep the moisture from the frescos, which are still brilliant.
+The _luxe_ of fountains was, as is known, great and universal in
+Pompeii, and the arrangement of its leaden conduits is ample and
+skilful. Besides the well-known frescos, with their airy figures and
+brilliant coloring, we are shown a bath, whose vaulted roof is adorned
+with stucco reliefs, arranged in small medallions, octagons alternating
+with squares.
+
+Presently we come to the street of tombs. Among these I best remember
+that which bears the inscription, "_Diomede, sibi suis_." At the upper
+end of this street we find a semicircular seat of stone, for the
+accommodation of the guard. Close by this was found the skeleton of the
+sentinel in armor which we saw in the Museum at Naples. In the prison
+were found the iron stocks, with at least one skeleton in them; others
+chained in divers ways. A feature new to me is that of various
+diminutive temples, with roofs roundly or sharply arched, devoted to the
+household gods. These usually stand upon an elevated projection, and
+might measure three feet in height and four in depth. The guide pointed
+out to us some small, square windows, which are simply open squares in
+the masonry, defended by iron gratings, deeply rusted. They are not
+numerous. Our guide suggests that there may have been a tax upon
+windows, accounting for their rare occurrence. One he shows us still
+nearly entire, a narrow slit, measuring, perhaps, eight inches by three,
+with a slab of talc in place of glass.
+
+And presently we come to a small museum, whose contents are much the
+same in kind with the household remains seen by us in the Museum at
+Naples. And farther on is a room in which we are shown the _quattro
+morti_--the four dead bodies whose impress on the hardened cinders which
+surrounded them has been so ingeniously utilized. It is known that the
+masses of cinder within which these bodies had slowly mouldered were
+filled with liquid plaster, and the forms of the bodies themselves,
+writhing in their last agonies, were thus obtained. One of these
+figures--that of a young woman--is full of pathetic expression. She
+lies nearly on her face, her hand near her eyes, as if weeping. Her
+back, entirely exposed, has the fresh and smooth outline of youth. The
+forms of two elder women and one man complete the sad gallery. Of these
+women one wears upon her finger a silver ring, the plaster having just
+fitted within it. This figure and that of the man are both swollen,
+probably from the decomposition that took place before the crust of
+ashes hardened around them into the rigid mould which to-day gives us
+their outlines.
+
+These four plaster ghosts were the last sights seen by us in Pompeii.
+For by this time we had walked and ridden three hours, and those three
+the most fervent of the day, beginning soon after noon. The heat was
+cruel and intense, but we had not given ourselves time to think of it.
+The umbrella and _portantina_ helped us as they could, but the feeling
+that the work had to be done now or never helped us most of all. Our
+vexation against our guides had long ago cooled into a quiet good will.
+Relinquishing the fiery journey, which might have been prolonged some
+hours further, we paid the rather heavy fee. The second carrier of the
+litter demanded a few extra pence, reminding us that at our first
+arrival he had brushed the dust from our dresses with a zeal which then
+appeared mysterious, but whose object was now clear. Parting from these,
+we passed into the little inn, quite bare and dirty, whose coolness
+seemed delicious. We here ordered an afternoon _déjeûner_, and ate,
+drank, and rested.
+
+
+
+
+THE CAPUCHIN.
+
+
+While we waited for our dinner, a Capuchin at another table enjoyed a
+moderate repast. Bologna sausage, cheese, fruit, and wine of two sorts
+contented him. His robust countenance beamed with health, his eyes were
+intelligent. This was one of the personalities of which the little shown
+makes one desirous to know more. His refreshment consumed and paid for,
+he began a rambling conversation with the _garçon_ who attended us, as
+well as with the proprietor of the _locanda_ in which we were. Capuchin
+and Garçon mutually deplored the poverty of the poor in Naples. Capuchin
+showed two blue silk handkerchiefs which he had been forced to purchase,
+for compassion, of a poor woman. Both obviously considered the new state
+of things as partly accountable for this poverty, which is, on the
+contrary, as old as the monastic orders. The Capuchin had been preaching
+Lenten sermons in Greece, and had been well received. Garçon rejoined
+that there were good Catholics in Greece, agreeing harmoniously with the
+man in brown. But at this juncture another face looks in at the door.
+"That is the man who plagues me to give him lucky numbers for play,"
+says the _frate_. Here I can keep out of the company no longer. "What
+does he play at--cards or dice?" I ask. "Neither, madam; that man ruins
+himself with playing at the lottery." Capuchin continues: "If I had the
+gift of fortunate numbers, I would not withhold them. I should wish to
+benefit my fellow-creatures in this way, if I were able to do so. But I
+have it not, this gift of prophecy." And if you had it, thought I, I am
+not so sure of the ultimate benefit of gambling to your
+fellow-creatures, even were they to win, instead of losing.
+
+The Capuchin and I, however, talk of other things--of monasteries, and
+rich libraries, closed to women. "So, father, you consider us the allies
+of the devil." "No, signora; the inhibition is mutual: we may not enter
+any nunnery." The _padrone_ of the inn here breaks in with the robust
+suggestion that these restrictions ought to be removed, and that monks
+and nuns should have liberty to visit each the establishments of the
+other. While this talk proceeds, I occasionally glance into the smoky
+depths of the kitchen opposite, where a mysterious figure, in whose
+cleanliness I desire to believe, wafts a frying-pan across a dull fire,
+which he stimulates by fanning with a turkey's wing. After each of his
+gymnastics, a dish is brought out, and set upon our table--first fish,
+then omelet, then cutlet; and we discover that the Capuchin and
+ourselves have a mutual friend at Fuligno, the good, intelligent,
+accomplished Count ----, in whose praises each of us is eloquent. We
+part, exchanging names and addresses. Our Pompeian guide urges us to
+return and make the ascent of Vesuvius under his care. But we depart
+untrammelled. Every one was satisfied with us except the cripple who
+rolled himself in the dust, and the weird, white-haired women with
+spindles, who followed us shrieking for a largess. We gave nothing, and
+they commented upon us with a gravity of moral reprobation quite fit to
+make one's hair stand on end, even with New England versus beggar behind
+one. But the train came, and mercifully took us away; and whether in not
+giving we did well or ill, is a point upon which theorists will not
+agree; so we may be pardoned for giving ourselves the benefit of a
+doubt.
+
+After Pompeii a little good fortune awaited us. As before said, we had
+encountered an American of the right sort,--kindly, sincere, and of
+adequate education. Joining forces with him, we no longer shivered
+before the hackman, nor shrank from the _valet de place_. We at once
+engaged the latter functionary, ordered the _remise_ of the hotel to
+wait for us, and started upon two days of eager but weary sight-seeing.
+Our first joint act was to scale again the height of San Martino, this
+time to enter the church and convent, and view their boasted riches. A
+pleasant court, with a well in the centre of it; a church whose chapels
+and altars were gorgeous with lapis lazuli, jasper, agate, and all
+precious marbles; a row of seats in wooden mosaic, executed by a monk of
+the Cistercian order, vowed to silence; cloisters as spacious and
+luxurious as can well be imagined; a great array of relics in golden
+boxes, shielded from dust and common sight by rich curtains of heavy
+silk and gold--this is all of the establishment that remains in our
+recollection. The present government has dismissed the saintly idlers of
+the monasteries, saying, perhaps, in the style of Henry VIII., "Go
+plough, you drones, go plough." But in what field and for what wages
+they henceforth labor is not known to me.
+
+Hence to the Grotto of Siana, half a mile long, and some eight feet
+wide. The chill of this long, damp passage, in contrast with the high
+temperature from which we entered it, so alarmed us that we turned back
+at half the distance, and gave up seeing the den or cave that lay
+beyond. At Pozzuoli we view Caligula's Bridge, of which but a few large
+stones remain: the guide points out the place at which Paul and Peter
+landed. Here are the ruins of a fine amphitheatre. The underground
+arrangements still show us the pits in which the wild beasts and the
+gladiators were kept. Square openings at the top ventilated each of
+these, and a long, open space in the middle separated the cells of the
+beasts from those of the gladiators. On public occasions all of these
+openings were closed by heavy plates of metal, so as to present the
+solid surface desired for the combats.
+
+    "Arise, ye Goths, and glut your ire!"
+
+In this neighborhood we visited what is left of the temple of Jupiter
+Serapis. The salt water formerly covered its columns to such a height as
+to corrode them badly. The smell caused by the evaporation of the
+sea-water in the hot sun was so offensive that the government found it
+necessary to apply a thorough drain. These time and tide worn marbles
+were of the choicest kinds--African marble, _rosso antico_, and so on.
+Their former beauty little avails them now. We drive further to the
+cavern with the stratum of carbonic acid gas, and see the dog
+victimized, which cruel folly costs us two francs. And then we visit
+the sulphur vapor baths, whose fiery, volcanic breath frightens us.
+These are near the Lake of Agnano, an ancient volcanic crater. In its
+neighborhood are the royal game preserves, in which fratricidal V. E.
+hunts and slays the wild boar. Returning, we climb to Virgil's tomb, a
+small, empty enclosure, with a stone and inscription dating from 1840.
+
+    "Cecini pascua, rura, duces,"
+
+says the poet, through his commemorator. Item, this steep journey under
+a scorching sun did not pay very well. Yet, having ascended the fiery
+stair, and stood in the small, dark enclosure, and read the tolerable
+inscription, I felt that I had done what I could to honor the great
+Mantuan: so, with a good conscience, I returned through cool,
+ill-smelling Posilippo, to the hotel, dinner, and the afternoon
+meditation.
+
+
+
+
+BAJA.
+
+
+The excursion to Baja called us up early in the morning. With a tender
+hush, a mysterious remembrance of our weaker and still sleeping
+brethren, we stole through the hotel, swallowed coffee, and issued forth
+with carriage and _valet de place_ for a day's campaigning. As the
+functionary just mentioned had invented a hitherto unpatented language,
+supposed by him to present some points of advantage over the Queen's
+English, I will here, _en passant_, serve up a brief sample, for the
+study of those inclined to the practical pursuit of linguistics.
+
+"Zat is ze leg Agnano [lake of.] In vinter he is full of vile dog [wild
+duck]." Of Lake Avernus: "Zis was de helty [hell]." Of the ruins of the
+amphitheatre at Pozzuoli: "Ruin by de barbions [barbarians]. Zey brok
+him in piece and pushed him down. Zar is Caligole's [Caligula's] Bridge.
+Tis de Sibyl's Cave, where she gib de ragle [oracle]. Temple Diana,
+temple Neptune, ze god of ze sea and ze god of ze land." Here was a
+mythological _aperçu_ thrown in. This individual rarely condescended to
+speak his native language--Italian. In ours, it required no little
+adjustment of the perceptive faculties to meet his views.
+
+Passing through Posilippo, we come first to a piece of ground which
+bears the form of an amphitheatre, although the whole structure, if it
+exist at all, is thickly overgrown with trees and shrubs. A rustic
+proprietor cultivates the vine here, but cannot pass the nights during
+July, August, and September, on account of the bad air. The wines, white
+and red, are nevertheless excellent. The right of excavation here vests
+in a Frenchman, who has purchased the same.
+
+Our next point of exploration is the Temple of Mercury, at Baja--a
+circular building, with fine columns partly overthrown. Here exists a
+perfect whispering gallery, for at a certain spot in the wall the
+slightest utterance is instantly heard at the point directly opposite.
+Here two forlorn women, with a tambourine and without costume, dance a
+joyless _tarantella_, which costs us a franc. They urge us, also, to buy
+sea-shells, and small fragments of mosaic, together with skeletons of
+the sea-horse, a queer little fish, some two inches long. After this, we
+are shown some _columbaria_, and a bath with stucco reliefs. Adjacent is
+the well preserved ruin of a large bathing establishment. Besides the
+baths, we here find places for reclining, where vapor baths were
+probably enjoyed.
+
+Now come Nero's prisons, gloomy, under-ground galleries, in which he
+kept his slaves. Torches here became necessary. These galleries,
+destitute of daylight, were quite extensive, frequently crossing each
+other at right angles. And then we visited the Piscina Mirabilis, an
+immense reservoir which formerly supplied the Roman fleet at Marina with
+fresh water. Its tall columns, still entire, are deeply corroded by
+water. This was a work of surprising extent and finish. Thereafter,
+mindful of Murder considered as a Fine Art, we gave some heed to the
+whereabouts of Agrippina's villa, and inquired concerning those
+matricidal attempts of her son, which were finally crowned with so
+entire a success. The villa of Hortensius, in this neighborhood, lies
+chiefly under water, the level of the ground having changed. Perhaps
+this villa was anciently built on ground reclaimed from the sea, as
+Horace says,--
+
+    "Marisque Baiis obstrepentis urges
+     Summovere litora. Parum locuples continente ripa."
+
+We next visited the Lake of Avernus, and Lake Fusano, the River Styx of
+Virgil and the Romans. Bordering upon this we found a whole hill-side
+honeycombed with _columbaria_. Then came the long sulphurous gallery
+leading to the hot spring in which eggs are boiled for your instruction.
+Each of these visitations has its fee, so that the pilgrimage, even if
+made on foot, would be a costly one. Cuma next claimed us. A long, dark
+gallery leads to the cave of the Cumæan Sibyl, described by Virgil. But
+the presence of water here makes it necessary for visitors to sit upon
+the shoulders of two or three shaggy and uncleanly-looking sprites. We
+stoutly decline this adventure, and are afterwards sorry. From this
+neighborhood was taken the Cumæan collection, which figures at the
+_Museo Nazionale_, presented by the Prince of Carignano. Somewhere in
+the course of this crowded and heated day, a dinner was slidden in,
+which gave our labor a brief interval of rest and refreshment. It
+consisted mostly of dirt, in various forms, flavored with cheese,
+garlic, and a variety of savors equally choice. To facilitate its
+consumption, we drank a sour-sweet fluid, called white Capri. I found
+none of the Italian wines joyous. Despite their want of body, they give
+one's nerves a decided shake.
+
+Well, I have narrated all that took place on the day set apart for Baja.
+Its results may be prosaically summed up as heat, haste, and headache,
+with a confused vision of the past and a most fragmentary sense of the
+present.
+
+
+
+
+CAPRI.
+
+
+I have a fresh chapter of torment for a new Dante, if such an one could
+be induced to apply to me. I will not expatiate, nor exhale any
+Francesca episodes, any "_Lasciate ogni spiranza!_" I will be succinct
+and business-like, furnishing the outlines from which some more
+leisurely artist, better paid and employed, shall do his hell-painting.
+
+We leave enchanting Naples,--tear ourselves from our hotel, whose very
+impositions grow dear to us; the precious window, too, which shows the
+bay and Capri, and close at hand the boats, the fish-market, and the
+chairs on which the populace sit at eventide to eat oysters and drink
+mineral water. A small boat takes us to a very small steamer, on whose
+deck we pay ten francs each to a stout young man, in appearance much
+like a southern poor Buckra, who departs in another small boat as soon
+as he has plundered us. The voyage to Capri is cool and reasonably
+smooth. A pleasant chance companion, bound to the same port, beguiles
+the time for us. We exchange our intellectual small wares with a certain
+good will, which remains the best part of the bargain. When quite near
+the island, the small steamer pauses, and lowers a boat in which we
+descend to view the famous Blue Grotto. At the entrance, we are warned
+to stoop as low as possible. We do so, and still the entrance seems
+dangerous. With some scratching and pushing, however, the boat goes
+through, and the lovers of blue feast their eyes with the tender color.
+The water is ultramarine, and the roof sapphire. The place seems a toy
+of nature--a forced detention of a single ray of the spectrum. Dyes
+change with the fashion; the blue of our youth does not color our
+daughter's silks and ribbons. The purples of ten years ago cannot be met
+with to-day. But this blue is constant, and therefore perfect.
+
+Our enjoyment of it, however, is marred by an old beast in human form
+who rushes at us, and insists upon being paid two francs for diving. He
+promises us that he will show us wondrous things--that he will fill the
+azure cave with silver sparkles. Wearied with his screeching, and a
+little deluded by his promises, we weakly offer him a franc and a half;
+whereupon he throws off some superfluous clothing, and softly glides
+into the deep, without so much as a single sparkle. He certainly
+presents an odd appearance; his weird legs look as if twisted out of
+silver; his back is dark upon the water. But the refreshing bath he
+takes is so little worth thirty sous to us that we feel tempted to
+harpoon him as he dodges about, sure that, if pierced, he can shed
+nothing more solid than humbug. On our return to the steamer we pay two
+francs each for this melancholy expedition, and presently make the
+little harbor of Capri.
+
+And here the promised Hell begins. The way to it, remember, is always
+pleasant. No sooner does our boat touch the land than a nest of human
+rattlesnakes begins to coil and hiss about us, each trying to carry us
+off, each pouring into our ears discordant, rapid jargon. "My donkey,
+siora." "And mine." "And mine." "How much will you give?" "Will you go
+up to Tiberio?" But all this with more repetition and less music than a
+chorus of Handel's or an aria of Sebastian Bach. "My donkey," flourish;
+"My do-n-onkey," high soprano variation; "My donkey," good grumbling
+contralto. "How much?" "How much?" "How much?" "How much?" shriek all in
+chorus. And you, the unhappy star in this hell opera, begin with
+uncertain utterance--"Let me see, good people. One at a time. What is
+just I will pay"--the _motivo_ also repeated; chorus renewed--"Money;"
+"Three francs;" "Four francs;" "Five francs;" "A _bottiglia_;" "A _buona
+mano_." A _buona mano_? Good hand--would one could administer it in the
+right way, in the right place! By this time each of you occupies the
+warm saddle of a donkey, and at one P. M., less twenty, the thermometer
+at 90 Fahrenheit or more, and being warned to reach the steamer by three
+P. M., at latest, the punishment of all your past, and most of your
+future sins begins.
+
+_Facile descensus Averni._ Yes; but the _ascensus_? To climb so high
+after Tiberio, who went so low! For this is the ruined palace of
+Tiberius Cæsar himself, which you go to seek and see, if possible. He
+still plagues the world, as he would have wished to do. Your expedition
+in search of his stony vestiges is a long network of torment, spun by
+you, the donkey, and the donkey-driver, undisguised Apollo standing by
+to weld the golden chains by which you suffer. As often as you seem to
+approach the object, a new _détour_ leads you at a zigzag from the
+straight direction. But this is little. At every turn in the road a
+beggar, in some variety, addresses you. Now a deformed wretch shows you
+his twisted limbs, and shrieks, "_co cosa, siora_." Now, a
+wholesome-looking mother, with a small child, asks a contribution to the
+wants of "_questa creatura_" Now, a grandam, with blackened face and
+bleached hair, hobbles after you. Children oppress you with flowers,
+women with oranges,--all in view of the largest _quid_ for the smallest
+_quo_. You grow afraid to look in a pretty face or return a civil nod,
+lest the eternal signal of beggary should make itself manifest. And such
+women and children!--every one a picture. Such intense eyes, such
+sun-ripened complexions! I take note of them, handsome devils that they
+are, all foreordained as a part of my fiery probation. For all this time
+I am making a steep ascent. Sometimes the donkey takes me up a flight of
+stone steps, clutching at each with an uncertain quiver, but stimulated
+by the nasal "n--a--a--a," which follows him from the woman who by turns
+coaxes and threatens him. Now we clamber along a narrow ledge, whose
+height causes my dizzy head to swim; there is nothing but special
+providence between me and perdition. A little girl, six years of age,
+pulls my donkey by the head; a dignified matron behind me holds the
+whip. The little girl leads carelessly, and I quake and grow hot and
+cold with terror; but it is of no use. The matron will not take the
+rein; her office is to flog, and she will do nought else. And the
+sun?--the sun works his miracles upon us until we wish ourselves as well
+off as the Niobides, who, at least, look cool. Finally, after an hour of
+jolting, roasting, quivering, and general exasperation, we reach the
+top. Here we are passively lifted from our donkeys; we mechanically
+follow our guide through a white-washed wine-shop into a small outer
+space, with a low wall around it, over which we are invited to look down
+some hundreds of feet into the sea. This is called the Leap of Tiberio:
+from this height, says the barefooted old vagabond who guides us, he
+pitched his victims into the deep. The descent here is as straight as
+the wall of a house. Farther on, we find some very fragmentary ruins, in
+the usual Roman style. Among them is a good mosaic pavement, with some
+vaults and broken columns. A sloping way is shown us, carefully paved,
+and with a groove on either side. Into this, say they, fitted the wheels
+of a certain chariot, in which guests were invited to seat themselves.
+The chariot, guided by two cords, then started to go down to the sea.
+But at a certain moment the vehicle was arrested by a sudden shock.
+Those within it were precipitated into the water, after which the cords
+comfortably drew the chariot back.
+
+I have never heard any of the evidence upon which is based the modern
+rehabilitation of Tiberius and Nero. I have, however, found in the
+stately Tacitus, and even in gossipy Suetonius, a shudder of horror
+accompanying the narration of their deeds. The world has seen cruelty in
+all ages, and sees it still; but I cannot believe that the average
+standard of humanity can justly be lowered so far as to make the acts of
+Tiberius simply rigorous, those of Nero a little arbitrary. Mr. Carlyle,
+in dealing with the French revolution, reprobates the hysterical style
+of reviewing painful events; but in the history of Rome under the Cæsars
+we hear too plainly the sobs and shrieks of the victims to be satisfied
+with the modern philosophizing which would deprive them of our
+compassion. Man is naturally cruel; superstition makes him more so. A
+genuine religion alone softens his ferocious instincts, and places the
+centre of action and obligation elsewhere than in his own pleasure or
+personal advantage. Man is also compassionate; but without the
+systematic formation of morals, his weak compassion will not compensate
+the ardor of his self-assertion, which may involve all crimes. Luxury
+exaggerates cruelty, because it intensifies the action of the selfish
+interests, and loosens the rein of restraint--its objects and the
+objects of morals being incompatible. The most cruel characters have
+been those presenting this admixture of luxury and ferocity. The silken
+noose gives finer and more atrocious death than the iron sword.
+
+I think that the (unless vilified) wretch Tiberius built this palace in
+fear, and dwelt in it in torment. In its fastnesses he felt himself safe
+from the knife of the assassin. In the leisure of its isolation he could
+meditate murders with æsthetic deliberation, and hurl his bolts of death
+upon the world below, remorseless and unattainable as Jove himself.
+
+Here is an episode of philosophizing in the hell I promised you. But
+hell itself would not be complete without the button-bore--the man or
+woman who holds you by a theory, and detains you amid life's intensity
+to attend the slow circlings of an elaborative brain.
+
+I have now finished Tiberio. The donkeys brought us down with more
+danger, more heat, more fear and clatter. Only beggary diminishes, a
+little discouraged, in our rear. It seems to have been given out that we
+have no small change, as is indeed the fact; so the young and old only
+grumble after us enough to keep their hand in. In compensation for this,
+however, a new trouble is added, viz., the danger of losing the small
+steamboat, which threatens to leave at three P. M., a period by this
+time scarce half an hour distant. Yet a bit of bread we must have at the
+hotel. It is the former palace of Queen Joanna; but we do not know it at
+the moment, and nothing leads us to suspect it. Here two good-natured
+English faces make us for the moment at home. A cup of tea,--the English
+and American restorative for all fatigues,--a wholesome slice of bread
+and butter, a moderate charge, and ten minutes of cool seclusion, make
+the Hotel di Tiberio pleasant in our recollection. And then we remount,
+and, the little steamer beginning to manoeuvre, our haste and anxiety
+become extreme; so we take no more heed of steep or narrow, but the
+donkeys and we make one headlong business of it down to the beach, where
+we have still to make a secondary embarkation before reaching the
+steamer. Here, as we had foreseen, the final crush attends us. The
+guide and each of the donkey girls and women insist upon separate
+payment. With grim satisfaction I fling a five-franc note for the whole.
+It is too much, but the whole island cannot or will not give change for
+it. And then ensues much shrieking, expostulation, and gesticulation, in
+the midst of which I plunge into the boat, make my bargain with Charon,
+and am for the time out of hell. As I looked back, methought I saw
+Stefano the guide and the women having it out pretty well with reference
+to the undivided fee. Stefano leaped wildly into the sea after me, and
+extorted five more _soldi_ from my confusion. Finally, I exhort all good
+Christians to beware of Capri, and on no account to throw away a trip
+thither, but to undertake the same as a penance, for the mortification
+of the flesh and the good of the immortal soul. The island is to-day in
+as heathen a condition as Tiberius himself could wish; only from a
+golden, it has descended to the perpetual invoking of a copper rain.
+That the Beggar's Opera should have been written out of the kingdom of
+Naples is a matter of reasonable astonishment to the logically inferring
+mind. I could improvise it myself on the spur of the moment, making a
+heroine out of the black-eyed woman who drove my animal--black-haired
+also, and with a scarlet cotton handkerchief bound around her head in
+careless picturesqueness. Gold ear-rings and necklace had she who
+screamed and begged so for a penny more than her due. And when I cried
+aloud in fear, she replied, "_Non abbia timor--donkey molt' avezzo_;"
+which diverted my mind, and caused me to laugh. As we went up and as we
+went down, she encountered all her friends and gossips in holiday
+attire; for yesterday was _Festa_, and to-day, consequently, is _festa_
+also--a saint's day leaving many small arrearages to settle, in the
+shape of headache, fight, and so on, so that one does not comfortably
+get to work again until the third day. This fact of the antecedent
+_festa_ accounted for the unusual amount of good clothes displayed
+throughout the island. Our eyes certainly profited by it, and possibly
+our purses; for we just remember that one or two groups in velvet
+jackets and gold necklaces did not beg.
+
+But all of this is a superfluous after-digression, as I am really, in my
+narrative, already on board of the little steamer, with the charitable
+waves between me and the brigand Caprians. A pleasant sail--not so
+smooth but that it made the Italian passengers ill--brought us to
+Sorrento. Here our trunk was hoisted on the head of a stout fellow, all
+the small fry of the harbor squabbling for our minor luggage. We climbed
+a long, steep flight of stone steps, walked through a shady orange
+garden, and came out upon a cool terrace fronting the sea, with the
+Rispoli Hotel behind it. Here we were to stay; our bargain was soon
+made, with the divine prospect thrown in. Our room was on the ground
+floor, behind a shallow arcade paved with majolica. Shaking off the dust
+of travel, and ranging our few effects in the rather narrow quarters, we
+at once took possession of the prospect, and regulated ourselves
+accordingly.
+
+
+
+
+SORRENTO.
+
+
+Ugh! after the roasting, hurried day at Capri, how delicious was the
+first morning's rest at Sorrento! The coral merchant came and went. We
+did not allow him to trouble us. They offered us the hotel asses; we did
+not engage them. The blue sea, the purple mountains, the green, rustling
+orange groves,--these were enough for us, pieced with the writing of
+these ragged notes, and a little dipping into our Horace, who, it must
+be confessed, goes lamely without a dictionary. A day of lights and
+shadows, of sunshine and silence, of pains caressed, and fatigues whose
+healing was sweeter than fresh repose. And we dreamed of novels that we
+could write beneath this romance-forging sun, and how the commonplace
+men and women about us should take grandiose shapes of good and ill, and
+figure as ideals, no longer as atoms. We would forsake our scholastic
+anatomy, and make studies of real life, with color and action. For this,
+as we know, we should need at least six months of freedom, which perhaps
+the remnant of our mortal lives does not offer. Meantime we sit and
+dream. Each sees the content of the landscape reflected in the other's
+eyes. We sit just within our room, the little writing-table half within,
+half without the window, that reaches to the ground. The soft breeze
+flutters our pages to and fro. We scold it caressingly, as one reproves
+the overplay of a gracious child. With the exception of an occasional
+straggling visitor, the whole terrace is ours. Now and then we forsake
+the writing-table, rush to the railing that borders the terrace, and
+take a good look up and down, to assure ourselves that what we see is
+real, and founded on terra firma. Here our wearied nerves shall bathe in
+seas of heavenly rest. As to our suffering finances, too,--if one word
+is not too often profaned for us to profane it, we will quote Horace's
+
+    "mox reficit rates quassas,"
+
+not
+
+    "indociles pauperiem pati"
+
+Here our rapture will cost nothing. We will feed our eyes. The sea and
+sky shall wear sapphires and diamonds for us. Our shabbiness will be the
+æsthetic complement to their splendors. Do you not remember the figures
+in brown or olive green that always lurk in the corners of pictures in
+whose centre the Madonna, or some saint, is glorified? They also serve,
+who only stand and wait in the shadow. So will we do now. We will lie
+forgotten in the corner of this splendid picture, while our time and our
+remaining credit equalize themselves a little. The days in Naples
+considerably outran our estimate; the days here must make up for it. And
+we want nothing; and all is delightful.
+
+It is true, we do not carry out those good intentions quite literally.
+Who ever does? But we adhere to our proposed outline of rigid economy
+with only an occasional break. We soon begin to take note of small
+temptations that lie about the streets. Here we see the little
+neck-ribbons that are so cheap and pretty. A handful of them twisted
+around the neck of Economy give her something of a choke. Further on in
+our days and walks, a sound of saws in motion arrests our attention;
+while a sign and tempting show-case urge us at least to _look_ at the
+far-famed Sorrento woodwork. We enter; we set the tenth clause of the
+Decalogue at nought, coveting wildly. Brackets, tea, glove, and cash
+boxes are displayed there for our overthrow; watch-cases, on a new
+principle, all either brave with mosaic, or smooth and shining in the
+simple beauty of the olive wood. Something of all this we snatched and
+fled. We took far too little for our wishes, rather too much for our
+means. Silk stockings we did resist by that simplest and best of
+measures--not entering the shops in which they were pressingly
+advertised. The very passing of those shops gave us, however, vague
+dreams of swimming about in silken movements; how grateful in a world of
+heat! But the line has to be drawn somewhere, and we draw it here.
+
+A donkey excursion pleasantly varies our experience in Sorrento. Do you
+know how much a donkey ride means in Sorrento? It does not mean a
+perpetual jolt, and horrible inter-asinicidal contest between the ass
+who carries the stick and the ass who carries you. The donkeys of
+Sorrento are fat and well-liking: smooth and gray are the pair that come
+for us, comfortable as to the saddle and the bridle. And our
+donkey-driver is a handsome youth, with a bold, frank countenance, and
+the ripest olive and vermilion complexion. His walk is graceful and
+robust; he knows every one he meets, and has his bit of fun with sundry
+of the groups who pass us. These consist of men and women bearing on
+their heads large flat baskets filled with cocoons, or in their hands
+bundles of the same; girls leading mules, or carrying household burdens;
+soldiers, beggars, Neapolitan princes, the syndic of Sorrento, and other
+varieties of the species vaguely called human. He takes us up a steep
+and rough ascent to the telegraph station. There are many bad bits in
+the road; he is but one, and the donkeys are two; but he has such a
+clever way, at critical moments, of holding on to the head of the second
+donkey in conjunction with the tail of the first, that he gets the two
+cowardly riders through many difficulties and more fears. Once on level
+ground, the donkeys amble along delightfully. So pleasant is the whole
+in remembrance, that, sitting here, at an interval of many miles in
+distance, and ten days in time, we feel a sincere twinge in remembering
+that we gave him only a franc for himself, paying by agreement two
+francs for either donkey. Forgive us, beauteous and generous Gaetano,
+and do not curse us in _aggio_ and _saggio_, the open-mouthed _patois_
+of your country.
+
+
+
+
+FLORENCE.
+
+
+A week is little for the grandeurs of Florence, much for the discomforts
+of its summer weather. The last week of May, which we passed there,
+mistook itself for June, and governed itself accordingly. We went out as
+early as human weakness, unsubdued by special discipline, permitted. We
+struggled with church, gallery, painting, sculpture, and antiquities.
+We breathlessly read sensible books, guides, and catalogues, in the
+little intervals of our sight-seeing. We dropped at night, worn and
+greedy for slumber; and the day died, and made no sign.
+
+A hot week, but a happy one. To be overcome in a good cause is glorious,
+and our failure, we trust, was quantitative, not qualitative. Good
+friends helped us, took away all little troubles and responsibilities;
+took us about in carriages of dignity and ease, and landed us before
+royal, imperial works of art. With all their aid and cherishing,
+Florence was too many for us. So, of her garment of splendors, we were
+able only to catch at and hold fast a shred here and there, and whether
+these fragments are worth weaving into a chapter at all, will better
+appear when we shall have made the experiment of so combining them.
+
+Our first view of her was by night; when, wearied with a day's shaking,
+a hot and a long one, we tumbled out of railroad car into arms of
+philanthropic friend, who received us and our bundles, selected our
+luggage, conquered our porter and hackman, pointed to various
+interesting quadrangles of lamps, and said, "This is Florence." But we
+had seen such things before, and gave little heed--our thought machinery
+being quite run down for lack of fuel. The aspect which we first truly
+perceived, and still remember, was that of a clean and friendly
+interior, a tea-table set, a good lamp bright with American _petrolio_
+(O shade of Downer!), and, behind an alcove, the dim, inviting
+perspective of a comfortable bed, which seemed to say, "Come hither,
+weary ones. I have waited long enough, and so have you."
+
+
+
+PALAZZO PITTI.
+
+
+The second aspect of Florence was the Pitti Palace, brown and massive;
+and the bridges numerously spanning the bright river; and the gay, busy
+streets, shady in lengths and sunny only in patches; the picturesque
+_mélange_ of business and of leisure, artisans, country people, English
+travellers and dressed-up Americans; the jeweller's bridge, displaying
+ropes of pearls and flashes of diamonds, with endless knottings and
+perplexities of gold and mosaic; alabaster shops, reading-rooms,
+book-stores, fashions, cabinets of antiquities--all leading to a welcome
+retirement within the walls of the Palazzo Pitti.
+
+Well content was the Medici to live in it, ill content to exchange it,
+even for the promised threshold of Paradise. A good little sermon here
+suggests itself, of which the text was preached long ago, "For where
+your treasure is, there will your heart be also." And Medici's
+investments had been large in Pitti, and trifling in Paradise; hence the
+difficulty of realizing in the latter. Within the Pitti Palace are
+things that astonish the world, and have a right to do so, as have all
+the original results of art. The paintings are all--so to speak--set on
+doors that open into new avenues of thought and speculation for mankind.
+The ideal world, of which the real is but a poor assertion, has, in
+these glimpses, its truest portraiture. Their use and dignity have also
+limits which the luxury and enthusiasm of mankind transgress. But
+indispensable were they in the world's humanization and civilization:
+that is enough to say of them.
+
+O, unseen in twenty-three years, and never to be seen again with the
+keen relish of youth. What have I kept of you? What good seed from your
+abundant harvest has ripened in my stony corner of New England? Your
+forms have filled and beautified the blank pages of life, for every life
+has its actual blanks, which the ideal must fill up, or which else
+remain bare and profitless forever. And you are here, my Seggiola, and
+you, my Andreas and Peruginos and Raphael; and Guercino's woman in red
+still tenderly clasps the knees of the dead Savior. But O! they have
+restored this picture, and daubed the faded red with savage vermilion.
+
+Scarcely less ungrateful than the restoration of a beautiful picture is
+the attempt to restore, after the busy intervals of travelling, the
+precious impressions made by works and wonders of art. The incessant
+labor of sight-seeing in Florence left little time for writing up on the
+spot, and that little was necessarily given to recording the then recent
+recollections of Naples and Rome. It was in Venice that I first tried to
+overtake the subject of Florence. It is in Trieste that I sit down and
+despair of doing the poorest justice to either. My meagre notes must
+help me out; but, in setting them down, I forgot how rapidly and
+entirely the material, of which they gave the outline, would disappear.
+I thought that I held it, so far as mind possession goes, forever. At
+the feast of the gods we think our joys eternal.
+
+On reference to the notes, then, I find that the best Andreas and Fra
+Bartolomeos are to be found here, and quite a number of them in the
+Pitti. Some of the first Raphaels also are here, and some Titians. The
+Seggiola looked to me a little dim under her glass. The Fates of Michael
+Angelo were strong and sincere. Two of the Andreas are the largest I
+remember, and very finely composed. Each represents some modification of
+the Madonna and Saints, subjects of which we grow very weary. Yet one
+perceives the necessity of these pictures at the time in which they were
+painted. The æsthetic platform of the time would have them, and accepted
+little else. A much smaller picture shows us the heads of Andrea and his
+beautiful wife, the _Lucia_, made famous by Browning. The two heads look
+a little dim now, both with age, and one with sorrow. Raphael's
+pictures, seen here in copious connection with those of his
+predecessors, appear as the undoubted culmination of the Florentine
+school, grandly drawn, and conceived with the subtlest grace and spirit.
+The Florentine school, as compared with others, has a great weight of
+æsthetic reason behind it. It reminds me of some rare writing in which
+what is given you represents much besides itself. The best Peruginos
+share this merit, so do, in a different manner, the works of Beato
+Angelico, whose wonderful faces deserve their gold background. How to
+overtake these supreme merits in the regions of prose and of verse, one
+scarcely knows. By combining bold and immediate conception with untiring
+energy, unflinching criticism, and a nicety that stops before no
+painfulness, one might do it. Life runs like a centiped; one dreams of
+being an artist, and dies.
+
+Here it may not be amiss for me to recur to the form of my diary, whose
+inartistic jottings will best give the order of my days and movements.
+
+Wednesday, May 29.--Walked to Santa Croce, hearing that a mass was to be
+celebrated there for the Florentine victims of '48. When I arrived, the
+mass was nearly over; the attendance had been very numerous, and we
+found many people still there. Near the high altar were wreaths and
+floral trophies. I should be glad to know whether the priests who
+celebrated this mass did so with a good will. The ideas of '48 are the
+deadly enemies of the absolute and unbounded assumptions of the Roman
+papacy and priesthood. I hear that many of the priests desire a more
+liberal construction of their office. Would to God it might be so. It is
+most mournful that those who stand, in the public eye, for the religion
+of the country, should be pledged to a course utterly out of equilibrium
+with the religious ideas of the age. Thus religious forms contradict the
+spirit and essence of religion, and the established fountain-heads of
+improvement shut the door against social and moral amelioration.
+
+In Santa Croce we hastily visited the monument erected to Alfieri by the
+Countess of Albany, and the tombs of Machiavelli, Galileo, and Raphael
+Morghen. The last has a mural background of florid marble, of a light
+red color, with a recumbent figure in white marble, and an elaborate
+medallion of the same material, representing the Madonna, infant and
+saints. I fully hoped and intended to revisit this venerable and
+interesting church, but was never able to do so. It has lately received,
+as all the world knows, a fine front in pure white marble, adorned by
+bas-reliefs executed by the popular sculptor Fedi. In the square before
+the church stands the new statue of Dante, which I found graceful, but
+not grandiose, nor indeed characteristic. The face bears no trace of the
+great poem; the awe and dignity of super-human visions do not appear in
+its lines. He, making hell and heaven present to our thoughts, did a far
+deeper and more difficult work than those accomplished who made their
+material semblance present to our eyes.
+
+The remainder of this morning we devoted to the gallery of the Uffizi,
+the artistic _pendant_ of the Pitti. We hastily make its circuit with a
+friend who points out to us the portraits of Alfieri and the Countess of
+Albany, his lady and companion. The head of Alfieri is bold and
+striking, the hair red, the temperament showing more of the northern
+energy than of the southern passion. The sobriety of his works and
+laborious character of his composition also evince this. The countess,
+painted from mature life, shows no very marked characteristic. Hers is
+the face of an intelligent woman, but her especial charm does not appear
+in this portrait.
+
+The Uffizi collection appears to have been at once increased and
+rearranged during the three and twenty years of our absence. We find the
+Niobides grouped in an order different from that in which we remember
+them. The portrait gallery of modern artists is for us a new feature,
+and one which, alas! we have not time to study, seeing that the great
+_chefs-d'oeuvres_ imperiously challenge our attention, and that our
+time is very short for them. We spend a dreamy hour in the Tribune,
+whose very circumscription is a relief. Here we are not afraid of
+missing anything. This _étui_ of gems is so perfectly arranged and
+inventoried that the absence of any one of them would at once be
+perceived. Here stands the Venus, in incomparable nudity. Here the Slave
+still sharpens his instrument--the classic Boxers hold each other in
+close struggle. Raphael, Correggio, Michael Angelo, Carlo Dolce, are all
+here in concentration. You can look from one to the other, and read the
+pictorial language of their dissents and arguments. A splendid Paul
+Veronese, in half figures, merits well its place here. It represents a
+Madonna and attendant female saint: the hair and costumes are of the
+richest Venetian type; and though the crinkles of the one and the
+stripes of the other scarcely suggest the fashions of Palestine, they
+make in themselves a very gorgeous presentment. In the other rooms we
+remember some of the finest Raphaels, a magnificent Perugino, Sodoma's
+beautiful St. Sebastian, a famous Salutation of Mary and Elizabeth, by
+Albertinelli, a very tipsy and impudent Silenus by Rubens, with other
+pictures of his which I cannot characterize. The Vandykes were all hung
+too high to be well seen. They did not seem nearly so fine as the
+Vandykes in the Brignoli Palace in Genoa. Here are some of Beato
+Angelico's finest works, among others his famous triptych, from whose
+bordering of miniature angels so many copies are constantly made. Here
+is also a well-known Leonardo da Vinci, as well as Raphael's portraits
+of Leo Tenth, attended by a cardinal and another dignitary. A narrow
+gallery is occupied by numerous marble alto relievos by Luca della
+Robbia and Donatello; here is also a marble bas-relief of the Madonna
+and Child, the work of the great Michael.
+
+By knocking at a side door you gain admittance into a small chamber,
+whose glass cases contain works of art in gold, crystal, and precious
+stones. Here is a famous cup, upon whose cover a golden Hercules
+encounters the many heads of the Hydra, brilliant with varied enamels,
+the work of Benvenuto Cellini. Miniature busts in agate and jasper,
+small columns of the same materials,--these are some of the features
+which my treacherous memory records. It has, however, let slip most of
+what is precious and characteristic in this collection. The Uffizi
+demands at least a week's study for even the slightest sketch of its
+contents. We had but a week for all Florence, and tasted of the great
+treasure only on this day, and a subsequent one still more hurried. In
+remembrance, therefore, we can only salute it with a free confession of
+our insufficiency.
+
+Thursday.--A _dies non_ for the galleries. It was a Festa, and they were
+all closed. So was the Bargello. The Boboli gardens were not open till
+noon, at which time the heat made them scarcely occupable. We visited
+the Church of San Michele, which was formerly a Loggia, or building with
+open sides and arches, like others still existing in various parts of
+the city. The filling up of these open arches changed it into a church.
+They tell us that it is to be reconverted into a Loggia, to answer the
+present necessities of the over-crowded city. Here we found a curious
+tabernacle, carved in marble--a square enclosure, with much detail of
+execution, and, on the whole, a Gothic effect. Tombs, monuments, and old
+mosaic pavement this temple also contains; but I cannot recall its
+details.
+
+The afternoon of this day we employed partly in a visit to the two tombs
+beside which American feet will be sure to pause. Here, in this
+sculptured sarcophagus, sleeps the dust of E. B. B. Here, beneath this
+granite cross, lie the remains of Theodore Parker. At the first, I
+seemed to hear the stifled sobs that mourned a private sorrow too great
+to take account of the public loss. For what she gave the world, rich
+and precious as it was, was less than that inner, unalienable jewel
+which she could not give but in giving herself. And he who had both, the
+singer and her song, now goes through the world interrogating the ranks
+of womanhood for her peer. Seek it not! She was unique. She died and
+left no fellow.
+
+A soberer _cortege_, probably, followed Theodore to his final
+resting-place. The grief of poets is ecstatic, and cannot be thought of
+without dramatic light and shade, imagined, if not known of. A
+sorrowing, patient woman, faithful through all reverses, stood beside
+the grave of the great preacher, the mighty disputant. She remembered
+that it had always been peace between her and this church militant. From
+every raid, every foray, into the disputed grounds of theory and
+opinion, she kept open for him a return to the orthodoxy of domestic
+life. The basis of his days was a calm, well-ordered household, whose
+doors were opened or shut in accordance with his desire of the moment.
+Would he receive his whole congregation, or a meeting of the clergy, or
+a company more mixed and fashionable? The simple, well-appointed rooms
+were always in order; the lights were always clear; the carpets swept;
+the books and engravings in nice order. The staid New England
+women-servants brought in the refreshments, excellent of their kind, and
+carefully selected for their suitableness to the occasion. The wife sat
+or moved unobtrusively among her guests; but she loved Theodore's
+friends, and made his visitors welcome. If Theodore had war without, and
+it became his business to have it, he had ever peace within. And this it
+was pleasant and exemplary to remember, standing beside his grave.
+
+How often have I, in thought, linked these two graves together, striving
+to find a middle term or point of meeting for them both! The distant
+image of the spot was sacred and dear to me. The person of the one, the
+character of the other, were fixed among my affections. For let me say
+here that though I have criticised Parker's theology, adopting neither
+his methods nor his conclusions, of Parker himself I have never ceased
+to think as of a person with a grand and earnest scope, of large powers
+and generous nature. He was tender in large and in little, a sympathist
+in practice as well as a philanthropist in theory. My heart still warms
+and expands at the remembrance of what he was in the pulpit and at the
+fireside. Nor was he the less a stern moralist because he considered the
+ordinary theories of sin as unjust and insufficient. No one would better
+console you for a sin deplored, no one could more forcibly deprecate a
+sin contemplated. He painted his time more wicked than it was, and saw
+it so. A modern Dante, all in the force of prose, E. B. B. lies here
+like the sweet Beatrice, who was at hand when the cruel task of
+criticism was over, to build before the corrected vision of the great
+pilgrim the silvery shrines and turrets of the New Jerusalem. So will we
+leave them--a lesser Dante, a greater Beatrice, and one who has borne
+record of herself.
+
+
+
+
+VENICE.
+
+
+Venice, which I seek to hold fast, is already a thing of yesterday.
+"Haste is of the devil," truly says the Koran, whose prophet yet knew
+its value. But the strokes of the pen need deliberation as much as those
+of the sword need swiftness. Strength goes with Time, and skill against
+him.
+
+Little of either had I after a night in the cars between Florence and
+Venice,--hot, dusty Florence, and cool, glassy Venice,--a night of
+starts and stops, morsels of sleep set in large frames of uneasy waking.
+The steep ascent of the Apennines is only partially descried through the
+darkness. It begins at Pistoia, and when it ends, Pistoia lies
+vertically under you, at the bottom of what seems in the darkness an
+abyss, in which its lights shine brightly. Tunnels there are in plenty
+on this road, and one of these threatens us with suffocation. For the
+engine was unduly replenished with coal at Pistoia in view of the hard
+task before it, and the undigested food vented itself in unwholesome
+gases, which the constraints of the tunnel drove in upon us, filling the
+lungs with mephitic stuff which caused them to ache for more than an
+hour afterwards. This part of the journey was made pleasant to us by the
+presence of a Venetian lady, handsome, intelligent, and cordial. At
+Bologna we lost her, making also a long stop. The hour was three in the
+morning; the place, a bare railroad depot. The hour passed there would
+not have been patiently endured by an American public. But Italians
+endure every possible inconvenience from the railway management, which
+is clearly conducted on _pessimistic_ principles. On reaching the cars
+again, another pleasant companion shortened the time with easy
+conversation. Not but that we dozed a little after the weary night; and
+the priest in the opposite compartment fell asleep over his morning
+prayers. But my new companion and I made our way through a shoal of
+general remarks to the _terra firma_ of a mutual acquaintance, in whose
+praises both of us grew warm. And at length we began to see marshes, and
+waters, and a fortress. "That is Venice," said the captain; and I
+replied with sincere surprise, "Is it possible?" For Venice, as
+approached by the railroad, makes no impression, presents no _coup
+d'oeil_. And this marks a precaution for which the devisers of
+railroads in this country may deserve praise. Being pure men of
+business, and not sentimentalists, they do not wish to find themselves
+mixed up with any emotions consequent upon the encounter of the sublime
+and beautiful. They cannot become responsible for any enthusiasm. And
+so, in their entrances and exits, they sedulously avoid the picturesque,
+and lead the traveller into no temptation towards stopping and lingering
+by the way. Of two possible routes, they, on principle, choose the more
+prosaic; so that the railroad traveller nowhere gets less beauty for his
+money than in this same Italy, the flower-garden of the world.
+
+The arrival even in Venice becomes, therefore, vulgar and commonplace in
+their management. And soon one gets one's luggage out of the clutches of
+guardians and porters, and cheaply, in an omnibus gondola, one swashes
+through a great deal of middling water, landing finally at Hotel
+Barbesi, where breakfast and the appliances of repose are obtained.
+
+We did not prudently devote this first day to sleep, as we ought to have
+done. The energy of travel was still in us, and we aroused ourselves,
+and went forth. The _valet de place_, with high cheek-bones, a fresh
+color, and vivacious eyes, led us on foot to the Place and Cathedral of
+St. Mark, the Ducal Palace, the Bridge of Sighs, and prisons of the
+condemned. We visited the great council-halls, superb with fretted
+gilding, and endless paintings by Tintoretto and Bellini. We saw the
+Lion's Mouth, into which anonymous accusations were dropped; the room of
+the Ten; the staircase all in white and gold, sacred to the feet of
+Doge and Dogaressa alone. As magnificent as is the palace, so miserable
+are the prisons, destitute of light, and almost of air--a series of
+small, close parallelograms, with a small hole for a window, opening
+only into a dark corridor, containing each a stony elevation, on which,
+perhaps, a pallet of straw was placed. Heaven forbid that the blackest
+criminal of our day should confront the justice of God with so poor a
+report to make of the mercy of man! In the dreaminess of our fatigue, we
+next visited a bead factory, and inspected some of its delicate
+operations. And then came the _table d'hôte_, and with it a little whiff
+of toilet and hotel breeding, sufficiently irksome and distasteful. In
+the evening there was to be a Fresco, or procession of gondolas on the
+great canal, with lanterns and music, in honor of Prince Plomplon, who
+was at Danieli's hotel. Uncertain whether to engage a gondola or not, I
+sat in the garden balcony of Barbesi's, immediately over the canal. I
+saw the gondolas of high society flit by, gay with flags and colored
+lanterns, the gondoliers in full livery. Their attitude in rowing is
+singular. They stand slanting forward, so that one almost expects to see
+them fall on their faces. In the gondola, however, one becomes aware of
+the skill and nicety with which they impel and guide their weird-looking
+vehicles.
+
+The Fresco was to be at nine o'clock; but by an hour earlier the
+gondolas were frequent. And soon a bark, with lanterns and a placard
+announcing an association of artists, stopped beneath our balcony, while
+its occupants, with vigorous lungs, shouted a chorus or two in the
+Venetian dialect. The effect was good; but when one of the singers asked
+for a "_piccola bottiglia_" and proceeded, hat in hand, to collect from
+each of us a small contribution, we felt that such an act was rather
+compromising for the artists. In truth, these men were artisans, not
+artists; but the Italian language has but one word for the two meanings,
+contriving to distinguish them in other ways.
+
+The stream of gondolas continued to thicken on the canal, and at nine
+o'clock, or thereabouts, a floating theatre made its appearance--a large
+platform, brilliantly lighted, and bearing upon it a numerous orchestra
+and chorus. The _chef d'orchestre_ was clearly visible as he passed,
+energetically dividing the melody and uniting the performers. This
+lovely music floated up and down the quiet waters, many lesser lights
+clustering around the greater ones. Comparison seems to be the great
+trick of descriptive writing; but I, for my part, cannot tell what the
+Fresco was like. It was like nothing that I have ever seen.
+
+And I saw it in the intervals of a leaden stupor; for, after the
+sleepless night and active day, the quiet of Barbesi's balcony was too
+much for me. Fain would I have hired a gondola, have gone forth to
+follow the musical crusade, albeit that to homage a Napoleon be small
+business for an American. But by a new sort of centaurship, my chair and
+I were that evening one, and the idea of dividing the two presented
+itself only in the light of an impossibility. Roused by the
+exclamations of those about me, I awoke from time to time, and
+mechanically took note of what I have here described, returning to sleep
+again, until a final wrench, like the partition of soul and body, sent
+me with its impetus to the end of all days--bed.
+
+The fatigue of this day made itself severely felt in the waking of the
+next morning. Shaking off a deadly stupor and dizziness, I arose and
+armed for the day's warfare. My first victim was the American consul,
+who, at the sight of a formidable letter of introduction, surrendered at
+discretion. Annexing the consul, I bore him in triumph to my gondola,
+but not until I had induced him to find me a lodging, which he did
+speedily; for of Barbesi and many francs _per diem_ I had already
+enough, and preferred charities nearer home to that of enriching him. I
+do, moreover, detest hotel life, and the black-coated varlets that
+settle, like so many flies, upon your smallest movement. I have more
+than once intrenched myself in my room, determining to starve there
+rather than summon in the imps of the bell. With the consul's aid, which
+was, I must say, freely given, I secured to myself the disposal of a
+snug bedroom and parlor, with a balcony leading into a music-haunted
+garden, full of shiny foliage, mostly lemon and myrtle trees, having
+also a convenient access to the grand canal. After this, we proceeded to
+the Church of the Frari, rich with the two monuments of Titian and
+Canova. Both are architectural as well as sculptural. That of Canova is
+a repetition of his own model, executed in the well-known Vienna
+monument, with the addition, I thought, of a winged lion and one or two
+figures not included in the other. The monument of Titian stands
+opposite to that already described. The upper portion of it presents a
+handsome façade enclosed in three arches, each of which contains a
+bas-relief of one of his great pictures. The middle one presents the
+Assumption, in sculpture; that on the right the Entombment of Christ;
+that on the left the St. Peter Martyr--the picture itself being in the
+sacristy of the Church of Santi Giovanni e Paolo. The Frari also
+contains a curious and elaborate monument to a doge whose name I forget.
+Above sits the doge in his ducal chair; below, four black slaves clad in
+white marble, their black knees showing through their white trousers,
+support the upper part of the monument upon their heads. Two bronze
+Deaths, between the doge and the slaves, bear each a scroll in white
+marble, with long inscriptions, which we did not read. The choir was
+adorned with the usual row of seats, richly carved in black walnut. From
+this rich and interesting temple we passed to the Academia delle belle
+Arti.
+
+This institution contains many precious and beautiful works of art. The
+Venetian school is, however, to the Florentine much as Rossini's
+Barbière to Dante's Divina Commedia. Here all is color, vitality,
+energy. The superabundance of life and of temperament does not allow the
+severer deliberations of thoughtful art. The finest picture of this
+school, the Assumption of Titian, is the intense embodiment of the
+present, an ideal moment that presupposes no antecedent and no
+successor. It is as startling as a sudden vision. But it is a vision of
+life, not of paradise. The Madonna is a grand, simple, human woman,
+whose attitude is more rapt than her expression. She stands in the
+middle of the picture, upon a mass of clouds, which two pendent cherubs
+deliciously loop up. Above, the Eternal Father, wonderfully
+foreshortened, looks down upon her. Beneath, the apostles are gazing at
+the astonishing revelation. All is in the strongest drawing, the most
+vigorous coloring. Yet the pale-eyed Raphaels have more of the inward
+heaven in them. For this is a dream of sunset, not of transfiguration.
+So great a work of art is, however, a boon beyond absolute criticism.
+Like a precious personality, its value settles the account of its being,
+however widely it may depart from the standard recognized in other
+things.
+
+In the same hall is the last work of Titian, a Pieta, or figure of the
+dead Christ upon his mother's knees. This picture is so badly placed
+that its effects can only be inferred, absolute glare and darkness
+putting out its light and shade. Far from the joyous allegro of Titian's
+characteristic style, the coloring presents a greenish pallor, rather
+negative and monotonous. The composition of the picture is artistic,
+tonic, and harmonious; its expression high and pathetic. The ebbing tide
+of the great master's vitality left this pearl on the shore of time.
+
+The Presentation of the Virgin in the Temple, by Titian, is another of
+the famous pictures in this collection. The Virgin is represented as a
+maiden of ten years, ascending the steps of the temple at Jerusalem.
+The figure and the steps are both of them seen in profile. Her pale-blue
+dress is relieved by an oblong glory which surrounds her from head to
+foot. More famous is a large Paul Veronese, representing Christ at
+supper in the house of the Pharisee. The richness of the Venetian
+costumes, the vigor and vitality of the figures, give this picture its
+great charm. It is no nearer to Christ and Jerusalem "than I to
+Hercules." A large painting by a French artist, in this hall, replaces
+the great Paul Veronese taken to Paris by Napoleon I.,--the Cena,--and,
+to my mind, replaces it very poorly. The huge paintings of Tintoretto
+are among the things that amaze one in Venice. How one hand, guided by
+one brain, could, in any average human life, have covered such enormous
+spaces of canvas, is a problem and a puzzle. The paintings themselves
+are full of vigor, color, and variety. But one naturally values them
+less on account of their great number. Of course, in the style of
+Raphael or Perugino, a single life could not have produced half of them.
+The Venetian school is sketchy, and its figures often have more toilet
+than anatomy.
+
+I am almost ashamed to speak of these pictures at all, since I speak of
+them so inadequately. Yet, gentle reader, all is not criticism that
+criticises, all is not enthusiasm that admires. Copious treatises are
+written on these subjects by people who know as little of them as is
+possible for a person of average education. Americans have especially to
+learn that a general tolerable intelligence does not give a man special
+knowledge in matters of art. Among the herd of trans-Atlantic travellers
+who yearly throng these galleries, they know most who pretend least to
+know.
+
+A brief interval of rest and dinner enabled us to visit the Armenian
+Convent at San Lazzaro. For this excursion two rowers were requisite.
+Starting at five P. M., we reached the convent in half an hour. It
+stands upon an island which its walls and enclosures fill. The porter
+opens to us. We have a letter of introduction from Ex-Consul Howills to
+Padre Giacomo, and bring also a presentation copy of the late consul's
+work on Venice. The padre receives us with courteous gravity. We make
+acquaintance with his monkey before we make acquaintance with him. The
+monkey leaps on the neophyte's hat, tears off a waxen berry, and eats
+it. His master thoughtfully leads us through the dreamy rooms and
+passages of the convent. Here is the room that Byron occupied; here is
+his name, written in Armenian in his own hand. Here also is Prince
+Plonplon's name, written by him in the book of illustrious visitors.
+After showing it, the padre offers another book, for commonplace
+visitors, in which he invites me to enter my name: I humbly comply. We
+visit the chapel, which is handsome, and the pleasant garden. The
+printing establishment interests us most. These Armenian fathers are
+great polyglots, and print books in a variety of languages. Padre
+Giacomo, who speaks good English, shows us an Armenian translation of
+Napoleon's Life of Julius Cæsar, which we are surprised and rather
+sorry to see. We afterwards hear it suggested that the expense of this
+work has probably been borne by the French emperor himself, with a view
+to the Eastern question. Among the antiquities of the convent we find a
+fine Armenian manuscript of the fourth century; among its modern
+curiosities, a book of prayers in thirty languages. In the refectory is
+a pulpit, from which one monk reads aloud, while the others dine.
+Connected with this convent is a college for the education of Armenian
+youths, either for the priesthood or for active life. Another
+institution, in Venice proper, receives from this those scholars who
+decide upon an ecclesiastical profession. Padre Giacomo had already
+bought Consul Howill's book for the convent library. He led us, lastly,
+into a small room, in which are kept the publications of the convent, to
+be sold for its benefit. Here we made a few purchases, and took leave,
+trusting to see Padre Giacomo again.
+
+One of my earliest acts in Venice, after the first preliminaries of
+living, was to get from a circulating library the first volume of Mr.
+Ruskin's Stones of Venice. I have never been a reader of Mr. Ruskin, and
+my position towards him is that of an outside unbeliever. I shun his
+partisans and disbelieve his theories. The title of this book, however,
+seemed to promise a key to the architectural mysteries of the mirror
+city, and I, taking him at his word, reached out eagerly after the same.
+But Mr. Ruskin's key opens a great many preliminary doors before
+admitting you to the point desired, and my one busy week was far too
+short to follow the intricacies of his persuasions. I could easily see
+that the book, right or wrong, would add to the pleasure and interest of
+investigating the city. Mr. Ruskin is an author who gives to his readers
+a great deal of thought and of study. His very positive mode of
+statement has this advantage; it sums up one side of the matter so
+exhaustively as to make comparatively easy the construction of the
+opposite argument, and the final decision between the two. Yet, while
+the writer's zeal and genius lead us to follow his reasonings with
+interest, and often with pleasure, his judgment scarcely possesses that
+weight and impartiality which would lead us to acquiesce in his
+decisions. Those who fully yield to his individual charm adopt and
+follow his opinions to all extremes. This already shows his power. But
+they scarcely become as wise as do those who resist, and having fully
+heard him, continue to observe and to think for themselves. And as, in
+Coleridge's well-known lines, anxiety is expressed as to the human
+agency that can cleanse the River Rhine when that river has cleansed the
+city of Cologne, we must confess that our expectations always desire the
+man who shall criticise Mr. Ruskin, when he has criticised to his full
+extent. For there is one person whom he cannot criticise, and that is
+himself. To do this would involve a deliberation of thought, an
+exactness of style, to which even Mr. Ruskin cannot pretend.
+
+With his help, however, I did observe the two granite columns in the
+Piazzetta, to whose shafts he gives fifteen feet of circumference, and
+to their octagonal bases fifty-six, a discrepancy exceeding the
+difference which the eye would measure. But he certainly ought to know.
+And I found also the columns brought from St. Jean d'Acre, which are, as
+he does not mention, square, and of a dark marble, with Oriental
+capitals and adornments. And I sought out, in the church of SS. Giov. e
+Paolo, two dogal monuments, of which he praises one and criticises the
+other with stress. The one praised is that of Doge Mocenigo; the other,
+that of Doge Vendramin. I did not find in either a significance to
+warrant the extensive notice he gives them. Having learned, with great
+satisfaction, that the artist of the monument which "dislikes" him was
+afterwards exiled from Venice for forgery, he proceeds to speak of "this
+forger's work," allowing no benefit of doubt. And this was my account
+with Mr. Ruskin, so far as the Stones of Venice are concerned; for time
+so shortened, and objects so multiplied, that I was constrained
+thereafter to dispense with his complicated instruments of vision, and
+to look at things simply with my own eyes.
+
+We made various visits to the Cathedral of San Marco, whose mosaic
+saints, on gold backgrounds, greet you in the portico with delight. The
+church is very rich in objects of art and in antiquities. It has columns
+from Palestine, dogal monuments, tessellated pavements, in endless
+variety. But the mosaics in the sacristy were for me its richest
+treasure. They comprise the conscientious labors mentioned by George
+Sand, in her Maîtres Mosaistes. The easy arch of the ceiling allows one
+to admire them without the painful straining usually entailed by the
+study of fresco or other ceiling adornment. In a small chapel we were
+shown a large baptismal font brought from Palestine, and the very stone
+on which John Baptist's head was cut off!
+
+We went in, one Sunday, hoping to see the famous _palle d'oro_, an
+altar-covering in massive gold, exhibited only on rare Festas, of which
+this day was one. But while we wedged ourselves in among the crowd, one
+of our party descried a boy with the pustules of small pox still fresh
+upon his face. We fled in precipitation, marvelling at the sanitary
+negligence which allows such exposures to take place at the public risk.
+
+We visited the Church of the Scalzi (Barefooted Friars), and found it
+very rich in African and other marbles. It boasts some splendid columns
+of _nero antico_. One of the side chapels has four doors executed in
+Oriental alabaster, together with simulated hangings in _rosso antico_,
+the fringe being carved in _giallo_. Another was adorned with oval slabs
+of jasper, very beautiful in color and in polish. The ceiling, painted
+in fresco by Tiepolo, was full of light and airy grace.
+
+From this, we went to the Church of the Gesuiti, in high repute for the
+richness of its adornments. We found it a basilica, its sides divided by
+square piers, and the whole interior, piers and walls, covered with a
+damasked pattern wrought in verd antique upon a ground of white marble.
+The capitals of the piers were heavily gilded. The baldecchino of the
+high altar was dome-shaped, and covered on the outside with a scolloped
+pattern in verd antique, each scollop having a slender bordering of
+white marble. The baldecchino is supported by four twisted columns
+formed of small rounded pieces of verd antique closely joined together.
+The pulpit has a heavy marble drapery, with simulated fringe, all in the
+pattern already mentioned. The whole is more luxurious than beautiful.
+Its art bears no proportion to its expense. To those who think of the
+Jesuits in general as I do, it will hardly stand as a monument of
+saintly service and simplicity. Near the high altar rest the ashes of
+the last Doge of Venice. The spot is designated by a simple slab,
+forming part of the pavement. On it is written, "_Æternitate suoe
+Manini cineres_."
+
+We visited two very good collections of antiquities, in one of which we
+found the door of the Bucentaur, and its banner of crimson silk, with
+gilded designs. Here were portraits of doges, curious arms, majolicas,
+and old Venetian glass, much finer than that of the present day. Here
+also are collected many relics of Canova, the most interesting of which
+are the small designs for his great works. Over the door of this museum
+stands a pathetic inscription to the effect that Michel Correr,
+"_vedendo cadere la patria_" had collected here many things of patriotic
+and historical interest.
+
+But these prosaic recounts are only the record of actual steps. The
+charm, the delight of Venice they do not and cannot express. My
+recollections of the city invest her with a solemn and stately
+personality. I did not see her bowed beneath the Austrian yoke,
+betrayed, but not sold, refusing to be cajoled and comforted. That
+cloud was removed. The shops were busy and prosperous, the streets
+thronged with people, the canals gay with gondolas, bearing also barges
+and large and small boats of very various patterns. The Piazza was
+filled at night with social groups of people, less childish, methought,
+than other Italians, and with a more visible purpose in them. Still, the
+contrast of the past and present, no longer shameful and agonizing, was
+full of melancholy. Venice can never be what she has been. The present
+world has no room for a repetition of her former career. But she can be
+a prosperous and happy Christian commonwealth, with her offices and
+dignities vested in her own sons, with education and political rights
+secured to all her children. And this is better, in the present day,
+than to be the tyrant of one half of the world, the fear and admiration
+of the other. For Peace, now, with open hands, bestows the blessings
+which War formerly compelled with iron grasp and frowning brow. The true
+compulsion now is to compel the world to have need of you, by the
+excellence of your service. Industry has a deeper mine of wealth than
+piracy or plunder can ever open. A man's success is in strict proportion
+to his use; and the servant of all is the master of all. So the new
+Venice for which I look is to be no more like the old Venice than the
+new Jerusalem will be like the city of David. Moral grandeur must make
+her great. Justice must make her people happy. And so beautiful and
+delightful is she, that I cannot help echoing the Psalmist's
+exclamation, "Pray for the peace of Jerusalem! They shall prosper who
+love thee!"
+
+A wash of waters, a play of lights, a breeze that cools like the
+perfumed water of the Narguilé, a constant interchange of accents
+musically softened from the soft Italian itself, which seems hard in
+comparison with them; rows of palaces that have swallowed their own
+story; churches modelled upon the water like wax-flowers upon a mirror;
+balconies with hangings of yellow-brown and white; dark canals, that
+suggest easy murders and throwing over of victims; music on the water;
+robust voices, of well-defined character; columns and arches, over which
+Mr. Ruskin raves, and which for him are significant of religion or
+irreligion; resolute-looking men and women; a world of history and
+legend which he who has to live in to-day can scarcely afford time to
+decipher,--this is Venice as I have seen her, and would see her again.
+Rejoice, O sister cities, that she is free. Visit her with your golden
+rain, O travellers; with your golden sympathy, O poets! Enrich her,
+commerce! Protect her, Christian faith of nations, for she is
+free--free!
+
+To me she is already a recollection. For after the days of which I have
+so briefly told, a far summons carried me to an elder land, a more
+mournful mystery. Looking, but not loving my last, I packed the
+wearisome trunk, paid for the nights and dinners, owing little else at
+my lodging. A certain nightingale, who, at eight precisely every
+morning, broke in upon my slumbers with delicious singing, did not
+figure in the bill. But remembering his priceless song, I almost regret
+my objections to certain items set down in the account against me. And I
+had a last row in the gondola, and a last ice in the Piazzetta, and,
+last of all, a midnight embarkation on board the Austrian steamer for
+Trieste. Farewell, Sebastiano, my trusty gondolier. I shall not hear you
+cry, "Oh, juiné" (giovine) again. I see the line of the Piazzetta,
+defined by the lamps. Brightly may they burn; glad be the hearts that
+beat near them. And now they are all out of sight, and the one outside
+light is disappearing, too. Farewell, wonderful Venice. Thou wert
+painfully gotten together, no doubt, like other dwelling-places of man.
+Thou camest of toiling and moiling, planning, digging, and
+stone-breaking. But thou lookest to have risen from the waters like a
+dream. And this wholeness of effect makes thee a great work of art, not
+henceforth to be plundered by the powerful ones of the earth, but to be
+cherished by the lovers of beauty, studied by the lovers of art.
+
+I will return upon my steps to mention one feature in the new Venice, a
+small and obscure one, whose significance greatly interested me. Having
+heard of a Protestant Italian congregation in the neighborhood of one of
+the great Catholic temples, I turned my steps one evening towards one of
+its meetings, and found, in a large upper chamber, a numerous assemblage
+of Italians of various grades, chiefly people of the poorer class, who
+listened with attention to a fervent address from a young clergyman of
+their own nation. The discourse had much of the spirit of religion,
+little of its technic, and was thereby, I thought, the better adapted
+to the feeling of the congregation. A sprinkling of well-dressed men was
+observable. A prayer followed the discourse, in which the auditors
+joined with a hearty amen. This little kernel of Protestantism, dropped
+in a field so new, gave me the assurance of the presence of one of the
+most important elements in the progress and prosperity of any state, to
+wit, that of religious liberty.
+
+It is quite true that the sects under whose protection the Protestant
+Venetian church has sprung up--the Scotch and Swiss Presbyterians--can
+in no sense be considered as exponents of liberal ideas in religion.
+Calvinism, _per se_, is as absolute as Catholicism, and as cruel. The
+Calvinistic hell is but an adjourned Inquisition, in which
+controversialists have as great satisfaction in tormenting the souls of
+their opponents as Torquemada had in tormenting their bodies. Yet
+Calvinism itself is a rough and barbaric symbolization of great truths
+which the discipline of Catholicism tended ever more and more to
+distance from the efficient lives of men. The principle of individual
+responsibility, the impossibility of moral action without religious
+liberty, the inward character of religious acts and experiences, in
+contradistinction to the precepts and practice of a religion which had
+become all form, all observance. These ideas, gathered together by a
+vigorous mind, and made efficient by the constitution of a sect or
+party, were capable of regenerating modern Europe, and did so. For it
+will be found that all of its Protestant piety ran within the bounds of
+this somewhat narrow channel. But even here, the liberalizing
+influences of time are irresistible, and although the cruel and
+insufficient doctrines are still subscribed to by zealous millions, the
+practice and culture of the church itself become more and more liberal.
+The zeal for propagandism, which characterizes the less tolerant portion
+of the Protestant sects, makes their ministration on new ground
+efficient and valuable. The material hell, from which, in good faith,
+they seek to deliver those who hear them, symbolizes the infinite danger
+and loss to man of a life passed without the impulses and restraints of
+religion. A more philosophic statement would be far less tangible to the
+minds alike of teacher and disciple. Their intervention in communities
+characterized by a low grade of religious culture is therefore useful,
+perhaps indispensable. And while I value and prize my own religious
+connections beyond aught else, I am thankful to the American missions
+that support Waldense preaching in Italy. They at least teach that a man
+is to think for himself, pray for himself; and their worship, even when
+rudest and most uncultured, is more an instruction of the multitude than
+a propitiation of the infinite love which is always ready to do for us
+more and better than we can ask.
+
+So, little Protestant congregation in Venice, my heart bids you God
+speed! But may the love of God be preached to you rather than the
+torment of fear, and may the simplicity and beauty of the Christian
+doctrine and example preserve you alike from the passional and the
+metaphysical dangers of the day.
+
+
+
+
+GREECE AND THE VOYAGE THITHER.
+
+"in a transition state."
+
+
+We have left Venice. We have passed an intolerable night on board the
+Austrian steamer, whose state-rooms are without air, its cabin without
+quiet, and its deck without shelter. So inconvenient a transport, in
+these days of steamboat luxury, makes one laugh and wonder. Trieste, our
+stopping-place, is the strangest mongrel, a perfect cur of a city
+(cur-i-o-sity). It is neither Italian, Greek, nor German, but all three
+of these, and many more. The hotel servants speak German and Italian,
+the shop-keepers also. Paper money passes without fight or _agio_ upon
+the prices demanded. It seems to be par, with gold and silver at a
+premium. Much Oriental-looking merchandise is seen in the shop windows.
+The situation is fine, the port first rate.
+
+Our consul here, Mr. Alex. Thayer, is the author of the Life of
+Beethoven, already favorably known to the world as far as the first
+volume. The second, not yet completed, is looked for with interest. Mr.
+Thayer's kind attentions made our short stay in Trieste pleasant, and
+our transit to the Austrian Lloyd's steamer easy, and within thirty-six
+hours after our arrival we found ourselves embarked on board the latter,
+_en route_ for Syra, where we should find another Austrian Lloyd waiting
+to convey us to the Piræus, the well-known port of Athens.
+
+Our voyage began with a stormy day. Incessant rain soaked the deck. A
+charming little upper cabin, cushioned and windowed like a luxurious
+carriage, gave us shelter, combined with fresh air--the cordial of those
+who "_coelum et animum mutant, quia trans mare current_." Here I
+pillowed myself in inevitable idleness, now become, alas! too familiar,
+and amused myself with the energetic _caquet_ of my companions.
+
+An elderly Greek gentleman, Count Lunzi of Zante, with a pleasing
+daughter; a young Austrian, accompanied by a pretty sister; an elderly
+Neapolitan bachelor,--these were our fellow-passengers in the first
+cabin. In the second cabin were eleven friars, and an intelligent
+Venetian apothecary, with whom I subsequently made acquaintance. The
+captain, a middle-aged Dalmatian, came and went. He wore over his
+uniform a capote of India rubber cloth, which he laid aside when he came
+into our deck-parlor for a brief sitting and a whiff of tobacco. The
+gentlemen all smoked without apology. The little Greek lady soon became
+violently seasick, and the Austrian maiden followed. The neophyte and
+the Austrian brother felt no pang, but the neophyte's mother was dizzy
+and uncomfortable. Count Lunzi and the Neapolitan kept up a perpetual
+conversation in French, having many mutual acquaintances, whose absence
+they found it worth while to improve. I blessed their loquacity, which
+beguiled for me the weary, helpless hours. We went down to dinner; at
+tea-time we were _non compos mensis_. The state-rooms below being
+intensely hot and close in consequence of the rain, we all staid up
+stairs as long as possible, and our final retreat was made in the order
+of our symptoms.
+
+The following morning brought us the sun. The rain was at an end, and
+the sea grew less turbulent. The day was Sunday, and the unmistakable
+accents of theological controversy saluted my ears as I ascended the
+companion-way, and took my place in the deck-parlor. Count Lunzi, a
+liberal, and a student of German criticism, was vigorously belaboring
+three of the friars, who replied to him whenever they were able to get a
+word in, which was not often. His arguments supported the action of the
+Italian government in disbanding all monastic fraternities throughout
+its dominions, giving to each member a small pension, and inviting all
+to live by exercising the duties of their profession as secular priests.
+Our friars had concluded to expatriate, rather than secularize,
+themselves, and were now _en route_ for Kaiafa, a place concerning which
+I could only learn that it was in Syria. They were impugned, according
+to the ancient superstition, as the causes of our bad embarkation and
+rough voyage. They were young and vigorous men, and the old count not
+unreasonably urged them to abandon a career now recognized as useless
+and obsolete, and to earn their bread by some availing labor. The circle
+of the controversy widened. More friars came up from below. The ship's
+surgeon joined himself to them, the Venetian siding with the count. The
+Neapolitan stood by to see fair play, and a good part of the day of rest
+was occupied by this symphony of discord.
+
+I confess that, although the friars' opinions were abhorrent to mine, I
+yet wished that they might have been let alone. Even Puritan Milton
+does not set a Calvinistic angel to argue with Adam and Eve concerning
+the justice of their expulsion from Paradise. The journey itself was
+pain enough, without the reprobation. As the friars had been turned out
+of their comfortable nests, and were poor and disconsolate, I myself
+would sooner have given them an obolus unjustified by theory than a
+diatribe justified by logic. But the old count was sincere and able, and
+at least presented to them views greatly in advance of their bigotry and
+superstition. While this conversation went on, we passed Lissa, where
+the Italian fleet was repulsed by the Austrians, during the war of
+Italian unity. Our fellow-passenger of the nation second named quietly
+exults over this event. He does well. Austrian victories have been rare
+of late. Of the day following my diary says,--
+
+June 17.--In sight of the Acroceraunian mountains and shore of Albania.
+Vessel laboring with head wind, I with Guizot's Meditations, which also
+have some head wind in them. They seem to me inconclusive in statement,
+and insufficient in thought, presenting, nevertheless, some facts and
+considerations of interest. At a little before two P. M., we pass Fano,
+the island in which Calypso could not console herself; and no wonder. At
+two we enter the channel of Corfu, but do not reach the shore itself
+until five o'clock. A boat conveys us to the shore, where, with our
+Austrian friends, we engage a carriage, and drive to view the environs.
+
+This is my first experience of Greece. The streets are narrow and
+irregular, the men mostly in European costume, with here and there a
+_fustanella_. Our drive took us to a picturesque eminence, commanding a
+lovely prospect. It led us through a sort of Elysian field, planted with
+shade trees, where the populace on gala days go to sip coffee, and meet
+their friends and neighbors. Returning to the town, we pass several
+large hotels and cafés, at one of which we order ices. I puzzle myself
+in vain with the Greek signs over the shop windows. Our leave of absence
+having expired, we hasten back to the steamer, but find its departure
+delayed by the labor of embarking a Turkish dignitary, Achmed Pacha,
+who, with a numerous suite, male and female, is to take passage with us
+for the Dardanelles.
+
+A steamer, bearing the Crescent flag at her mast-head, was anchored
+alongside of our own. Our hitherto quiet quarters were become a little
+Babel of strange tongues and costumes. Any costume artist would have
+gone mad with delight over the variety of coats and colors which our new
+visitors displayed. Those wonderful jackets and capotes, which are the
+romance of stage and fancy-ball attire, here appeared as the common
+prose of every-day dress. Every man wore a fez. I remember a handsome
+youth, whose crimson head-gear contrasted with a white sheepskin jacket
+with wide, hanging sleeves--the sleeves not worn on the arms, but at the
+back; the close vest, loose, short skirt, and leggings were also
+white--the whole very effective. He was only one figure of a brilliant
+panorama, but treacherous memory does not give me the features of the
+others.
+
+Our vessel, meanwhile, was engaged in swallowing the contents of the
+Turkish steamer with the same deliberation with which an anaconda
+swallows a bullock. The Turks and Albanians might scream and chatter,
+and declaim the whole Koran at their pleasure, the great crane went
+steadily on--hoisting bale after bale, and lowering the same into our
+hold. This household stuff consisted principally of rugs and bedding,
+with trunks, boxes, and kitchen furniture, and some mysterious bundles
+whose contents could not be conjectured.
+
+The sight of this unwholesome-looking luggage suggested to some of us
+possible communication of cholera, or eastern plague. The neophyte and I
+sat hand in hand, looking ruefully on, and wondering how soon we should
+break out. But when the dry goods were disposed of, the transfer of the
+human merchandise from one vessel to the other seized our attention, and
+put our fears out of sight.
+
+Our first view of the pacha's _harem_ showed us a dozen or more women
+crouching on the deck of the Turkish steamer, their heads and faces
+bundled up with white muslin veils, which concealed hair, forehead,
+mouth, and chin, leaving exposed to view only the triangle of the eyes
+and nose. Several children were there, who at first sight all appeared
+equally dirty and ill-dressed. We were afterwards able to distinguish
+differences between them.
+
+The women and children came on board in a body, and took up a position
+on the starboard side of the deck. With them came an old man-servant,
+in a long garment of whitish woollen cloth, who defined their boundaries
+by piling up certain bales of property. In the space thus marked off,
+mattresses were at once laid down and spread with coverlets; for these
+women were to pass night as well as day on deck. Five ladies of the
+pacha's family at once intrenched themselves in one of the small cabins
+below, where, with five children, they continued for the remainder of
+the voyage, without exercise or ventilation. Too sacred to be seen by
+human eyes, these ladies made us aware of their presence by the sound of
+their incessant chattering, by the odor of their tobacco, and by the
+screaming of one of their little ones, an infant of eight months.
+
+When these things had been accomplished, our captain sent word to the
+pacha that he was ready to depart. The great man's easy-chair--by no
+means a splendid one--was then carried on board, and the great man
+himself, accompanied by his son-in-law and his dragoman, came among us.
+He was a short, stout person, some fifty years of age, and wore a dark
+military coat, with a gold stripe on the shoulder, and lilac trousers.
+His dragoman was a Greek. He and his suite smoked vigorously, and stared
+somewhat, as, with the neophyte on one side and the little Austrian lady
+on the other, I walked up and down the deck. The women and the old
+servant all slept _à la belle étoile_. The pacha and his officers had
+state-rooms in the saloon; the other men were in the third cabin. I
+forgot to say that at Corfu we left Count Lunzi and his amiable
+daughter, whose gracious manners and good English did credit to Mrs.
+Hills's excellent tuition, which the young lady had enjoyed for some
+years at her well-known school in Athens.
+
+When we came on deck the next morning, we found some of the Turkish
+women still recumbent, others seated upon their mattresses. Two of the
+children, a girl of ten years and a boy of twelve, went about under
+orders, and carried dishes and water-vessels between the cabin and the
+deck. We afterwards learned that these were Albanian slaves. The girl
+was named Haspir, the boy Ali. The first had large dark eyes and a
+melancholy expression of countenance; the boy also had Oriental eyes,
+whose mischievous twinkle was tempered by the gravity of his situation.
+The old servant, whom they called Baba, ate his breakfast in a corner.
+He had a miscellaneous looking dish of fish, bread, and olives. The
+women fed chiefly, as far as I could judge, on cucumbers and radishes,
+which they held and munched. Water was given from a brazen pitcher, of a
+pattern decidedly Oriental. Coffee was served to the invisible family in
+the small cabin. I did not see the women on deck partake of it. But from
+this time the scope of my observations was limited. A canvas partition,
+made fast to the mast overhead, now intervened, to preserve this portion
+of the _harem_ from the pollution of external regards. Henceforth, we
+had glimpses of its members only when a lurch of the steamer swayed the
+canvas wall far out of equilibrium. The _far niente_ seemed to be their
+fate, without alternative. Nor book nor needle had they. The children
+came outside, and peeped at us. Baba, grim guardian of the household,
+sat or squatted among his bales, oftenest quite unoccupied, but
+sometimes smoking, or chattering with the children. I took my modest
+drawing-book, and, with unsteady hand, began to sketch him in pen and
+ink. He soon divined my occupation, and kept as still as a mouse until
+by a sign I released him, when he begged, in the same language, to see
+what I had drawn. I next tried to get a _croquis_ of a pretty little
+girl who played about, wearing a pink wadded sack over a gown and
+trousers of common flowered calico, buff and brown. She was disposed to
+wriggle out of sight; but Baba threatened her, and she was still.
+
+Presently, the slave-boy, Ali, came up from the select cabin below,
+bearing in his arms an ill-conditioned little creature, two years of
+age, who had come on board in a cashmere pelisse lined with fur, a pink
+wadded under-jacket, and a pair of trousers of dirty common calico. He
+had now discarded the fur-pelisse. On his round little head he wore a
+cap of pink cashmere, soiled and defaced, with a large gold coin
+attached to it. A natural weakness drew me towards the little wretch,
+whom I tried to caress. Ali patted him tenderly, and said, "Pacha." This
+was indeed the youngest member, save one, of the pacha's family--the
+true baby being the infant secluded down stairs, whose frequent cries
+appealed in vain for change of air and of scene. The two-year-old had
+already the title of bey.
+
+"Can a baby a bey be?" I asked, provoking the disgust which a pun is
+sure to awaken in those who have not made it.
+
+We met the pacha at meals, interchanging mute salutations. He had a
+pleasant, helpless sort of smile, and ate according to the orthodox
+standard of nicety. On deck some attendant constantly brought him a pipe
+composed of a large knob of amber, which served as a mouth piece, and a
+reed some eight inches in length, bearing a lighted cigar.
+
+As we sat much in our round house, it was inevitable that I should at
+last establish communication with him through the mediation of a young
+Greek passenger, who spoke both Turkish and French.
+
+It was from the pacha that I learned that Haspir and Ali were slaves.
+The little girl whom I had sketched was his daughter. I inquired about a
+girl somewhat younger, who played with this one. The pacha signified
+that he had given the mother of his daughter to one of his men, and that
+the second little girl was born of this connection. The two younger
+children already spoken of were born of another mother, probably each of
+a different one.
+
+"O Christian marriage!" I thought, as I looked on this miscellaneous and
+inorganic family, "let us not complain of thy burdens."
+
+With us the birth of a child is the strongest bond of union between its
+parents; with the Oriental it is the signal for separation. No society
+will ever permanently increase whose structure rests on an architecture
+so feeble. The Turkish empire might spread by conquest and thrive by
+plunder. But at home it can never compete with nations in which family
+life has individuality of centre and equality of obligation. With Greeks
+and Albanians to work for them, and pay them tribute, the Turks are able
+to attain a certain wealth. It is the wealth, however, which
+impoverishes mankind, exhausting the sources of industry and of
+enterprise. Let the Turk live upon what he can earn, and we shall hear
+little of him.
+
+The women sometimes struggled out from their canvas enclosure, and went
+below on various errands. On these occasions they were enveloped in a
+straight striped covering, white and red, much like a summer
+counterpane. This was thrown over the head, held together between the
+teeth, and reached to the feet. It left in view their muslin
+head-dresses, and calico trousers, gathered at the ankle, nothing more.
+A few were barefoot--one or two only wore stockings. Most of them were
+shod with _brodequins_, of a size usually worn by men.
+
+At a late hour in the afternoon, Ali brought to their enclosure a round
+metal dish of stewed meat, cut in small pieces for the convenience of
+those whose customs are present proof that fingers were made before
+knives and forks. A great dish of rice simultaneously made its
+appearance. Baba chattered very much, Ali made himself busy, and a
+little internal commotion became perceptible behind the canvas wall.
+
+My opportunity of observing Turkish manners was as brief as it was
+limited. Having taken the Moslems on board on Monday, well towards
+evening, the Wednesday following saw, at ten A. M., my exit from the
+steamer. For we were now in the harbor of Syra. When I came on deck,
+soon after five A. M., the pacha sent me coffee in a little cup with a
+silver stand. It was prepared after the Turkish manner, and was fragrant
+and delicious. While we were at breakfast, Mr. Saponzaki, American
+consul at Syra, came on board in search of me, followed soon by an old
+friend, Mr. Evangelides. With real regret I took leave of the friendly
+captain and pleasant companions of the voyage. I shook hands with the
+pacha, not unmindful of the miseries of Crete. Baba also gave me a
+parting salutation. He was a nice observer of womanly actions, and his
+farewell gesture seemed to say, "Although barefaced, you are
+respectable;" which, if he really meant it, was a great deal for him to
+allow. Our luggage was now transferred on board the smaller steamer,
+which was to sail at six P. M. for the Piræus, and the neophyte and
+myself soon found ourselves under the shelter of Mr. Evangelides' roof,
+where his Greek wife made us cordially welcome.
+
+
+
+
+SYRA.
+
+
+Mr. Evangelides was one of a number of youths brought to the United
+States, after the war of Greek independence, for aid and education. The
+latter was the chief endowment with which his adopted country returned
+him to his native land. The value of this gift he was soon to realize,
+though not without previous hardships and privations. After a year or
+two of trial, he commenced a school in Syra. This school was soon
+filled with pupils, and many intelligent and successful Greeks of the
+present day are among his old scholars. Besides methods of education, he
+brought from America a novel idea--that of the value of real estate.
+Looking about Syra, and becoming convinced of its inevitable growth, he
+invested the surplus of his earnings in tracts of land in the immediate
+neighborhood of the then small town, to the utter mystification of his
+neighbors. That one should invest in jewels, arms, a house, or a
+vineyard, would have seemed to them natural enough; but what any man
+should want of mere land scarcely fit for tillage, was beyond their
+comprehension. The expected growth was not slow in coming. Mr.
+Evangelides soon began to realize handsomely, as we should say, from his
+investment, and is now esteemed a man of wealth. His neighbors
+thereafter named him "the Greek Yankee;" and I must say that he seems to
+hold equally to the two belongings, in spite of the Scripture caution.
+
+Under the escort of my old friend, I went out to see the town, and to
+make acquaintance with the most eminent of the inhabitants, the custom
+of the country making the duty of the first call incumbent upon the
+person newly arrived.
+
+Unfurling a large umbrella, and trembling with the fear of sun-stroke, I
+proceeded to climb the steep and narrow streets of the town. We first
+incommode with our presence the governor of the Cyclades, a patriotic
+Greek, who speaks good English and good sense. We talk of Cretan
+affairs; he is not sanguine as to the efficient intervention of the
+European powers.
+
+We next call upon the archbishop, at whose house we are received by a
+black servant in Frank dress, speaking good French. Presently the
+prelate appeared--a tall, gentlemanly person in a rich costume, one
+feature of which was a medallion, brilliant with precious stones of
+various colors. His reverence had made his studies in Germany, and spoke
+the language of that country quite fluently. Tholuck had been his
+especial professor, but he had also known Bauer; and he took some pains
+to assure me that the latter was not an irreligious man, in spite of the
+hardihood of his criticism. He deplored the absence of a state religion
+in America. I told him that the progress of religion in our country
+seemed to establish the fact that society attains the best religious
+culture through the greatest religious liberty. He replied that the
+members should all be united under one head. "Yes," said I, "but the
+Head is invisible;" and he repeated after me, "Indeed, the Head is
+invisible." I will here remark that nothing could have been more
+refreshing to the New England mind than this immediate introduction to
+the theological opinions of the East.
+
+Other refreshment, however, was in store for me--the sweetmeats and
+water which form the somewhat symbolical staple of Greek hospitality. Of
+these I partook in the orthodox manner. One dish only is brought in, but
+many spoons, one of which each guest dips into the _gliko_ (sweet), and,
+having partaken, drops the spoon into the glass of fresh water which
+always follows. Turkish coffee was afterwards served in small cups
+without spoons. And now, not knowing what sermons or other duties my
+presence might impede, I took leave, much gratified by the interview.
+
+We passed from hence to the house of the Austrian consul, Dr. Hahn, a
+writer of scientific travels, and a student of antiquities. He had not
+long before visited the Island of Santorin, whose recently-awakened
+volcano interests the world of science. He told me of a house newly
+excavated in this region, containing tools and implements as old, at
+least, as those of the Lacustrine period, and, in his opinion, somewhat
+older. This house had been deeply buried in ashes by an ancient
+eruption, so violent as to have eviscerated the volcano of that time,
+which subsequently collapsed. The depth of ashes he stated as
+considerably greater than that found in any part of the Pompeian
+excavation, being at least thirty yards. Hewn stones were found here,
+but no metal implements, nor traces of any. Caucasian skulls were also
+found, and pottery of a finer description than that belonging to the
+Lacustrine period. He gave me a model of a small pitcher discovered
+among the ruins, of which the nose was shaped like the beak of a bird,
+with a further imitation of the eye on either side. Another small vessel
+was ornamented by the model of a human breast, to denote plenty. He had
+also plaster casts of skulls, arm and jaw bones, and flint saws, upon
+which he descanted with great vivacity.
+
+Dr. Hahn's courteous and charming manners caused me to remember him as
+one of the many Austrians whose amiable qualities make us doubly regret
+the _onus_ which the untimely policy of their government throws upon
+them.
+
+These visits at end, Mr. Evangelides took me home to dinner, where the
+best Greek dishes were enhanced by Samian wine. We had scarcely dined
+when the archbishop, followed by an attendant priest, came to return our
+visit. The Greeks present all kissed his hand, and _gliko_ and coffee
+were speedily offered. We resumed our conversation of the morning, and
+the celibacy of the clerical hierarchy came next in order in our
+discussion. The father was in something of a strait between the
+Christian dignification of marriage and its ascetic depreciation. The
+arrival of other visitors forced us to part, with this interesting point
+still unsettled. We next visited the wife of the American
+vice-consul--Mr. Saponzaki--a handsome person, who received us with
+great cordiality. After a brief sojourn, we walked down to the landing,
+visiting the foundery, where they were making brass cannon, and the
+_Acadi_, the smart little steamer given by the Greeks of London to the
+Cretan cause. She ran our blockade in the late war, but is now engaged
+in a more honest service, for she runs the Turkish blockade, and carries
+the means of subsistence to the Cretans. Here we met Mr. DeKay, a
+youthful Philcandiote of our own country. He had already made himself
+familiar with the state of things in Candia, and, like the
+blockade-runner, was serving in his second war, with the difference that
+his former record showed him to have been always on the side of
+Christian loyalty.
+
+Finally, amid thanks and farewells, a small boat took us alongside of
+the Austrian steamer, which carried us comfortably, and by magnificent
+moonlight, to the Piræus.
+
+
+
+
+PIRÆUS--ATHENS.
+
+
+We were still soundly asleep when the cameriere knocked at the door of
+our cabin, crying, "Signora, here we are at the Piræus." The hour was
+four of the morning, but we were now come to the regions in which men
+use the two ends of the day, and throw away the middle. We, therefore,
+seized the end offered to us, and as briefly as possible made our way on
+deck, where we found a commissionaire from the Hotel des Etrangers, at
+Athens. We had expected to meet here the chief of our party, who had
+gone before us to Athens. The commissionaire, however, brought us a
+note, telling of an accident whose fatigues did not allow him to wait
+upon us in person. We were soon in the small boat, and soon after in the
+carriage, intent upon reaching Athens. Pireo, as they call the classic
+port, is quite a bustling place, the harbor gay with shipping and flags
+of all nations. The drive to the Capitol occupies three quarters of an
+hour. The half-way point of the distance is marked by two rival _khans_,
+at one of which the driver of a public vehicle always stops to water his
+horses and light his cigar. Here a plate of _lokumia_, a sweetmeat
+something like fig-paste, and glasses of fresh water, were brought out
+and offered to us. Soon we came in sight of the Acropolis, not without
+an indescribable puzzle at beholding, in commonplace existence, one of
+those dreams whose mystical beauty we never expect to realize, and fear
+to dissipate. Now we drive through many streets and squares, and
+finally stop at a hotel in front of one of the prettiest of the latter,
+from whose door our chief issues to welcome us. With him is the elder
+neophyte, who has so far shared his wanderings, and latterly the near
+danger of shipwreck. Under her guidance we walk out, after breakfast, to
+look at the shops in Hermes Street, but the glaring sun soon drives us
+back to our quarters. We take the midday nap, dine, and at sunset drive
+to the Acropolis. On our way thither, we pass the remaining columns of
+the Temple of Jupiter Olympius, a Roman-Greek structure, the work of
+Adrian. These columns, sixteen in number, stand on a level area of some
+extent. One of them, overthrown by an earthquake, lies in ruins, its
+separate segments suggesting the image of gigantic vertebræ. The spine
+is indeed a column, but it has the advantage of being flexible, and the
+method and principle of its unity are not imitable by human architects.
+At the Acropolis a wooden gate opens for our admission, and a man in
+half-military costume follows our steps.
+
+We visit first the Propylea, or five gates, then the Parthenon. Our
+guide points out the beauty of its Doric columns, the perfection of
+their execution--the two uniting faces of each of their pieces being
+polished, so as to allow of their entire union. Here stood the great
+statue of Minerva Medica; here, the table for sacrifice. Here are the
+ways on which the ponderous doors opened and shut. And Pericles caused
+it to be built; and this, his marble utterance, is now a lame sentence,
+with half its sense left out. In this corner is the high Venetian
+tower, a solid relic, modern beside that which it guards. And worse than
+any wrong _dénouement_ of a novel is the intelligence here given you
+that the Parthenon stood entire not two hundred years ago, and that the
+explosion of a powder magazine, connected with this Venetian
+fortification, shattered its matchless beauty.
+
+Here is the Temple of Victory. Within are the bas-reliefs of the
+Victories arriving in the hurry of their glorious errands. Something so
+they tumbled in upon us when Sherman conquered the Carolinas, and
+Sheridan the valley of the Shenandoah, when Lee surrendered, and the
+glad president went to Richmond. One of these Victories is untying her
+sandal, in token of her permanent abiding. Yet all of them have trooped
+away long since, scared by the hideous havoc of barbarians. And the
+bas-reliefs, their marble shadows, have all been battered and mutilated
+into the saddest mockery of their original tradition. The statue of
+Wingless Victory that stood in the little temple, has long been absent
+and unaccounted for. But the only Victory that the Parthenon now can
+seize or desire is this very Wingless Victory, the triumph of a power
+that retreats not--the power of Truth.
+
+I give heed to all that is told me in a dreamy and desolate manner. It
+is true, no doubt--this was, and this, and this; but what I see is none
+the less emptiness--the broken eggshell of a civilization which Time has
+hatched and devoured. And this incapacity to reconstruct the past goes
+with me through most of my days in Athens. The city is so modern, and
+its circle so small! The trumpeters who shriek around the Theseum in the
+morning, the _café_ keeper who taxes you for a chair beneath the shadow
+of the Olympian columns, the _custode_ who hangs about to see that you
+do not break the broken marbles further, or carry off their piteous
+fragments, all of these are significant of modern Greece; but the ruins
+have nothing to do with it.
+
+Poor as these relics are in comparison with what one would wish them to
+be, they are still priceless. This Greek marble is the noblest in
+descent; it needs no eulogy. These forms have given the model for a
+hundred familiar and commonplace works, which caught a little gleam of
+their glory, squaring to shapeliness some town-house of the west, or
+southern bank or church. So well do we know them in the prose of modern
+design, that we are startled at seeing them transfigured in the poetry
+of their own conception. Poor old age! poor columns!
+
+And poor Greece, plundered by Roman, Christian, and Mussulman. Hers were
+the lovely statues that grace the halls of the Vatican--at least the
+loveliest of them. And Rome shows to this day two colossal groups, of
+which one bears the inscription, "_Opus Praxitelæ_," the other that of
+"_Opus Phidiæ_." And Naples has a Greek treasure or two, one thinks,
+besides her wealth of sculptural gems, of which the best are of Greek
+workmanship. And in England those bas-reliefs which are the treasure of
+art students and the wonder of the world, were pulled from the pediment
+of the Parthenon, like the pearly teeth from a fair mouth, the mournful
+gaps remaining open in the sight of the unforgiving world. "Thou art old
+and decrepit," said England. "I am still in strength and in vigor. All
+else has gone, as well thy dower as thy earnings. Thou hast but these
+left. I want them; so give them me."
+
+Royal Munich also had his share. The relict of Lola Montes did to the
+temple at Egina what Lord Elgin did to the Parthenon, inflicting worse
+damage upon its architecture. At the time, the unsettled state of the
+country, and the desire to preserve things so costly and beautiful, may
+be accepted as excuses for such acts. But when Greece shall have a
+museum fit to preserve the marbles now huddled in the Theseum, or left
+exposed on the highways, then she may demand back the Elgin and Bavarian
+marbles. She will then deserve to receive them again. Nor could she,
+methinks, do better than devote to this noble purpose some of the
+superfluous extent of Otho's monstrous palace, whose emptiness afflicts
+the visitor with sad waste of room and of good material. Making all
+allowance for the removal of the Penates of its late occupants, it is
+still obvious that these two luxurious wrens occupied but a small
+portion of this eagle's nest. A fine gallery could as easily be spared
+from its endless apartments as are the public galleries from the
+Vatican.
+
+Nor should this new kingling and his Russian bride be encouraged to
+people such an extent of masonry with smart aid-de-camps, lying
+diplomats, and plundering stewards and _dames d'honneur_. For pity's
+sake, let the poor kingdom have a modest representative, who shall
+follow the spirit of modern reform, and administer the people's revenues
+with clean hands. A sculpture gallery, therefore, in the palace by all
+means, open to the public, as are the galleries of Italian palaces. And
+these marbles in the Theseum and elsewhere--fie upon them! Not only are
+they so crowded that one cannot see them, but so dirty that one cannot
+discern their features. "Are they marble?" one asks, for a thick coating
+of the sand and dust in which they were embodied for ages still envelops
+them, and can only be removed by careful artistic intervention.
+
+A little money, please, king and Parliament, for these unhappy ones. The
+gift would repay itself in the end, for a respectable collection of
+authentic Greek remains on the very soil in which they were found would
+bring here many of the wide-ranging students of art and antiquity. A
+little money, please, for good investment is good economy. Moreover,
+despite the velvet flatteries and smiling treasons of diplomacy, the
+present government of Greece is, as every government should be, on good
+behavior before the people. Wonderfully clever, enterprising, and
+liberal have the French people made the author of the Life of Julius
+Cæsar. Wonderfully reformative did the radicals of twenty years since
+make the pope. And the Greek nation, taken in the large, may prove to
+have some common sense to impart to its symbolical head, of whom we can
+only hope that the something rotten in the state of Denmark may not have
+been taken from it to corrupt the state of Greece.
+
+
+
+
+EXPEDITIONS--NAUPLIA.
+
+
+A few days of midsummer passed in Athens make welcome any summons that
+calls one out of it. Majestic as the past is, one likes to have its grim
+skeleton a little cushioned over by the æsthetic of the present, and, at
+the present season, this is not to be had, even in its poorest and
+cheapest forms. The heat, moreover, though tempered by healthful
+breezes, is yet of a kind and degree to tell heavily upon a northern
+constitution. To take exercise of any kind, between ten A. M. and six P.
+M., is uncomfortable and far from safe. How delightful, therefore, to
+pack one's little budget, and start upon a cruise!
+
+For the government, we must confess, is very hospitable to us. Our chief
+veteran goes about to distribute clothing to the Cretan refugees, who,
+in advanced stages of nakedness, congregate in Egina, Syra, Argos, and
+other places, as well as in Athens. And he asks the government, and the
+government lends its steamer, the Parados, for the philanthropic voyage.
+So we drive down to the Pireo and embark, and are on our way. A pleasant
+little Athenian lady accompanies us, together with her father, a Cretan
+by birth, and a man who has been much in the service of the government.
+Our travelling library for this occasion is reduced to a copy of
+Machiavelli's Principe, a volume of Muir's Greece, and a Greek
+phrase-book on Ollendorff's principle. We have also some worsted work;
+but one of us, the writer of these notes, has added to these another
+occupation, another interest.
+
+Take note that the beds of the hotel at Athens are defended by
+mosquito-nets, which show, here and there, the marks of age. Take note
+that we close these nettings the first night a little carelessly,
+remembering Cuba, and expecting nothing worse. Take note that we neither
+wear gloves at night, nor bandage our arms and wrists, and then take
+note of what follows.
+
+A fiery stinging of needle points in every accessible part of your body.
+Each new bite is like a new star of torment in the milky way of your
+corporeal repose. These creatures warn not, like the honest American
+mosquito, rattlesnake, or bore, of their intended descent upon you. In
+comparison with their silent impudence, the familiar humming of our
+Yankee torments becomes an apologetic murmur, significant of, "We are
+very sorry indeed, but we cannot well do otherwise." This is the
+language of the dun--the Greek insect has the quiet of the thief.
+
+So much for the action; now for the result. You awake uncomfortably,
+and, provoked here and there, begin to retort upon your skin a little.
+Never was more salient illustration of the doctrine of the forgiveness
+of injuries. Let by-gones be by-gones; suffer the bites to rest. Ah! the
+warning comes too late. The fatal process has begun. At every touch you
+get worse, but cannot stop. You now realize what a good gift your
+Anglo-Saxon skin was, and so clean, and so comfortable! and it cost you
+so little! But just because it was so good, these foreign vermin
+insisted on sharing it with you. And you exemplify in little the fate of
+Italy and of Greece, which have been feasted on for ages, and cursed by
+the absolute mosquito for not continuing in perpetuity to yield their
+life-blood without remonstrance. This for the moral aspect of the case.
+The material aspect is that of intolerable pain and itching,
+accompanying a distinct suppuration of every spot punctured by the
+insect. For some days and nights the principal occupation of the writer
+of these notes was to tear the unhappy hands and arms that aid in their
+production. A remedy is casually mentioned--vinegar. Bandages dipped in
+this fluid, and closely wrapped around the suffering members, give
+instant relief, but have to be frequently renewed, the fever of the skin
+rapidly drying them. The sufferings of Job were now understood, and his
+eminent but impossible virtue appreciated. Even he, however, had
+recourse to a potsherd. Never were my human sympathies so called out
+towards the afflicted Scotch nation! Well, let this subject rest.
+Recovery is now an established fact. From the height of experience we
+can look down upon future sufferers and say, "This, too, shall pass
+away."
+
+But now, to return to the deck of the Parados. Scenery, worsted work,
+the Principe, and a little conversation caused the time to pass very
+agreeably. We took also the Ollendorff book, and made a short trial of
+its lumbering machinery. And we had _déjeûner_ on board, and dinner. And
+Georgi, the cameriere, had the features of Edwin Booth--the strong eyes,
+the less forcible mouth, something even of the general expression. At
+about 7.30 P. M., we made the harbor of Nauplia, otherwise called
+Napoli de Romania. The harbor being shallow, the steamer anchored at
+some distance from the land, whither its boats conveyed us. On the quay
+stood a crowd of people, waiting to see us. They had discerned the
+steamer afar, and had flocked together from mere curiosity. Something in
+the landing made me think of that portion of the quay at Naples which
+lies before the Hotel de Russie. Much of the present town was built by
+the Turks. The streets are narrow and irregular, and many of the houses
+have balconies. One of these streets is nearly blocked by a crowd. We
+inquire, and learn that the head of a brigand has just been brought in.
+For the brigands, long tolerated in some regions by usage and indolence,
+have now set foot in a region in which they will not be endured. The
+Peloponnesus will not have them, and the peasants, who elsewhere aid the
+brigands, here aid the _gens d'armes_. Upon the head of their leader,
+Kitzos, a large price has been set. But the head which causes the
+commotion of this evening is not that of Kitzos. Getting through the
+crowd at length, we come upon a pretty square, surrounded by houses, and
+planted with pepper-trees.
+
+Here is the house of the prefect, at whose door we knock, imploring
+shelter. Our Cretan friend, M. Antoniades, is well known to the prefect;
+hence the daring of this summons. The prefecture receives us. The
+prefect--a vivacious little man, with blue eyes and light hair--capers
+about in great excitement. He has to do with the war against the
+brigands, and joy at the bringing in of the head before mentioned nearly
+causes him to lose his own. His large _salon_ is thronged with
+visitors, who come partly to talk over these matters, partly to see the
+strangers. We, the ladies, meanwhile take refuge on a roomy balcony,
+where we have chairs, and where _gliko_ and cold water are offered to
+us. I make my usual piteous request for vinegar, and renew my bandages,
+while the others enjoy cool air and starlight. The prefect goes off to
+supper at nine, having first signified to us that his wife is occupied
+with a baby two days old, and cannot wait upon us; that his house is at
+our disposal, and that he will send out among his neighbors and obtain
+all that we may require. One of his visitors--M. Zampacopolus, a major
+of cavalry--promises to wait upon us at five in the morning, to conduct
+us up the steep ascent of the fortress Palamides. By ten o'clock the
+mattresses are brought. They are spread in a row on the floor, and we
+weary women, four in number, lie down and sleep as only weary people
+can.
+
+The summons that arouses us at five the next morning does not awaken
+enthusiasm. We struggle up, however, and get each a minimum of the
+limited basin and towel privilege. Descending, we find Major
+Zampacopolus in full uniform, and are admonished by him for being so
+late. He came for us at four o'clock; but the chief veteran would not
+suffer us to be disturbed. The sun had already risen, and the ascent
+looked most formidable. Invoking the courage of our ancestors, we
+unfolded the umbrellas and began. We had six hundred steps to climb, and
+steep ones at that. The labor caused such perspiration that at any turn
+commanding the breeze we were forced to shield ourselves, the sudden
+evaporation being attended with great danger. The ascent is everywhere
+guarded by loopholes for musketry, and could not be carried by any party
+of human assailants. There is, however, another route of access to the
+fortress, which may be pursued on horseback. It was by this latter path
+that the Greeks ascended during the war of independence. They took the
+fortress from the Turks, but were admitted within the gates by
+treachery. After weary efforts and pauses, we reach the plane of the
+main structure, which consists of a number of independent bastions in
+strong positions, commanding each other and the pass. It was built by
+the Venetians, and vouches for their skill and thoroughness in military
+architecture. The officers receive us, and accommodate us in an airy
+bedroom, whose draughts of air we avoid, being _en nage_ with
+perspiration. We cool by degrees, and enjoy the balcony. A pot of basil
+is offered us for fragrance, at which we smell with little pleasure. We
+are then told the legend of the discovery of the true cross beneath a
+growth of this plant, which circumstance consecrates it among Eastern
+traditions forever. In the mean time a functionary enters, and furtively
+carries away a small box. Not very long afterwards its contents are
+returned in the shape of a cup of delicious coffee for each of us, with
+a piece of the ration bread of the garrison. "This bread," said the
+major, "is made with the hands, as we know, for it is made by the
+soldiers; but the bread you commonly eat in Greece is made with the
+feet." Here was indeed a heightening of present enjoyment by a somewhat
+unwelcome disparagement of unavoidable past and future experiences. We
+now proceeded to visit the bastions in detail. Each of them has its own
+name. One is called Miltiades. The most formidable one is called Satan.
+The view from the highest parapet is very grand. We go about, wondering
+at the grim walls and the manifold openings for musketry. They show us
+an enormous cistern for rain water. The place contains several of these,
+and is thus capable of standing a very long siege. We pass an enclosure
+in which are detained "the military prisoners," whoever they may be. As
+a _bonne bouche_ we are promised a sight of the criminals condemned to
+death. These are kept in the strongest recess of the fortress. They lead
+us to it, and bid us look down into a court below, in which we perceive
+twenty-five or more unfortunates refreshing themselves in the open air.
+At the door and grated window of the prison behind them appear the faces
+of others. Stationed on a narrow bridge above stand the military guard,
+whose muskets command the court. These men have all been convicted of
+crimes of violence against the person. Sentence has been passed upon
+them, and its execution follows the convenience and pleasure of the
+officers of the law. At short intervals a little group of them is led
+out to endure the last penalty. "Do not pity them, madam," said the
+major; "they have all done deeds worthy of death." But how not to pity
+them, when they and we are made of the same fragile human stuff, that
+corrupts so easily to crime, and is always redeemable, if society would
+only afford the costly process of redemption. A sad listlessness hung
+over the melancholy group. Some of them were busied in preparing
+breakfast--coffee, probably. Most of them sat or stood quite idly, with
+the terrible guns bristling above them. They looked up in our women's
+faces as if they sought there something, some compassionate glance that
+might recall mother or sweetheart--if such people have them. One old
+brigand lifted his voice, and petitioned the officers that his single
+daily hour of fresh air might be extended to two hours, pleading the
+pain he suffered in his eyes. This was granted. Our guides directed our
+attention to a man of elastic figure and marked face--tall, athletic,
+and blond. All that they could tell us was, that there seemed to be
+something remarkable about this man, as, indeed, his appearance
+indicated. In his face, more than in those of the others, we observed
+the blank that Hope leaves when her light is extinguished. All days, all
+things, were alike to him now; the dark, close prison behind, before him
+only the day when one in command shall say, "This is thy last!" If the
+priest shall then have any hidden comfort to bestow upon him! Shade of
+Jesus, we will hope so!
+
+These men, however, go to death with bold defiance, singing and
+laughing. A rude sympathy and admiration from the multitude gives them
+the last thrill of pleasure. As I looked at them, I was struck by a
+feeling of their helplessness. What is there in the world so helpless
+as a disarmed criminal? No inner armor has he to beat back the rude
+visiting of society; no secure soul-citadel, where scorn and anger
+cannot reach him. He has thrown away the jewel of his manhood; human law
+crushes its empty case. But the final Possessor and Creditor is unseen.
+
+In our wanderings we catch glimpses of a pretty little garden, disposed
+in terraces, and planted with flowers, vegetables, and vines. This
+garden recalls to memory a gentle-hearted commandant who planted it,
+loving flowers, and therefore not hating men. It is a little gone to
+decay since he left it, but its presence here is a welcome and useful
+boon. After visiting its beds and borders, we take leave of the
+hospitable officers, and by rapid and easy descent return to the
+prefecture, where the breakfast-table is set, and where a large tea-pot
+and heaped dish of rice attest the hospitable efforts of our host.
+
+I have only forgotten to say that on one of the ramparts of the fortress
+they showed us two old Venetian cannon, both of which served in the last
+revolution; and further, that, in returning, passing through the old
+gate of the town, we saw sculptured in stone the winged lion of St.
+Mark, the valorous device of Venice.
+
+
+
+
+ARGOS.
+
+
+We found the prefect at the very maximum of excitement. Another telegram
+concerning the brigands, and yet another. Kitzos is closely beleaguered
+by peasants and gens-d'armes; he cannot get away. Another head will be
+brought in, and the country will be free of its scourge. With much
+jumping up and declaiming, our entertainer shared the morning meal with
+us. We feed the discontented servant, whose views of life appeared to be
+dismal, kissed the sweet-eyed children of the family, and, as a party,
+leaped into two carriages, leaving the prefect intent upon welcoming
+with grim hospitality the prospective heads of bandits, which did not
+hinder him from shaking hands with us, cordially inviting us to return
+to the shelter of his roof. But shelter was not for us under any roof,
+save the ambulating cover of the carriage. We were now _en route_ for
+Argos. Our drivers were clothed alike, in well-worn bags of blue
+homespun, peaked babouches without stockings, and handkerchiefs bound
+about the head. The thermometer was ranging in the upper regions. Dust
+and overwhelming heat assail us. Stopping to water the well-flogged
+horses, we take refuge for a few minutes in a shady garden, planted with
+flowers, vines, and merciful trees with flat, not pointed, foliage. We
+sit around a tiny fountain, at whose small spouts the smaller bees
+refresh themselves on the wing. This sojourn is brief; our next halt is
+on the burning, dusty high-road, where the chief veteran says, "Tiryns,"
+and leads a very forlorn hope across thorny fields and stony ditches to
+a Cyclopean ruin--a side and angle of old wall, built after the manner
+so denominated, and so solidly that it outlasts at least three thousand
+years. We stand and consider this grim old remnant as long and as
+attentively as the fear of sun-stroke will permit. The veteran,
+however, leads us farther in pursuit of a cave in which, during the war
+of Greek independence, he was wont to seek shelter from sun and rain.
+This cave is probably one of the galleries of the ancient fortress; for
+that the ruin was a fortress, they say who know. It is perhaps twenty
+yards in length, and three in its greatest height; for it has a pointed
+roof, laboriously formed by the fitting and approximation of the two
+sides, no arch being then invented. The stones that form this roof are
+very large, rather broken than hewn, and are laid together with great
+care. Some of them are of very hard material. From these most venerable
+relics we creep back, under the deadly fire of the sun, to the carriage.
+The remainder of our drive leads across the plain of Argos, the "courser
+feeding," as Homer denominates it. We come in sight of its lofty
+Acropolis long before we reach the town, through whose narrow streets we
+drive, and after a brief pause at the prefecture, find rest and shelter
+in a private house.
+
+The proprietors of this house ranked among the best people of the
+place--_oi megaloi_, as the multitude naively denominate them. They
+received us in a large _salon_ without carpets, darkened by green
+blinds, and furnished with a mahogany centre table and chairs, all of a
+European pattern, with a cushioned divan occupying one corner of the
+room, according to the favorite fashion of these parts. The lady of the
+house wore a dress of ordinary figured jacconet, open at the neck, and a
+red fez, around which her own hair was bound in a braid. Her husband
+appeared in full Palicari dress, with an irrepproachable fustanella,
+and handsome jacket and leggings. They welcomed us with great
+cordiality, and bestirred themselves to minister to our necessities.
+Gliko and water were immediately brought us, together with the vinegar
+for my fevered hands. We next begged for mattresses, which were brought
+and spread on the floor of a bedroom adjoining. The four feminines, as
+usual, dropped down in a row. In the drawing-room mattresses were
+arranged for the gentlemen. We rested from 12.30 until 2 P. M., the hour
+appointed for the distribution of clothing to the destitute Cretans, of
+whom there is a large settlement at Argos. For I may as well mention
+here that our pursuit of pleasures and antiquities in the terms of this
+expedition was entirely secondary to the plans of our veteran for
+clothing the nakedness of these poor exiles. In his energetic company we
+now walked to a large building with court enclosed--a former convent, in
+whose corridors our eager customers, restrained by one or two officials,
+were in waiting. We were ushered into a well-sized room, in which lay
+heaps of cotton under-clothing, and of calico dresses, most of them in
+the shape of sacks and skirts. These were the contents of one or two
+boxes recently arrived from Boston. Some of them were recognized as
+having connection with a hive of busy bees who used to gather weekly in
+our own New England parlor. And what stress there was! and what
+hurrying! And how the little maidens took off their feathery bonnets and
+dainty gloves, wielding the heavy implements of cutting, and eagerly
+adjusting the arms and legs, the gores and gathers! With patient pride
+the mother trotted off to the bakery, that a few buns might sustain
+these strenuous little cutters and sewers, whose tongues, however active
+over the charitable work, talked, we may be sure, no empty nonsense nor
+unkind gossip. For charity begins indeed at home, in the heart, and,
+descending to the fingers, rules also the rebellious member whose
+mischief is often done before it is meditated. At the sight of these
+well-made garments a little swelling of the heart seized us, with the
+love and pride of remembrance so dear. But sooner than we could turn
+from it to set about our business, the Cretans were in presence.
+
+Here they come, called in order from a list, with names nine syllables
+long, mostly ending in _poulos_, a term signifying descent, like the
+Russian "witzch." Here they come, the shapely maiden, the sturdy matron,
+the gray-haired grandmother, with little ones of all small sizes and
+ages. Many of the women carried infants at the breast; many were
+expectant of maternity. Not a few of them were followed by groups of
+boys and girls. Most of them were ill-clothed; many of them appeared
+extremely destitute of attire. A strong, marked race of people, with
+powerful eyes, fine black hair, healthy complexions, and symmetrical
+figures. They bear traces of suffering. Some of the infants have pined;
+but most of them promise to do well. Each mother cherishes and shows her
+little beggar in the approved way. The children are usually robust,
+although showing in their appearance the very limited resources of
+their parents. Some of the women have tolerable gowns; to these we give
+only under-clothing. Others have but the rag of a gown--a few stripes of
+stuff over their coarse chemises. These we make haste to cover with the
+beneficent growth of New England factories. They are admitted in groups
+of three or four at a time. As many of us fly to the heaps of clothing,
+and hastily measure them by the length and breadth of the individual. A
+papa, or priest, keeps order among them. He wears his black hair uncut,
+a narrow robe much patched, and holds in his hand a rosary of beads,
+which he fingers mechanically. We work at this distribution for a couple
+of hours, and return to the house to take some necessary refreshment. We
+find a dinner-table set for us in one of the sleeping-rooms, and are
+cordially invited to partake of fish cooked in oil, bread, acrid cheese,
+cucumbers, olives, and cherries, together with wine which our Greek
+companions praised as highly stomachic, but which to us seemed at once
+bitter, sour, and insipid--a wine without either sugar or sparkle, dull
+as a drug, sufficient of itself to overthrow the whole Bacchic
+dispensation. Having enjoyed the repast, we returned to the Cretan
+settlement, and continued the distribution of the clothing until all
+were provided. The dresses did not quite hold out, but sufficed to
+supply the most needy, and, in fact, the greater number. Of the
+under-clothes we carried back a portion, having given to every one. To
+an old papa (priest) who came, looking ill and disconsolate, I sent two
+shirts and a good dark woollen jacket. Among all of these, only one
+discontented old lady demurred at the gift bestowed. She wanted a gown,
+but there was none; so that she was forced to content herself, much
+against her will, with some under-clothing. The garments supplied, of
+which many were sent by the Boston Sewing Circle, under the
+superintendence of Miss Abby W. May, proved to be very suitable in
+pattern and in quality. The good taste of their assortment gave them an
+air of superiority over the usual dress of the poor in this and other
+countries of the old world. The proportion of children's clothing was
+insufficient; but who could have foreseen that the Cretans would have
+had such large families of such little children? Finally, we rejoiced in
+the philanthropic energy of our countrywomen, and in the good appearance
+of our domestic manufactures. As we descended the steps, we met with
+some of the children, already arrayed in their little clean shirts, and
+strutting about with the inspiration of fresh clothing, long unfelt by
+them.
+
+We now went on foot to visit a fine amphitheatre in the neighborhood of
+the town, called by the ignorant "the tomb of Helen." The seats are hewn
+out of the solid rock, and occupy the whole ascent of a lofty hill-side.
+From the ground to the middle row they were faced with fine white
+marble. The remainder consisted simply of the stone itself, without
+covering. The division first mentioned is in better condition than the
+second, the marble incasement having protected the softer stone against
+the action of the elements. In front are some remains which probably
+represent the stage and its background. The extent embraced is
+unusually large; and as we sat in the chief seats and looked towards
+the proscenium, we wondered a little as to what manner of entertainment
+could be given to an assembly so vast. The ancient masks were indeed
+necessary to enable the distant portion of the audience to have any idea
+of the expression of countenance intended to be conveyed. But I should
+suppose that games of strength and agility, races, combats of wild
+beasts, would have been best suited to such an arena. To us it was
+sufficiently melancholy in its desertion and desecration--grass and
+thorny shrubs growing profusely between its defaced stones, the heavy
+twilight forming the background, while the stars that enlivened the
+evening were real ones, not their human symbols. As we descended,
+however, from our half hour of contemplation, we received notice of the
+incursion of busy western life even into this charmed domain. In a field
+hard by, a threshing machine was winnowing the Argive grain,--a thing of
+wonder to the inhabitants, probably an object of suspicion,--the
+property of a rich land-owner. Beggars are rare in Greece; but the Argos
+children followed us both to and from the amphitheatre with mendicant
+solicitations. They went thither under the plea of showing us the way,
+and pursued our return under that of being paid for the same. We
+endeavored to satisfy two or three of them; but, the whole troop
+following and tormenting, one of our companions appealed in Greek to the
+parents, as we passed their thatched dwellings. These called off the
+little hounds with threats of the bastinado. We reached the hospitable
+roof of our entertainers, first taking a lemonade at a little booth in
+the dark street. The mattresses were spread, the sick hands bathed, and
+we lay down to rest as we could, an early start being before us. A
+variety of insects preyed upon us, and made not very unwelcome the
+dawning of the early hour that saw us roused and dressed.
+
+But here I have forgotten to make mention of a fact which had much to do
+with our immediate movements at this time. The evening of our sojourn in
+Argos saw an excitement much like that which blocked the street in
+Nauplia. The occasion was the same--the bringing home of a brigand's
+head; but this the very head and front of all the brigands, Kitzos
+himself, upon whose head had been set a prize of several thousand
+drachmas. Our veteran with difficulty obtained a view of the same, and
+reported accordingly. The robber chief, the original of Edmond About's
+"Hadji Stauros," had been shot while sighting at his gun. He had fallen
+with one eye shut and one open, and in this form of feature his
+dissevered head remained. The soldier who was its fortunate captor
+carried it concealed in a bag, with its long elf-locks lying loose about
+it. He showed it with some unwillingness, fearing to have the prize
+wrested from him. It was, however, taken on board of our steamer, and
+carried to Athens, there to be identified and buried.
+
+All this imported to us that Mycenæ, which we desired to visit, had for
+some time been considered unsafe on account of the presence of this very
+Kitzos and his band. But at this moment the band were closely besieged
+in the mountains. They wanted their Head, and so did Kitzos. We, in
+consequence, were fully able to visit the treasure of Atreus and the
+ruins of Mycenæ without fear or risk from those acephalous enemies.
+Taking leave therefore of our friendly entertainers with many thanks,
+"polloi, polloi," we sprang again into the dusty carriages, and the
+sunburnt youths in blue bagging drove us out upon the wide plain to a
+spot where we were desired to dismount and make our way over a thorny
+and flinty hill-side to the spot in question. Such walking, in all of
+Greece with which I became acquainted, is difficult and painful. It is
+scarcely possible to avoid treading on the closely-growing bushes of
+nettles. To come in contact with these is like putting one's foot on a
+cushion of needles whose sharp points should be uppermost. Where you
+shun these, the small, pointed stones present difficulty as great.
+Creeping up from the plain, crying out for assistance and sympathy,
+beneath a sun already burning, we came to the entrance of the cave to
+which they give the name of the tomb of Agamemnon. This is an opening in
+the hill-side. Its door has long been wanting, but the formidable
+door-posts still remain. Two heavily-built stone sides support a single,
+horizontal stone, twenty-seven feet in length, by perhaps eight in
+breadth, and about the same in thickness. The door obviously swung open
+from the bottom; the traces in the stone-work make this clear. The cave
+itself is hollowed out from the height and depth of the hill. It is
+lined with large stones, carefully fitted to each other, and is in the
+shape of a rounded cone, whose gradual diminution to the top is very
+symmetrical. Here a small aperture, partly covered by a stone, admits
+the light. The perfection of the work in its kind is singular. From this
+outer chamber, an opening admits you to an inner cave, without light, in
+which they suppose the treasure to have been kept. This is much smaller
+than the first chamber, and, like it, is heavily lined with squared
+stone. A fire of dry brush enables us to distinguish so much; but our
+observations are somewhat hurried, for the chill of these interterranean
+passages, acting upon the perspiration that bathes our limbs, suggests
+terrible fears of an untimely end to be attained in some inflammatory
+and painful way.
+
+The outer structure, of which I have endeavored to give some idea, is,
+however, indescribable, and the manner of its building scarcely
+comprehensible in these days. It suggests a time whose art must be as
+far removed from ours as its nature, and whose solid and simple
+construction takes little heed of the passage of time.
+
+From the treasure of Atreus to the old citadel and gate of Mycenæ, we
+pass, by a few painful steps, through thorns, stones, and dust. Here we
+sit and meditate, as well as we are able. Mycenæ was in ruins in Homer's
+time. This gate and citadel go back at least to the time of Agamemnon.
+In one of the tragedies of Sophocles, Electra and Orestes meet before
+the gate of Mycenæ, which we naturally suppose to have been this one.
+Its heavy stone masonry is surmounted by a curious sculpture, a
+bas-relief, representing two lions aspiring to a column that stands
+between them. The column is one of the ancient symbols of Apollo, and
+is met with in some of the coins of the period. Agamemnon, Cassandra,
+Clytemnestra,--this trio of ghosts will serve to fill up for us the
+ancient gateway. Of the city nothing remains save the walls of the
+citadel, the space within being now piled up and grassed over by the
+action of time. At the present day, this citadel would be of little
+avail, being itself commanded by an adjacent hill, from which artillery
+would soon knock it into pieces. The walls just mentioned are solidly
+built of squared stone, laid together without mortar. The briefness of
+our time hurried us away before we had taken in half the significance of
+the spot. But so it was, and we turned with regret from a mere survey of
+objects that deserve much study.
+
+We were now to find our way back to Nauplia, but our fasting condition
+compelled us to pause for a moment at a little khan, whose energetic
+mistress bestirred herself, with small materials, to make us
+comfortable. The morning shadow threw her window in the dark. We
+gathered around it, escaping for the moment the scorching heat of the
+sun. Near us a traveller on a donkey rested himself and his patient
+beast. The little woman had blue eyes and chestnut hair, bound with a
+handkerchief. She offered us cold fish, fried in oil, from her frying
+pan. Each of us took a fish by the tail, and devoured it as we could.
+Cucumbers were next handed to us. Of these we ate with salt, which the
+mistress strewed with her fingers on the wooden window-sill, together
+with a little pepper. Wine and water she dipped out for us, the one
+from a barrel, the other from an earthen jar. We had brought with us two
+large loaves of bread from Argos, which greatly assisted our pedestrian
+meal. The mistress rinsed the glasses with her own hands, not over
+clean. When we had eaten, she poured water over our hands, offering us a
+piece of soap and a towel. As we laughed, she laughed--we at her want of
+accommodation, she probably rejoicing in its sufficiency. We now
+returned to our carriages, and drove back to Nauplia, and through
+Nauplia down to the quay, where our boats were waiting for us. The
+remainder of the day we passed on board the steamer, reaching Porus at
+sunset, and going on shore to visit its fine arsenal, and narrow, dirty
+streets. In the arsenal, with other heroes, hangs the portrait of
+Bouboulina, the famous woman who did such good naval service in the war
+of Greek independence. She commanded a ship, and her patriotic efforts
+were acknowledged by conferring on her the style and title of admiral.
+
+From the roof of the arsenal we enjoyed a beautiful view of the harbor.
+The town, as seen at a little distance, has rather an inviting aspect.
+On a nearer view, it offers little to detain the traveller. We passed
+along the quay, looking at the groups of men, occupied with coffee or
+the narghilé, and soon regained our boat and steamer. The Greeks, we are
+told, give Porus a nickname which signifies "Pig-city," just as our
+Cincinnati is sometimes called "Porkopolis." But the pigs in Porus are
+human.
+
+
+
+
+EGINA.
+
+
+We passed this night on board of the steamer, first supping luxuriously
+on deck, by the light of various lanterns fastened to the masts and
+bulwarks of the ship. The next morning saw us early awake and on foot to
+visit the Temple of Egina. The steamer came to anchor near the shore,
+and its boats soon conveyed us to land. We found on the shore two
+donkeys with pack-saddles, upon which two of us adventured to ascend the
+long and weary eminence. The temple is one of the most beautiful remains
+that we have seen. Its columns are of the noblest Doric structure. A
+number of them are still standing. His majesty of Munich and Montes
+robbed this temple, at some convenient moment of political confusion. He
+had a statue or so, perhaps several, and pulled down the architrave to
+obtain the bas-reliefs. Can we wonder that the Greeks do not punish
+brigandage after such royal precedents in its favor. A fine lion in
+marble, twenty feet in length, was taken from this temple, either by
+this or a similar marauding. The lion was sawn in three pieces, that it
+might be more conveniently conveyed by boat. But, being left over night,
+the peasants, in their rage, came and destroyed with their hammers what
+they were not able to protect. Here no diplomatic interference was
+possible, and the fact accomplished had to be accepted.
+
+This temple stands upon one of those breezy eminences so often selected
+by the Greeks for their places of worship and defence. It commands a
+wide view of the sea and surrounding islands. On the opposite island of
+Salamis they show you Xerxes' Seat, the spot from which he contemplated
+the land he intended to enslave. Here the inexorable veteran conceded to
+us a pleasant half hour, enabling us to survey the fine columns from
+various points of view, and to enjoy fully the beauty of their
+surroundings. Too soon, however, came the summons to descend. I again
+mounted the ass, but found my sideward and unsupported seat only
+maintainable by a gymnastic of the severest order. I yielded, therefore,
+this uneasy accommodation to one who might bestride the beast at his
+ease, being quite of the opinion of the Irishman, who, having been
+regaled with a ride in a bottomless sedan chair, said that, if it was
+not for the name of it, it was not much better than walking. In the same
+way I concluded that to be so badly carried by the ass was almost as bad
+as to carry him myself. We were soon on board and afloat again, and a
+few hours of sea travel, cherished for their coolness, brought us back
+to busy Piræus, and thence to torrid Athens, where the great heats now
+begin. We had meditated a change of hotel at the time of our leaving
+Athens, and had contemplated a fine apartment at lower charges in an
+establishment opposite to our own. But our hitherto landlord was too
+much for us. He was down at Piræus to receive us. The veteran yielded to
+his dangerous smile, and after a brief parley, implying a slight
+enlargement in accommodations, we found ourselves bagged, and carried
+back to the Hotel des Etrangers. Here the servants cordially welcomed
+us, and made us much at home. I regretted a certain beautiful view of
+the Acropolis commanded by the hotel opposite, but my view was outvoted;
+and we gave ourselves up again to the imprisonment of our small rooms,
+and to the darkness which is a necessary attendant upon summer life in
+Athens. And the gallant vision of the Parados, with its prow turned to
+the sea, and of lofty climbings, and monument-seeking wanderings, faded
+from all but these notes, in which so much of it as may live is
+faithfully preserved.
+
+
+
+
+DAYS IN ATHENS.
+
+    "As idle as a painted ship
+     Upon a painted ocean."
+
+
+O, there were many of them, each hotter and stiller than the other. All
+night we steamed and sleepily suffered beneath the mosquito-net. In the
+morning we arose betimes. We smiled to each other at breakfast, sighed
+at dinner, were dumb at tea-time. The whole long day held its flaming
+sword at our door. Sun-stroke and fever threatened us, should we cross
+the threshold. Visits were tame, and carriages expensive. For many days
+we sat still, doing little. This is what people call "being thrown upon
+one's own resources." But to those accustomed to active and energetic
+life it is rather a being thrown off from all that usually renders the
+passage of time pleasurable and useful. Even those dull days had,
+however, their distinctions. And, like a picture of our Indian summer,
+hazy, dreamy, and indistinct, so will I try to give a color picture of
+that unheroic time, in which we grew ungrateful for classic
+surroundings, forgetful of great names and histories, and sat and
+sewed, and said, "How long?"
+
+First, the little newsboys in the street who shriek, "_Pende leptà!_"
+calling the price of the paper for the paper itself. This music one may
+hear at any hour of the day when there is news from Crete, or when a
+steamer has arrived from England for the Cretan service, or when
+anything takes place that can motive the publishing of an extra. The
+veteran catches one day one of these curious little insects. He is
+barefoot, his hair is wild, his eyes are wilder. His extra is a single
+column, scarcely ten inches long; and over this he dares to make as much
+noise as if it were an issue of the New York Herald, or the Tribune
+itself, with white-haired Greeley at its back.
+
+Next, the funerals, starting always with music, and bearing flat disks
+of gilded metal, something in the style of the Roman eagles. At one time
+a mortality prevailed among children, and the little coffins were
+carried through the street, with mournful sounds of wind instruments. We
+saw several military funerals. In these the deceased is carried by hand
+in a crimson velvet coffin, bound with silver lace. A glass cover shows
+him at full length. The velvet cover that corresponds with the coffin
+itself is carried before in an upright position. The hearse, drawn by
+four or five horses, follows. Priests walk along, and chant prayers in
+the intervals of the music, which on these occasions is supplied by a
+full band. A body of soldiers also makes part of the pageant. Friends
+and relatives walk after, carrying the large cambric parasols so much
+in vogue here. As the cemetery is at some distance from the town, the
+hearse probably serves later for the transport of the body. But I from
+my window always saw it following in empty state. The friends all go to
+the church, where the prayers and orations occupy from one to two hours.
+The deceased is usually in full dress, and the countenance is often
+painted in white and red. The gilded symbols which are carried, and the
+wild tones of the wind instruments, give to those processions a somewhat
+barbaric aspect, as compared with the sober mourning of countries more
+familiar to ourselves. But there is nothing grim in the Greek funeral;
+it seems rather a cheerful and friendly attendance, and compares
+favorably with the _luxe_ of English burials, their ingenious ugliness
+and tasteless exaggeration of all that is gloomy and uncongenial to
+life.
+
+Next, the out-of-door life and music. The first is, of course, limited
+by the severe heat of the day. Eight A. M. is a fashionable hour for
+being abroad. You will then find the market thronged. You will encounter
+seated groups, who take their coffee or smoke their cigar. Many
+carriages drive past, conveying people in easy circumstances to Faleran,
+a small harbor three miles distant from Athens, where the luxury of
+sea-bathing is enjoyed. At nine A. M. the best of the military bands
+begins to play before the palace. I have their _repertoire_ pretty well
+in mind, having listened to its repetition for three weeks past. They
+play most of the airs from the Barbiere di Seviglia, the overture to
+Othello, and sundry marches and polkas. With the early morning period
+begins the crying of fruit in the streets. These cries proceed from men
+who drive before them donkeys laden with rude baskets, in which you see
+potatoes, tomatoes, small squashes, apricots, and other fruits. They
+stop at various doors in our neighborhood, and serve their customers.
+The maid-servants come out. From one of those doors issues with his
+nurse a little child, who is set upon the donkey's back, and allowed to
+stay there while the dealer supplies the houses in the vicinity. This
+little one wears a white cambric weed on his hat to prevent sun-stroke,
+after the manner of greater people.
+
+From ten A. M. to five P. M., the streets are quiet. After the latter
+hour the carriages begin again to roll, though the fashionable drive
+scarcely begins earlier than six o'clock. One drives to Faleran, to the
+Piræus, or, if it be Sunday, to the Polygonon, where the band plays, and
+whither the regent, mounted on a well-bred steed, is sure to betake
+himself. This Polygonon is simply a several-sided pavilion, at a
+distance of a mile and a half from the palace. A crowd of people flock
+to it on Sunday afternoons, either in carriages or on foot, and all in
+their best clothes. At a little distance stands a small café, where
+lemonade and lokumia may be enjoyed, but no ince. The view of the
+Acropolis from this spot is a very pleasant one. But to return to our
+Athenian streets. Carriages are very dear in the afternoon, being in
+request for drives to the bath, which is taken either at Faleran or at
+Pireo. A visit to either place refreshes after the long, hot day. When
+you return in the evening, you see the streets and squares about the
+cafés thronged with people sitting at little tables and enjoying ices or
+coffee. The narghilé, or water-pipe, is much in use here. At these
+tables one often sees it. The sacred herb basil, also, whose legend we
+have elsewhere recounted, appears upon these tables, growing in earthen
+pots. You will somewhere encounter the military band, which nightly
+performs in some stated place. But the café opposite our hotel has a
+band every evening, and our discussions of Greek politics and of Cretan
+prospects are frequently interrupted by strains from Norma, Trovatore,
+Traviata, and other late abortions of the muse. From this phrase let me,
+however, even in passing, deliver Norma. This statement carefully
+enumerates the external resources of Athens during waking hours.
+
+Within doors, besides our grave studies, we have visits. Many Greeks and
+Cretans wait upon the veteran, together with American consuls, and
+Cretan women bringing silks, laces, and stockings of their own
+manufacture, or petitioning for little special helps over and above the
+forty lepta per diem allowed to each of them by the committee. Some
+mysterious consultations are there, bent on merciful conspiracies and
+Heaven-approved stratagems. Omer Pacha and his army have surrounded the
+unhappy Island of Candia, and are tightening their folds like a huge
+serpent. The severity of the blockade is starving to death the women and
+children who are shut up in the towns, or hidden in caves and recesses
+of the mountains. England meanwhile feasts the sultan, and pledges the
+bloody toast of non-interference. How comfortable is the water-proof by
+which my Lords Derby and Stanley ward off the approach of any fact that
+might induce compassion or compel indignation! Sympathy at every
+entrance quite shut out, and at every appeal for mercy a fat English
+laugh, echoed by the House, which may make the angels weep. Smart Argyle
+keeps heart of grace against this squad of the heartless. He even takes
+the trouble to get facts from Greece from sources less poisoned with
+prejudice than the Times' correspondent.[A] And I am fain to believe
+that a Scotch Presbyterian may easily have more heart, brains, and
+religion than one who combines church and state with the betting-book,
+and, among all races, honors least the human race.
+
+      [A] It is only fair to state here that the Times'
+          correspondent, minus his Mishellenism, is a most genial,
+          accomplished, and hospitable person.
+
+Our war upon the Turks is a war of biscuit and of cotton cloth. We run
+every permissible risk to feed the hungry and clothe the naked, both of
+these terms being of literal application. Our agent lands his
+insufficient cargo, and before his errand is known, the moan and wail of
+the suffering ones break out from hill-side and cavern. _Psomi!_
+_psomi!_ for God's sake, bread! And here comes the sad procession. The
+merciful man is ashamed to look at the women; their rags do not cover
+them. Hunted are they and starved like beasts. But the sultan feasts in
+England well. O, brave and merciful hearts of men and women, be lifted
+up to help them. And O, noble people, poor and hard-working,
+unsophisticated by theories which make the Turk's dominion a necessary
+nuisance, and his religion a form of Christianity, do you come forward,
+and make common cause with Christ's poor and oppressed, whose faces are
+ground, whose chains are riveted, in his name.
+
+Last evening the veteran received his Cretan mail. The biscuits arrived
+safely. The letters which acknowledge them begin with, "Glory to the
+triune God!" They then invoke blessings on the American people, and
+fervently thank the veteran, who has been at once the provoker of their
+zeal and the distributor of their bounty. Such thanks are painful; they
+make us feel the agonized suffering to which our small largess gives a
+momentary relief. The Arkadi, our blockade-runner, after landing her
+cargo, took on board more than three hundred women and children, fleeing
+from the last extremities of want and misery. This morning appears at
+the door of our hotel a little group of these unfortunates--a mother
+with four small children, the youngest a little nursing babe. Bread we
+give them, and a line to the committee. We ask the woman if she would
+not go back to Crete. "O God! no," she replies: "the Turks would murder
+us."
+
+Before the letters came, last evening, we heard continual cries of
+"Pende lepta," betokening the issue of an extra. The servant buys one
+and brings it. The news from Crete is, that Mechmet Pacha has been in a
+measure surrounded by the Cretans. Our veteran shakes his head, and
+fears that it is otherwise. A little later come in some of our Cretan
+friends, together with one or two new faces. They are hopeful and in
+some excitement. In the midst of this arrives the Cretan budget, as
+before mentioned. Eagerly indeed are the letters devoured. But the
+veteran remains thoughtful, and not sanguine. And when we are alone, I
+find that he will go at once to France and England, jog the easy
+conscience of diplomacy, and appeal to the sense and sympathy of the
+people. I utter a hearty "God speed!" We had intended visiting
+Constantinople; but that is now given up, and scarcely regretted, so
+urgent is the need of doing all that can be done for Crete.
+
+
+
+
+EXCURSIONS.
+
+
+To return to matters purely personal. I must not set down the heat and
+monotony of long days in Athens without stating also the _per contras_
+of freshness and enjoyment which have been paid in by various small
+undertakings and excursions. First among these I will mention a morning
+meeting under the columns of Jupiter Olympius. A small party of us, by
+appointment, started at five A. M., and reached the columns, some ten
+minutes later. They stand quite flatly on a large plain, lifting their
+Corinthian capitals high in the blue empyrean. But this we have already
+described elsewhere. On this occasion we take seats in the comforting
+shadow, around a little table, and call for coffee, lemonade, and
+lokumias. The early morning is very beautiful. A company of soldiers
+goes through its drill quite near us. Presently its officers also
+retreat under the shadows, take chairs and a table, and call for what
+pleases them best. The regimental band plays an air or two, perhaps in
+compliment to the neophytes, who are of our company. We enjoy the unique
+scene and combination--the picturesque costumes, the beauties and
+associations of the spot. So rampant does this effort make us, that we
+determine to have a meeting in the Acropolis in the afternoon of this
+very day, of cloudless promise, like its fellows.
+
+We disperse and return home before the severe heat of the morning sets
+in; and this is well, for between the shade of the pepper-tree walk and
+the shade of the columns there is a long tract of sunny expanse. At this
+hour it is quite endurable; an hour later it becomes overpowering. We
+pass the day after the usual fashion. At six o'clock in the afternoon we
+do meet in the Acropolis, and hold poetic session in a sheltered corner
+of the Parthenon. She who was there invited to read her own and other
+verses felt an especial joy and honor in so doing. And we had
+recitations besides, and singing, and Bengal lights, which the fairest
+of moons put to shame. And we went home afterwards with great
+reluctance.
+
+We had three windy days in Athens, really of a cool and boisterous
+quality. We took advantage of one of them to visit Eleusis, where stood
+the great Temple of Ceres, famous as the scene of initiation into the
+Eleusinian mysteries, which formed an epoch in the youth of every Greek.
+The road to it leads through Daphne, the spot on which Apollo is
+supposed to have chased the classic nymph. The rose laurels (oleanders)
+still bloom on its somewhat barren soil. The way leads also by the sea,
+commanding a refreshing outlook on the same. A modern Albanian village
+covers the greater part of the space formerly occupied by the temple. As
+the day is Sunday, we find the inhabitants walking about in picturesque
+costumes, the men in embroidered jackets or goatskin capotes, the
+shoulder of the garment expanding into a wide, short sleeve; the women
+in narrow skirts, wearing long, narrow redingotes without sleeves, in a
+coarse white woollen material, with two rows of black embroidery down
+the back, between which falls their long, braided hair, tied at the end
+with a black ribbon. Some of them wore at the waist large girdle-clasps,
+composed of two disks of silvered copper, not unlike a belt ornament
+worn by ladies in our own country. We asked leave to enter one of the
+small thatched cottages. It consisted of a single room. The walls were
+neatly whitewashed. An earthen pot was boiling upon a fire of sticks. I
+saw no furniture except a low wooden chest, on which was seated an old
+woman, the grandmother of the family. Several young women occupied the
+hut with her; all had small children with them. They stood about, all
+but one, who sat on the floor in a corner, soothing a sick and crying
+child. Of the ruins of the temple a small angle only is exposed. It
+includes some square yards of marble pavement, fragments of pillars, and
+one very large and fine Corinthian capital. It shows, besides this, some
+remnants of masonry indicating a number of small chambers. Near it is a
+wall, piled up of large pieces of the finest Greek marble, roughly
+broken with a hammer--the wreck, obviously, of former walls or columns.
+The magnitude of the temple is marked by some stones lying quite at the
+other end of the village street: the space between these and those first
+mentioned would indicate a building of enormous extent. Much of its
+ruined material probably underlies the little village, and will scarcely
+be brought to light in these times. A small cabin adjacent is dignified
+with the title of museum. To this we were admitted by a custode, an old
+soldier, who has it in charge. The collection consists of a mass of
+small fragments, some of which formerly belonged to statues, some to
+architectural sculptures. We saw little to move the cupidity of the
+visitor, but tried to bargain for one relic less ugly than the rest; in
+vain, however. A Frenchman, not long ago, took from these ruins many
+valuable objects, marbles, and even jewelry; since which time the
+government has strictly forbidden these Elgin thefts. The custode's
+domestic arrangements amused me more than did his museum. There was one
+very poor little tin, in which he boiled his coffee; another, smaller
+and more miserable, held oil and a wick. He had gunpowder in a gourd.
+His bed was small and much dilapidated. A fragment of mat thrown upon a
+heap of stones was his only seat. Few beggars in America are, probably,
+so ill provided with the appliances of life.
+
+One of the women of the cabin I had visited followed me to the museum,
+and naturally held out her hand for "pende lepta." Yet beggary is very
+rare in Greece, and this petitioner asked in rather a shamefaced
+manner, pointing to the little baby on her arm. And this is all that
+there is to narrate of the expedition to Eleusis.
+
+Of a more stately character was the expedition to Kephissia. We started
+at seven in the morning. There were two carriage-loads of our party;
+for, in addition to the veteran's six-syllabled secretary, we were
+accompanied by an amiable Greek family, whose guests we became for the
+day. In the villages that surround Athens there are no hotels or
+lodging-houses of any description. The traveller perforce implores
+hospitality, and usually receives it. On this occasion our friends had
+asked and obtained the key of a large and sumptuous house at Kephissia,
+whose owners are absent. They had also secured the company of three
+_gens d'armes_, who galloped along the dusty road beside us. The drive
+at this early hour was cool and most refreshing. The only drawback to
+its comfort was the dust, which the foremost carriage could not avoid
+sending back to that which followed. We reached first the village of
+Maroussi, a pretty, shady little place, in whose café we saw a group of
+peasants playing at cards. The usual appliances, coffee and tobacco,
+were also visible. Here we stopped to water the horses. A handsome
+marble fountain, beneath a shady clump of trees, bears the names of the
+family who caused it to be erected for the public good. Shade and water
+are, indeed, the two luxuries of regions such as these. A little farther
+on, we came to Kephissia, and stopped at the door of the palatial
+residence that was to give us shelter for the day. We entered a hall
+paved with white marble, and ascended a marble staircase. We now found
+ourselves in a spacious set of apartments, well kept, and furnished
+according to the Greek theory of summer furniture. Roomy divans extended
+with the walls of each _salon_, of which there were three, opening one
+into the other. Tables and chairs there were; and, had the proprietors
+resided there, handsome Turkish mats would, no doubt, have variegated
+the bare floors. The chief _salon_ opened upon a balcony commanding an
+extensive view. The fresh wind blew to quite a gale, greatly raising our
+languid energies. On the walls of this apartment hung two
+portraits--those of the former master and mistress of the house. She was
+sumptuous in dark blue velvet, with a collar of Valenciennes lace and a
+fastening bow of blue plaid ribbon. Her fingers were adorned with rings.
+Her husband appeared in his best broadcloth, wearing on his head a red
+fez with a white under edge. He had begun life in a humble station, and
+had raised himself to great opulence by his own exertions. Something of
+the consciousness of this was expressed in his countenance, which was a
+good-natured one. He and his wife did not long enjoy the fortune so
+justly earned. They died almost before the house at Kephissia was
+finished, bequeathing its magnificence to two young nephews, also rich,
+but resident in Italy.
+
+The freedom of our day here made amends for the many days of hot
+imprisonment passed in the hotel at Athens. Breakfast was necessary on
+first arriving. We then surveyed the bedrooms and made arrangements for
+our midday nap. We found comfortable bedsteads of bright metal. The
+servants brought clean mattresses, and unrolled them for us. Water and
+towels we enjoyed in abundance. We then walked out to view the environs.
+And first our steps brought us to an enormous plane tree, under whose
+far-reaching shade the gossips of the village hold their daily meetings.
+The boughs of this tree, with the cleared space under them, formed a
+sort of rustic _salon_, cool and delightful even in the heat of the day.
+The unfailing café was near at hand; its chairs and tables were
+scattered about these rustic purlieus, and its servants waited for
+orders. Here our companions encountered various acquaintances from the
+city, who have come hither to pass the season of the great heats. They
+wore white veils on their straw hats, as is much the custom here, and
+had altogether the enfranchised air which city men are wont to assume in
+country retirement. Mail and public conveyance they had none. One of our
+party brought them letters, and took the answers back to Athens. We now
+went in search of the source of the Kephisus, called Kefalari. We found
+a deep spring of the purest water, very cool for these parts, and
+constantly welling up. So clear was this pool that one saw without
+impediment the smallest objects at the bottom of the water. There were
+waving trees beside it. We sat down, and drank, and rested. Our walk
+next brought us to a wine factory, and, as we entered to look at it, the
+sound of a grand piano, skilfully touched, arrested us. Our friends
+guessed the unseen artist, and knocked at her door for admittance.
+Entering, we found two ladies, mother and daughter, of whom the elder
+was the mistress of the musical instrument. The daughter, very young,
+but already married, bears the historical name of Colocotroni, her
+husband being the grandson of the old revolutionary chieftain of that
+name. These ladies own extensive possessions in this vicinity, and the
+establishment in which we were belonged to them. They have a large villa
+at some distance; but fear of the brigands induces them to be satisfied
+with the shelter of two or three rooms, divided off from the rest of the
+factory, in which they live in comfortable simplicity. The table was
+laid for their _déjeûner_ in a little arbor made of pine tree branches.
+Dinner they took at twilight, without shelter. They entertained us with
+the invariable _gliko_ and water, and, at our request, the elder lady
+gave us a specimen of her skill in dealing with the piano-forte. Madame
+Colocotroni speaks both French and English, and the books and pamphlets
+in her drawing-room had quite a cosmopolitan air of culture.
+
+After these doings, we returned to the great house, and sheltered
+ourselves in its shady rooms. Here reading, worsted work, and
+conversation beguiled the time until dinner was announced. The
+gentlemen, meanwhile, had retired to smoke and discuss political
+questions. The dinner was much too well-appointed for a country picnic.
+Our munificent entertainers had sent out their own valets and _chef de
+cuisine_. And so we had potage, and entrées, and dessert, with Kephissia
+wine, both white and red, of which I found the former much like a
+Sauterne wine, and very mild and pure in quality. One of the guests was
+an Asiatic Greek from Broussa. His politics were of the backward
+sort--those of the Greek Greeks were radical and progressive. The dinner
+arena developed therefore some amicable differences of opinion. He from
+Broussa gave me a few characteristic particulars of his life. When he
+was but a year old, his father chartered a ship, put much of his
+property on board of her, and sent therewith his children to be educated
+in Europe. After many years of absence, M. L. returned to Broussa, to
+seek some traces of his family. Such as remained of them had been
+compelled by the pressure of circumstances to adopt the Turkish
+language, and to profess Mohammedanism. Their Christian prayers they
+always continued to recite in private, but were fain by every outward
+expedient to escape the ill treatment which Christians receive in a
+country in which Turkish authority is dominant. He told me--what I hear
+strongly corroborated by other testimony--that the Turks had often cut
+out the tongues of Greek women, in order that they should not be able to
+teach their children either their own language or their own religion.
+Under these circumstances the gradual absorption of the race in those
+regions seems almost inevitable.
+
+An after-dinner nap and a ramble completed our experience of Kephissia.
+At sunset we started homeward, the carriages all open, the _gens
+d'armes_ galloping, the dust playing a thousand solid antics, and
+writing hieroglyphics of movement all over our garments and faces. We
+found the little village of Maroussi cool with the evening shadows, and
+the women and children with their pitchers gathered around the marble
+fountain. We ourselves came back to Athens in a cooled and consoled
+condition, and said at parting, commanding the little Greek we knew,
+_Poly kalá-evkaristò_.
+
+
+
+
+HYMETTUS.
+
+
+It happened that the next day was fixed upon for a visit to Hymettus,
+whose water is celebrated, as well as its honey. A certain monkless
+monastery on the side of the mountain receives travellers within its
+shady courts, and allows them to feed, rest, and amuse themselves
+according to their own pleasure. We started on this classic journey soon
+after five A. M., carrying with us a basket containing cold chicken,
+bread, and fruit. We filled one carriage; a party of friends accompanied
+us in another. The road to Hymettus is hilly and difficult; and our own
+troubles in travelling it were augmented by those of our friends in the
+foremost carriages, whose horses, at an early period in the ascent,
+began to back and balk. As these horses, who go so ill, insist upon
+going first, and refuse to stir the moment we take the lead, it comes to
+pass that in some steep ascents they press back upon us, to our
+discomfort and danger.
+
+An anxious hour brings us to the convent, which stands at no great
+elevation on the side of the mountain. The sun is already burning, and
+we are glad to take refuge in the shady inner court of the convent,
+where we are to pass the day. Our friends of the other carriage have
+brought with them Hatty, a child two years of age, and Marigo, a little
+servant of thirteen. The latter has somewhat the complexion of a
+potato-skin, with vivacious eyes, and dark hair, bound, after the Greek
+fashion, with a handkerchief. A young brother follows on a slow donkey,
+which he belabors to his heart's content.
+
+The court just spoken of is a small enclosure, surrounded on all sides
+by whitewashed walls, of which one includes a small chapel, with its
+tapers and painted images. In one corner a doorway leads into a den
+which must once have served as a kitchen. It is roughly built of stone,
+with no chimney, its roof presenting various apertures for the issue of
+smoke. Here a fire of sticks is hastily kindled on a layer of stones,
+and the coffee, boiled at home, is made hot for us. A wooden table is
+allowed us from the convent, which we decorate with a white cloth and
+green leaves. Rolls, butter, hard-boiled eggs, and fruits, together with
+the coffee, constitute a very presentable breakfast. We have around us
+the shade of vines and of lemon trees. Our repast is gay. When it is
+ended, we amuse ourselves with books, work, and conversation of a scope
+suited to the weather. An Athenian Plato could discourse philosophy in
+the present state of the thermometer. We need it more than ever he did,
+but we cannot attain it.
+
+While we sit cheerful and quiescent, dodging the sharp sunlight, which
+slyly carries one position after another, sounds of laughter from the
+outer court reach our ears. This is a feast day, and in this outer court
+a company of Athenian artisans, of the Snug and Bottom order, are
+keeping it after their fashion. Following their voices, we come to a
+shady terrace, where some eight or ten men are seated on the ground
+around a wooden table, one foot in height, while two or three of their
+comrades are employed in cutting up a lamb newly roasted, spitted on a
+long, slender pole.
+
+The cooking apparatus consisted of two or three stones, on which the
+fire of sticks was kindled, and of two forked stakes, planted upright,
+across which the spit and roast were laid. While the two before
+mentioned were hacking the paschal lamb with rude anatomy, a third was
+occupied with the salad, consisting of cucumbers sliced, with green
+herbs, oil, and vinegar. Olives, bread, and wine completed the repast.
+As we stood surveying them, one of their number approached us, bearing
+in one hand a plate containing choice morsels of the roasted meat. This
+he offered to each of us in turn, with great courtesy. In the other hand
+he carried a rather dirty fragment of cotton cloth, which he also
+presented to each in turn, as a towel. We took the meat with our
+fingers, and ate it standing, in true Passover fashion. The doubtful
+accommodation of the table napkin also we were glad to accept. Having
+fed each of us, he presently returned with a glass and bottle of wine,
+which he poured out and offered, saying, "_Eleuthera, eleuthera_" which
+signifies "free, free." The wine, however, was a little out of rule for
+us, and was therefore declined.
+
+This man wore neither coat nor shoes, but his manners were full dress.
+His comrades, meanwhile, had fallen to attacking their provisions with a
+hearty good will. When the wine was poured out, a toast was proposed,
+and "_Eleutheria tis Cretis_" ("the liberty of Crete") rang from every
+lip. "Amen, amen," answered we, and the _entente cordiale_ was at once
+established. Having eaten and drunk, they began to sing in a monotonous
+strain, keeping time by clapping their hands. Retiring to our court, we
+still heard this cadence from theirs. Their song, though little musical,
+had no brutal intonations. It breathed a rather refined good nature and
+hilarity. When we again visited our neighbors, they were dancing. All,
+save two of them, formed a line, joining hands, the leader and the one
+next him holding together by a pocket handkerchief. They sang all the
+while, stepping rather slowly. The leader, at intervals, made as though
+he would sit upon the ground, and then suddenly sprang high, with an
+_oich!_ something like the shout in a Highland fling. In another figure,
+they all lay upon their backs, springing up again quite abruptly, and
+continuing their round.
+
+These doings, together with talking, writing, and needle-work, brought
+on the hour at which, in these climates, sleep becomes necessary. In
+Greece, if you have risen early in the morning, by noon, or soon after,
+you are sensible of a sudden ebb of energy. The marrow seems to forsake
+your bones, the volition your muscles. You may not feel common
+sleepiness, but your skeleton demands instant release from its upright
+effort. You ask to become a heap, instead of a pile, and on the offer of
+the first accommodation, you fall like the disjointed column of Jupiter
+Olympius, more fortunate only in the easier renewal of your
+architecture. Such a fall, at this moment, the stiffest of us coveted.
+
+Meanwhile, an ancient hag, from the inner recesses of the building, had
+waited upon us, with copious chattering of her pleasure in seeing us,
+and of the drawback which the brigands had offered to her little
+business of serving the strangers who used to visit the convent before
+Kitzos and others made them afraid. For, the convent no longer
+containing monks, those who occupy it are glad to accommodate visitors
+from Athens and elsewhere. And the hag brought some heavy mats and
+quilts, and spread them on the floor of a little whitewashed out-house.
+And on these the little two-year-old child and others of the party lay
+down and slept. But "_e megale kyrie_"--meaning here the elder
+lady,--said the hag, "cannot sleep on the floor. I have a good bed up
+stairs; she shall lie there."
+
+So up stairs mounted the _megale kyrie_, and found a quiet room, and a
+bed spread with clean sheets in one corner. A rude chintz lounge, a
+wooden chest, and an eight-inch mirror completed the furniture of this
+apartment. Here, in the bed-corner, the Olympian column of _e megale_
+fell, and barbarian sleep, sleep of the _middle ages_, at once seized
+upon it and kept it prostrate. After a brief interval of Gothic
+darkness, the column rose again, and confronted the windows commanding a
+view of the court. On one of its wooden settles lay the young Greek
+secretary in wholesome slumber. Not far from him rested the Greek
+missionary, a graduate of Amherst, and a genial and energetic man. And
+presently the two-year-old, waking, desires to waken these also, and
+makes divers attempts against their peace, causing _e megale_ to descend
+for their protection. On her way, in an outer passage, she encounters a
+poor woman, lying on a heap of cedar boughs, and bewailing a bitter
+headache. Dinner-time next arrives. The wooden tables are once more set
+out with meat and fruit. We exert ourselves to give the feast a
+picturesque aspect, and are not altogether unsuccessful in so doing. The
+true feast, however, seems to consist in saying over to one's self,
+"This is Greece--this is Hymettus. I am I, and I am here." And now the
+greatest heat of the day being overpast, a ramble is proposed.
+
+The young people, escorted by the missionary, climb half the steep
+ascent of the mountain. _E megale_ and the secretary pause in the outer
+court, to whose festivities a new feature is now added. Our friends, the
+artisans, have feasted again, and little of the lamb remains save the
+bones. They are singing and dancing as before, but a strange figure from
+the mountain has joined them. He calls himself a shepherd, but looks
+much like a brigand. He wears a jacket, fustanella, and leggings, of the
+dirtiest possible white--a white which mocks at all washings, past and
+future. He has taken the leadership of the coryphées, and now executes a
+dance which is called the "Klepht." His sly movements express cunning,
+to which the twinkle of his sinister eyes responds. Now he pretends to
+be stabbed from behind; now he creeps cautiously upon a pretended foe.
+His dancing, which is very quiet, fatigues him extremely; but before
+making an end, he performs the feat of carrying a glass of wine on his
+head through various movements, not spilling a drop of it. The artisans
+are now intending to break up. They cork the bottles of wine and
+vinegar, empty and repack the dishes. We have brought them some fruit
+from our dessert. One of them makes a little speech to us, in behalf of
+all, thanking for our interest in the freedom of Crete and in the
+prosperity of their country. And "_Zeto! zeto!_" (live! live!) was the
+pleasant termination of the discourse, to which we were obliged to
+respond through the medium of a friendly interpretation.
+
+Finally the day began to wane, and we to pack and embark. The bell of
+the little church now made itself heard, and, looking in, we saw the
+priest engaged in going through his service, while a very homespun
+assistant stood at the reading-desk, wearing spectacles upon his nose,
+and making responses through it. A circlet of tapers was burning before
+the altar. One old woman or so, a peasant mother with her child,--these
+were the congregation. The idea of the Greek as of the Catholic mass is,
+that it effects a propitiation of the Divine Being; so the priest
+performs his office, often with little or no following. As to those who
+should attend, I believe that one pays one's money and has one's choice;
+there is nothing absolute about it. And now _e megale_ bestows a
+trifling largess upon the hag, who has also dined off the relics of our
+feast. The books and work are gathered, the carriages summoned. Item,
+our driver wore a Palicari dress, and took part, very lamely, in the
+dances we witnessed. Farewell, Hymettus! farewell, shady convent, clear
+and sparkling water! We kiss our hands to you, and cherish you in our
+remembrance.
+
+On our homeward way we soon passed the Athenian party, riding ten or
+twelve in a one-horse cart, carrying with them for an ensign the pole on
+which their lamb had been spitted. They saluted us, and we shouted back,
+"_Eleutheria tis Kritis!_" Amen, simple souls! your instincts are wiser
+than the reasons of diplomatists.
+
+
+
+
+ITEMS.
+
+
+My remaining chronicles of Athens will be brief and simple--gleanings at
+large from the field of memory, whose harvests grow more uncertain as
+the memorizer grows older. In youth the die is new and sharp, and the
+impression distinct and clean cut. This sharpness of outline wears with
+age; all things observed give us more the common material of human life,
+less its individual features. In this point of view it may well be that
+I shall often speak of things trivial, and omit matters of greater
+importance. Yet even these trifles, sketched in surroundings so
+grandiose, may serve to shadow out the features of something greater
+than themselves, always inwardly felt, even when not especially
+depicted. It is in this hope that I bind together my few and precious
+reminiscences of Grecian life, and present them, inadequate as they
+are, as almost better than anything else I have.
+
+
+
+
+THE PALACE.
+
+
+Armed with a permit, and accompanied by a Greek friend, we walked, one
+bitter hot afternoon, to see the royal palace built by King Otho, it is
+said, out of his own appanage, or private income. As an investment even
+for his own ultimate benefit, he would have done much better in
+expending the money on some of the improvements so much needed in his
+capital. The salary of the King of Greece amounts to two hundred and
+fifty thousand dollars; and this sum is sufficiently disproportionate to
+the slender monetary resources of the kingdom, without the additional
+testimony of this palatial monument of a monarch who wished to live like
+a rich man in a poor country. The palace is a very large one. It not
+only encloses a hollow square, but divides that square by an extension
+running across it. The internal arrangements and adornments are mostly
+in good taste, and one can imagine that when the king and queen held
+their state there, the state apartments may have made a brave show. The
+rooms now appear rather scantily furnished; the hangings are faded; and
+one can make one's own reflections upon the vanity and folly of
+ambitious expense, unperverted by the witchery of present luxury, which
+always argues, "Yes, the peasants have no beds, but see--this arm-chair
+is so comfortable!" Now, luxury was for the time absent on leave, and
+we thought much of the peasant, and little of the prince. For the
+peasant is a fact, and the prince but a symbol, and a symbol of that
+which to-day can be represented without him; viz., the unity of will and
+action essential to the existence of the state. This unity to-day is
+accomplished by the coöperation of the multitude, not by its exclusion.
+The symbol remains useful, but no longer sublime. No need, therefore, to
+exaggerate the difference between the common symbol and the common man.
+Fortify your unity in the will and understanding of the people, not in
+their fear and imagination. And let the king be moderate in his
+following, and illustrious in his character and office. So shall he be a
+leader as well as a banner--a fact as well as a symbol.
+
+While I thought these things, I admired Queen Amalia's blue, pink, and
+green rooms, the lustres of fine Bohemian glass, the suite of apartments
+for royal visitors, the ball-room and its marble columns, running
+through two stories in height, and altogether well-appointed. "The court
+balls were beautiful," said my companion, "and the hall is very
+brilliant when lighted and filled." "Is the queen regretted?" I asked.
+"Not much," was the moderate reply.
+
+The theatre interested me more, with its scenes still standing. In the
+same hall, at the other end, is a frame and enclosure for "tableaux
+vivants," of which the court were very fond. The prettiest girls in
+Athens came here, and _posed_ as Muses, Minervas, and what not. I have
+the photograph of one, with her white robe and lyre. And this brings to
+me the only good word I can say for Otho and Amalia, in the historic
+light in which I view them. They were not gross, nor cruel, nor
+sluttish. Their tastes and pleasures were of the refined, social order,
+and in so far their influence and example were softening and civilizing
+in tendency. The temporary prevalence of the German element has
+introduced a tendency towards German culture. And while the Greeks who
+seek commercial education very generally migrate to London or Liverpool,
+the men most accomplished in letters and philosophy have studied in
+Germany. All this may not have hindered the German patronage from
+becoming oppressive, nor the German rule from becoming intolerable to
+the people at large. But, with the examples of this and other ages
+before one, one thanks a monarch for not becoming either a beast or a
+butcher. Otho was neither. But neither was he, on the other hand, a
+Greek, nor a lover of Greeks. Nor could he and his queen present the
+people with a successor Greek in birth, if not in parentage. This
+absence of offspring, which is said to have sorely galled the queen, was
+really a weak point in their case before the people. To be ruled by a
+Greek is their natural and just desire.
+
+Europe, which has so little charity for their divergence from her
+absolute standard, must remember that it is not at their request that
+this expensive and uncongenial condition of a foreign prince has been
+annexed to their system of government. The superstitions of the old
+world have here planted a seed of mischief in the gardens of the new.
+England finds it most convenient to be governed by a German; France, by
+an Italian; Russia, by a Tartar line. What more natural than that they
+should muffle new-born Greece in their own antiquated fashions? The
+Greeks assassinated Capo d'Istrias for acts of tyranny from which they
+knew no other escape. For, indeed, the head of their state was very
+clumsily adjusted to its body by the same powers who left out of their
+construction several of its most important members. An arbitrary
+president was no head for a nation which had just conquered its own
+liberty. A foreign absolute prince was only the same thing, with another
+name and a larger salary. By their last resolution the Greeks have
+attained a constitutional government. If their present king cannot
+administer such a one properly, he will make room for some one who can.
+To his political duties, meanwhile, military ones will be added. Greece
+for the Greeks,--Candia, Thessaly, and Epirus delivered from the Moslem
+yoke,--this will be the watchword, to which he must reply or vanish.
+
+It is in the face of America that the new nations, Greece and Italy,
+must look for encouragement and recognition. The old diplomacy has no
+solution for their difficulties, no cure for their distresses. The
+experience of the present century has developed new political methods,
+new social combinations. In the domestic economy of France and England
+these new features are felt and acknowledged. But in the foreign policy
+of those nations the element of progress scarcely appears. In this,
+force still takes the place of reason; the right of conquest depends
+upon the power of him who undertakes it; and in the farthest regions
+visited by their flags, organized barbarism gets the better of
+disorganized barbarism. The English in India, the French in Algeria,
+were first brigands, then brokers. Of these two, we need not tell the
+civilized world that the broker plunders best.
+
+Greece is a poor democracy; America, a rich one. The second commands all
+the luxuries and commodities of life; the first, little more than its
+necessaries. Yet we, coming from our own state of things, can understand
+how the Greek values himself upon being a man, and upon having a part in
+the efficient action of the commonwealth. Greece is reproached with
+giving too ambitious an education to her sons and daughters. Her
+institutions form teachers, not maids and valets, mistresses and
+masters, not servants. But for this America will not reproach
+her--America, whose shop-girls take music lessons, whose poorest menials
+attend lectures, concerts, and balls. A democratic people does not
+acquiesce either in priestly or in diplomatic precedence. Let people
+perform their uses, earn their bread, enjoy their own, and respect their
+neighbors; these are the maxims of good life in a democratic country.
+"Love God, love thy neighbor," is better than "fear God, honor the
+king." As to the sycophancy of snobs, the corruption of office, the
+contingent insufficiency alike of electors and elected,--these are the
+accidents of all human governments, to be arrested only by the constant
+watchfulness of the wiser spirits, the true pilots of the state.
+
+By the time that I had excogitated all this, my feet had visited many
+square yards of palace, comprising bed-room, banqueting-room, chief
+lady's room, chapel, and so on. I had seen the queen's garden, and the
+_palmas qui meruit ferat_, and which she has left for her successor. I
+had seen, too, the fine view from the upper windows, sweeping from the
+Acropolis to the sea. I had exchanged various remarks with my Athenian
+companion. New furniture was expected with the Russian princess, but
+scarcely new enthusiasm. The little king had stopped the movement in
+Thessaly, which would have diverted the Turkish force now concentrated
+upon Crete, giving that laboring island a chance of rising above the
+bloody waters that drown her. Little love did the little king earn by
+this course. One might say that he is on probation, and will, in the
+end, get his deserts, and no more. And here my friend has slipped some
+suitable coin into the hand of the smiling major-domo, who showed us
+over the royal house. Farewell, palace: the day of kings is over.
+Peoples have now their turn, and God wills it.
+
+
+
+
+THE CATHEDRAL.
+
+
+In close juxtaposition with the state is the church. In America we have
+religious liberty. This does not mean that a man has morally the right
+to have no religion, but that the very nature of religion requires that
+he should hold his own convictions above the ordinances of others. The
+Greeks have religious liberty, whose idea is rather this, that people
+may believe much as they please, provided they adhere outwardly to the
+national church. The reason assigned for this is, that any change in the
+form or discipline of this church would weaken the bond that unites the
+Greeks out of Greece proper with those within her limits. This outward
+compression and inward latitude is always a dangerous symptom. It points
+to practical irreligion, an ever widening distance between a man's
+inward convictions and his outward practice. Passing this by, however,
+let us have a few words on the familiar aspect and practical working of
+the Greek church as at present administered. Like other bodies politic
+and individual already known to us, it consists of a reconciled
+opposition, which, held within bounds, secures its efficiency. The same,
+passing those bounds, would cause its annihilation. Like other churches,
+it is at once aristocratic and democratic. It binds and looses. It is
+less intellectual than either Catholicism or Protestantism; perhaps less
+intolerant than either, so far as dogma goes. I still think it narrower
+than either in the scope of its sympathies, lower than either in its
+social and individual standard. Taken with the others, it makes up the
+desired three of human conditions; but before it can meet them
+harmoniously, it has a long way to go.
+
+Refusing images, but clinging to pictures; allowing the Scriptures to
+the common people, but discouraging their use of the same; with an
+unmarried hierarchy of some education, and a married secular clergy of
+none,--the Greek church seems to me to be too flatly in contradiction
+with itself and with the spirit of the age to maintain long a social
+supremacy, a moral efficiency. The department of the clergy last
+mentioned receive no other support than that of the contingent
+contributions of the people, paid in small sums, as the wages of
+services better withheld than rendered. Exorcisms, benedictions, prayers
+recited over graves, or secured as a cure for sick cattle,--these are
+some of the sacerdotal acts by which the lesser clergy live. Those who
+wish to keep these resources open must, of course, discourage the
+reading of the New Testament, whose great aim and tendency are to
+substitute a religion of life and doctrine for a religion of
+observances. Congregations reading this book for themselves, no matter
+how poor or ignorant in other matters, will ask something other of the
+priest than the exorcism of demons or the cure of cattle.
+
+Of the higher clergy, some have studied in Germany, and, reversing Mr.
+Emerson's sentence, must know, one thinks, better than they build.
+Orthodox their will may be, firm their adherence to the establishment,
+strict their administration of it. But they must be aware of the limits
+that it sets to religious progress. And so long as they cannot preach to
+their congregations the full sincerity and power of their inward
+convictions, their ministration loses in moral power,--the house is
+divided against itself.
+
+I visited the Cathedral of Athens but once. It is a spacious and
+handsome church, in what I should call a modern Eastern style. It was
+on Sunday, and mass was going on. The middle and right aisles were
+filled with men, the left aisle with women. I do not know whether I have
+mentioned elsewhere that in the Greek and Russian, as in the Quaker
+church, men and women stand separately--stand, for seats are neither
+provided nor allowed. I found a place among the women, commanding a view
+of the high altar. The archbishop, a venerable-looking man, in gold
+brocade and golden head-dress, went through various functions, which,
+though not identical with those of the Romish mass, seemed to amount to
+about the same thing. There were bowings, appearings and retirings, the
+swinging of censers, and the presentation of tapers fixed in silver
+candelabras, and tied in the middle with black ribbon, so as to form a
+sheaf. These candelabras the archbishop from time to time took, one
+under each arm, and made a step or two towards the congregation. The
+dresses of the assistant priests were very rich, and their heads
+altogether Oriental in aspect. One of them, with his gold-bronzed face
+and golden hair, looked like pictures of St. John. The vocal part of the
+performance consisted of a sort of chant, with responses intensely nasal
+and unmusical. This psalmody, which is little relished by Greeks of
+culture, is yet maintained, like the discipline, intact, lest the most
+trifling amelioration should weaken the tie of Christian brotherhood
+between the free Greek church and the church that is in bondage with her
+children. To one familiar with the pretexts of conservatism, this plea
+of union before improvement is not new nor availing. One laughs, and
+remembers the respectabilities who tried to paralyze the American
+intellect and conscience in order to save the Union, which, after all,
+was saved only by the measures they abhorred and denounced. I had soon
+enough of what I was able to hear and see of the Greek mass. As I stole
+softly away, I passed a sort of lesser altar, before which was burning a
+circular row of tapers. An old woman had similar tapers on a small
+table, for sale, I suppose. I was invited, by gesture, to consummate a
+pious act by the purchase of some of these, but declined, not without
+remembering that I was some time since elected a lay delegate from a
+certain Unitarian church to a certain Unitarian conference. This fact,
+if communicated, would not have heightened my standing in the
+approbation of the sisters who then surrounded me. "What, no candle?"
+said their indignant glances. I was silent, and fled.
+
+
+
+
+THE MISSIONARIES.
+
+
+In the presence of the contradictions alluded to above, the position of
+the Greek church and of American Protestant missionaries becomes one of
+mutual delicacy and difficulty. The church allows religious liberty, and
+assumes religious tolerance. Yet it naturally holds fast its own
+children within its own borders. The Protestants are pledged to labor
+for the world's Christianization. When they see its progress opposed by
+antiquated usage and insufficient method, they cannot acquiesce in these
+obstacles, nor teach others to revere them. Here we must say at once
+that no act is so irreligious as the resistance of progress. Thought and
+conscience are progressive. Christ's progressive labor carried further
+the Jewish faith and tenets which were religious before he came, but
+which became irreligious in resisting the further and finer conclusions
+to which he led. "I come not to destroy, but to fulfil." Progress does
+fulfil in the spirit, even though it destroy in the letter.
+Protestantism acknowledges this, and this acknowledgment constitutes its
+superiority over the Greek and Catholic churches. The sincere reader of
+the New Testament will be ever more and more disposed to make his
+religion a matter lying directly between himself and the Divine Being.
+His outward conformity to all just laws and good institutions will be,
+not the less, but the more, perfect because his scale of obligation is
+an individual one, the spring and motive of his actions a deeply inward
+one. Church and state gain in soundness and efficiency by every
+individual conscience that functions within their bounds. Religion of
+this sort leads away from human mediations, from confessions,
+benedictions, injunctions, and permissions of merely human authority. It
+confesses first to God, afterwards, if at all, to those whom its
+confessions can benefit. It brings its own thought to aid and illustrate
+the general thought. It cannot abdicate its own conclusions before any
+magnitude either of intellect or of age.
+
+The Protestant, therefore, would be much straitened within the Greek
+limits. He is forced to teach those who will listen to him that God is
+much nearer than the priest, and that their own simple and sincere
+understanding of Christian doctrine is at once more just and more
+precious than the fallacies and sophisms of an absolute theology. Such
+teaching will scarcely be more relished by the Greek than by the Romish
+clergy; yet the Protestant must teach this, or be silent.
+
+And this, after their fashion, the American missionaries do set forth
+and illustrate. Their merits and demerits I am not here to discuss. How
+much of polite culture, of sufficient philosophy, goes with their honest
+purpose, it is not at this time my business to know or to say. Neither
+is their special theology mine. They believe in a literal atonement,
+while I believe in the symbolism which makes a pure and blameless
+sufferer a victim offered in behalf of his enemies. They look for a
+miraculous, I for a moral regeneration. They make Christ divine of
+birth, I make him simply divine of life. Their dogmas would reconcile
+God to man, mine would only reconcile man to God. Finally, they revere
+as absolute and divine a book which I hold to be a human record of
+surpassing thoughts and actions, but with the short-comings, omissions,
+and errors of the human historiographer stamped upon them. With all this
+diversity of opinion between the church of their communion and that of
+mine, I still honor, beyond all difference, the Protestant cause for
+which they stand in Greece, and consider their representation a just and
+genuine one.
+
+In writing this I have had in mind the three dissenting missionaries,
+Messrs. Kalopothaki, Constantine, and Zacularius. The older mission of
+Dr. and Mrs. Hill is an educational one. I believe it to have borne the
+happiest fruits for Greece. Whenever I have met a scholar of Mrs. Hill,
+I have seen the traces of a firm, pure, and gentle hand--one to which
+the wisest and tenderest of us would willingly confide our daughters. In
+raising the whole scale of feminine education in Greece, she has applied
+the most potent and subtle agent for the elevation of its whole society.
+She herself is childless; but she need scarcely regret it, since whole
+generations are sure to rise up and call her blessed.
+
+Dr. Hill is at present chaplain to the English embassy, at whose chapel
+he preaches weekly. Mrs. Hill and himself seem to stand in very
+harmonious relations with Athenian society, as well as with the
+travelling and visiting world.
+
+The missionaries preach and practise with unremitting zeal. They also
+publish a weekly religious paper. Their wives labor faithfully in the
+aid and employment of the Cretan women and children, and, I doubt not,
+in other good works. But of these things I have now told the little that
+I know.
+
+
+
+
+THE PIAZZA.
+
+
+Venice has a Piazza, gorgeous with shops, lights, music, and, above all,
+the joyous life of the people. Athens also has a Piazza, bordered with
+hotels and cafés, with a square of trees and flowering shrubs in the
+middle. It lies broadly open to the sun all day long, and gives back his
+rays with a torrid refraction. When day declines, the evening breezes
+sweep it refreshingly. Accordingly, as soon as the shadows permit, the
+spaces in front of the cafés--or, in Greek, _cafféneions_--are crowded
+with chairs and tables, the chairs being filled by human beings, many of
+whom have ripened, so far as the head goes, into a fez--have unfolded,
+so far as the costume goes, into pali-kari petticoats and leggings.
+Between the two hotels is mortal antipathy. Ours--"Des Etrangers"--has
+taken the lead, and manages to keep it. The prices of the other are
+lower, the _cuisine_ much the same, the upper windows set to command a
+view of the Acropolis, which is in itself an unsurpassable picture.
+Where the magic resides which keeps our hotel full and the other empty,
+I know not, unless it be in the slippery Eastern smile of the
+landlord--an expression of countenance so singular that it inevitably
+leads you, from curiosity, to follow it further. In our case it led to
+no profound of wickedness. We were not cheated, nor plundered, nor got
+the better of in any way that I remember. Our food was good, our rooms
+proper, our charges just. Yet I felt, whenever I encountered the smile,
+that it angled for me, and caught me on a hook cunningly baited.
+
+I must say that our landlord was even generous. Besides our three meals
+_per diem_,--which grew to be very slender affairs, so far as we were
+concerned,--we often required lemonades and lokumia, besides sending of
+errands innumerable. For these indulgences no extra charge was made. In
+an Italian, French, or English hotel, each one of them would have had
+its penitentiary record. So the mystery of the smile must have had
+reference to matters deeply personal to its wearer, and never made known
+to me.
+
+The cafés seemed to maintain a thrifty existence. But one of them took
+especial pains to secure the services of a band of music. Hence, on the
+evenings when the public band did not play, emanated the usual
+capriccios from Norma, Trovatore, and the agonies of Traviata. Something
+better and worse than all this was given to us in the shape of certain
+ancient Greek or Turkish melodies, obviously composed in ignorance of
+all rules of thorough-bass, with a confusion of majors and minors most
+perplexing to the classic, but interesting to the historic sense. I
+rejoiced especially in one of these, which bore the same relation to
+good harmony that Eastern dress bears to good composition of color. It
+was obviously well liked by the public, as it was usually played more
+than once during the same evening.
+
+Before the shadows grew quite dark, a barouche or two, with ladies and
+livery, would drive across the Piazza, giving a whiff of fashion like
+the gleam of red costume that heightens a landscape. And the people sat,
+ate and drank, came and went, in sober gladness, not laughing
+open-mouthed--rather smiling with their eyes. From our narrow hotel
+balcony we used to look down and wonder whether we should ever be cool
+again. For though the evenings were not sultry, their length did not
+suffice to reduce the fever of the day. And the night within the
+mosquito-nettings was an agony of perspiration. I now sit in Venice, and
+am cool; but I would gladly suffer something to hear the weird music,
+and to see the cheerful Piazza again. Yet when I was there, for ten
+minutes of this sea-breeze over the lagoons I would have given--Heaven
+knows what. O Esau!
+
+
+
+
+DEPARTURE.
+
+
+Too soon, too soon for all of us, these rare and costly delights were
+ended. We had indeed suffered days of Fahrenheit at 100° in the shade.
+We had made experience of states of body which are termed bilious, of
+states of mind more or less splenetic, lethargic, and irritable. We
+dreamed always of islands we were never to visit, of ruins which we
+shall know, according to the flesh, never. We pored over Muir and Miss
+Bremer, and feebly devised outbreaks towards the islands, towards the
+Cyclades, Santorini, but especially towards Corinth, whose acropolis
+rested steadily in our wishes, resting in our memory only as a wish.
+Towards Constantinople, too, our uncertain destinies had one moment
+pointed. But when the word of command came, it despatched us westward,
+and not eastward. By this time our life had become somewhat too
+literally a vapor, and our sublimated brains were with difficulty
+condensed to the act of packing. Perpetual thirst tormented us. And of
+this as of other Eastern temptations, I must say, "Resist it." Drinking
+does not relieve this symptom of hot climates. It, moreover, utterly
+destroys the tone of the stomach. A little tea is the safest
+refreshment; and even this should not be taken in copious draughts.
+Patience and self-control are essential to bodily health and comfort
+under these torrid skies. The little food one can take should be of the
+order usually characterized as "nutritious and easy of digestion." But
+so far as health goes, "Avoid Athens in midsummer" will be the safest
+direction, and will obviate the necessity of all others.
+
+In spite, however, of all symptoms and inconveniences, the mandate that
+said, "Pack and go," struck a chill to our collective heart. We visited
+all the dear spots, gave pledges of constancy to all the kind friends,
+tried with our weak sight to photograph the precious views upon our
+memory. Then, with a sort of agony, we hurried our possessions, new and
+old, into the usual narrow receptacles, saw all accounts discharged,
+feed the hotel servants, took the smile for the last time, and found
+ourselves dashing along the road to the Piræus with feelings very unlike
+the jubilation in which we first passed that classic transit. It was all
+over now, like a first love, like a first authorship, like a honey-moon.
+It was over. We could not say that we had not had it. But O, the void of
+not having it now, of never expecting to have it again!
+
+Kind friends went with us to soften the journey. At the boat, Dr. and
+Mrs. Hill met and waited with us. I parted from the apostolic woman with
+sincere good-will and regret. Warned to be on board by six P. M., the
+boat did not start till half-past seven. We waved last adieus. We clung
+to the last glimpses of the Acropolis, of the mountains; but they soon
+passed out of sight. We savagely went below and to bed. The diary bears
+this little extract: "The Ægean was calm and blue. Thus, with great
+pleasure and interest, and with some drawbacks, ends my visit to Athens.
+A dream--a dream!"
+
+
+
+
+RETURN VOYAGE.
+
+
+To narrate the circumstances of our return voyage would seem much like
+descending from the poetic _dénouement_ of a novel to all the prosaic
+steps by which the commonplace regains its inevitable ascendency after
+no matter what abdication in favor of the heroic. Yet, as travel is
+travel, whether outward or inward bound, and as our homeward cruise had
+features, I will try, with the help of the diary, to pick them out of
+the vanishing chaos of memory, premising only that I have no further
+_dénouement_ to give.
+
+    "Story? Lord bless you, I have none to tell, sir."
+
+On referring, therefore, to Clayton's quarto, of the date of July 21,
+1867, I find the day to have been passed by us all in the hot harbor of
+Syra, on board the boat that brought us there. At seven A. M. we did
+indeed land in a small boat with Vice-Consul Saponsaki, and betake
+ourselves through several of the steep and sunny streets of the town. At
+one of the two hotels we staid long enough to order lemonades and drink
+them. The said hotel appeared, on a cursory survey, to be as dirty and
+disorderly as need be; but we soon escaped therefrom, and visited the
+theatre, the Casino, and the Austrian consul. The Casino is spacious and
+handsome, giving evidence at once of wealth and of taste in those who
+caused it to be built. Such an establishment would be a boon in Athens,
+where there is no good public reading-room of any kind. The theatre is
+reasonable. Here, in winter, a short opera season is enjoyed, and, in
+consequence, the music books of the young ladies teem with arrangements
+of Verdi and of Donizetti. We found the square near the quay lively with
+the early enjoyers of coffee and the narghilé. Every precious inch of
+shade was, as usual, carefully appropriated; but the sun was rapidly
+narrowing the boundaries of the shadow district. Our chief errand
+resulted in the purchase of an ok of _lokumias_, which we virtuously
+resolved to carry to America, if possible. The little boat now returned
+us to the steamer, where breakfast and dinner quietly succeeded each
+other, little worthy of record occurring between. One interesting half
+hour reached us in the shape of a visit from Papa Parthenius, a young
+and active member of the Cretan Syn-eleusis. He came with tidings for
+our chief veteran,--tales of the Turks, and how they could get no water
+at Svakia; tidings also of brave young DeKay, and of his good service in
+behalf of the island. While these, in the dreadful secrecy of an unknown
+tongue, impart he did, I seized pen and ink, and ennobled my unworthy
+sketch-book with a _croquis_ of his finely-bronzed visage. His
+countenance was such as Miss Bremer would have called dark and
+energetic. He wore the dress of his calling, which was that of the
+secular priesthood. He soon detected my occupation, and said, in Greek,
+"I regret that the kyrie should make my portrait without my arms."
+
+We parted from him very cordially. Consul Campfield afterwards gave us a
+refreshing row about the harbor, bringing us within view of the two
+iron-clads newly purchased and brought out to run the Turkish blockade.
+One of these was famous in the annals of Secessia. Both served that more
+than doubtful cause. Then we went back to the vessel, and the rest of
+the day did not get beyond perspiration and patience.
+
+Towards evening a spirited breeze began to lash the waters of the harbor
+into hilly madness. White caps showed themselves, and we, who were to
+embark on board another vessel, for another voyage, took note of the
+same. The friendly Evangelides now came on board, and scolded us for not
+having sent him word of our arrival. We pleaded the extreme heat of the
+day, which had made dreadful the idea of visiting and of locomotion of
+any sort. He was clad from head to foot in white linen, and looked most
+comfortable. While he was yet with us, the summons of departure came. In
+our chief's plans, meanwhile, a change had taken place. Determining
+causes induced him to return to Athens, minus his female _impedimenta_:
+so the little boat that danced with us from the Lloyd's Syra to the
+Lloyd's Trieste steamer danced back with him, leaving three disconsolate
+ones, bereft of Greece, and unprotected of all and any. Nor did we make
+this second start without a _contretemps_. Having bidden the chief
+farewell, we proceeded at once to take account of our luggage; and lo!
+the shawl bundle was not. Now, every knowing traveller is aware that
+this article of travelling furniture contains much besides the shawl,
+which is but the envelope of all the odds and ends usually most
+essential to comfort. For the second in command, therefore, previously
+designated as _a megale_, there was but one course to pursue. To hire a
+boat, refuse to be cheated in its price, tumble down the ship's side,
+row to the Syra steamer, pick up the missing bundle, astonish the chief
+in a pensive reverie, "_sibi et suis_," on the cabin sofa, and return
+triumphant, was the work of ten minutes. But the sea ran high, the
+little boat danced like a cockle-shell, and the neophytes were afraid,
+and much relieved in mind when the ancient reappeared.
+
+The America (the Trieste steamer) did not weigh anchor before midnight.
+Soon after the adventure of the shawl bundle, the Syra steamer fired a
+gun, and slipped out to sea. We had seen the last of the chief for a
+fortnight at least, and our attention was now turned to the quarters we
+were to occupy for four days to come. These did not at first sight seem
+very promising. Our state-rooms were small, and bare of all furniture,
+except the bed and washing fixtures. Just outside of them, on the deck,
+was the tent under which the Turkish women horded. For we found, on
+coming on board, a Turkish pacha and suite, bound from Constantinople to
+Janina, to take the place of him whom we had, a month before,
+accompanied on his way from Janina to Constantinople, via Corfu, where
+we were to be quit of the present dignitary. But before I get to the
+Turks, I must mention that good Christian, the Austrian consul at Syra,
+who came on board before we left, and introduced to me a young man in an
+alarming condition of health, a Venetian by birth, and an officer in the
+Austrian navy. His illness had been induced by exposure incident to his
+profession in the hot harbor of Kanea.
+
+The first night we made acquaintance only with various screaming babies,
+the torment of young mothers who did not know how to take care of them,
+their nurses having been left at home. The night was sufficiently
+disturbed up to the period of departure, and these little ones vented
+their displeasure in tones which argued well for their lungs. The next
+morning showed us a rough sea, the vessel pitching and tossing, the
+ladies mostly sea sick--we ourselves well and about, but much incommoded
+by heat and want of room. A tall member of the pacha's suite came into
+our little round house, dressed principally in a short, quilted sack of
+bright red calico. He carried in his arms a teething baby, very dirty
+and ill-dressed, and tried to nurse and soothe it on his knee, the
+mother being totally incapacitated by seasickness. This man was tall and
+fair. I thought he might be an Albanian. I made some incautious remarks
+in French concerning his dress, which he obviously understood, for he
+disappeared, and then reappeared dressed in a handsome European suit,
+with a bran-new fez on his head, but carrying no baby. Another of the
+suite, unmistakably a Turk, pestered the round-house. This individual
+wore white cotton drawers under a long calico night shirt of a faded
+lilac pattern, which was bound about his waist with a strip of yellow
+calico. The articles of this toilet were far from clean. Glasses and a
+fez completed it. The wearer we learned to be a fanatical Turk, who came
+among us in this disorderly dress to show his contempt for Christians in
+general. His motive was held to be, in his creed, a religious one. It
+further caused him to take his meals separately from us--a circumstance
+which we scarcely regretted. He was much amazed at the worsted work in
+the hands of one of the neophytes, and went so far as to take it up, and
+to ask a bystander who spoke his language whether the young girl spun
+the wools herself before she began her tapestry. He then asked the price
+of the wools, and on hearing the reply exclaimed, "What land on earth
+equals Turkey, where you can buy the finest wool for twelve píastres an
+ok!"
+
+Besides these not very appetizing figures, we had on board some
+Fanariote Greeks, of aristocratic pretensions and Turkish principles;
+some Hellenes of the true Greek stamp; a Dalmatian sea captain, his wife
+and daughters, who spoke Italian and looked German; an Armenian lady and
+young daughter from Constantinople, bound to Paris; several Greeks
+resident in Transylvania, speaking Greek and German with equal facility;
+two Armenian priests returning from an Eastern mission, and _en route_
+for Vienna; the Austro-Italian before spoken of; a Bohemian glass
+merchant; and an array of deck passengers as varied and motley as those
+already enumerated as belonging to the first cabin. With all of the
+latter we made acquaintance; but although we moved among them with
+cordiality and good-will, the equilibrium of sympathy was difficult to
+find. The Fanariotes were no Philhellenes, the Armenian ladies were
+frequenters of the sultan's palace; the Italian was thoroughly German in
+his inclinations, and spoke in utter dispraise of his own country when
+his feeble condition allowed him to speak. Of the Armenian priests, one
+was quite a man of the world, and somewhat reserved and suspicious. The
+other showed something of the infirmity of advanced age in the prolixity
+of his speech, as well as in its matter. In this Noah's ark _e megale_
+moved about, mindful of the bull in the china shop, and tried not to
+upset this one's mustard-pot and that one's vase of perfume. And as all
+were whole when she parted from them, she has reason to hope that her
+efforts were tolerably successful.
+
+In the human variety shop just described, I must not forget to speak of
+my sisters, the Turkish women, imprisoned in a small portion of the
+deck, protected by a curtain from all intrusion or inspection. As this
+sacred precinct lay along the outside partition of the ladies' cabin, I
+became aware of a remote window, through which a practicable breach
+might be made in their fortress. Thither, on the first day, I repaired,
+and paid my compliments. They were, I think, five in number, and lay
+along on mattresses, disconsolately enough. With the help of the
+stewardess, I inquired after their health, and learned that seasickness
+held them prostrate and helpless. Nothing ate they, nothing drank they.
+Two of them were young and pretty. Of these, one was the wife of the bey
+who accompanied the pacha. She had a delicate cast of features,
+melancholy dark eyes, and dark hair bound up with a lilac crape
+handkerchief. The other was the mother of the teething child spoken of
+above, and the wife of the tall parent who nursed it. By noon on the
+second day the sea had sunk to almost glassy smoothness. All of the
+patients were up and about; the children were freshly washed and
+dressed, and became coaxable. One of the Armenian ladies now volunteered
+to go with me to look in upon our Turkish friends. We found them up and
+stirring, making themselves ready to land at Corfu. And to my companion
+they told what good messes they had brought from Constantinople, and
+thrown into the blue Ægean; for the heat of the vessel spoiled their
+victuals much faster than they, being seasick, could keep them from
+spoiling. And they laughed over their past sufferings much after the
+fashion of other women. The pretty mother now appeared in a loose gown
+of yellow calico, holding up her baby. I made a hasty sketch of the pair
+as they showed themselves at the cabin window; but the flat, glaring
+light did not allow me to do even as well as usual, which is saying
+little. The oval face, smooth, black brows, and long, liquid eyes, were
+beautiful, and her smile was touchingly child-like and innocent. The
+bey's wife wore a lilac calico; another wore pale green. These dresses
+consisted of loose gowns, with under-trousers of the same material; they
+were utterly unneat and tasteless. I presently saw them put on their
+yashmacs, and draw over their calicoes a sort of cloak of black stuff,
+not unlike alpaca. They now looked very decently, and, being covered,
+were allowed to sit on deck until the time of the arrival in Corfu. The
+pretty one whom I sketched begged to look at my work. On seeing it she
+exclaimed, "Let no man ever behold this!" Nor could I blame her, for it
+maligned her sadly. Concerning the landing in Corfu, the meagre diary
+shows this passage:--
+
+"Went on shore at Corfu at 5.45 P. M., returning at 6.50. Expenses in
+all, ten francs, including boat, ices, and _valet de place_. The steamer
+was so hot that this short visit on shore was a great relief, Corfu
+being at this hour very breezy and shady. Every one says that the Ionian
+Islands are going to ruin since the departure of the English. This is
+from the want of capital and of enterprise. So it would seem as if
+people who have no enterprise of their own must be content to thrive
+secondarily upon that of other people. The whole type of Greek life,
+however, is opposed to the Occidental type. Its luxury is to be in
+health, and to be satisfied with little. We Westerns illustrate the
+multiplication of wants with that of resources, or _vice versa_. [The
+diary, prudently, does not attempt to decide the question of antecedence
+and consequence between these two.] The Greeks seem, so far, to
+illustrate the converse. Whether this opposition can endure in the
+present day, I cannot foresee. But this I can see--that Greece will not
+have more luxury without more poverty. The circle of wealth, enlarging,
+will more and more crowd those who are unfitted to attain it, and who
+must be content with the minimum even of food and raiment."
+
+So far the pitiful, sea-addled diary. It does not recount how mercifully
+the captain of our steamer found a _valet de place_ for us, and told him
+to take care of us, and bring us back at a given moment. Nor how our
+payment of ten francs for three persons, instead of Heaven knows what
+exorbitation, was owing to this circumstance. For it may not be known to
+the inexperienced that the boatmen of Corfu are wont to make a very
+moderate charge for setting people ashore on the island. This is done in
+order to disarm suspicion: _facile descensus Averni--sed revocare
+gradum_! But when you wish to return to your vessel, the need being
+pressing, and the time admitting of no delay, the same boatmen are wont
+to demand fifteen or twenty francs _per capita_, and the more you swear
+the more they laugh. Among the arrearages of justice adjourned to that
+supreme chancery term, the Day of Judgment, I fear there must be many of
+English et al. _vs._ boatmen. But under the captain's happy
+administration, I made bold, when the boatman insisted on being paid for
+the return trip in mid-sea, to refuse a single copper. Now, the gift of
+unknown tongues sometimes resides in the person who hears them. And I
+received it as a decided advantage that I understood no phrase of the
+boatmen's low muttering and grumbling. So they were forced to carry us
+to the gangway of the steamer, where the captain stood to receive us.
+And I paid the men and the valet under the captain's supervision, and
+when the former demanded a _bottiglia_, the captain cried out, in
+energetic tones, "Get off of my ship at once, you scoundrels; you have
+been well paid already;" the which indeed befell.
+
+Neither does the diary recount how the drivers of public carriages
+followed us up and down the streets, insisting upon our engaging them,
+first at their price, and then at ours, for a trip which we had neither
+time nor mind to make, desisting after half an hour's annoyance; nor how
+a money changer, given a napoleon, contrived to make up one of its
+francs by slipping in two miserable Turkish _paras_, not worth half a
+franc; nor how the whistle of the steamer made our return very anxious
+and hurried, the passengers accusing us of having delayed the departure,
+while the captain confided to us that he had assumed this air of extreme
+hurry, in order to stimulate the disembarkation of the Turks, whose
+theory of taking one's own time was somewhat loosely applied in the
+present instance. Well, this is all I know of Corfu. It is little
+enough, and yet, perhaps, too much.
+
+
+
+
+FARTHER.
+
+
+Corfu was the last of Greece to us. A tightening at our heartstrings
+told us so. We consented to depart, but conquered the agony of making
+farewell verses, dear at any price, in the then state of the
+thermometer. Our feelings, such as they were, were mutely exchanged with
+the bronze statue of that late governor, who brought the water into the
+town. Unless he should prove as frisky as the Commendatore in Don
+Giovanni, they will never be divulged.
+
+We now set our faces, in conjunction with the tide of conquest,
+westward. We all suffered heat, ennui, and baby-yell. The Italian
+invalid languished in his hot state-room, or in our cabin, his weak
+condition increasing the dangerous discomfort of perspiration--a grave
+matter when a chill would be death. Worsted work progressed, the hungry
+sketch-book got a nibble or two, and the mild good-wills of the voyage
+ripened, never, we fear, to bear future harvests of profit and
+intercourse. Not the less were we beholden to them for the time. And we
+will even praise thee here, Armenian Anna, with thy young graces, thy
+Eastern beauty, thy charming English, and thoroughly genial behavior.
+Mother and daughter had _distinction_, in the French sense of the word.
+From the former I had many _aperçus_ of Eastern life. She was married at
+the early age of fourteen, and wore on that occasion the traditional
+veiling of threads of gold, bound on her brow and falling to her feet.
+"How glad I was to remove it," she said, "it was so heavy!" "What did
+you do with it?" I asked. "I divided it into several portions, and
+endowed with them the marriage of poorer girls, who could not afford it
+for themselves." But madame informed me that this cumbrous ornament has
+now passed out of fashion, the tulle veil and orange flowers of French
+usage having generally taken its place. This lady was supposed by most
+people to be the elder sister of her pretty daughter. In her soberer
+beauty one seemed to see the dancing eyes and pouting cheeks of the
+other carried only a little farther on. And both were among the chief
+comforts of the voyage.
+
+Of the two Armenian priests, the younger held himself aloof, as if he
+understood full well the inconveniences of sympathy--a dry, steely,
+well-balanced man, without enthusiasm, but fine in temperament, well
+bred, and with at least the culture of a man of the present world. But
+Père Michel, the elder, was more willing to impart his mental gifts and
+experiences to such as would hear them. And he was a man of another age,
+with obsolete opinions, which he produced like the unconscious bearer of
+uncurrent coin.
+
+Here is a little specimen of his talk, the subject being that of dreams
+and revelations: "What is to happen, that God alone can know. But that
+which is already happening, or which has happened at a distance, this
+the _demonio_ may know and reveal. And he will reveal it to you in a
+dream, or in a vision, or by a presentiment."
+
+"But what does the _demonio_ get, Père Michel, for the trouble of
+revealing it to us?"
+
+"The satisfaction of making men superstitious?"
+
+_Non c'e male, Père Michel._ And what, thought I, is the chief advantage
+of being pope, cardinal, arch-priest, confessor? The satisfaction of
+making men superstitious. At another time I remarked upon the fact that
+the monasteries in Greece are usually situated at some height on a
+mountain side. "They are of the order of St. Basil," said the old man;
+"he always loved the retirement of the mountains, and his followers
+imitate him in this." Père Michel had a pleasant smile, with just enough
+of second childhood to be guileless, not foolish. And I may here say
+that the Armenian priesthood appear to me to have quite an individuality
+of their own, corresponding to no order of the Romish priesthood with
+which I am acquainted.
+
+The excessive heat of the cabins and after deck one day induced me to
+head a valorous invasion of the forward deck, followed by as many of the
+sisterhood as I was able to recruit. The steamer being a very long one,
+we had to make quite a journey before we entered that almost interdicted
+region, crossing a long bridge, and passing the captain's sacred office.
+We carried books and work; our _fauteuils_ followed us. And here we
+found cool breezes and delicious shade. The sailors and deck passengers
+lay in heaps about the boards, taking their noonday nap in a very
+primitive manner. We profited by this discovery so far as to repeat the
+invasion daily while the voyage lasted.
+
+But it came to end sooner than one might suppose from this long
+description. We had left Syra on Sunday night; on Thursday afternoon we
+landed in Trieste. Farewell, Turco-Italians, Austro-Italians, Sieben
+Gebirgers, Transylvanians, Dalmatians, ladies, babies, priests, and all.
+When shall we meet again? Scarcely before that great and final analysis
+which promises to distinguish, once for all, the sheep from the goats.
+And even for that supreme consummation and its results, all of you may
+command my best wishes.
+
+
+
+
+FRAGMENTS.
+
+
+Up to the point last reached, my jottings down had been made with
+tolerable regularity. Living is so much more rapid than writing, that an
+impossible babe, who should begin his diary at his birth, would be sure
+to have large arrears between that period and the day of his death,
+however indefatigable he might be in his recording. A man cannot live
+his life and write it too; hence the work that men who live much leave
+to their biographers. So, of the space that here intervened between
+Trieste and Paris, I lived the maximum and wrote the minimum; that is,
+the little death's-head and cross-bone mementos with which the diary is
+forced to record the spot at which each day fell and lay, together with
+the current expenses of its interment. In some places even these are
+wanting, and the stricken soul, looking over the diary, cries out, "O,
+my leanness!" or words to that effect. Yet the poor document referred to
+shall help us what it can, beginning with the return from cheap, cosy
+Trieste to that polished jewel of the Adriatic, which now shines doubly
+in its new setting of liberty.
+
+We went, as we came, in the Lloyd steamer, declining, however, to engage
+a state-room, mindful of the exceeding closeness of that in which we
+suffered on our outward voyage. The embarkation was made, like that from
+Venice, at the mysterious hour of midnight; and we, coming on board at
+half past ten, secured such sofa and easy-chair privileges as moved the
+wrath of a high-talking German party who came at the last moment, and
+shouted for a quarter of an hour the assertion that his Damen were fully
+equal, if not superior, to any other Damen on board the steamer, and
+that if the other Damen had places, his surely ought much more to have
+them. The cameriere merely shrugged his shoulders, and we failed to be
+convinced that our first duty would be to vacate our limited
+accommodations, and stand at large for the benefit of these or any other
+virgins of the tardy and oily description. The blatant champion thereon
+took himself and his Damen up stairs. We reserved to ourselves the good
+intention of sharing our advantages with them at a later period, when
+the passage of the present acerbity should make intercourse possible.
+The cabin soon became insufferably hot and close. After various
+ineffectual attempts at repose, in a cramped position on the sofa, with
+a shawl bundle for a pillow, I went on deck, where I at least found
+fresh air and darkness, the blazing lamp in the cabin being enough, of
+itself, to banish sleep. Every available spot here was occupied by
+groups or single figures, whose _tout ensemble_, what with the darkness
+and their draping, constituted a very respectable gallery of figures,
+much resembling the conspirators in Ernani, or Mme. Tussaud's Chamber of
+Horrors, in the absence of the illuminating medium. I unconsciously
+seated myself on one sleeping figure, which kicked and cried, O! With
+difficulty I found a narrow vacancy on one of the side benches, after
+occupation of which I wrapped my shawl about me, and gave up to the
+situation.
+
+    "For we were tired, my back and I."
+
+Seasick women sobbed and gasped around me, not having, as we, graduated
+in the great college of ocean passage. The night was very black.
+Presently a form nestled at my right. It was the elder neophyte,
+disgusted with the cabin, and willing to be anywhere else. The moon rose
+late, a de-crescent. The whole time was amphibious, neither sleeping nor
+waking, neither day nor night. Suddenly, a perceptible chill seized upon
+us; a little later the black sky grew gray, and the series of groups
+that filled the deck were all revealed, like hidden motives in the light
+of some new doctrine. The sunrise was showery, and attended by a
+rainbow. The people bestirred themselves, stretched their benumbed
+limbs, and shook their tumbled garments into shape. Black coffee could
+now be had for ten sous a cup, and _café au lait_ for twenty, with a
+crust of bread which defied gnawing. The diary says, "L. and I grew
+quite tearful as we saw beautiful Venice come out of the water, just as
+we had seen her disappear. At the health station we were fumigated with
+chloride of lime--an unpleasant and useless process. We arrived opposite
+the Piazzetta at half past seven A. M. The captain was kind in helping
+us to find our effects and to get off. The gondoliers asked five francs
+for bringing us to our lodgings, and got them. The Barbiers could not
+receive us at our former snug abode, but monsieur went round to show us
+some rooms in Palazzo Gambaro, which he offered for seven francs _per
+diem_. We were glad to take them. Went to Florian's café for breakfast,
+visited San Marco, and then proceeded to install ourselves in our new
+lodging. Ordered a dinner for six francs, which proved abundant. Took a
+long sleep,--from one to four P. M.,--having only dozed a little during
+the night. Our lodgings are very roomy and pleasant--two large rooms
+well furnished, and two smaller ones. We expect to enjoy many things
+here, and all the more because we now know something of what is to be
+seen."
+
+This expectation was fully realized during the week that followed,
+although the meagre entries of the diary give little assistance in
+recalling the strict outlines of the brilliant picture. It was now
+height of season in Venice. The grand canal was brilliant, every
+evening, with gondolas, and gondoliers in costumes. Now we admired full
+suits of white, with scarlet sashes, trimmed with gold fringe, now gray
+and blue, edged with silver. Now an ugly jockey costume, got up by some
+Anglo-maniac, insulted the Italian _beau-idéal_, and, indeed, every
+other. For the short coat and heavy clothes, suited at once to the
+saddle and the English climate, were utterly unsuited to the action of
+rowing, as well as to the full bloom of an Italian summer. I cannot help
+remarking upon this unsightly livery, because it was an eyesore, and
+because it was obviously considered by its proprietor as a brilliant
+success. In stylish gondolas, the rowers are two in number, and always
+dressed in livery. The fashionables, in height of millinery bliss, float
+up and down the grand canal, until it is time for the rendezvous on the
+Piazza. As you pass the palaces, you often see the gondola in waiting
+below, while in a balcony or arched window above, the fresh, smiling
+faces make their bright picture; and the domestic stands draped in the
+white opera-cloaks or bournooses. And I remember a hundred little
+nonsensical songs about this very passage in Venetian life.
+
+            "Prent'e la gondoletta,
+            Tutt'e serena il mar,
+            Ninetta, mia diletta,
+            Vieni solcar il mar
+    Il marinar, che gioja--che gioja il marinar!"
+
+Which I translate into English equivalency as follows:--
+
+    The two-in-hand is waiting,
+      The groom is in his boots;
+    The lover's fondly prating,
+      The lady's humor suits:
+        Susanna! Susanna!
+      What joy to flog the brutes!
+    What joy, what joy in driving!
+    What joy, what joy to drive!
+
+Like all other poetical visions, these, once seen, speedily become
+matters of course. Still, we found always a fairy element in the "_Gita
+in gondoletta_." Our gondolier had always a weird charm in our eyes. He
+seemed almost a feudal retainer, a servant for life or death. His shrewd
+glance showed that he was not easily to be astonished. He could tip over
+an obnoxious person in the dark, stab at a street corner, carry the most
+audacious of letters, and deliver the contraband answer under the very
+nose of high-snuffing authority. Nought of all this did we desire of
+him: in fact, nothing but safe conduct and moderate charges. Yet we
+admired his mysterious talents, and wondered in what unwritten novels he
+might have figured. For, indeed, the watery streets of Venice, no less
+than her gondoliers, suggest the idea of romantic and desperate
+adventure. What balconies from which to throw a rival, dead or alive!
+What silent, know-nothing waters to receive him! What clever assistants
+to aid and abet!
+
+But enough of the evening row, which ends at the Piazzetta. Here you
+dismiss your man-at-oars, naming the hour at which you shall require his
+presence, he being meanwhile at liberty to sleep in his gondola, or lo
+leave it in charge with a friend, and to follow you to the Piazza, where
+you will amuse yourself after your fashion, he after his. Here the
+banners are floating, the lights glancing, the band stormily performing.
+Florian's café is represented by a crowd of well-dressed people sitting
+in the open air, with the appliances of chair and table covered by their
+voluminous draperies. If you arrive late, you may wait some time before
+a table, fourteen inches by ten, is vouchsafed to you. Ices are very
+good, very cheap, and very small. Tea and bread and butter are
+excellent. While you wait and while you feast, a succession of venders
+endeavor to impose upon you every small article which the streets of
+Venice show for sale. Shoes, slippers, alabaster work, shell work, tin
+gondolas concealing inkstands, nets, bracelets, necklaces,--all these
+things are offered to you in succession, together with allumettes,
+cigars, journals, and caramels, or candied fruits strung upon straws.
+If you are mild in your discouragement of these venders, they will
+fasten upon you like other vermin, and refuse to depart until they shall
+have drawn the last drop of your change. I found a brisk charge
+necessary, with appeals to Florian's _garçon_, after whose interference,
+life on the Piazza became practicable.
+
+To the mere enjoyment of good victuals, with squabbles intervening, may
+be superadded the perception of fashionable life, as it goes on in these
+regions. When your eyes have taken the standard of light of the Piazza,
+you recognize in some of the groups about you persons whom you have
+seen, either in the balcony or in the gondola. Here are two young women
+whom I saw emerge from a narrow passage, this evening, rowed by a
+fine-looking servant, who stood bareheaded, and one other. They have
+diamond earrings, fashionable bonnets, and dresses dripping from a
+baptism of beads. One by one a group of young men, probably of the first
+water, forms about them. One of the ladies is handsome and quiet, the
+other plain and voluble. The latter becomes perforce the prominent
+figure in what goes on, which indeed amounts to nothing worth repeating.
+These were on my right. On my left soon appeared a lady of a certain
+age, with "world" written in large letters all over her countenance. She
+chaperons a daughter, got up with hair _à l'Anglaise_, whose pantomimic
+countenance suggests that she has been drilled by an English governess
+with _papa_, _prunes_, _prism_, or some equivalent gymnastic. When
+addressed, she looks down into her fan, and rolls her eyes as if she
+saw her face in it. And lady friends come up: "Ah, marchesa! ah, signora
+contessa!" and the young bloods, hat in hand. So here we are, really, on
+the borders of high life, without intending it. And the baroness
+introduces a female relative--_una sorella maritata_--who has been
+handsome, and whose smile seems accustomed to fold the cloak of her
+beauty around the poverty of her character. And there is coffee, and
+there come ices. The ladies sip and gossip, the beaux come and go,
+talking of intended _villeggiaturas_; for the greatest social
+illustration for an Italian is that of travel. A third group immediately
+in front of us shows a young lady in an advanced stage of ambition,
+attired in a conspicuous tone, accompanied by quieter female relatives
+and a young boy. She regards with envious eyes the two popular
+associations on my right and left. She is dying to be noticed, and does
+not know how to manage it. And while I take note of these and other
+vanities, beggars whine for pence, or insist upon carrying off our
+superfluous bread or cake, for which, indeed, we must pay; but they eat
+the bread before your eyes with such evident relish that you are
+satisfied.
+
+By and by this palls upon you. You have seen and heard enough. The
+society to which you belong is over the water. Here your heart finds no
+place; and from the crowd of strangers even your lodging and quiet bed
+seem a refuge. So you settle with Florian's _garçon_, close your account
+with all beggars for the night, wander to the Piazzetta, and cry,
+"Bastiano!" and he of the mysterious intelligence sooner or later
+responds. You give a penny to the crab,--the man who superfluously holds
+the boat while you get in,--and are at home after a brief dream of
+smooth motion under a starry sky. And in this way end all midsummer days
+in Venice. Not so smooth, however, is your climbing of three flights of
+stone stairs in the dark, with thumping and bumping. But you are up at
+last, and Gianetta--the shrewd maid--receives you with a candle-end.
+Frugal orders for breakfast, and to rest, with the cherubs of the
+mantel-piece watching over you.
+
+For over the said mantel-piece, two fair, fat babes, modelled in
+flat-relief, playfully contended for the mastery, their laughing faces
+near together, their swinging heels wide apart, as the festoon required.
+Elsewhere in the same relief were arabesques with birds and flowers.
+This bedroom of ours has been a room of state in its day. A passage-way
+and dressing-room have been taken from its stately proportions, and
+still it remains very spacious for our pretensions. Our _salon_ is
+larger still, and largely mirrored. Two of its windows give upon a leafy
+garden, whose tree-tops lie nearer to us than to their owners. Its
+furniture has been hastily thrown together, and is mostly composed of
+odds and ends. But one of its pieces moves our admiration. It is a
+toilet table, enclosing a complete set of utensils in the finest
+Venetian glass--basins, ewers, toilet bottles and glasses, and the
+little boxes for soap and powder, all cut after the finest pattern. This
+toilet was made for a royal personage, a queen of something, whose
+effects somehow seem to have been sold at auction in these parts.
+Another relic of her we discover in a bureau entirely incrusted with
+mother-of-pearl, an article that makes one's mouth water, if one has any
+mouth, which all men, like all horses, have not. The doors which divide
+our sitting from our sleeping room are at once objects of wonder and of
+fear to us. Their size is monstrous, and each of them hangs, or rather
+clings, by the upper hinge, the lower being dismounted. These doors are
+left all day at a conciliatory angle between closing and opening. We
+fear their falling on our heads whenever we approach them. We hear
+vaguely of some one who shall come to put them in order; but he never
+appears. Our own veteran, arriving at last, sets this right in as
+summary a manner as he has dealt with other nuisances. For the veteran,
+worn with travel, does arrive from Greece one morning, rowing up to our
+palace just as we have stepped from it to meet our gondola. He has a
+tale to tell like the wanderings of Ulysses. But between this event and
+those that precede it, the diary shows the following important entry:--
+
+Thursday, Aug. 1.--To Malamocco this A. M., with three rowers--our own,
+and two others, who received one florin between them. The row, both in
+going and returning, was delightful. Arrived at Malamocco, the men
+demanded one franc for breakfast, and disappeared within the shades of
+the Osteria. This is a small settlement at the very entrance of the
+lagoons. It was strongly fortified by the Austrians. The heat, however,
+did not permit us to inspect the fortifications. We saw little of
+interest, but visited the church and a peasant's house. One of the
+daughters was engaged in stringing beads for sale. The beads were in a
+tray, and she plunged into them a bunch of wire needles some six inches
+in length, each carrying its slender thread. The merchant, she said,
+came weekly to bring the beads, and to take away those ready strung for
+the market. "To earn a penny, signora," said the mother, a
+substantial-looking person, wearing large gold earrings. The houses here
+looked very comfortable for people of the plain sort. The men seemed to
+be mostly away, whether engaged in fishing, or following the sea to
+foreign parts. On our way back we stopped at San Clementi, an ancient
+church upon a little island, now undergoing repairs. Within the church
+we found a marble tabernacle with solid walls, built behind the high
+altar. It may have been forty feet in length by twenty in breadth, and
+twelve or more feet in height. A massive door of bronze gave entrance to
+this huge strong-box, which was formerly used as a prison for refractory
+priests. We found the interior divided into two compartments. The larger
+of these was fitted up as a chapel; the smaller had served as the cell
+of confinement. The altar was erected at the partition which separated
+the two, and a grating inserted behind the altar figure allowed the
+prisoner the benefit of the religious services carried on in the chapel.
+The dreariness of this little prison can scarcely be described. No light
+had it, unless that of a lamp was allowed. A church within a church,
+and within the inner church a place of torment! This arrangement seemed
+to violate even the Catholic immunity of sanctuary. Think of the
+unfortunate shut up within on a feast day, when faint sounds of outward
+jubilee might penetrate the marble walls, and heighten his pain by its
+contrast with the general joyous thrill of life. Think of the cheerless
+mass or vespers vouchsafed to him,--no friendly face, no brother voice,
+to sweeten worship. And if he continued recalcitrant, how convenient was
+this isolation for the final disposition to be made of him! _De
+profundis clamavit_, doubtless, and the church did not know that God
+could hear him.
+
+The diary does not record our second visit to the Armenian convent,
+which took place in these days. I do not even find in its irregular
+columns any mention of a franc which I am sure I paid to the porter, and
+which, I faintly hope, has been put to my credit elsewhere. Despite this
+absence of _pièces justificatives_, the visit still remains so freshly
+in my memory that I may venture to speak of it. The elder neophyte not
+having been with us before in Venice, the convent was new ground to her.
+We who had already seen it felt much more at home on the occasion of our
+second visit than of our first. For Padre Giacomo had answered our
+invasion by a friendly call; and did we not now know him to be a most
+genial and hospitable person? Had we not, moreover, made ourselves
+familiar with his religion, on our late voyage, by frequent converse
+with two priests of his profession? Did I not possess Father Michel's
+views concerning the _demonio_, as well as his version of the Book of
+Job? And of Père Isaak did I not know the polished, uncommunicative side
+which covered his intimate convictions, whatever they may have been? The
+Armenian ladies, too,--had they not made me free of the guild? One of
+them had shown me her prayer-book. The other, being but fifteen years of
+age, had no prayer-book. So, with an assured step, we entered the sacred
+parlor, and demanded news of Padre Giacomo, and of his monkey. And the
+father came, smiling a little better than before, but with a sweet
+Oriental gravity. And he showed us again the library, and hall, and
+chapel, with the refectory, from whose cruel pulpit one brother is set
+to read while the others feast. We saw again the printing presses,
+worked by hand. And in the sacristy he commanded two of the younger
+brethren to bring the chiefest embroidered garments, reserved for high
+occasions, judging of us unjustly by our sex. And these satin and velvet
+wonders were, indeed, embossed with lambs, and birds, and flowers, in
+needlework of silver and gold, and of various colors, meet for the necks
+of them that divide the spoil. And we saw also a very fine mummy, as
+black, and dried, and wizened, as any old Pharaoh could be. A splendid
+bead covering lay over him, in open rows of blue and white, with
+hieroglyphic-looking men in black and yellow. This covering had been
+lately cleaned and repaired at the glass-works of Murano, as Padre
+Giacomo recounted with pride. He showed us in the old part of the work
+some curious double beads, which Venice itself, he said, was unable to
+imitate. The colors were as fresh and clear as if the mummy had clothed
+himself from the last fancy fair, with a description of afghan well
+suited to the Egyptian climate.
+
+Having done justice to this human preserve, the padre now regaled us
+with a preparation of rose leaves embalmed in sugar. He also bestowed
+upon us one of the convent publications, a tolerable copy of verses
+composed on the spot itself by the late Louis of Bavaria, celebrating
+its calm and retirement. I myself could have responded to the royal
+_suspiria_ with one distich.
+
+    "Here no people comes to beg thee,
+     Here no Lola comes to plague thee."
+
+As we passed from the building to the garden, the wicked monkey, chained
+and lying in wait, sprang at my hat, and, snatching my lilac veil, bore
+it off with a flying leap of animal grace and malice. Padre Giacomo
+anxiously apologized for his pet's misconduct, which was certainly
+surprising. But the monkey's education, as every one knows, is
+dependent, not upon precept, but upon example, and Padre Giacomo's
+example, to the monkey, was only a negative. We parted from our
+cloistered friend, sincerely desiring, if not hoping, to see him again.
+
+Of our last day in fairest Venice the diary gives this meagre account:--
+
+Sunday, August 4. Early to Piazza, where we encountered the Bishop of
+Rhode Island. At San Marco's, visited Luccati's beautiful mosaics in
+the sacristy. The three figures over the door are especially
+fine--Madonna in the middle, and a saint on either side. A colossal
+cross adorns the ceiling, and the wall on one side is occupied by
+figures of twelve prophets; on the other, by the twelve disciples. The
+cross almost seems to bloom with beautiful devices. Luccati was
+imprisoned, they say, in the Piombi.
+
+To the Italian Protestant service, held in a good hall in the
+neighborhood of the Church of San Giovanni e Paolo. The hall was densely
+crowded. I found no seat, and barely room to stand. The audience seemed
+a mixed one, so far as worldly position goes, but was entirely
+respectable in aspect and demeanor, the masculine element largely
+predominating. Signor Comba, a young man, is quite eloquent and taking.
+He delivers himself clearly, and with energy. He criticised at some
+length the unchristian doctrines of the Romish church--this is part of
+his work.
+
+The service ended, I passed into the Church of San Giovanni e Paolo, and
+enjoyed my visit unusually. The vivid light of the day and hour made
+many of the monuments appear new to me. The doges in this, as in other
+churches, are stowed away on shelves, like mummies. Found a monument to
+Doge Sterno, dated early in the fifteenth century, and beside it the
+effigy of a youth designated as Aloysius Trevisano, æt. 23, deeply
+regretted, and commemorated for his attainments in Greek, Latin, and
+philosophy. The figure is recumbent, the face of a high and refined
+character, with the unmistakable charm of youth impressed upon it. The
+date is also of the fifteen century. From the church to the sacristy, to
+take a last look at the two pictures, Titian's Death of St. Peter,
+martyr, and a fine Madonna of Gian Bellini. The Titian was glorious
+to-day. It has great life and action. The Dominican in the foreground,
+who has his arm raised as if appealing to heaven and earth against the
+barbarous act, seems to have communicated a touch of his passion to the
+two cherubs above, who bear the martyr palm. They are stormy little
+cherubs, and seem in haste to bring in sight the recompense of so much
+suffering.
+
+Of the Protestant preaching I will once more and finally say, that it is
+a genuine missionary work, and commend it to the good wishes and good
+offices of those whose benefactions do not fear to cross the ocean. May
+it permanently thrive and prosper.
+
+Of the pictures I can only say, that I doubly congratulate myself on
+having paid them my last homage before leaving Titian's lovely city.
+For, not long after, a cruel fire broke out in or near that sacristy,
+precious with carvings in wood and marble bas-reliefs; and all the
+treasures were destroyed, including the two pictures, only temporarily
+bestowed there, and many square yards of multitude by Tintoretto,
+bearing, as usual, his own portrait in a sly corner, representative, no
+doubt, of his wish to watch the effect of his masterpieces upon humanity
+at large. The Madonna by Bellini was a charming picture, but the St.
+Peter is a loss that concerns the world. The saint, one hopes, has been
+comfortable in Paradise these many years. But the artist? What Paradise
+would console him for the burning of one of his _chefs-d'oeuvre_? He
+would be like Rachel weeping for her children, which reminds me that
+ideal parentage is of no sex. The artist, the poet, the reformer, are
+father and mother, all in one.
+
+We left Venice, the diary tells me, on the 5th of August, with what
+regret we need not say. The same venerable authority records a grave
+disagreement with the custom-house officers, of whose ministrations we
+had received no previous warning. So, two very modest pieces of dress
+goods, delayed in the making, caused me to be branded as a
+_contrabandista_, with a fine, and record to my discredit. I confess to
+some indecorous manifestations of displeasure at these circumstances.
+The truth is, forewarned is forearmed. Venice is a free port, and the
+traveller who leaves her by railroad for the first time may not be aware
+of the strict account to which he will be held for every little
+indulgence in Venetian traffic. Now, to have the spoons presented to you
+in the house, and to be arrested as a thief when you would pass the
+door, is a grievous ending to a hospitable beginning. So it came to pass
+that I anathematized beautiful Venice as I departed, gathering up the
+broken fragments of my peace, past diamond cement. But here, in
+trunk-upsetting Boston, I bethink me, and confess. I was wrong, utterly
+wrong, O custom-house officers, when I frowned and stormed at you,
+contending inch by inch and phrase by phrase. You were neither unjust
+nor uncivil, although I was both. Only I still attest and obsecrate to
+the fact that I did not intend to smuggle, and entered your jealous
+domain with no sense of contraband about me. Yet to such wrath did your
+perquisitions bring me, that the angry thoughts slackened only at
+Verona, where the tombs of the Scaligers and the rounds of the
+amphitheatre compelled me to quiet small distempers with great thoughts.
+
+At railroad speed, however, we visited these rare monuments. Can Grande
+and his horse looked flat and heavy from their eminence. We admired the
+beautiful iron screen of one of the tombs, hammer-wrought, and flexible
+as a shirt of mail. And we remembered Dante, paid two francs to the
+guardian of the enclosure, and drove away. The afternoon's journey
+whirled us past some strange antique towns, with walls and battlements,
+and at night we were in Bolsena, Germanicè _Bottsen_. And when we asked
+the hotel maid if she had ever been in Verona, she replied, "O, no; that
+is in Italy." And so we knew that we were not.
+
+
+
+
+FLYING FOOTSTEPS.
+
+
+The journey which we now commenced was too rapid to allow of more than
+the briefest record of its route. The breathlessness of haste, and the
+number of things to be seen and visited, left no time for writing up on
+the subjects suggested by the meagre notes of the diary. To the latter,
+therefore, I am forced to betake myself, piecing its fragmentary
+statements, where I can do so, from memory.
+
+Tuesday, August 6. Started with vetturino for Innspruck, via Brenner
+pass. A splendid day's journey. Stopped to dine at a pretty
+village,--name forgotten,--at whose principal inn a smart, bustling
+maid-servant in costume, very clean and civil, came to the carriage,
+helped us to alight, and carried our travelling bags up stairs to a
+parlor with a stout bed in it, upon which our chief threw himself and
+slept until the cutlets were ready. This old-fashioned zeal and civility
+were pleasant to contemplate once more, probably for the last time. For
+a railroad has been built over the Brenner pass, the which will go into
+operation next week. Then will these pleasant manners insensibly fade
+away, with the up-to-time curtness of modern travel. The porter who
+helps you to carry your hand luggage from the car to the depot will
+sternly demand his fee for that laborious service. All officials will
+grow as reticent of doing you the smallest pleasure as if civility were
+a contraband of war. And it does indeed become so, for the railroad
+develops the antagonisms of trade. Its flaming sword allows of no
+wanderings in wayside Paradises. Its steam trumpet shrieks in your ear
+the lesson that the straight line is the shortest distance between two
+points. It swallows you at one point and vomits you at another, with
+extreme risk of your life between. And it vulgarizes every place that it
+touches. The mixed stir and quiet of the little town become concentrated
+into fixed crises of excitement. For the postilion's horn and whip, and
+the pleasant rattling of the coming and going post-chaise, you will
+have, three or four times in the day, those shrill bars whose infernal
+symphony is mercifully allowed to proceed no farther; and a cross and
+steaming crowd; and a cool and supercilious few in the first or second
+class _wart-saal_; and then a dull and dead quiet in the little town, as
+if steam and stir came and went together, and left nothing behind them.
+
+The buxom maid-servant mourned over the impending ruin of the small
+tavern business, as she showed us the curious arrangements of the old
+house. It had formerly been a convent of nuns, and was very solidly put
+together. The back windows commanded a lovely view of the mountains. In
+the garden we found a pleasant open house, no doubt formerly a place for
+devout assemblages and meditations, but now chiefly devoted to the
+consumption of beer.
+
+After dinner we walked to the church near by, and looked at the curious
+iron crosses and small mural tablets which marked the final
+resting-place of the village worthies. Their petty offices and cherished
+distinctions were all preserved here. All of them had received the "holy
+death sacrament," and had started on the mysterious voyage in good hope.
+Through this whole extent of country, the crucifixes by the wayside were
+numerous. Resuming our journey, we reached Mittelwald, a picturesque
+hamlet, composed of a small church, a stream, a bridge, and a short
+string of houses. Here we defeated the future machinations of all
+officers of customs, by causing the two offending dress-patterns,
+already twice paid for, and treated at length in various printed and
+written documents, to be cut into breadths, which we hastily managed to
+sew up, reserving their fuller treatment for the purlieus of civilized
+life.
+
+Our two days' drive over the mountains was refreshing and most charming.
+Our vetturino was not less despondent than the maid-servant before
+alluded to. In our progress we were much in sight of the scarcely
+completed railroad, whose locomotive and working cars constantly
+appeared and disappeared before us, plunging into the numerous tunnels
+that defeat the designs of the mountain fortresses, and mocking our slow
+progress, as the money-getting train of success and sensation mocks the
+tedious steps of learning and the painful elaboration of art.
+
+"This is my last journey," said the vetturino; "the railway opens on
+Monday of next week."
+
+"What will you do thereafter?" I inquired.
+
+"Sell all out, and go to work as I can," he answered; adding, however,
+"In case you should intend going as far as Munich by carriage, I beg to
+be honored,"--of which the Yankee rendering would be, "I shouldn't mind
+putting you through."
+
+This, however, was hardly to be thought of, and at Innspruck we took
+leave of this honest and polite man, whose species must soon become
+extinct, whether he survive or no. Here recommenced for us the prosaic
+chapter of the railroad. Our route, however, for a good part of the way,
+lay within sight of the mountains. The depots at which we took fiery
+breath were in the style of Swiss châlets, quite ornamental in
+themselves, and further graced by vines and flowers. The travellers we
+encountered were not commonplacely cosmopolite. The young women were
+often in Tyrolese costume, wearing gilt tassels on their broad, black
+felt hats. We encountered parties of archers going to attend shooting
+matches, attired in picturesque uniforms of green and gold. At the
+depots, too, we encountered a new medium of enlivenment. We were now in
+a land of beer, and foaming glasses were offered to us in the cars, and
+at the railway buffets. Mild and cheerful we found this Bavarian
+beverage,--less verse-inspiring than wine,--and valuable as tending to
+reduce the number of poets who tease the world by putting all its
+lessons into rhymes, chimes, and jingles. Whatever we ourselves may have
+done, it is certain that our companions of both sexes embraced these
+frequent opportunities of refreshment, and that the color in their
+cheeks and the tone of their good-natured laughter were heightened by
+the same. One of these, a young maiden, told us how she had climbed the
+mountain during four hours of the day before, visiting the huts of the
+cowherds, who, during summer, pasture their cows high up on the green
+slopes. The existence of these people she described as hard and solitary
+in the extreme. The rich butter and cheese they make are all for the
+market. They themselves eat only what they cannot sell, according to the
+rule whereby small farmers live and thrive in all lands. The young girl
+wore in her hat a bunch of the blossom called _edelweiss_, which she had
+brought from her lofty wanderings. It is held in great esteem here, and
+is often offered for sale.
+
+In the afternoon we turned our back upon the mountains. A flat land lay
+before us, green and well tilled. And long before sunset we saw the
+spires of Munich, and the lifted arm of the great statue of Bavaria. Our
+arrival was prosperous, and through the streets of the handsome modern
+city we attained the quiet of an upper chamber in a hotel filled with
+Americans.
+
+
+
+
+MUNICH.
+
+
+Our two days in Munich were characterized by the most laborious
+sight-seeing. A week, even in our rapid scale of travelling, would not
+have been too much for this gorgeous city. We gave what we had, and
+cannot give a good account of it.
+
+My first visit was to the Pinakothek, which I had thoroughly explored
+some twenty-three years earlier, when the galleries of Italy and the
+Louvre were unknown to me. Coming now quite freshly from Venice, with
+Rome and Florence still recent in my experience, I found the Munich
+gallery less grandiose than my former remembrance had made it. The diary
+says, "The Rubenses are the best feature. I note also two fine heads by
+Rembrandt, and a first-rate Paris Bordone--a female head with golden
+hair and dark-red dress; four peasant pictures by Murillo, excellent in
+their kind, quite familiar through copies and engravings; some of the
+best Albert Dürers. The Italian pictures not all genuine. None of the
+Raphaels, I should say, would be accepted as such in Italy. The Fra
+Angelicos not good. Two good Andrea del Sartos; a Leonardo da Vinci,
+which seems to me a little caricatured; a room full of Vander Wertes,
+very smooth and finely finished; many Vandycks, scarcely first rate."
+
+The afternoon of this day we devoted to the Glyptothek, or gallery of
+sculpture. Here our first objects of interest were the Æginetan marbles,
+whose vacant places we had so recently seen on the breezy height of the
+temple from which they were taken.
+
+We found these rough, and attesting a period of art far more remote than
+that of the Elgin marbles. They are arranged in the order in which they
+stood before the pediment of the temple, a standing figure of Minerva in
+the middle, the other figures tapering off on either side, and ending
+with two seated warriors, the feet of either turned towards the outer
+angle of his side of the pediment. All seemed to have belonged to a
+dispensation of ugliness; they reminded us of some of the Etruscan
+sculptures.
+
+This gallery possesses a famous torso called the Ilioneus, concerning
+which Mrs. Jamieson rhapsodizes somewhat in her Munich book. The
+Barberini Faun, too, is among its treasures. As my readers may not be
+acquainted with the artistic antecedents of this statue, I will subjoin
+for their benefit the following narration, which I abridge from the
+"Ricordi" of the Marquis Massimo d' Azeglio, recently published.
+
+At the time of the French domination in Italy, the Roman nobles were
+subjected to the levying of heavy contributions. The inconvenience of
+these requisitions often taxed the resources of the wealthiest families,
+and led to the sale of furniture, jewels, and the multifarious
+denomination of articles classed together as _objets d'art_. Among
+others, the Barberini family, in their palace at the Quattro Fontane,
+exposed for sale various antiquitties, and especially the torso of a
+male figure, of Greek execution and in Pentelican marble, a relic of the
+palmy days of Hellenic art.
+
+A certain sculptor, Cavalier Pacetti, purchased this last fragment, sold
+at auction for the sum of seven or eight hundred dollars. The arms and
+legs were wholly wanting--the narrator is uncertain as to the head.
+Pacetti had made this purchase with the view of restoring the mutilated
+statue to entireness. He proceeded to model for himself the parts that
+were wanting, and in time produced the sleeping figure known as the
+Barberini Faun.
+
+This work was esteemed a great success. Besides the value of its long
+and uncertain labor must be mentioned the difficulty of matching the
+original marble. To effect this the artist was obliged to purchase and
+destroy another Greek statue, of less merit, whose marble supplied the
+material for the restoration.
+
+In the mean time the Napoleonic era had passed away; the pope had
+returned to Rome. Foreigners from all parts now flocked to the Eternal
+City, and to one of these Pacetti sold his work for many thousands of
+dollars. Before it could be packed and delivered, however, a
+governmental veto annulled the sale, directing the artist to restore the
+statue to the Barberini family, under the plea of its being subject to a
+_fidei commissa_, and offering him the sum of money expended by him in
+the first purchase, together with such further compensation for his
+labor and materials as a committee of experts should award.
+
+The unfortunate Pacetti resisted this injustice to the extent of his
+ability. He demonstrated the sale of the torso to have been made without
+reserve, the money for its purchase to have been raised by him with
+considerable effort. The further expense of the secondary statue was a
+heavy item. As an artist, he could not allow any one but himself to set
+a price upon his work.
+
+In spite of these arguments, the Barberinis, remembering that possession
+is nine points of the law, managed to confiscate the statue by armed
+force. Before this last measure, however, a mandate informed the artist
+that the pitiful sum offered to him in exchange (not in compensation)
+for his work, had been placed in the bank, subject to his order, and
+that from this sum a steady discount would mark every day of his delay
+to close with the shameful bargain.
+
+Pacetti now fell ill with a bilious fever, the result of this bitter
+disappointment. His recovery was only partial, and his death soon
+followed. His sons commenced and continued a suit against the Barberini
+family. They obtained a favorable judgment, but did not obtain their
+property, which the Barberinis sold to the King of Bavaria.
+
+I have thought it worth while to quote this history of a world-renowned
+work of art. I do not know that a more perfect and successful
+combination of modern with ancient art exists than that achieved in
+this Munich Faun. The mutilated honor of the Barberini name is, we
+should fear, beyond restoration by any artist.
+
+The Glyptothek closed much too soon for us. With the exception of the
+sculptures just enumerated, it possesses nothing that can compete in
+interest with the noted Italian galleries, or perhaps with the Louvre.
+But the few valuables that it has are first rate of their kind, and it
+contains many duplicates of well-known subjects. The building and
+arrangements are very elegant, and seem to cast a certain pathos over
+the follies of the old king, to whom it owes its origin, making one more
+sorry than angry that one who knew the Graces so well should not have
+fraternized more with the Virtues. The Æginetan Minerva is stern and
+hideous, however, and may have exercised an unfortunate influence over
+her _protegé_.
+
+We closed the labors of this day by visiting the colossal statue of
+Bavaria, who, with a strange hospitality, throws open her skull to the
+public. The external effect of the figure is not grandiose, and the
+sudden slope of the ground in front makes it very difficult to get a
+good view of it. With the help of a lamp, and in consideration of a
+small fee, we ascended the spinal column, and made ourselves comfortable
+within the sacred precincts of phrenology. The circulation, however,
+soon became so rapid as to produce a pressure at the base of the brain.
+Calling to the guardian below to impede for the moment all further
+ascent, we flowed down, and the congestion was relieved. Of this statue
+an artist once said to us, "As for such a thing as the Munich Bavaria,
+the bigger it is, the smaller it is"--a saying not unintelligible to
+those who have seen it.
+
+Our remaining day we devoted, in the first place, to the new Pinakothek.
+Here we saw a large picture, by Kaulbach, representing the fall of
+Jerusalem. Although full of historical and artistic interest, it seemed
+to me less individual and remarkable than his cartoons. A series of
+small pictures by the same artist appeared quite unworthy of his great
+powers and reputation. They were exceedingly well executed, certainly,
+but poorly conceived, representing matters merely personal to artistic
+and other society in Munich, and of little value to the world at large.
+
+Here was also a holy family by Overbeck, closely imitated from Raphael.
+The diary speaks vaguely of "many interesting pictures, the religious
+ones the poorest." I remember that we greatly regretted the limitation
+of our time in visiting this gallery. In the vestibule of the building
+we were shown a splendid Bavaria, in a triumphal car, driving four lions
+abreast, the work of Schwanthaler. This noble design so far exists only
+in plaster; one would wish to see it in fine Munich bronze. Apropos of
+which I must mention, but cannot describe, a visit to the celebrated
+foundery in which many of the best modern statues have been cast. Here
+were Crawford's noble works; here the more recent compositions of
+Rogers, Miss Stebbins, and Miss Hosmer. An American naturally first
+seeks acquaintance here with the works of his countrymen. He finds them
+in distinguished company. The foundery keeps a plaster cast of each of
+its models, and the ghosts of our heroes appear with tie-wig princes and
+generals of other times, as also with poets and _littérateurs_. The
+group of Goethe and Schiller, crowned and hand in hand, suggests one of
+the noblest of literary reminiscences--that of the devoted and genuine
+friendship of two most eminent authors, within the narrow limits of one
+small society. The entireness and sincerity of each in his own
+department of art alone made this possible. He who dares to be himself,
+and to work out his own ideal, fears no other, however praised and
+distinguished.
+
+We visited the new and old palaces in company with a small mob of
+travellers of all nations, whose disorderly tendencies were restrained
+by the palace _cicerones_. These worthies did the honors of the place,
+told the stories, and kept the company together. In the new palace we
+were shown the frescos, the hall of the battlepieces, the famous gallery
+of beauties, and the throne-room, whose whole length is adorned with
+life-size statues of royal and ducal Bavarian ancestors in gilded
+bronze. The throne is a great gilded chair, cushioned with crimson
+velvet, the seat adorned with a huge _L_ in gold embroidery.
+
+Of the gallery mentioned just before, I must say that its portraits are
+those of society belles, not of artist beauties. However handsome,
+therefore, they may have been in their ball and court dresses, there is
+something conventional and unlovely in their _toute ensemble_, as a
+collection of female heads. I would agree to find artists who should
+make better pictures from women of the people, taken in their ordinary
+costume, and with the freedom of common life in their actions and
+expressions. An intangible armor of formality seems to guard the persons
+of those great ladies. One imagines that one could understand their
+faces better, were they translated into human nature.
+
+In the old palace, which has now rather a deserted and denuded aspect,
+we still found traces of former splendor. Among these, I remember a
+state bed with a covering so heavily embroidered with gold, that eight
+men are requisite to lift it. The _valet de place_ astonished us with
+the price of this article; but having forgotten his statement, I cannot
+astonish any one with it. Of greater interest was a room, whose walls
+bore everywhere small brackets, supporting costly pieces of porcelain,
+cups, _flacons_, and statuettes. Beyond this was a _boudoir_, whose
+vermilion sides were nearly covered by miniature paintings, set into
+them. Many of these miniatures were of great beauty and value. Clearly
+the tastes of the Bavarian family were always of the most expensive.
+They looked after the flower garden, and allowed the kitchen garden to
+take care of itself. Of this sort was the farming of Otho and Amalia.
+But peace be to them. Otho is just dead of measles, Amalia nearly dead
+of vexations.
+
+Our two days allowed us little time for the churches of Munich. The
+Frauenkirche has many antiquities more interesting than its splendid
+restorations. On one of its altars I found the inscription, "Holy
+mother Ann, pray for us." I suppose that ever since the dogma of the
+immaculate conception has become part of church discipline, the sacred
+person just mentioned has found her clientele much enlarged. The new
+Basilica is quite gorgeous in its adornments, but I have preserved no
+minutes of them.
+
+We had the satisfaction of seeing a number of Kaulbach's drawings, among
+which were his Goethe and Schiller series, very fine and full of
+interest.
+
+One of the last of these represents Tell stepping from Gessler's boat at
+the critical moment described in Schiller's drama. One of the newest to
+me was a figure of Ottilie, from the Wahlverwandtschaften, hanging with
+mingled horror and affection over the innocent babe of the story. The
+intense distress of the young girl's countenance contrasts strongly with
+the reposeful attitude of the little one. It made me ponder this
+ingenious and laboriously achieved distress. The very exuberance of
+Goethe's temperament, I must think, caused him to seek his sorrows in
+regions quite remote from common disaster. The miseries of his
+personages (vide Werther and the Wahlverwandtschaften) are far-fetched;
+and the alchemy by which he turns wholesome life into sentimental
+anguish brings to light no life-treasure more substantial than the fairy
+gold which genius is bound to convert into value more solid.
+
+And this was all of Munich, a place of polite tastes surely, in which
+life must flow on, adorned with many pleasantnesses. Neither would
+business seem to be deficient, judging from the handsome shops and
+general air of prosperity. Our view of its resources was certainly most
+cursory. But life is the richer even for adjourned pleasures, and we
+shall never think of Munich without desiring its better acquaintance.
+
+
+
+
+SWITZERLAND.
+
+
+Travelling in Switzerland is now become so common and conventional as to
+invite little comment, except from those who remain in the country long
+enough to study out scientific and social questions, which the hasty
+traveller has not time to entertain in even the most cursory matter. I
+confess, for one, that I was content to be enchanted with the wonderful
+beauty which feasts the eye without intermission. I was willing to
+believe that the mountains had done for this people all that they should
+have done, giving them political immunities, and a sort of necessary
+independence, while the hardships of climate and situation keep
+stringent the social bond, and temper the fierceness of individuality
+with the sense of mutual need and protection. It would be, I think, an
+instructive study for an American to become intimately acquainted with
+the domestic features of Swiss republicanism. It is undoubtedly a system
+less lax and more carefully administered than our own. The door is not
+thrown open for beggary, ignorance, and rascality to vote themselves, in
+the shape of their representatives, the first places in outward dignity
+and efficient power. The old traditions of breeding and education are
+carefully held to. Without the nonsense of aristocratic absolutism,
+there is yet no confusion of orders. The mistress is mistress, and the
+maid is maid. Wealth and landed property persevere in families. Great
+changes of position without great talents are rare.
+
+To our American pretensions, and to our brilliant style of
+manoeuvring, the Swiss mode of life would appear a very slow business.
+It seems rather to develop a high mediocrity than an array of startling
+superiorities. It has, moreover, no room for daring theories and
+experiments. It cannot afford a Mormon corner, a woman's-rights
+platform, an endless intricacy of speculating and swindling rings.
+Whether we can afford these things, future generations will determine.
+There is a great deal of moral and political fancy-work done in America
+which another age may put out of sight to make room for necessary
+scrubbing, sweeping, and getting rid of vermin. Meantime the poor
+present age works, and deceives, and dawdles, hoping to be dismissed
+with the absolving edict, "She hath done what she could."
+
+Hotels, railways, and depots in Switzerland are comfortable, and managed
+with great order and system. The telegraph arrangements are admirable,
+cheap, and punctual, as they might be here, if they were administered
+for the people's interest, and not for the aggrandizement of private
+fortunes. Living and comfort are expensive to the traveller, not
+exorbitant. Subordinates neither insult nor cringe. Churches are well
+filled; intelligent and intelligible doctrine is preached. Education is
+valued, and liberal provision is made for those classes in which
+natural disability calls for special modes of instruction. I dare not go
+more into generals, from my very limited opportunity of observation.
+Everything, however, in the aspect of town and country, leads one to
+suppose that the average of crime must be a low one, and that the
+preventing influences--so much more efficient than remedial
+measures--have long, been at work. It is Protestant Switzerland which
+makes this impression most strongly. In the Catholic cantons, beggary
+exists and is tolerated as a thing of course; yet the Protestant element
+has everywhere its representation and its influence.
+
+Swiss Catholicism has not the slavish ignorance of Roman Catholicism.
+The little painted crucifixes by the wayside indeed afflict one by their
+impotence and insignificance. Not thus shall Christ be recognized in
+these days. In some places their frequency reminded me of the recurrence
+of the pattern on a calico or a wall paper. Yet, as a whole, one feels
+that Switzerland is a Protestant power.
+
+For specials, I must have recourse to the insufficient pages of the
+diary, which give the following:--
+
+August 13. Museum at Zurich. Lacustrine remains, in stone, flint, and
+bronze; fragments of the old piles, cut with stone knives. Hand-mill for
+corn, consisting of a hollow stone and a round one, concave and convex.
+Toilet ornaments, in bone and bronze; a few in gold.--The Library. Lady
+Jane Grey's letters, three in number; Zwingle's Greek Bible.--The
+Armory. Zwingle's helmet and battle-axe; three suits of female armor;
+curious shields, cannon, pikes, and every variety of personal defence.
+
+August 14. Left Zurich at half past six A. M. for Lucerne, reaching the
+latter place at half past eight. Visited Thorwaldsen's lion, whose
+majestic presence I had not forgotten in twenty-three years. Yet the
+Swiss hireling under foreign pay is a mischievous institution. At two P.
+M. took the boat for Hergeswyl, intending to ascend from that point the
+Mount Pilatus. At half past three began this ascension. The road is very
+fine, and my leader was excellent; yet I had some uncomfortable moments
+in the latter part of the ascent, which was in zigzag, and very steep.
+Each horse cost ten francs, and each leader was to have a _trink-geld_
+besides. We stopped very gladly at the earliest reached of the two
+hotels which render habitable the heights of the mountain. We learned
+too late that it would have been better to proceed at once to that which
+stands nearly on the summit. We should thus have gained time for the
+great spectacle of the sunrise on the following morning. Our view of the
+sunset, too, would have been more extended. Yet we were well content
+with it. Near the hotel was a very small Catholic chapel, through whose
+painted windows we tried to peep. A herd of goats feeding near by made
+music with their tinkling bells. Swiss sounds are as individual as Swiss
+sights. Voices, horns, bells, all have their peculiar ring in these high
+atmospheres.
+
+We lay down at night with the intention of rising at a quarter of four
+next morning, in order to witness the sunrise from the highest point of
+the mountain. Mistaking some sounds which disturbed my slumbers for the
+guide's summons, I sprang out of bed, and having no match, made a hasty
+toilet in the dark, and then ran to arouse my companions. One of these,
+fortunately, was able to strike a light and look at his watch. It was
+just twelve, and my zeal and energy had been misdirected. When I again
+awoke, it was at four A. M., already rather late for our purpose. We
+dressed hastily, and vehemently started on the upward zigzag. As the
+guide had not yet appeared, I carried our night bundle, but for which I
+should have kept the lead of the party. Small as was its weight, I felt
+it sensibly in this painful ascent, and was thankful to relinquish it
+when the tardy guide came up with us. In spite of his aid, I was much
+distressed for breath, and suffered from a thirst surpassing that of
+fever. My ears also ached exceedingly in consequence of the rarefaction
+of the atmosphere. The last effort of the ascent was made upon a ladder
+pitched at such an angle that one could climb it only on hands and
+knees. We reached the last peak a little late for the sunrise, but
+enjoyed a near and magnificent view of the snow Alps. The diary contains
+no description of this prospect. I can only remember that its coloring
+and extent were wonderful. But a day of fatigue was still before us.
+Breakfasting at six o'clock, we soon commenced the painful downward
+journey. No "_facilis descensus_" was this, but a climbing down which
+lasted three full hours. We had kept but one horse for this part of our
+journey, but this was such an uncertain and stumbling beast that we
+gladly surrendered him to our chief, who, in spite of this assistance,
+was found more than once lying on a log, assuring us that his end was at
+hand. We had little breath to spare for his consolation, but gave him a
+silent and aching sympathy. A pleasant party of English girls left the
+hotel when we did, one on horseback and three on foot. The hardships of
+the way brought us together. I can still recall the ring of their
+voices, and the freshness and sparkle of their faces, which really
+encouraged my efforts. The pleasures of this descent were as intense as
+its pains. The brilliant grass was enamelled with wild flowers,
+exquisite in color and fragrance. The mountain air was bracing and
+delightful, the details of tree and stream most picturesque. For some
+reason, which I now forget, we stopped but little to take rest. At a
+small châlet half way down, we enjoyed a glass of beer, and were waited
+upon by a maiden in white sleeves and black bodice, her fair hair being
+braided with a strip of white linen, and secured in its place by a large
+pin with an ornamented head. We reached Alpenach in a state of body and
+of wardrobe scarcely describable. But our minds at least were at ease.
+We had done something to make a note of. We had been to the top of Mons
+Pilatus.
+
+Of Interlaken the diary preserves nothing worth transcribing. The great
+beauty of the scenery made us reluctant to leave it after a few hours of
+enjoyment. The appalling fashionable and watering-place aspect of the
+streets and hotels, on the other hand, rendered it uncongenial to quiet
+travellers, whose strength did not lie in the _clothes_ line. Our brief
+stay showed us the greatest mixture and variety of people; the hotels
+were splendid with showy costumes, the shops tempting with onyx,
+amethyst, and crystal ornaments. We saw here also a great display of
+carvings in wood. The unpaved streets were gay with equipages and donkey
+parties. A sousing rain soon made confusion among them, and reconciled
+us to a speedy departure.
+
+Of Berne and Fribourg I will chronicle only the organ concerts, given to
+exhibit the resources of two famous instruments. At both places we found
+the organ very fine, and the musical performance very trashy. No real
+organ music was given on either occasion, the _pièce de resistance_
+being an imitation of a thunderstorm. Both instruments seemed to me to
+surpass our own great organ in beauty and variety of tone. The larger
+proportions of the buildings in which they are heard may contribute to
+this result. Both of these are cathedrals, with fine vaulted roofs and
+long aisles, very different from the essentially civic character of the
+music hall, whose compact squareness cannot deal with the immense volume
+of sound thrown upon its hands by the present overgrown incum--bent.
+
+
+
+
+THE GREAT EXPOSITION.
+
+
+It would be unfair to American journalism not to suppose that all
+possible information concerning the Great Exposition has already been
+given to the great republic. There have doubtless been quires upon
+quires of brilliant writing devoted to that absorbing theme. Columns
+from the most authentic sources have been commanded and paid for.
+American writing is rich in epithets, and we may suppose that all the
+adjective splendors have been put in requisition to aid imagination to
+take the place of sight. Yet, as the diversities of landscape painting
+show the different views which may be taken of one nature, even so the
+view taken by my sober instrument may possibly show something that has
+escaped another.
+
+I here refer to the pages of my oft-quoted diary. But alas! the wretch
+deserts me in the hour of my greatest need. I find a record of my first
+visit only, and that couched in one prosaic phrase as follows:
+Exposition--valet, six francs.
+
+Now, I am not a Cuvier, to reconstruct a whole animal from a single
+fossil bone; nor am I a German historian, to present the picture of a
+period by inventing the opposite of its records. Yet what I can report
+of this great feature of the summer must take as its starting-point this
+phrase: Exposition--valet, six francs.
+
+This extravagant attendance was secured by us on the occasion of our
+first visit, when, passing inside the narrow turnstile, with ready
+change and eager mind, we encountered the great reality we had to deal
+with, and felt, to our dismay, that spirit would help us little, and
+that flesh and blood, eyes and muscles, must do their utmost, and begin
+by acknowledging a defeat. Looking on the diverse paths, and flags and
+buildings, we sought an Ariadne, and found at least a guide whom Bacchus
+might console. Escorted by him, we entered the first great hall, with
+massive machines partially displayed on one side. A _coup d'oeil_ was
+what we sought on this occasion, and our movements were rapid. The Sèvre
+porcelains, the magnificent French and English glasses, the weighty
+majolicas, the Gobelin tapestries, and the galleries of paintings,
+chiefly consumed our six francs, which represented some three hours.
+Magnificent services of plate, some in silver, and some in imitation of
+silver, were shown to us. In another place the close clustering of men
+and women around certain glass cases made us suspect the attraction of
+jewelry, which may be called the sugar-plummery of æsthetics.
+Insinuating ourselves among the human bees, we, too, fed our eyes on
+these sweets. Diadems, necklaces, earrings, sufficient, in the hands of
+a skilful Satan, to accomplish the damnation of the whole female sex,
+were here displayed. I was glad to see these dangerous implements of
+temptation restrained within cases of solid glass. I myself would fain
+have written upon them, "Deadly poison." There are enough, however, to
+preach, and I practised by running off from these disputed
+neighborhoods, and passing to the contemplation of treasures which to
+see is to have.
+
+Among the Gobelins I was amazed to see a fine presentation of Titian's
+Sacred and Profane Love, a picture of universal reputation. The
+difficulty of copying so old and so perfect a work in tapestry made this
+success a very remarkable one. Very beautiful, too, was their copy of
+Guido's Aurora, and yet less difficult than the other, the coloring
+being at once less subtile and more brilliant.
+
+I remember a gigantic pyramid of glass, which arose, like a
+frost-stricken fountain, in the middle of the English china and glass
+department. I remember huge vases, cups as thin as egg-shell, pellucid
+crystals in all shapes, a glory of hard materials and tender colors. And
+I remember a department of raw material, fibres, minerals, germs, and
+grains, and a department of Eastern confectionery, and one of Algerine
+small work, to wit, jewelry and embroidery. An American soda fountain
+caused us to tingle with renewed associations. And we hear, with
+shamefaced satisfaction, that American drinks have proved a feature in
+this great phenomenon. Machines have, of course, been creditable to us.
+Chickering and Steinway have carried off prizes in a piano-forte tilt,
+each grudging the other his share of the common victory. And our
+veteran's maps for the blind have received a silver medal. Tiffany, the
+New York jeweller, presents a good silver miniature of Crawford's
+beautiful America. And with these successes our patriotism must now be
+content. We are not ahead of all creation, so far as the Exposition is
+concerned, and the things that do us most credit must be seen and
+studied in our midst.
+
+Our longest lingerings in the halls of the Exposition were among the
+galleries of art. Among these the French pictures were preëminent in
+interest. The group of Jerome's paintings were the most striking of
+their kind, uniting finish with intensity, and both with ease. In his
+choice of subjects, Jerome is not a Puritan. The much admired Almée is a
+picture of low scope, excusable only as an historic representation. The
+judgment of Phryne will not commend itself more to maids and matrons who
+love their limits. Both pictures, however, are powerfully conceived and
+colored. The "Ave Cesar" of the _morituri_ before Vitellius is better
+inspired, if less well executed, and holds the mirror close in the cruel
+face of absolute power.
+
+Study of the Italian masters was clearly visible in many of the best
+works of the French gallery. I recall a fine triptych representing the
+story of the prodigal son in which the chief picture spoke plainly of
+Paul Veronese, and his Venetian life and coloring. In this picture the
+prodigal appeared as the lavish entertainer of gay company. A banquet,
+shared by joyous _hetairæ_, occupied the canvas. A slender compartment
+on the right showed the second act of the drama--hunger, swine-feeding,
+and repentance. A similar one on the left gave the pleasanter
+_dénouement_--the return, the welcome, the feast of forgiveness. Both of
+the latter subjects were treated in _chiaro-scuro_, a manner that
+heightened the contrast between the flush of pleasure and the pallor of
+its consequences. Rosa Bonheur's part in the Exposition was scarcely
+equal to her reputation. One charming picture of a boat-load of sheep
+crossing a Highland loch still dwells in my memory like a limpid
+sapphire, so lovely was the color of the water. The Russian, Swedish,
+and Danish pictures surprised me by their good points. If we may judge
+of Russian art by these specimens, it is not behind the European
+standard of attainment. Of the Bavarian gallery, rich in works of
+interest, I can here mention but two. The first must be a very large and
+magnificent cartoon by Kaulbach, representing a fancied assemblage of
+illustrious personages at the period of the Reformation. Luther,
+Erasmus, and Melanchthon were prominent among these, the whole belonging
+to a large style of historical composition.
+
+The second was already familiar to us through a photograph seen and
+admired in Munich. It is called Ste. Julie, and represents a young
+Christian martyr, dead upon the cross, at whose foot a young man is
+depositing an offering of flowers. The pale beauty and repose of the
+figure, the massive hair and lovely head, the modesty of attitude and
+attire, are very striking. The sky is subdued, clear, and gray, the
+black hair standing out powerfully against it. The whole palette seems
+to have been set with pure and pearly tints. One thinks the brushes that
+painted this fair dove could never paint a courtesan. A single star, the
+first of evening, breaks the continuity of the twilight sky. This
+picture seemed as if it should make those who look at it thenceforward
+more tender, and more devout. Among the English pictures, the Enemy
+sowing Tares, by Millais, was particularly original--a malignant sky,
+full of blight and destruction, and a malignant wretch, smiling at
+mischief, and scowling at good,--a powerful figure, mighty and mean.
+This picture makes one start and shudder; such must have been its
+intention, and such is its success.
+
+Among sculptures, the most conspicuous was one called the Last Hour of
+Napoleon--a figure in an invalid's chair, with drooping head and worn
+countenance, the map of the globe lying spread upon his passive knees.
+Every trait already says, "This _was_ Napoleon," the man of modern times
+who longest survived himself, who was dead and could not expire. Wreaths
+of immortelles always lay at the foot of this statue. It is the work of
+an Italian artist, and the only sculpture in the whole exhibition which
+I can recall as easily and deservedly remembered.
+
+Our American part in the art-exhibition was not great. William Hunt's
+pictures were badly placed, and not grouped, as they should have been,
+to give an adequate idea of the variety of his merits. Bierstadt's Rocky
+Mountains looked thin in coloring, and showed a want of design. Church's
+Niagara was effective. Johnston's Old Kentucky Home was excellent in its
+kind, and characteristic. Kensett had a good landscape. But America has
+still more to learn than to teach in the way of high art. Success among
+us is too cheap and easy. Art-critics are wordy and ignorant, praising
+from caprice rather than from conscience. It would be most important for
+us to form at least one gallery of art in which American artists might
+study something better than themselves. The presence of twenty
+first-rate pictures in one of our great cities would save a great deal
+of going abroad, and help to form a sincere and intelligent standard of
+æsthetic judgment. Such pictures should, of course, be constantly open
+to the public, as no private collection can well be. We should have a
+Titian, a Rubens, an Andrea, a Paul Veronese, and so on. But these
+pictures should be of historical authenticity. The most responsible
+artists of the country should be empowered to negotiate for them, and
+the money might be afforded from the heavy gains of late years with far
+more honor and profit than the superfluous splendors with which the
+fortunate of this period bedizen their houses and their persons.
+
+Among American sculptures I may mention a pleasing medallion or two by
+Miss Foley. Miss Hosmer's Faun is a near relative in descent from the
+Barberini Faun, and, however good in execution, has little originality
+of conception. And these things I say, Beloved, in the bosom of our
+American family, because I think they ought to be said, and not out of
+pride or fancied superiority.
+
+I am ashamed to say that I have already told the little I am able to
+tell of the Exposition as seen by daylight--the little, at least, that
+every one else has not told. But I visited the enclosure once in the
+evening, when only the cafés were open. Among these I sought a beer-shop
+characterized as the Bavarian brewery, and sought it long and with
+trouble; for the long, winding paths showed us, one after the other,
+many agglomerations of light, which were obviously places of public
+entertainment, and in each of which we expected to find our Bavarian
+brewery, famous for the musical performances of certain gypsies much
+spoken of in Parisian circles. In the pursuit of this we entered half a
+dozen buildings, in each of which some characteristic entertainment was
+proceeding. Coming finally to the object of our search, we found it a
+plain room with small tables, half filled with visitors. Opposite the
+entrance was a small orchestral stage, on which were seated the wild
+musicians whom we sought. A franc each person was the entrance fee, and
+we were scarcely seated before a functionary authoritatively invited us
+to command some refreshment, in a tone which was itself the order of the
+day. In obedience, one ordered beer, another _gloria_, a third
+cigars--all at extortionate prices. But then the music was given for
+nothing, and must be paid for somehow. And it proved worth paying for.
+At first the body of sound seemed overpowering, for there was no
+pianissimo, and not one of the regular orchestral effects. A
+weird-looking leader in high boots stood and fiddled, holding his violin
+now on a level with his eyes, now with his nose, now with his stomach,
+writhing and swaying with excitement, his excitable troupe following the
+ups and downs of his movement like a track of gaunt hounds dashing after
+a spectre. The café gradually filled, and orders were asked and given.
+But little disturbance did these give either to the band or its hearers.
+They played various wild airs and symphonies (not technical ones), being
+partially advised therein by an elegant male personage who sat leaning
+his head upon his jewelled hand, absorbed in attention. These melodies
+were obviously compositions of the most eccentric and accidental sort.
+Not thus do great or small harmonists mate their tones and arch their
+passages. But there was a vivacity and a passion in all that these men
+did which made every bar seem full of electric fire; and these must be,
+I thought, traditional vestiges of another time, when music was not yet
+an art, but only nature. Here Dwight's Journal has no power. Beethoven
+or Handel may do as he likes; these do as they please, also. This is the
+heathendom of art, in which feeling is all, authority nothing; in which
+rules are only suspected, not created. After an hour or more of this
+entertainment, we left it, not unwillingly, being a little weary of its
+labyrinthine character and unmoderated ecstasy. Yet we left it much
+impressed with the musical material presented in it. Our civilized
+orchestras have no such enthusiasts as that nervous leader, with his
+leaping violin and restraining high boots. And this, with the lights and
+shadows, and broken music of the outside walks, is all that I saw of
+evening at the Exposition.
+
+
+
+
+PICTURES IN ANTWERP.
+
+
+As you cannot, with rare exceptions, see Raphael out of Italy, so, I
+should almost say, you cannot see Rubens and Vandyck out of Belgium.
+This is especially true of the former; for one does, I confess, see
+marvellous portraits of Vandyck's in Genoa and in other places. But one
+judges a painter best by seeing a group of his best works, which show
+his sphere of thought with some completeness. A single sentence suffices
+to show the great poet; but no one will assume that a sentence will give
+you to know as much of him as a poem or volume. So the detached
+sentences of the two great Flemish painters, easily met with in
+European galleries, bear genuine evidence of the master's hand; but the
+collections of Antwerp and Bruges show us the master himself. Intending
+no disrespect to Florence, Munich, or the Medicean series at the Louvre,
+I must say that I had no just measure of the dignity of Rubens as a man
+and as an artist, until I stood before his two great pictures in the
+Cathedral of Antwerp. One of these represents the Elevation of the
+Cross. Mathematically it offends one--the cross, the principal object in
+the picture, being seen diagonally, in an uneasy and awkward posture. On
+the other hand, the face of the Christ corresponds fully to the heroism
+of the moment; it expresses the human horror and agony, but, triumphing
+over all, the steadfastness of resolve and faith. It is a
+transfiguration--the spiritual glory holding its own above all
+circumstances of pain and infamy. A sort of beautiful surprise is in the
+eyes--the first deadly pang of an organism unused to suffer. It is a
+face that lifts one above the weakness and meanness of ordinary human
+life. This soul, one sees, had the true talisman, the true treasure. If
+we earn what he did, we can afford to let all else go. The Descent from
+the Cross is better known than its fellow-picture. It had not to me the
+wonderful interest of the living face of Christ in the supreme moment of
+his great life; for I shall always consider that the Christ represented
+in the Elevation is a true Christ, not a mere fancy figure or dramatic
+ghost. The Descent is, however, more grand and satisfactory in its
+grouping, and the contrast between the agony of the friendly faces that
+surround the chief figure and the dead peace of his expression and
+attitude is profound and pathetic. The head and body fall heavily upon
+the arms of those who support it, and who seem to bear an inward weight
+far transcending the outward one. The pale face of the Virgin is
+stricken and compressed with sorrow. Each of the pictures is the centre
+of a triptych, the two smaller paintings representing subjects in
+harmony with the chief groups. On the right of the Descent we have Mary
+making her historical visit to the house of Elisabeth; on the left, the
+presentation of the infant Christ in the temple. On the right of the
+Elevation is a group of those daughters of Jerusalem to whom Christ
+said, "Weep not for me." The subject on the left is less significant.
+
+With these pictures deserves to rank the Flagellation of Christ, by the
+same artist, in the Church of St. Paul. The resplendent fairness of the
+body, the cruel reality of the bleeding which follows the scourge, and
+the expression of genuine but noble suffering, seize upon the very quick
+of sympathy, weakened by mythicism and sentimentalism. This fair body,
+sensitive as yours or mine, endured bitter and agonizing blows. This
+great heart was content to endure them as the penalty of bequeathing to
+mankind its priceless secret.
+
+The churches of Antwerp are rich in architecture, paintings, and
+marbles. In the latter the Church of St. Jacques excels, the high altar
+and side chapels being adorned with twisted columns of white marble, and
+with various sculptures. The Musée contains many pictures of great
+reputation and merit. Among these are a miniature painting of the
+Descent from the Cross, by Rubens himself, closely, but not wholly,
+corresponding with his great picture; the Education of the Virgin, and
+the Vierge au Perroquet, both by Rubens, in his most brilliant style.
+Another composition represents St. Theresa imploring the Savior to
+release from purgatory the soul of a benefactor of her order. Rubens is
+said to have given to this benefactor the features of Vandyck, and to
+one of the angels releasing him those of his young wife, Helena Forman;
+while the face of an old man still in suffering represents his own.
+
+This gallery contains three Vandycks of first-class merit, each of which
+will detain the attention of lovers of art. The one that first meets
+your eye is a Pietà, in which the body of Christ is stretched
+horizontally, his head lying on the lap of his mother. The strongest
+point of the picture is the Virgin's sorrow, expressed in her pallid
+face, eyes worn with weeping, and outstretched hands. The second is a
+small crucifix, very harmonious and expressive. The third is a life-size
+picture of the crucifixion, with a very individual tone of color. The
+Virgin, at the foot of the cross, has great truth and dignity, but is
+rather a modern figure for the subject. But the pride of the whole
+collection is a unique triptych by Quintin Matsys, his greatest work,
+and one without which the extent of his power can never be realized. The
+central picture represents a dead Christ, surrounded by the men and
+women who ministered to him, preparing him for sepulture. The right
+hand of the Christ lies half open, with a wonderful expression of
+acquiescence. The faces of those who surround him are full of intense
+interest and tenderness; the Virgin's countenance expresses heart-break.
+The whole picture disposes you to weep, not from sentimentalism, but
+from real sympathy. Of the side pieces, one represents the wicked women
+with the head of John the Baptist, the other the martyrdom of Ste.
+Barbe. Add to these some of the best Teniers, Ostades, Ruysdaels, and
+Vanderweldes, with many excellent works of second-class merit, and you
+will understand, as well as words can tell you, what treasures lie
+within the Musée of Antwerp.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Copy is exhausted, say the printers. Perhaps patience gave out first. My
+MS. is at end--not handsomely rounded off, nor even shortened by a
+surgical amputation, but broken at some point in which facts left no
+room for words. Observation became absorbing, and description was
+adjourned, as it now proves, forever. The few sentences which I shall
+add to what is already written will merely apologize for my sudden
+disappearance, lest the clown's "Here we are" should find a comic
+_pendant_ in my "Here we are not."
+
+I have only to say that I have endeavored in good faith to set down this
+simple and hurried record of a journey crowded with interests and
+pleasures. I was afraid to receive so freely of these without attempting
+to give what I could in return, under the advantages and disadvantages
+of immediate transcription. In sketches executed upon the spot, one
+hopes that the vividness of the impression under which one labors may
+atone for the want of finish and of elaboration. If read at all, these
+notes may be called to account for many insufficiencies. Some pages may
+appear careless, some sentences Quixotic. I am still inclined to think
+that with more leisure and deliberation I should not have done the work
+as well. I should, perhaps, like Tintoretto, have occupied acres and
+acres of attention with superfluous delineation, putting, as he did, my
+own portrait in the corner. Rejoice, therefore, good reader, in my
+limitations. They are your enfranchisement.
+
+Touching Quixotism, I will plead guilty to the sounding of various
+parleys before some stately buildings and unshaken fortresses. "Who is
+this that blows so sharp a summons?" may the inmates ask. I may answer,
+"One who believes in the twelve legions of angels that wait upon the
+endeavors of faithful souls." Should they further threaten or deride, I
+will borrow Elizabeth Browning's sweet refrain,--
+
+    "I am no trumpet, but a reed,"--
+
+and trust not to become a broken one.
+
+Conscious of my many shortcomings, and asking attention only for the
+message I have tried to bring, I ask also for that charity which
+recognizes that good will is the best part of action, and good faith the
+first condition of knowledge.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The following typogrphical errors were corrected by the etext
+transcriber:
+
+embarassment=>embarrassment
+
+Minature=>Miniature
+
+procesison=>procession
+
+pivations=>privations
+
+the shonlder of the garment=>the shoulder of the garment
+
+fortutunate=>fortunate
+
+Bronner pass.=>Brenner pass.
+
+Pinakethek=>Pinakothek
+
+antiquitties=>antiquities
+
+Macchiavelli's Principe=>Machiavelli's Principe
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's From the Oak to the Olive, by Julia Ward Howe
+
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+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of From the Oak to the Olive, by Julia Ward Howe
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: From the Oak to the Olive
+       A Plain record of a Pleasant Journey
+
+Author: Julia Ward Howe
+
+Release Date: November 24, 2011 [EBook #38127]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FROM THE OAK TO THE OLIVE ***
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+</pre>
+
+<hr class="full" />
+
+<p class="figcenter">
+<a href="images/cover_lg.jpg">
+<img src="images/cover.jpg" width="349" height="550" alt="images of the book&#39;s cover"
+title="images of the book&#39;s cover" /></a>
+</p>
+
+<h1><small>FROM THE</small><br /><br /><br />
+OAK TO THE OLIVE.</h1>
+
+<p class="cb">&nbsp;<br /><br />A P<small>LAIN</small> R<small>ECORD OF A</small> P<small>LEASANT</small> J<small>OURNEY.</small></p>
+
+<p class="cb">&nbsp;<br /><br /><br />
+<small>BY</small><br /><br />
+JULIA WARD HOWE</p>
+
+<p class="cb">&nbsp;<br /><br /><br /><br />
+BOSTON:<br />
+LEE AND SHEPARD.<br />
+1868.</p>
+
+<p class="c">&nbsp;<br /><br /><br />
+<small>Entered, according to Act of Congress, In the year 1868, by<br />
+JULIA WARD HOWE,<br />
+In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts.</small><br />
+<br /><br /><br /><br />
+<small><small>STEREOTYPED AT THE<br />
+BOSTON STEREOTYPE FOUNDRY,<br />
+19 Spring Lane.</small></small><br />&nbsp;<br /><br /><br />
+</p>
+
+<p class="cb">
+TO<br />
+<br />
+S. G. H.,<br />
+<br />
+<i>THE STRENUOUS CHAMPION OF GREEK LIBERTY<br />
+AND OF HUMAN RIGHTS</i>,<br />
+<br />
+<small>IS OFFERED SUCH SMALL HOMAGE AS THE<br />
+DEDICATION OF THIS VOLUME<br />
+CAN CONFER.</small><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>
+<br />&nbsp;
+<br />
+</p>
+
+<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" summary="CONTENTS">
+
+<tr><th align="center" colspan="2"><a name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS"></a><big>CONTENTS</big></th></tr>
+
+<tr><td align="right" colspan="2"><small>PAGE</small></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="smcap">Preliminaries.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_001">1</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">The Voyage.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_003">3</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Liverpool.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_009">9</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Chester&mdash;Lichfield.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_011">11</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">London.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_017">17</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">St. Paul's&mdash;the Japanese.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_023">23</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Society.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_028">28</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">The Channel.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_036">36</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Paris and Thence.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_037">37</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Marseilles.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_042">42</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Rome.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_045">45</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">St. Peter's.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_050">50</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Supper of the Pilgrims.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_055">55</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Easter.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_058">58</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Works of Art.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_060">60</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Piazza Navona&mdash;the Tombola.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_065">65</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Sundays in Rome.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_070">70</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Catacombs.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_074">74</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Via Appia and the Columbaria.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_081">81</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Naples&mdash;the Journey.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_088">88</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">The Museum.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_092">92</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Naples&mdash;Excursions.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_096">96</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">The Capuchin.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_102">102</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Baja.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_106">106</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Capri.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_110">110</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Sorrento.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_119">119</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Florence.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_122">122</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Palazzo Pitti.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_124">124</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Venice.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_133">133</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Greece and the Voyage Thither.&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; </td><td align="right"><a href="#page_153">153</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Syra.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_164">164</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Piræus&mdash;Athens.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_169">169</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Expeditions&mdash;Nauplia.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_175">175</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Argos.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_183">183</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Egina.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_196">196</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Days in Athens.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_198">198</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Excursions.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_205">205</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Hymettus.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_214">214</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Items.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_221">221</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">The Palace.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_222">222</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">The Cathedral.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_227">227</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">The Missionaries.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_231">231</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">The Piazza.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_234">234</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Departure.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_237">237</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Return Voyage.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_239">239</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Farther.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_249">249</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Fragments.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_253">253</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Flying Footsteps.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_270">270</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Munich.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_275">275</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Switzerland.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_284">284</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">The Great Exposition.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_290">290</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="smcap">Pictures in Antwerp.</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_299">299</a></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p><br /><br /><br /><br /><a name="page_001" id="page_001"></a></p>
+
+<h1>FROM THE OAK TO THE OLIVE.</h1>
+
+<p class="cb">&mdash;&mdash;&mdash;&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<h2>P<small>RELIMINARIES</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>Not being, at this moment, in the pay of any press, whether foreign or
+domestic, I will not, at this my third landing in English country, be in
+haste to accomplish the correspondent's office of extroversion, and to
+expose all the inner processes of thought and of nature to the gaze of
+an imaginary public, often, alas! a delusory one, and difficult to be
+met with. No individual editor, nor joint stock company, bespoke my
+emotions before my departure. I am, therefore, under no obligation to
+furnish for the market, with the elements of time and of postage
+unhandsomely curtailed. Instead, then, of that breathless steeple chase
+after the butterfly of the moment, with whose risks and hurry I am
+intimately acquainted, I feel myself enabled to look around me at every
+step which I shall take on paper, and to represent, in my small literary
+operations, the three dimensions of time, instead of the flat disc of
+the present.</p>
+
+<p>And first as to my pronoun. The augmentative <i>We</i><a name="page_002" id="page_002"></a> is essential for
+newspaper writing, because people are liable to be horsewhipped for what
+they put in the sacred columns of a daily journal. <i>We</i> may represent a
+vague number of individuals, less inviting to, and safer from, the
+cowhide, than the provoking <i>egomet ipse</i>. Or perhaps the <i>We</i> derives
+from the New Testament incorporation of devils, whose name was legion,
+for we are many. In the Fichtean philosophy, also, there are three
+pronouns comprised in the personal unity whose corporeal effort applies
+this pen to this paper, to wit, the <i>I</i> absolute, the <i>I</i> limited, and
+the <i>I</i> resulting from the union of these two. So that a philosopher may
+say <i>we</i> as well as a monarch or a penny-a-liner. Yet I, at the present
+moment, incline to fall back upon my record of baptism, and to confront
+the white sheet, whose blankness I trust to overcome, in the character
+of an agent one and indivisible.</p>
+
+<p>Nor let it be supposed that these preliminary remarks undervalue the
+merits and dignity of those who write for ready money, whose meals and
+travels are at the expense of mysterious corporations, the very cocktail
+which fringes their daily experience being thrown in as a brightener of
+their wits and fancies. Thus would I, too, have written, had anybody
+ordered me to do so. I can hurry up my hot cakes like another, when
+there is any one to pay for them. But, leisure being accorded me, I
+shall stand with my tablets in the marketplace, hoping in the end to
+receive my penny, upon a footing of equality with those who have borne
+the burden and heat of the day.<a name="page_003" id="page_003"></a></p>
+
+<p>With the rights of translation, however, already arranged for in the
+Russian, Sclavonian, Hindustanee, and Fijian dialects, I reserve to
+myself the right to convert my pronoun, and to write a chapter in <i>we</i>
+whenever the individual <i>I</i> shall seem to be insufficient. With these
+little points agreed upon beforehand, to prevent mistakes,&mdash;since a book
+always represents a bargain,&mdash;I will enter, without further delay, upon
+what I intend as a very brief but cogent chronicle of a third visit to
+Europe, the first two having attained no personal record.</p>
+
+<h2>T<small>HE</small> V<small>OYAGE</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>The steamer voyage is now become a fact so trite and familiar as to call
+for no special illustration at these or any other hands. Yet voyages and
+lives resemble each other in many particulars, and differ in as many
+others. Ours proves almost unprecedented for smoothness, as well as for
+safety. We start on the fatal Wednesday, as twice before, expecting the
+fatal pang. Our last vicarious purchase on shore was a box of that
+energetic mustard, so useful as a counter-irritant in cases of internal
+commotion. The bitter partings are over, the dear ones heartily
+commended to Heaven, we see, as in a dream, the figure of command
+mounted upon the paddle-box. We cling to a camp stool near the red
+smoke-stack, and cruelly murmur to the two rosy neophytes who are our
+companions, "In five minutes you will be more unhappy than you ever were
+or ever dreamed of being." They reply with<a name="page_004" id="page_004"></a> sweet, unconscious looks of
+wonder, that ignorance of danger which the recruit carries into his
+first battle, or which carries him into it. But five minutes pass, and
+twelve times five, and the moment for going below does not come. In the
+expected shape, in fact, it does not arrive at all. We do not resolve
+upon locomotion, nor venture into the dining saloon; but leaning back
+upon a borrowed <i>chaise longue</i>, we receive hurried and fragmentary
+instalments of victuals, and discuss with an improvised acquaintance the
+aspects of foreign and domestic travel. The plunge into the state-room
+at bedtime, and the crawl into the narrow berth, are not without their
+direr features, which the sea-smells and confined air aggravate. We hear
+bad accounts of A, B, and C, but our neophytes patrol the deck to the
+last moment, and rise from their dive, on the second morning, fresher
+than ever.</p>
+
+<p>Our steamer is an old one, but a favorite, and as steady as a
+Massachusetts matron of forty. Our captain is a kindly old sea-dog, who
+understands his business, and does not mind much else. To the innocent
+flatteries of the neophytes he opposes a resolute front. They will
+forget him, he says, as soon as they touch land. They protest that they
+will not, and assure him that he shall breakfast, dine, and sup with
+them in Boston, six months hence, and that he shall always remain their
+sole, single, and ideal captain; at all of which he laughs as grimly as
+Jove is said to do at lovers' perjuries.</p>
+
+<p>Our company is a small one, after the debarkation<a name="page_005" id="page_005"></a> at Halifax, where
+sixty-five passengers leave us,&mdash;among whom are some of the most
+strenuous <i>euchreists</i>. The remaining thirty-six are composed partly of
+our own country people,&mdash;of whom praise or blame would be impertinent in
+this connection,&mdash;partly of the Anglo-Saxon of the day, in the
+pre-puritan variety. Of the latter, as of the former, we will waive all
+discriminating mention, having porrigated to them the dexter of
+good-will, with no hint of aboriginal tomahawks to be exhumed hereafter.
+Some traits, however, of the <i>Anglais de voyage</i>, as seen on his return
+from an American trip, may be vaguely given, without personality or fear
+of offence.</p>
+
+<p>The higher in grade the culture of the European traveller in America,
+the more reverently does he speak of what he has seen and learned. To
+the gentle-hearted, childhood and its defects are no less sacred than
+age and its decrepitude; withal, much dearer, because full of hope and
+of promise. The French barber sneezes out "Paris" at every step taken on
+the new land. That is the utmost his ratiocination can do; he can
+perceive that Boston, Washington, Chicago, are not Paris. The French
+exquisite flirts, flatters the individual, and depreciates the
+commonwealth. The English bagman hazards the glibbest sentences as to
+the falsity of the whole American foundation. Not much behind him lags
+the fox-hunting squire. The folly and uselessness of our late war supply
+the theme of diatribes as eloquent as twenty-<i>five</i> letters can make
+them. Obliging <i>aperçus</i> of the degradation and misery in<a name="page_006" id="page_006"></a> store for us
+are vouchsafed at every opportunity. But it is when primogeniture is
+touched upon, or the neutrality of England in the late war criticised,
+that the bellowing of the sacred bulls becomes a brazen thunder. After
+listening to their voluminous complaints of the shortcomings of western
+civilization, we are tempted to go back to a set of questions asked and
+answered many centuries ago.</p>
+
+<p>"What went ye out into the wilderness for to see? A man clothed in soft
+raiment? Behold, they that live delicately dwell in kings' houses. But
+what went ye out for to see? A prophet? Yea, I say unto you, And more
+than a prophet." For the prophet only foretells what is to be, but the
+prophetic nation is working out and fulfilling the prophet's future.</p>
+
+<p>Peace, however, peace between us and them. Let the bagman return to his
+business, the squire to his five-barred gate. We wish them nothing worse
+than to stay at home, once they have got there. Not thus do the Goldwin
+Smiths, the Liulph Stanleys, take the altitude of things under a new
+horizon. They have those tools and appliances of scientific thought
+which build just theories and strait conclusions. The imperfection and
+the value of human phenomena are too well understood by them to allow
+them to place all of the values in the old world, and all of the
+imperfections in the new. And, <i>apropos</i> of this, we have an antidote to
+all the poison of gratuitous malignity in the shape of M. Auguste
+Laugel's thorough and appreciative treatise entitled The United States
+during the<a name="page_007" id="page_007"></a> War. From depths of misconception which we cannot fathom we
+turn to his pages, and see the truths of our record and of our
+conviction set forth with a simplicity and elegance which should give
+his work a permanent value. To Americans it must be dear as a righteous
+judgment; to Europeans as a vindication of their power of judging.</p>
+
+<p>It must not, however, be supposed that our whole <i>traversée</i> is a
+squabble, open or suppressed, between nationalities which should contend
+only in good will. The dreamy sea-days bring, on the contrary, much
+social chat and comfort. Two of the Britons exercise hospitality of tea,
+of fresh butter, of drinks cunningly compounded. One of these glows at
+night like a smelting furnace, and goes about humming in privileged
+ears, "The great brew is about to begin." For this same great brew he
+ties a white apron before his stout person, breaks ten eggs into a bowl,
+inflicting flagellation on the same, empties as many bottles of ale in a
+tin pan, and flies off to the galley, whence he returns with a smoking,
+frothing mixture, which is dispensed in tumblers, and much appreciated
+by the recipients. In good fellowship these two Britons are not
+deficient, and the restriction of the alphabet, dimly alluded to above,
+does not lie at their door.</p>
+
+<p>After rocking, and dreaming, and tumbling; after drowsy attempts to get
+hold of other people's ideas and to disentangle your own; after a week's
+wonder over the hot suppers of such as dine copiously at four P. M., and
+the morning cocktails of those who drink whiskey<a name="page_008" id="page_008"></a> in all its varieties
+before we separate for the night; after repeated experiments, which end
+by suiting our gait and diet to an ever-mobile existence, in which our
+prejudices are the only stable points, our personal restraints the only
+fixed facts,&mdash;we fairly reach the other side. The earliest terrene
+object which we behold is a light-house some sixty miles out at sea,
+whose occupants, we hope, are not resolutely bent upon social enjoyment.
+Here the sending up of blue lights and rockets gives us a cheerful sense
+of some one besides ourselves. Queenstown, our next point, is made at
+two A. M., and left after weary waiting for the pilot, but still before
+convenient hours for being up. Some hours later we heave the lead, and
+enjoy the sight of as much <i>terra firma</i> as can be fished up on the
+greased end of the same. Our last day on board is marred by a heavy and
+penetrating fog. We are in the Channel, but can see neither shore. In
+the early morning we arrive at Liverpool, and, after one more of those
+good breakfasts, and a mild encounter with the custom-house officers, we
+part from our late home, its mingled associations and associates to be
+recalled hereafter with various shades of regard and regret. The good
+captain, having been without sleep for two nights, does not come to take
+leave of us&mdash;a neglect which almost moves the neophytes to tears. The
+two veterans console them, however; and now all parties are in the
+little lighter which carries the steamer's passengers and luggage to the
+dock. Here, three shillings' worth of cab and horse convey us and ours,
+a respectable show of trunks, to the hotel of our<a name="page_009" id="page_009"></a> choice&mdash;the
+Washington by name. We commend this cheapness of conveyance, a novel
+feature in American experience. At the hotel we find a comfortable
+parlor, and, for the first time in many days, part from our wrappings.
+After losing ourselves among the Egyptian china of our toilet set,
+wondering at the width of beds and warmth of carpets, we descend to the
+coffee-room, order dinner, and feel that we have again taken possession
+of ourselves.</p>
+
+<h2>L<small>IVERPOOL</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>A good deal of our time here is spent in the prosaic but vital
+occupation of getting something to eat. If Nature abhors a vacuum, she
+does so especially when, after twelve days of a fluctuating and
+predatory existence, the well-shaken traveller at last finds a stable
+foundation for self and victuals. The Washington being announced as
+organized on the American plan, we descend to the coffee-room with the
+same happy confidence which would characterize our first appearance at
+the buffet of the Tremont House or Fifth Avenue Hotel. But here no
+waiter takes possession of you and your wants, hastening to administer
+both to the mutual advantage of guest and landlord. You sit long
+unnoticed; you attract attention only by a desperate effort. Having at
+length secured the medium through which a dinner may be ordered, the
+minister (he wears a black dress coat and white trimmings) disappears
+with an air of "Will you have it now, or wait till you can get it?"
+which our subsequent experience entirely justifies. We<a name="page_010" id="page_010"></a> learn later that
+a meal ordered half an hour beforehand will be punctually served.</p>
+
+<p>And here, except in cases of absolute starvation, we shall dismiss the
+meal question altogether, and devote ourselves to nobler themes. We
+ransack the smoky and commercial city in search of objects of interest.
+The weather being incessantly showery, we lay the foundation of our
+English liberty in the purchase of two umbrellas, capable each of
+protecting two heads. Of clothes we must henceforward be regardless. In
+the streets, barefooted beggary strikes us, running along in the wet,
+whining and coaxing. We visit the boasted St. George's Hall, where,
+among other statues, is one of the distinguished Stephenson, of railroad
+memory. Here the court is in session for the assizes. The wigs and gowns
+astound the neophytes. The ushers in green and orange livery shriek
+"Silence!" through every sentence of judge or counsel. No one can hear
+what is going on. Probably all is known beforehand. At the hotel, the
+Greek committee wait upon the veteran, with asseverations and
+hiccoughings of to us incomprehensible emotions. We resist the theatre,
+with the programme of "Lost in London," expecting soon to experience the
+sensation without artistic intervention. We sleep, missing the cradle of
+the deep, and on the morrow, by means of an uncanny little ferry-boat,
+reach the Birkenhead station, and are booked for Chester.<a name="page_011" id="page_011"></a></p>
+
+<h2>C<small>HESTER</small>&mdash;L<small>ICHFIELD.</small></h2>
+
+<p>The Grosvenor Inn receives us, not at all in the fashion of the hostelry
+of twenty years ago. A new and spacious building forming a quadrangle
+around a small open garden, the style highly architectural and somewhat
+inconvenient; waiters got up after fashion plates; chambermaids with
+apologetic caps, not smaller than a dime nor larger than a dinner plate;
+a handsome sitting-room, difficult to warm; airy sleeping-rooms; a
+coffee-room in which our hunger and cold seek food and shelter; a
+housekeeper in a striped silk gown,&mdash;these are the first features with
+which we become familiar at the Grosvenor. The veteran falling ill
+detains us there for the better part of two days; and we employ the
+interim of his and our necessities in exploring the curious old town,
+with its many relics of times long distant. The neophytes here see their
+first cathedral, and are in raptures with nothing so much as with its
+dilapidation. We happen in during the afternoon hour of cathedral
+service, and the sexton, finding that we do not ask for seats, fastens
+upon us with the zeal of a starved leech upon a fresh patient, and leads
+us as weary a dance as Puck led the Athenian clowns. This chase after
+antiquity proves to have something unsubstantial about it. The object is
+really long dead and done with. These ancient buildings are only its
+external skeleton, the empty shell of the tortoise. No effort of
+imagination can show us how people felt when these dark passages and
+deserted enclosures were full of<a name="page_012" id="page_012"></a> the arterial warmth and current of
+human life. The monumental tablets tell an impossible tale. The immortal
+spirit of things, which is past, present, and future, dwells not in
+these relics, but lives in the descent of noble thoughts, in the
+perpetuity of moral effort which makes man human. We make these
+reflections shivering, while the neophytes explore nave and transept,
+gallery and crypt. A long tale does the old sexton tell, to which they
+listen with ever-wondering expectation. Meantime the cold cathedral
+service has ended. Canon, precentor, and choir have departed, with the
+very slender lay attendance. In a commodious apartment, by a bright
+fire, we recover our frozen joints a little. Here stands a full-length
+portrait of his most gracious etc., etc. The sexton, preparing for a
+huge jest, says to us, "Ladies, this represents the last king of
+America." The most curious thing we see in the cathedral is the room in
+which the ecclesiastical court held its sittings. The judges' seat and
+the high-backed benches still form a quadrangular enclosure within a
+room of the same shape. Across one corner of this enclosure is mounted a
+chair, on which the prisoner, accused of the intangible offence of
+heresy or witchcraft, was perforce seated. I seem to see there a face
+and figure not unlike my own, the brow seamed with cabalistic wrinkles.
+Add a little queerness to the travelling dress, a pinch or two to the
+black bonnet, and how easy were it to make a witch out of the sibyl of
+these present leaves! The march from one of these types to the other is
+one of those retrograde steps whose<a name="page_013" id="page_013"></a> contrast only attests the world's
+progress. The sibylline was an excellent career for a queer and
+unexplained old woman. To make her a sorceress was an ingenious device
+for getting rid of a much-decried element of the social variety. Poor
+Kepler's years of solitary glory and poverty were made more wretched by
+the danger which constantly threatened his aged mother, who was in
+imminent danger of burning, on account of her supposed occult
+intelligences with the powers of darkness.</p>
+
+<p>After a long and chilly wandering, we dismiss our voluble guide with a
+guerdon which certainly sends him home to keep a silver wedding with his
+ancient wife. The next day, the veteran's illness detained us within the
+ancient city, and we contemplated at some leisure its quaint old houses,
+which in Boston would not stand five days. They have been much propped
+and cherished, and the new architecture of the town does its best to
+continue the traditions of the old. The Guide to Chester, in which we
+regretfully invest a shilling, presents a list of objects of interest
+which a week would not more than exhaust. One of these&mdash;the Roodeye&mdash;is
+an extensive meadow with a silly legend, and is now utilized as a
+race-course. We see the winning post, the graduated seats, the track.
+For the rest,&mdash;</p>
+
+<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="poetry">
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 0em;">"The Spanish fleet thou canst not see, because</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 0.25em;">It is not yet in sight."</span></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>We visit the outside of a tiny church of ancient renown,&mdash;St.
+Olave's,&mdash;but, dreading the eternal sexton with the eternal story, we do
+not attempt to effect an entrance.<a name="page_014" id="page_014"></a> The much-famed Roman bath we find in
+connection with a shop at which newspapers are sold. We descend a narrow
+staircase, and view much rubbish in a small space. For description, see
+Chester Guide. One of our party gets into the bath, and comes out none
+the cleaner. Spleen apart, however, the ruin is probably authentic, with
+its deep spring and worn arches. Near the Grosvenor Hotel is a curious
+arcade, built in a part of the old wall&mdash;for Chester was a fortified
+place. A portion of the old castle still stands, but we fail to visit
+its interior. The third morning sees us depart, having been quite
+comfortably entertained at the Grosvenor, even to the indulgence of
+sweetmeats with our tea, which American extravagance we propose speedily
+to abjure. Our national sins, however, still cling to us.</p>
+
+<p>Although the servants are "put in the bill," the cringing civility with
+which they follow us to the coach leads me to suspect that the nimble
+sixpence might find its way to their acceptance without too severe a
+gymnastic. <i>En route</i>, now, in a comfortable compartment, with hot water
+to our feet, according to the European custom. Our way to Lichfield lies
+through an agricultural region, and the fine English mutton appear to be
+forward. Small lambs cuddle near magnificent fat mothers. The wide
+domains lie open to the view. Everything attests the concentration of
+landed property in the hands of the few. We stop at Lichfield, attracted
+by the famous cathedral. The Swan Inn receives, but cannot make us
+comfortable, a violent wind sweeping through walls and windows. Having
+eaten and drunk, we implore<a name="page_015" id="page_015"></a> our way to the cathedral, St. Chadde, which
+we find beautiful without, and magnificently restored within. Many
+monuments, ancient and modern, adorn it, with epitaphs of Latin in every
+stage of plagiarism. A costly monument to some hero of the Sutlej war
+challenges attention, with its tame and polished modern sphinxes. Tombs
+of ancient abbots we also find, and one recumbent carving of a starved
+and shrunken figure, whose leanness attests some ascetic period not
+famous in sculpture. The pulpit is adorned with shining brass and
+stones, principally cornelians and agates. The organ discoursed a sonata
+of Beethoven for the practice of the organist, but secondarily for our
+delectation. A box with an inscription invites us to contribute our mite
+to the restoration of the cathedral, which may easily cost as much as
+the original structure. Carving, gilding, inlaid work, stained glass&mdash;no
+one circumstance of ecclesiastical gewgawry is spared or omitted; and
+trusting that some to us unknown centre of sanctification exists, to
+make the result of the whole something other than idol worship, we
+comply with the gratifying suggestion of our wealth and generosity.
+After satisfying ourselves with the cathedral, we look round wonderingly
+for the recipient of some further fee. He appears in the shape of a
+one-eyed man who invites us to ascend the tower. Guided by a small boy,
+Neophyte No. 1 executes this ascent, and of course reports a wonderful
+prospect, which we are content to take on hearsay. Leaving the
+cathedral, we seek the house in which Dr. Johnson is said to have been
+born. It is, strange to<a name="page_016" id="page_016"></a> say, much like other houses, the lower story
+having been turned into a furnishing shop, where we buy a pincushion
+tidy for remembrance. In an open space, in front of the house, sits a
+statue of the renowned and redoubted doctor, supported by a pedestal
+with biographical bas-reliefs. Below one of these is inscribed, "He
+hears Sacheverell." The design represents a small child in a father's
+arms, presented before a wiggy divine, who can, of course, be none other
+than the one in question. While these simple undertakings are planned
+and executed, the veteran and elder neophyte engage a one-horse vehicle,
+and madly fly to visit an insane asylum. We shiver till dinner in the
+chilly parlor of the inn, and inter ourselves at an early hour in the
+recesses of a huge feather-bed, where the precious jewel, sleep, is
+easily found. And the next morning sees us <i>en route</i> for London.</p>
+
+<p>At one of the stations between Lichfield and London, we encounter a
+group whose chief figure is that of a pretty little lady, blithe as a
+golden butterfly, apparelled for the chase. Her dress consists of a
+narrow-skirted habit, of moderate length, beneath which we perceive a
+pair of stout boots, of a description not strictly feminine. A black
+plush paletot corresponds with her black skirt. A shining stove-pipe
+crowns her yellow tresses. As she emerges from the railway carriage, a
+young man of elegant aspect approaches her. He wears white hunting
+trousers, high black boots, a black plush coat, and carries a hunting
+whip. The similarity of color in the costumes leads us to suppose that<a name="page_017" id="page_017"></a>
+the wearers belong to some hunting association. He is at least Sir
+Charles, she, Lady Arabella. He accosts her with evident pleasure, and
+is allowed a shake of the hand. An elderly relative in the background, a
+servant in top boots, who touches his hat as if it could cure the
+plague,&mdash;these complete the picture.</p>
+
+<p>At the same station we descry another huntsman in white breeches,
+scarlet cap, and overcoat. We learn that there are two <i>meets</i> to-day in
+this region, but our interests are with the black and white party.
+Farewell, Sir Charles and Lady Arabella. Joyous be your gallop, light
+your leap over five-barred gates. The sly fox Cupid may be chasing you,
+while you chase poor Renard. <i>Prosit</i>.</p>
+
+<h2>L<small>ONDON</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>"Charing Cross Hotel? 'Ere you are, sir;" and a small four-wheeled cab,
+with a diminutive horse and beer-tinted driver, has us up at the door of
+the same. In front, within the precincts of the hotel court, stands the
+ancient cross, or that which replaces it, and around radiate cook-shops
+and book-shops, jewellers and victuallers and milliners. The human river
+of the Strand fluxes and refluxes before this central spot, and
+Trafalgar Square, and Waterloo Place, and Westminster Abbey, and the
+Houses of Parliament are near. Cabs spring up like daisies and primroses
+beneath the footsteps of spring. At the hotel they make a gratifying
+fuss about us. They seize upon all of us but our persons; the lift,
+(<i>Americane</i>&mdash;elevator) does that, and<a name="page_018" id="page_018"></a> noiselessly lodges us on the
+second floor, where we occupy a decent sitting-room, with bedrooms <i>en
+suite</i>. A fire of soft coal soon glows in the grate. A smart chambermaid
+takes our orders. We get out our address-book, rub up our recollections,
+enclose and send our cards, then run out and take a dip in the Strand,
+and expand to the full consciousness that we are in the mighty city
+which cannot fall because there is no hollow deep enough to hold it.</p>
+
+<p>We have a quiet day and a half at the hotel before we receive the echo
+of our cards. This interval we improve by visits to the houses of
+Parliament and Westminster Abbey, where we pay our full price, and visit
+the royal chapels with their many tombs. At the recumbent figures of
+Mary Stuart and Elizabeth we pause to think of the dramatic ghosts which
+will not allow them to rest in their graves. Poetry is resurrection, and
+for us who have seen Rachel and Ristori, Mary and Elizabeth are still
+living and speaking lessons of human passion and misfortune. These
+marbles hold their crumbling bones, but we have seen them in far
+America, doing a night's royalty before a democratic audience, and
+demanding to be largely paid for the same.</p>
+
+<p>The frescoes and statues in the long corridors of the Houses of
+Parliament deserve a more minute study than we are able to give them.
+The former show considerable progress in the pictorial art during the
+seventeen years which divide our present from our past observations.
+They represent noted events in English history, the last sleep of
+Argyle, the execution of Montrose, and<a name="page_019" id="page_019"></a> so on. Among them we see the
+departure of the May Flower, but not the battle of Bunker Hill. The
+statues perpetuate the memories of public men, including a great variety
+both as to opinion and as to service. The solidity of all these
+adornments and arrangements well deserves the praise with which English
+authorities have been wont to comment upon them. A little sombre and
+sober in their tone, they are expressive of the taste and feeling of the
+nation. Parliament is now in session, and various interesting measures
+and reforms are under contemplation. Among these are the extension of
+the elective franchise, the abolition of flogging in the army, and the
+change of the whole long-transmitted system by which commissions in the
+latter are conferred or purchased. The last is perhaps a more democratic
+measure than is dreamed of. Throw open the military and church benefices
+to the competition of the most able and deserving, and the younger sons
+of houses esteemed noble will stand no better chance than others. They
+will then simply earn their bread where they can get it. Then, down
+comes primogeniture, then the union of state and church, then the
+prestige of royalty. This last we think to be greatly on the wane. The
+English prefer an hereditary to an elective symbol of supreme power. The
+permitted descent in the female line prevents the inconvenient issues to
+which the failure of an heir male might give rise. The Georges rose to
+great respectability in the third person, and sank to a disreputable
+level in the fourth. The present queen is an excellently behaved woman,
+and has adhered strictly<a name="page_020" id="page_020"></a> to her public and private duties. Her long and
+strict widowhood is a little carped at by people in general, the
+personal sentiment having seemed to encroach upon the public career and
+office. But the Prince of Wales will be held to strict and sensible
+behavior, and, failing of it, will be severely dealt with. The English
+people will endure no second season of Carlton House, no letting down of
+manly reserve and womanly character by the spectacle of royal favorites,
+bankrupt at the fireside, but current in the world. All this John Bull
+will not put up with again. Nor will any Christendom, save that Frankish
+and monkeyish one which has yet to learn that true freedom of thought is
+not to be had without purity of conscience, and which, in its desire to
+be polite, holds the door wider open to bad manners than to good ones.</p>
+
+<p>Rash words! What noble, thoughtful Frenchmen have not we known, and the
+world with us! Shall boastful Secesh and blustering Yankee, or the
+sordid, shining shoddy fool stand for the American? Yet these are the
+figures with which Europe is most familiar. So let us fling no smallest
+pebble at the nation of Des Cartes, Montesquieu, Pascal, and De
+Tocqueville. It is not in one, but in all countries that extremes meet.
+And in this connection a word.</p>
+
+<p>The less we know about a thing, the easier to write about it. To give
+quite an assured and fluent account of a country, we should lose no time
+on our first arrival. The first impression is the strongest. Familiarity
+constantly wears off the edge of observation. The face of the new region
+astonishes us once, and once only. We soon<a name="page_021" id="page_021"></a> grow used to it, and forget
+to describe it. The first day of our arrival in Liverpool or in London
+gave us volumes to write, which have proved as evanescent as the
+pictures of a swift panorama, vanishing to return no more. For now we
+are seated in London as though we had always lived there. We may sooner
+astonish it with our western accent, unconsidered costume, and wild
+coiffure, than it can rivet our attention with its splendors and its
+queernesses, its squares, fountains, equipages, cabmen, well-dressed and
+well-mannered circles. This for the features, for the surface. But for
+the depth and spirit of things, the longer we explore, the less sanguine
+do we feel of being able to exhaust them. We sink our deepest shaft, and
+write upon it, "Thus far our abilities and opportunities; far more
+remains than we can ever bring to light."</p>
+
+<p>And, <i>apropos</i> of this terrible familiarity with things once discerned,
+let me say that when we shall have been two days in heaven, we shall not
+know it any longer, which is one reason why we must always be getting
+there, but never arrive. Pope's old-fashioned line, "always to be
+blest," expresses profoundly this philosophical necessity, although he
+saw it in a simply didactic light, and stated it accordingly. The line
+none the less takes its place in the stately train of the ideal
+philosophy, to which those have best contributed who have been least
+aware of the fact of their having done so. "Lord, when saw I thee naked
+and an hungered," etc., etc. On some smallest, obscurest occasion
+probably, when, the recognized form and the ignored spirit presenting<a name="page_022" id="page_022"></a>
+themselves together, thy hospitable bosom received the one, and left the
+other to take care of itself.</p>
+
+<p>Our neophytes take this great Babel with the charming <i>at-homeness</i> to
+which our paragraph alludes. They devour London as if it were the
+perpetual bread and butter which their father's house keeps always cut
+and spread for them; cab hire, great dinners, distinguished company, the
+lofty friend's equipage and livery, lent for precious occasions,&mdash;all
+this seems as much a matter of course as Lindley Murray's rules, or the
+Creed and the Commandments. Joachim? Of course they will hear Joachim,
+and the Opera, if it be good enough, and Mr. Dickens. Lady &mdash;&mdash;, Duke of
+So and so. Very well in their way. Presented at court? They wouldn't
+mind, provided it were not too tedious. Mr. Carlyle? Herbert Spencer?
+Yes, they have heard tell of them.</p>
+
+<p>Happy season of youth, which can find nothing more reverend than its
+possibilities, more glorious than its unwasted powers! In spite of all
+the new views and theories, I say, let children be born, and let women
+nurse them and bring them up, and let us have young people to take our
+work where we leave it, laughing at our limitations, and excelling us
+with noble strides; to pause some day, and remember our lessons, and
+weep over our pains, not the less, O God of the future, surpassing us!
+So let children continue to be born, and let no one attempt to
+reconstruct society at the expense of one hair of the head of these
+little ones, ourselves in hope as well as in memory.<a name="page_023" id="page_023"></a></p>
+
+<h2>ST. P<small>AUL'S&mdash;THE</small> J<small>APANESE.</small></h2>
+
+<p>The first feature of novelty in visiting St. Paul's Cathedral is the
+facility for going thither afforded by the city railways,&mdash;one of which
+swiftly deposits us in Cannon Street, whence, with the Cathedral in full
+sight, we beg our way to the entrance, so far as information goes,&mdash;one
+only of its several doors being open to the public at all times. The
+second is the crypt occupied and solemnized by the ponderous funereal
+pomps of the late Duke of Wellington. In conjunction with these must be
+mentioned the Nelson monument. These two men have been the great
+deliverers of England in modern times, and there is, no doubt, a certain
+heartiness in the gratitude that attends their memory. The duke's
+mausoleum is of solid porphyry, highly polished, in a quadrangular
+enclosure, at each of whose four corners flames a gas-jet, fixed on a
+porphyry shaft. Behind this a large space is filled by the huge funereal
+car which bore the hero to this place of rest. It is of cast iron,
+furnished by the cannon taken in his victories. In it are harnessed
+effigies of the six horses that dragged it, in the veritable trappings
+worn on the occasion. The heavy black draperies of the car are edged
+with a colored border, representing the orders worn by the duke. And
+here the care of England will, no doubt, preserve them, with the nodding
+hearse-plumes, and all the monuments of that holiday of woe, to moulder
+as long as such things can possibly hold together. For there is a point
+at which the most illustrious antiquity<a name="page_024" id="page_024"></a> degenerates into dirt. And in
+England the past and present will yet have some awkward controversies to
+settle; for the small island cannot always have room for both, and to
+cramp and crowd the one for the heraldic display of the other will not
+be good housekeeping, according to the theories of to-day. So, when the
+fox-hunting squire tells us that his chief public aim and occupation
+will be to keep his county conservative, we think that this should mean
+to cheat the honest and laborious peasantry out of their eye teeth;
+though how they should be ignorant enough to be outwitted by him, is a
+question which makes us pause as over an unexplored abyss of
+knownothingism.</p>
+
+<p>St. Paul's is clearly organized for the extortion of shillings and
+sixpences. So much for seeing the bell, clock, and whispering gallery;
+so much for the crypt. You are pressed, too, at every turn, to purchase
+guide-books, each more authentic than the last. There, as elsewhere, we
+go about spilling our small change at every step, and wondering where it
+will all end. We remember the debtors' prisons which still abound in
+England, and endeavor to view the younger neophyte in the sober livery
+of Little Dorrit.</p>
+
+<p>The only occasion of public amusement that we improve, after the one
+happy hearing of Joachim, is an evening performance of the Japanese
+jugglers, which remains fresh and vivid in our recollections, with all
+its barbaric smoothness and perfection.</p>
+
+<p>The first spectacle which we behold is that of a chattering and
+shrieking monkey of a man, who, squatting<a name="page_025" id="page_025"></a> on his haunches, visibly
+fills a tea-cup with water, inverts it upon a pile of papers without
+spilling a drop, and pulls out layer after layer of those papers, all
+perfectly dry, which he waves at us with a childish joy. By and by, he
+restores the cup to its original position, and then empties its contents
+into another vessel before our eyes. Another, a top-spinning savage,
+continually whirls his top into that state which the boys call "sleep,"
+and spins it, thus impelled, along the sharp edge of a steel sword, up
+to the point and back again, and along the border of a paper fan, with
+other deeds which it were tedious to enumerate. While these feats go on,
+two funny little Japanese children, oddly bundled up according to the
+patterns of the two sexes, toddle about and chatter with the elders,
+probably for the purpose of illustrating the features of family life in
+Japan. A young creature, said to be the wife of six unpronounceable
+syllables, strums on a monotonous stringed instrument, and screeches,
+sometimes striking an octave, but successfully dodging every other
+interval. Both in speech and in song the tones of these people betray an
+utter want of command over the inflections of the voice. Every elevation
+is a scream, every depression, <i>con rispetto</i>, a grunt. And when, in
+addition to the song and strumming, the little ones lustily beat a large
+wooden tea-box with wooden weapons, we begin to waver a little about the
+old proverb, <i>De gustibus non disputandum est</i>. The beautiful butterfly
+trick, however, consoles our eyes for what our ears have suffered. The
+conjurer twists first one, then two, butterflies out of<a name="page_026" id="page_026"></a> a bit of white
+paper, and, by means of a fan, causes them to fly and poise as if they
+were coquetting with July breezes. When, at last, he presents a basket
+of flowers, the illusion is perfect. They settle, fly again, and hover
+round, in true coleopteric fashion.</p>
+
+<p>But the acrobatic exhibition is that which beggars all that our
+overworked sensibilities have endured at the hands of rope-dancer or
+equestrian. Blondin himself, Hanlon in the flying trapeze, are less
+perfect and less terrible. Acrobat No. 1 appears in an athlete's costume
+of white linen. He binds a stout silken tie around his head&mdash;a
+precaution whose object is later understood. He then gets into a small
+metal triangle with a running cord attached, and is swung up to the
+neighborhood of the high, arched ceiling, where various cross-pieces,
+slight in appearance, are attached. To one of these he directs his
+venturous flight, and letting his triangle depart, he takes his station
+with his legs firmly closed upon the cross-piece, his head hanging down,
+his hands free. Acrobat No. 2 now comes upon the scene. Mounting in a
+second triangle, he is swung to a certain height at a distance of some
+twenty or more feet from the first performer. A bamboo pole is here
+handed him, of which he manages to convey the upper end within the grasp
+of the latter. And now, swinging loose from his triangle, he hangs at
+the lower end of the bamboo, his steadfast colleague holding fast the
+upper end. And this mere straight line, with only the natural jointings
+of the cane, becomes to him a domain, a palace of ease. Now he clings to
+it apparently with<a name="page_027" id="page_027"></a> one finger, throwing out the other hand and both
+feet. Now he clings by one foot, his head being down, and his hands
+occupied with a fan. There is, in fact, no name for the singularities
+with which he amazes us for at least a quarter of an hour. No. 1 always
+holds on like grim death. No. 2 seems at times to hold on by nothing.
+All the while one of their number chatters volubly in the Japanese
+dialect, directing attention to the achievements of the two pendent
+heroes. Our thoughts recurred forcibly to a dialogue long familiar in
+our own country:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Wat's dat darkening up de hole?" asks Cuffee in the she bear's den to
+Cuffee without, who is forcibly detaining the returned she bear by one
+extremity.</p>
+
+<p>"If de tail slips through my fingers, you'll find out," is the curt
+reply, and end of the story.</p>
+
+<p>But the pole did not slip through, and, finally, the second triangle was
+swung towards acrobat No. 2, who relinquished his hold of the bamboo,
+and intwining his legs about it, pleasantly made his descent with his
+head downwards, afterwards setting himself to rights with one shake.
+Acrobat No. 1 now condescends to come down from his high position, also
+with his head down, and a cool and consummate demeanor. But he walks off
+from the stage as if his late inverted view of it had given him
+something to think of. And in all this, not one jerk, one hasty snatch,
+one fall and recovery. All goes with the rounded smoothness of
+machinery. These gymnasts have perfected the mechanism of the body, but
+they have given it nothing to do that is worth doing.<a name="page_028" id="page_028"></a></p>
+
+<h2>S<small>OCIETY</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>We bite at the tempting bait of London society a little eagerly. In our
+case, as veterans, it is like returning to a delicious element from
+which we have long been weaned. The cheerfulness with which English
+people respond to the modest presentment of a card <i>well-motived</i>, the
+cordiality with which they welcome an old friend, once truly a friend,
+may well offset the reserve with which they respond to advances made at
+random, and the resolute self-defence of the British <i>Lion</i> in
+particular against all vague and vagabond enthusiasms. Carlyle's wrath
+at the Americans who homaged and tormented him prompted a grandiose
+vengeance. He called them a nation of hyperbores. Not for this do we now
+vigorously let him alone, but because his spleeny literary utterances
+these many years attest the precise moment in which bright Apollo left
+him. The most brilliant genius should beware of the infirmity of the
+fireside and admiring few, whose friendship applauds his poorest
+sayings, and, at the utmost, shrugs its shoulders where praise is out of
+the question.</p>
+
+<p>Our remembrance of the London of twenty-four years ago is, indeed
+hyperdelightful, and of that description which one does not ask to have
+repeated, so perfect is it in the first instance. A second visit was
+less social and more secluded in its opportunities. But now&mdash;for what
+reason it matters not; would it were that of our superior merit&mdash;we find
+the old delightful account reopened, the friendly visits frequent, and
+the luxurious<a name="page_029" id="page_029"></a> invitations to dinner occupy every evening of our short
+week in London, crowding out theatres and opera,&mdash;the latter now just in
+the bud. To these dissipations a new one has been added, and the
+afternoon tea is now a recognized institution. Less formal and expensive
+than a New York afternoon reception, it answers the same purpose of a
+final object and rest for the day's visiting. In some instances, it
+continues through the season; in others, invitations are given for a
+single occasion only. You go, if invited, in spruce morning dress, with
+as much or as little display of train and bonnet as may suit with your
+views. You find a cheerful and broken-up assemblage&mdash;people conversing
+in twos, or, at most, in threes. And here is the Very Reverend the Dean.
+And here is the Catholic Archbishop, renowned for the rank and number of
+his proselytes. And here is Sir Charles&mdash;not he of the hunting-whip and
+breeches, but one renowned in science, and making a practical as well as
+a theoretical approximation to the antiquity of man. And here is Sir
+Samuel, who has finally discovered those parent lakes of the Nile which
+have been among the lost arts of geography for so many centuries. In
+this society, no man sees or shows a full-length portrait. A word is
+given, a phrase exchanged, and "<i>tout est dit</i>." What it all may amount
+to must be made out in another book than mine.</p>
+
+<p>Well, having been more or less introduced, you take a cup of tea, with
+the option of bread and butter or a fragment of sponge cake. Having
+finished this, you vanish; you have shown yourself, reported yourself;
+more was not expected of you.<a name="page_030" id="page_030"></a></p>
+
+<p>A graver and more important institution is the London dinner, commencing
+at half past seven, with good evening clothes&mdash;a white neckcloth and
+black vest for gentlemen; for <i>nous autres</i>, evening dress, not
+resplendent. The dinners we attend have perhaps the edge of state a
+little taken off, being given at short notice; but we observe female
+attire to be less showy than in our recollections of twenty-four years
+previous, and our one evening dress, devised to answer for dinner,
+evening party, and ball, proves a little over, rather than under, the
+golden mean of average appearance. As one dinner is like all, the
+briefest sketch of a single possible occasion may suffice. If you have
+been at afternoon tea before dinner, your toilet has been perforce a
+very hurried one. If it is your first appearance, the <i>annonce</i> of a
+French hair-dresser in the upper floor of your hotel may have inspired
+you with the insane idea of submitting your precious brain-case to his
+manipulations. Having you once in his dreadful seat, he imposes upon you
+at his pleasure. You must accept his hair-string, his pins, his rats, at
+a price at which angola cats were dear. You are palpitating with haste,
+he with the conceit of his character and profession. Fain would he add
+swindle to swindle, and perfidy to perfidy. "Don't you want a little
+crayon to darken the hair?" and hide the ravages of age; "it is true it
+colors a little, since it is made on purpose." You desire it not. "A
+cream? a pomade? a hair-wash?" None of all this; only in Heaven's name
+to have done with him! He capers behind you, puffing your sober head
+with curls,<a name="page_031" id="page_031"></a> as if he had the breath of Æolus, according to Flaxman's
+illustration. Finally he dismisses you at large and unwarranted cost;
+but in your imagination he capers at your back for a week to come.</p>
+
+<p>This prelude, which gives to</p>
+
+<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="poetry">
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 8em;">"<i>hairy</i> nothing</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 2em;">A local habitation and a name,"</span></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p class="nind">leaves little time for further adornment. A hired cab takes your
+splendors to the door of the inviting mansion, and leaves them there.
+When you depart, you request the servant of the house which feeds you to
+call another cab, which he does with the air of rendering a familiar
+service.</p>
+
+<p>I have no intention of giving a detailed portrait of the entertainment
+that follows. Its few characteristic features can be briefly given.
+Introductions are not general; and even in case the occasion should have
+been invoked and invited for you, the greater part of your fellow-guests
+may not directly make your acquaintance. Servants are graver than
+senators with us. Dishes follow each other in bewildering and rather
+oppressive variety. You could be very happy with any one of them alone,
+but with a dozen you fear even to touch and taste. Conversation is not
+loud nor general, scarcely audible across the table. As in marriage,
+your partner is your fate. One would be very glad to present one brick
+so that another could be laid on top of it, or even to attempt an angle
+and a corner adjustment. But this conversation is not architectonic. It
+aims at nothing<a name="page_032" id="page_032"></a> more than the requisite small change. If by chance the
+society be assembled at an informal house, and composed of artists and
+authors, we shall hear jests and laughter, but the themes of these will
+scarcely go beyond the most familiar matters. Having told thus much we
+have told all, except that ice is not served, as with us, upon the
+table, in picturesque variety of form and color, but is usually bestowed
+in spoonfuls, one of either kind to each person, the quality being
+excellent, and the quantity, after all else that has been offered, quite
+sufficient. It is here one of the most expensive articles of
+<i>luxe</i>&mdash;costing thrice its Yankee prices. The ladies leave the table a
+little before the gentlemen; but these arrive with no symptoms of
+inordinate drinking. The latter, as is well known, is long gone out of
+fashion, and with it, we imagine, the description of wit and anecdote,
+whose special enjoyment used to be reserved for the time "after the
+ladies had left the table." This is all that can be told of the dinner,
+which is the <i>ne plus ultra</i> of English social enjoyments; for balls
+everywhere are stale affairs, save to the dancing neophytes, and the
+enjoyment to be had at them is either official or gymnastic. At a
+"select" <i>soirée</i> following a state dinner, we hear Mr. Ap Thomas, the
+renowned harpist, whose execution is indeed brilliant and remarkable.
+The harp, however, is an instrument that owes its prestige partly to its
+beauty of form, partly to the romance of its traditions, from King David
+to the Welsh bards. In tone and temper it remains greatly inferior to
+the piano-forte, the finger governing the strings far better<a name="page_033" id="page_033"></a> with than
+without the intervention of the keys and hammers.</p>
+
+<p>But while we thankfully accept the offered opportunities of meeting
+those whom we desire to see, we are forced, as hygienists and
+economists, to enter our protest against the English dinner&mdash;this last
+joint in the back-bone of luxury. After hearty luncheon and social tea,
+it would seem to be a mere superfluity, not needed, a danger if partaken
+of, a mockery if neglected. So let New England cherish while she can the
+early dinner; for with the extended areas of business and society,
+dinner grows ever later, and the man and his family wider apart. By the
+time that tea and coffee are got through with, it may well be half past
+ten o'clock, and by eleven, at latest, unless there should be music or
+some special after-entertainment, you take leave.</p>
+
+<p>Hoping to revisit more fully this ancestral isle before the tocsin of
+depart for home, we will now, with a little more of our sketchiness,
+take leave of it, which we should do with heartier regret but for the
+prospect of a not distant return.</p>
+
+<p>In philosophy, England at the present day does not seem to go beyond
+Mill on the one hand, and Stewart on the other. The word "science" is
+still used, as it was ten years ago with us, to express the rules and
+observances of physical and mathematical study. Science, as the mother
+of the rules of thought, generating logic, building metaphysics, and
+devising the rules of coherence by which human cogitation is at once
+promoted and measured,&mdash;this conception of science I did not<a name="page_034" id="page_034"></a> recognize
+in those with whom I spoke, unless I except Rev. H. Martineau, with whom
+I had only general conversation, but whose intellectual position is at
+once without the walls of form, and within the sanctuary of freedom. I
+was referred to Jowett and his friends as the authorities under this
+head, but this was not the moment in which to find them. In religion,
+Miss Cobbe leads the van, her partial method assuming as an original
+conception what the Germans have done, and much better done, before her.
+Theodore Parker is, I gather, her great man; and in her case, as in his,
+largeness of nature, force and geniality of temperament, take the place
+of scientific construction and responsible labor. Mr. Martineau's
+position is well known, and is for us New Englanders beyond controversy.
+The broad church is best known to us by Kingsley and Maurice. To those
+who still stand within the limits of an absolute authority in spiritual
+matters, its achievements may appear worthy of surprise and of
+gratulation. To those who have passed that barrier they present no
+intellectual feature worth remarking.</p>
+
+<p>I well remember to-day my childish astonishment when I first learned
+that I and my fellows were outside the earth's crust, not within it. In
+connection with this came also the fact of a mysterious force binding us
+to the surface of the planet, so that, in its voyages and revolutions,
+it can lose nothing of its own.</p>
+
+<p>Something akin to this may be the discovery of believers that they and
+those whom they follow are, so far as concerns actual opportunity of
+knowledge, on the<a name="page_035" id="page_035"></a> outside of the world of ideal truth. Eye hath not
+seen, nor ear heard, nor heart conceived, any absolute form of its
+manifestation. A divine, mysterious force binds us to our place on its
+smiling borders. Of what lies beyond we construe as we can&mdash;Moses
+according to his ability, Christ and Paul according to theirs. Unseen
+and unmanifested it must ever remain; for though men say that God has
+done so and so, God has never said so. Of this we become sure: religion
+spiritualizes, inspires, and consoles us. The strait gate and narrow
+path are blessed for all who find them, and are the same for all who
+seek them. But this oneness of morals is learned experimentally; it
+cannot be taught dogmatically.</p>
+
+<p>Proposing to return to this theme, and to see more of the broad church
+before I decide upon its position, I take leave of it and of its domain
+together. Farewell, England! farewell, London! For three months to come
+thou wilt contain the regalia of all wits, of all capabilities. Fain
+would we have lingered beside the hospitable tables, and around the
+ancient monuments, considering also the steadfast and slowly-developing
+institutions. But the chief veteran is in haste for Greece, and on the
+very Sunday on which we should have heard Martineau in the forenoon, and
+Dean Stanley in the afternoon, with delightful social recreation in the
+evening, we break loose from our moorings, reach Folkstone, and embark
+for its French antithesis, <i>Boulogne sur mer</i>.<a name="page_036" id="page_036"></a></p>
+
+<h2>T<small>HE</small> C<small>HANNEL</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>If the devil is not so black as he is painted, it must be because he has
+an occasional day of good humor. Some such wondrous interval is hinted
+at by people who profess to have seen the Channel sea smooth and calm.
+We remember it piled with mountains of anguish&mdash;one's poor head
+swimming, one's heart sinking, while an organ more important than either
+in this connection underwent a sort of turning inside out which seemed
+to wrench the very strings of life. But on this broken Sabbath our
+wonderful luck still pursues us. It is in favor of the neophytes that
+this new dispensation has been granted. The monsters of the deep respect
+their innocence, and cannot visit on them the vulgar offences of their
+progenitors. They bind the waves with a garland of roses and lilies,
+whose freshness proves a spell of peace. We, the elders, embark,
+expecting the usual speedy prostration; but, placing ourselves against
+the mast, we determine, like Ulysses, to maintain the integrity of our
+position. And it so happens that we do. While a few sensitive mortals
+about us execute the irregular symphony of despair, we rest in a calm
+and upright silence. Never was the Channel so quiet! We were not
+uproarious, certainly, but contemplative. A wretch tucked us up with a
+tarpaulin, for which he afterwards demanded a trifle. If civility is
+sold for its weight in silver anywhere, it is on English soil and in
+English dependencies. We, the veterans, took our quiet ferriage in mute
+amazement; the neophytes took it as a thing of course.<a name="page_037" id="page_037"></a></p>
+
+<p>Arrived, we rush to the <i>buffet</i> of the railroad station, where every
+one speaks French-English. Here a very limited dinner costs us five
+francs a head. We accept the imposition with melancholy thoughtfulness.
+Then comes the whistle of the locomotive. "<i>En voiture, messieurs!</i>" And
+away, with a shriek, and a groan, and a rattle,&mdash;to borrow Mr. Dickens's
+refrain, now that he has done with it,&mdash;<i>en route</i> for Paris.</p>
+
+<h2>P<small>ARIS</small> A<small>ND</small> T<small>HENCE</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>In Paris the fate of Greece still pursues us. Two days the rigid veteran
+will grant; no more&mdash;the rest promised when the Eastern business shall
+have been settled. But those two days suffice to undo our immortal souls
+so far as shop windows can do this. The shining sins and vanities of the
+world are so insidiously set forth in this Jesuits' college of Satan,
+that you catch the contagion of folly and extravagance as you pace the
+streets, or saunter through the brilliant arcades. Your purveyor makes a
+Sybarite of you, through the inevitable instrumentality of breakfast and
+dinner. Your clothier, from boots to bonnet, seduces you into putting
+the agreeable before the useful. For if you purchase the latter, you
+will be moved to buy by the former, and use becomes an after-thought to
+your itching desire and disturbed conscience. Paris is a sweating
+furnace in which human beings would turn life everlasting into gold,
+provided it were a negotiable value. You, who escape its allurements
+solvent, with a franc or two in your pocket, and your resources for a
+year to come not<a name="page_038" id="page_038"></a> mortgaged, should after your own manner cause <i>Te
+Deum</i> to be sung or celebrated. Strongly impressed at the time, moved
+towards every acquisitive villany, not excluding shop-lifting nor the
+picking of pockets, I now regard with a sort of indignation those silken
+snares, those diamond, jet, and crystal allurements, which so nearly
+brought my self-restraint, and with it my self-respect, to ruin.
+Everything in Paris said to me, "Shine, dye your hair, rouge your
+cheeks, beggar your purse with real diamonds, or your pride with false
+ones. But shine, and, if necessary, beg or steal." Nothing said, "Be
+sober, be vigilant, because your adversary, like a roaring lion," etc.,
+etc. What a deliverer was therefore the stern Crete-bound veteran, who
+cut the Gordian knot of enchantment with, "Pack and begone." And having
+ended that inevitable protest against his barbarity with which women
+requite the offices of true friendship, I now turn my wrath against
+false, fair Paris, and cry, "Avoid thee, <i>scelestissima</i>! Away from me,
+<i>nequissima</i>! I will none of thee; not a franc, not an obolus. Avoid
+thee! <i>Nolo ornari!</i>"</p>
+
+<p>Touching our journey from Paris to Marseilles, I will only give the
+scarce-needed advice that those who have this route to make should
+inflict upon themselves a little extra fatigue, and stop only at Lyons,
+if at all, rather than risk the damp rooms and musty accommodations of
+the smaller places which lie upon the route, offering to the traveller
+few objects of interest, or none. For it often happens in travelling
+that a choice only of inconveniences is presented to us, and in our
+opinion a<a name="page_039" id="page_039"></a> prolonged day's journey in a luxurious car is far less
+grievous to be borne than a succession of stoppages, unpackings, and
+plungings into unknown inns and unaired beds. To this opinion, however,
+our Greece-bound veteran suffers not himself to be converted, and,
+accordingly, we, leaving Paris on the Wednesday at ten A. M., do not
+reach Marseilles until four o'clock of the Friday afternoon following.</p>
+
+<p>The features of our first day's journey are those of a country whose
+landed possessions are subdivided into the smallest portions cultivable.
+Plains and hill-sides are alike covered with the stripes which denote
+the limits of property. Fruit trees in blossom abound every where, but
+the villages, built of rough stone and lime, are distant from each
+other. As we go southward, the vine becomes more apparent, and before we
+reach Lyons we see much of that contested gift of God. The trains that
+pass us are often loaded with barrels whose precious contents cannot be
+bought pure for any money, on the other side of the Atlantic, or even of
+the Straits of Dover. To this the procession of the jolly god has come
+at last. He leers at us through the two red eyes of the locomotive; its
+stout cylinder represents his <i>embonpoint</i>. Instead of frantic
+Bacchantes, the rattling cars dance after him, and "<i>Ohe evohe!</i>"
+degenerates into the shrill whew, whew of the engine. At the <i>buffets</i>
+and hotels <i>en route</i> his mysteries are celebrated. These must be sought
+in the labyrinthine state of mind of those who have drunken frequently
+and freely. They utter words unintelligible to the sober and uninspired,
+sentences<a name="page_040" id="page_040"></a> of prophetic madness which the prose of modern physiology
+condenses into those two words&mdash;gout and delirium tremens. Yet these two
+dire diseases are rare among the temperate French. They export the
+producing medium <i>au profit de l'étranger</i>.</p>
+
+<p>We stop the first night at Macon, and sleep in an imposing, chilly room,
+without carpets, under down coverlets. The second day's journey brings
+us to Lyons an hour before noon. We engage a <i>fiacre</i>, drive around the
+town, whose growth and improvement in the interval of sixteen years do
+not fail to strike us. Fine public squares adorn it, themselves
+embellished with bronze statues, among which we observe an equestrian
+figure of the first and only Napoleon. The shops are as tormenting as
+those of Paris, the Café Casati, where we dine, as elegant. Re-embarking
+at four P. M., we reach Valence in about four hours.</p>
+
+<p>The worst of it is, that, arriving at these quaint little places after
+dark, you see none of their features, and taste only of their
+discomforts. At Valence our inn was so dreary, that, having bestowed the
+neophytes in sound slumber, the veteran and I sallied forth in quest of
+any pastime whatever, without being at all fastidious as to its source
+and character. Passing along the quiet streets, we observe what would
+seem to be a theatre, on the other side of the way. Entering, we find a
+youthful guardian, who tells us that there is up stairs a "<i>confèrence
+de philosophie</i>." We enter, and find a very respectable assemblage,
+listening attentively to an indistinct orator, who rhapsodizes upon the
+poets of modern<a name="page_041" id="page_041"></a> France, with quotations and personal anecdotes. What he
+says has little originality, but is delivered with good taste and
+feeling. He speaks without notes; for, indeed, such a <i>causerie</i> spins
+itself, like a sailor's yarn, though out of finer materials.</p>
+
+<p>Returning to our hostelry, we sleep with open window in a musty room,
+and catch cold. The next day's journey still conducts us through a
+vine-growing region, in a more and more advanced condition. The constant
+presence of the <i>morus multicaulis</i> also makes us aware of the presence
+of the silk-worm&mdash;so far, only in the egg-condition; for that prime
+minister of vanity is not hatched yet. We learn that the disease which
+has for some years devastated the worm is on the decline. The world with
+us, meanwhile has become somewhat weaned from the absolute necessity of
+the article, and the friendly sheep and alpaca have made great progress
+in the æsthetics of the toilet. As we approach Marseilles, we cross a
+dreary flat of wide extent, covered with stones and saltish grass, and
+said to produce the finest cattle in France. The olive, too, makes his
+stiff bow to us as we pass, well remembering his dusty green. The olive
+trees seem very small, and are, indeed, of comparatively recent growth;
+all the larger ones having been killed by a frost, rare in these
+latitudes, whose epoch we are inclined to state as posterior to our last
+presence in these parts. Our informant places it at twenty years ago.
+After three days of piecemeal travelling, the arrival at Marseilles
+seems quite a relief.<a name="page_042" id="page_042"></a></p>
+
+<h2>M<small>ARSEILLES</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>At Marseilles we find a quasi tropical aspect&mdash;long streets, handsome
+and well-shaded, tempting shops, luxurious hotels, a motley company,
+and, above all, a friend, one of our own countrymen, divided between the
+glitter of the new life and the homesick weaning of the old. Half, he
+assumes the cicerone, and guides our ignorance about. Half, he sits to
+learn, and we expound to him what has befallen at home, so far as we are
+conscious of it. We take half a day for resting, the next day for
+sight-seeing. On the third, we must sail, for finding that Holy Week is
+still to be, we determine to make our reluctant sacrifice to the
+Mediterranean, and to trust our precious comfort and delicate
+equilibrium to that blue imposture, that sunniest of humbugs.</p>
+
+<p>On the second day, we climb the steep ascent that leads to the chapel of
+La Bonne Mère de la Garde. This hot and panting ascent is not made by us
+without many pauses for recovered breath and energy. At every convenient
+stopping-place in the steep ascent are stationed elderly women presiding
+over small booths, who urgently invite us to purchase candles to give to
+the Madonna, medals, rosaries, and photographs, to all of whom we oppose
+a steadfast resistance. We have twice in our lives brought home from
+Europe boat-loads of trash, and we think that, as Paul says, the time
+past of our lives may suffice us. Finally, with a degree of perspiration
+more than salutary, we reach the top, and enjoy first the view of the
+Mediterranean, including<a name="page_043" id="page_043"></a> a bird's-eye prospect of the town, which looks
+so parched and arid as to make the remembrance of London in the rain
+soothing and pleasant. A palace is pointed out which was built in the
+expectation of a night's sojourn of the emperor, but to which, they tell
+us, he never came. Our point of view is the top of one of the towers of
+the church. Going inside, we look down upon the aisles and altars from a
+lofty gallery. The silver robes of the Madonna glisten, reflecting the
+many wax-lights that devotees have kindled around her. The first sight
+of these material expressions of devotion is imposing, the second
+instructive, the third, commonplace and wearisome. We are at the last
+clause, and gaze at these things with the eyes of people who have seen
+enough of them.</p>
+
+<p>The remainder of the disposable day we employ in a drive to the Prado,
+the fashionable region for the display of equipage and toilet. This is
+not, however, the fashionable day, and we meet only a few grumpy-looking
+dowagers in all stages of fatitude. The road is planted with double rows
+of lindens, and is skirted by country residences and villas to let. We
+stop and alight at the Musée, a spacious and handsome building, erected
+and owned by a noble of great wealth, long since dead, who committed
+celibacy, and left no personal heir. It is now the property of the city
+of Marseilles. The hall is fine. Among the spacious salons, the largest
+is used as a gallery of pictures, mostly by artists of this
+neighborhood, and of very humble merit. In another we find a very good
+collection of Egyptian antiquities,<a name="page_044" id="page_044"></a> while in yet another the old state
+furniture is retained, the rich crimson hangings, long divan of gobelin,
+and chairs covered with fine worsted needle-work. Beyond is a pretty
+Chinese cabinet, with a full-length <i>squatue</i> of Buddh, gayly gilded and
+painted. Above stairs, the state bed and hangings are shown, the latter
+matching a handsome landscape chintz, with which the walls are covered.
+This museum has in it a good deal of instructive and entertaining
+matter, and is kept in first-rate order. Returning, we drive around the
+outer skirts of the town, and see something of the summer bathing
+hotels, the great storehouses, and the streets frequented by the working
+and seafaring portion of the community.</p>
+
+<p>In the evening we walk through the streets, which are brilliant with
+gas, and visit the cafés, where ices, coffee, and lemonade are enjoyed.
+We finally seat ourselves in a casino, a sort of mixed café and theatre,
+where the most motley groups of people are coming, going, and sitting.
+At one end is a small stage, with a curtain, which falls at the end of
+each separate performance. Here songs and dances succeed each other,
+only half heeded by the public, who drink, smoke, and chatter without
+stint. After a hornpipe, a dreadful woman in white, with a blue peplum,
+hoarsely shouts a song without music, accompanied by drums and barbaric
+cymbals. She makes at last a vile courtesy, matching the insufficiency
+of her dress below by its utter absence above the waist, and we take
+flight. The next morning witnesses our early departure from Marseilles.<a name="page_045" id="page_045"></a></p>
+
+<h2>R<small>OME</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>With feelings much mingled, I approach, for the third time, the city of
+Rome. I pause to collect the experience of sixteen years, the period
+intervening between my second visit and the present. I left Rome, after
+those days, with entire determination, but with infinite reluctance.
+America seemed the place of exile, Rome the home of sympathy and
+comfort. To console myself for the termination of my travels, I
+undertook a mental pilgrimage, which unfolded to me something of the
+spirit of that older world, of which I had found the form so congenial.
+To the course of private experience were added great public lessons.
+Among these I may name the sublime failure of John Brown, the sorrow and
+success of the late war. And now I must confess that, after so many
+intense and vivid pages of life, this visit to Rome, once a theme of
+fervent and solemn desire, becomes a mere page of embellishment in a
+serious and instructive volume. So, while my countrymen and women, and
+the Roman world in general, hang intent upon the pages of the
+picture-book, let me resume my graver argument, and ask and answer such
+questions of the present as may seem useful and not ungenial.</p>
+
+<p>The Roman problem has for the American thinker two clauses: first, that
+of state and society; secondly, that of his personal relation to the
+same. Arriving here, and becoming in some degree acquainted with things
+as they are, he asks, first, What is the theory of this society, and how
+long will it continue? secondly, What do my countrymen<a name="page_046" id="page_046"></a> who consent to
+pass their lives here gain? what do they give up? I cannot answer either
+of these questions exhaustively. The first would lead me far into social
+theorizing; the second into some ungracious criticism. So a word, a
+friendly one must stand for good intentions where wisdom is at fault.</p>
+
+<p>The theory of this society in policy and religion is that of a symbolism
+whose remote significance has long been lost sight of and forgotten.
+Here the rulers, whose derived power should represent the <i>consensus</i> of
+the people, affect to be greater than those who constitute them, and the
+petty statue, raised by the great artist for the convenience and
+instruction of the crowd, spurns at the solid basis of the heaven-born
+planet, without which it could not stand. Rank here is not a mere
+convenience and classification for the encouragement of virtue and
+promotion of order. Rank here takes the place of virtue, and repression,
+its tool, takes the place of order. A paralysis of thought characterizes
+the whole community, for thought deprived of its legitimate results is
+like the human race debarred from its productive functions&mdash;it becomes
+effete, and soon extinct.</p>
+
+<p>Abject poverty and rudeness characterize the lower class (<i>basso ceto</i>),
+bad taste and want of education the middle, utter arrogance and
+superficiality the upper class. The distinctions between one set of
+human beings and another are held to be absolute, and the inferiority of
+opportunity, carefully preserved and exaggerated, is regarded as
+intrinsic, not accidental. Vain is it to plead the democratic allowances
+of the Catholic<a name="page_047" id="page_047"></a> church. The equality of man before God is here purely
+abstract and disembodied. The name of God, on the contrary, is invoked
+to authorize the most flagrant inequalization that ignorance can prepare
+and institutions uphold. The finest churches, the fairest galleries, you
+will say, are open to the poorest as to the richest. This is true. But
+the man's mind is the castle and edifice of his life. Look at these
+rough and ragged people, unwashed, uncombed, untaught. See how little
+sensible they are of the decencies and amenities of life. Search their
+faces for an intelligent smile, a glance that recognizes beauty or
+fitness in any of the stately circumstances that surround them. They are
+kept like human cattle, and have been so kept for centuries. And their
+dominants suppose themselves to be of one sort, and these of another.
+But give us absolutism, and take away education, even in rich and roomy
+America, and what shall we have? The cruel and arrogant slaveholder, the
+vulgar and miserable poor white, the wronged and degraded negro. The
+three classes of men exist in all constituted society. Absolutism allows
+them to exist only in this false form.</p>
+
+<p>This race is not a poor, but a robust and kindly one. Inclining more to
+artistic illustration than to abstract thought, its gifts, in the
+hierarchy of the nations, are eminent and precious. Like the modern
+Greek, the modern Celt, and the modern negro, the Italian peasant asks a
+century or two of education towards modern ideas. And all that can be
+said of his want of comprehension only makes it the more evident that
+the sooner we begin, the better.<a name="page_048" id="page_048"></a></p>
+
+<p>It should not need, to Americans or Englishmen, to set out any formal
+argument against absolutism. Among them it has long since been tried and
+judged. Enough of its advocacy only remains to present that opposition
+which is the necessary basis of action. And yet a word to my countrymen
+and countrywomen, who, lingering on the edge of the vase, are lured by
+its sweets, and fall into its imprisonment. It is a false, false
+superiority to which you are striving to join yourself. A prince of
+puppets is not a prince, but a puppet; a superfluous duke is no dux; a
+titular count does not count. Dresses, jewels, and equipages of
+tasteless extravagance; the sickly smile of disdain for simple people;
+the clinging together, by turns eager and haughty, of a clique that
+becomes daily smaller in intention, and whose true decline consists in
+its numerical increase,&mdash;do not dream that these lift you in any time
+way&mdash;in any true sense. For Italians to believe that it does, is
+natural; for Englishmen to believe it, is discreditable; for Americans,
+disgraceful.</p>
+
+<p>Leaving philosophy for the moment, I must renew my sketchy pictures of
+the scenes I pass through, lest treacherous memory should relinquish
+their best traits unpreserved. Arrived in Rome, at a very prosaic and
+commonplace station, I had some difficulty in recognizing the front of
+Villa Negroni, an old papal residence belonging to the Massimi family,
+in whose wide walls the relatives I now visit had formerly built their
+nest. A cosy and pleasant one it was, with the view of the distant
+hills, a large <i>entourage</i> of gardens, a fine orange grove,<a name="page_049" id="page_049"></a> and the
+neighborhood of some interesting ruins and churches. With all the
+cordiality of the old time these relatives now met me. My labors of
+baggage and conveyance were ended. One leads me to the carriage, where
+another waits to receive me. Time has been indulgent, we think, to both
+of us, for each finds the other little changed.</p>
+
+<p>And now we begin in earnest to tread the fairy land of dreams. Here are
+the Quattro Fontane, there is the Quirinal, yonder the dome of domes. We
+thread the streets in which I used to hunt for small jewelry and
+pictures at a bargain, enacting the part of the prodigal son, and
+providing a dinner of husks for the sake of a feast of gewgaws. A
+certain salutary tingling of shame visits my cheeks at the remembrance
+of the same. I find the personage of those days poor and trivial. But
+here is the Forum of Trajan, and soon we drive within a palatial
+doorway, and our guides lead us up a stately marble staircase&mdash;a long
+ascent; but we pause finally, and a great door opens, and they say,
+Welcome! We are now at home.</p>
+
+<p>Through a long hall we go, and through a sweep of apartments unmatchable
+in Fifth Avenue, at least in architectural dignity, seconded by rich and
+measured taste&mdash;green parlor, crimson parlor, drab parlor, the lady's
+room, the signore's room, the children's room. And in the guest-chamber
+I confronted my small and dusty self in the glass&mdash;small, not especially
+in my human proportions. But the whole of my modest house in B. Place
+would easily, as to solid contents,<a name="page_050" id="page_050"></a> lodge in the largest of those lofty
+rooms. The Place itself would equally lodge in the palace. I regard my
+re-found friends with wonder, and expect to see them execute some large
+and stately man&oelig;uvre, indicating their possession of all this space.</p>
+
+<p>And now, dinner served in irreproachable style, and waited on by two
+young men whose air and deportment would amply justify their appearance
+at Papanti's Hall on any state occasion. We soon grow used to their
+polite services; but at first Mario and Giuseppe somewhat intimidate us.</p>
+
+<p>And after dinner, talk of old times and old friends, question of this
+region and the other, the cold limbo as to weather, whence we come. Long
+and familiar is our interchange of facts, and sleep comes too soon, yet
+is welcome.</p>
+
+<h2>ST. P<small>ETER'S.</small></h2>
+
+<p>The first day in Rome sees us pursuing the phantom of the St. Peter
+ceremonies, for all of which, tickets have been secured for us. Solid
+fact as the performance of the <i>functions</i> remains, for us it assumes a
+forcible unreality, through the impeding intervention of black dresses
+and veils, with what should be women under them. But as these creatures
+push like battering-rams, and caper like he-goats, we shall prefer to
+adjourn the question of their humanity, and to give it the benefit of a
+doubt. We must except, however, our countrywomen from dear Boston, who
+were not seen otherwise than decently and in order. Into the
+well-remembered <i>palco</i> we now drag the trembling neophyte, dished up<a name="page_051" id="page_051"></a>
+in black in a manner altogether astonishing to herself. And we push her
+youthful head this way and that. "See, there are the cardinals; there is
+the pope; there, in white-capped row, sit the pilgrims. Now, the pope's
+mitre being removed, he proceeds with great state to wash the pilgrims'
+feet." But she, like sister Anne in the Blue Beard controversy, might
+reply, "I see only a flock of black dresses, heaped helter-skelter, the
+one above the other." Some bits of the picture she does get, certainly,
+which may thus be catalogued: "Pope's nose, black dress, ditto
+skull-cap, black dress, a touch of cardinal's back, black dress&mdash;and
+now? Bla&mdash;ck dre&mdash;ss, for the rest of the time. But what is this
+commotion?" For now the he-goats begin to jump in the most extraordinary
+way, racing out of the tribune as eagerly as they had pressed into it.
+Their haste is to see the <i>tavola</i>, or pilgrims' table, up stairs, where
+the pope and cardinals are to wait upon the twelve elect, whose
+foot-washing we have just tried to see. Silence, decency, decorum&mdash;all
+are forgotten. One in diamonds calls to a friend in the crowd outside,
+"Hollo, Hollo! Come along with us!" and at the top of her voice. If "the
+devil take the hindmost" be the moving cause of this gymnastic, I would
+humbly suggest that, on these occasions, the devil certainly seems to be
+in the foremost. With a little suppressed grumbling, we tumble out of
+the tribune, and descend to the body of the church, where the double
+line of Swiss guards detains us so long as to render our tickets for the
+<i>cupola</i>, where the pilgrims' feast takes place, nearly useless. This
+detention seems to be entirely arbitrary; for when, after endless<a name="page_052" id="page_052"></a>
+entreaty, we are allowed to reach the door, an easy ingress is allowed
+us. And here, bit by bit, the neophyte puzzles out the significance of
+the scene before her&mdash;a table set with massive golden ornaments (silver
+gilt at best), the twelve white caps behind; the great church
+dignitaries handing plates of fish, vegetables, and fruit towards the
+table; the pope hidden behind some black dress or other, and a chanting
+of prayers or texts, we know not what. The whole is much like the stage
+banquet in Macbeth, the part of Banquo's ghost being played by the
+spirit of the Christian religion.</p>
+
+<p>And now away, away! to the door of the Sistine Chapel, where the
+<i>Miserere</i> will be sung at six of the clock, it now being one of the
+same. So, in profane haste, we reach that door, already occupied by a
+small mob of women of the politer sort, and others. Here one maintains
+one's position till two o'clock, when the door opens, and, in shocking
+disorder, the mob enter. Those who keep the door exclaim, "Do not push
+so, ladies; there is room for all." But the savageness of the
+Anglo-Saxon race has full scope to-day, not being on its good behavior,
+as at home. So the abler-bodied jam and cram the less athletic without
+stint. After falling harmlessly on my face, I breathe freely, and obtain
+an end seat on the long benches reserved for the unreserved ladies.</p>
+
+<p>And here passed three weary hours before the office began, and another
+hour after that before the musical <i>bonne bouche</i>, coveted by these
+people, and little appreciated by many of them, was offered to their
+tired acceptance.<a name="page_053" id="page_053"></a> The first interval was mostly employed in the
+resuscitating process of <i>chawing</i> upon such victuals as had not proved
+contraband for such an occasion. And here were exchanged some little
+amenities which revived our sinking hopes of the race. Biscuits,
+sandwiches, and chocolate pastilles were shared. "Muffin from the Hotel
+de Russie" was offered by a face not unknown. Munching thereon with
+thankfulness, we interrogate, and find with joy a Boston woman. O
+comfort! be my friend; and when the next black rush doth come, if
+fisticuffs should become general and dangerous, be so good as to belabor
+the woman who belabors me.</p>
+
+<p>The office begins at five. It consists mostly of linked sameness long
+drawn out. The chapel is by this time well filled with ceremonial
+amateurs in every sort and quality. Men of all nationalities, in
+gentlemen's dress, fill the seats and throng the aisle. Priests,
+<i>militaires</i>, and even Sisters of Charity, vary the monotony of the
+strict coat and pantaloon. Upon an upright triangle, as is well known,
+are spiked the fifteen burning candles, of which all, save one, must be
+quenched before we can enjoy our dear-bought <i>Miserere</i>. Much of our
+attendant zeal is concentrated upon the progress visible in their
+decline. The effect of the chanting is as square and monotonous as would
+be the laying down of so many musical paving-stones. We tried to peep at
+the Latin text of a book of prayers in the hand of a priest on our left;
+but the pitiless Swiss guard caused him and his Breviary to move on, and
+this resource was lost. About half way through the office, a pause came
+over<a name="page_054" id="page_054"></a> matters, very unwelcome to our hurry. A door on the left of the
+altar opened, and the pope entered, preceded by his guard. He walked to
+his throne on the right of the altar, and the chanting was resumed. Some
+time before this, however, the <i>treni</i> or lamentations were sung. These
+were chanted in a high voice, neither fresh nor exact, and did not make
+on me the impression of sixteen years ago. The extinguishing of the
+candles was a slow agony, the intervals appearing endless. Finally, all
+the lights were out. The one burning taper which represented Christ was
+removed out of sight, the pope sank upon his knees before the altar, and
+the verses of the <i>Miserere</i> were sung. Twilight and fixed attention
+prevailed through the chapel, whose vaulted roof lends a certain magic
+of its own to the weird chant. Yet, with the remembrance of sixteen
+years since, and with present judgment, I am inclined to consider the
+supremacy of the <i>Miserere</i> a musical superstition. I know not what
+critical convictions its literal study would develop, but, as I heard
+it, much of it seemed out of tune, and deformed by other than musical
+discords. The <i>soprani</i>, without exception, were husky, and strained
+their voices to meet the highest effects. The vaulted roof, indeed,
+gives a lovely scope to such melody as there is. The dim, majestic
+frescos, which you still feel, though you see them no longer,&mdash;the
+brilliancy and variety of the company, its temporary stillness,&mdash;all
+these circumstances in this <i>ne plus ultra</i> of the Roman æsthetic
+combine to impress you. But the kneeling pontiff and his cardinals did
+not appear<a name="page_055" id="page_055"></a> to me invested with any true priesthood. I could feel no
+religious sympathy with their movements, which seemed a show, and part
+of a show&mdash;nothing more. And when the verses were all sung, and the
+shuffling of feet at the end got through with, I staid not to see the
+procession into the Pauline Chapel, nor the adoration of the relics, nor
+the mopping of St. Peter's altar. I had seen enough of such sights, and,
+quietly wrapping the twilight about my discontent, I thankfully went
+where kindred voices and a kindred faith allowed me to claim the shelter
+of home.</p>
+
+<h2>S<small>UPPER OF THE</small> P<small>ILGRIMS.</small></h2>
+
+<p>Faster go these shows than one can describe them. On Good Friday evening
+we attempted only to see the supper of the female pilgrims at the
+Trinità dei Pellegrini. This again I undertook for the neophytes' sake,
+having myself once witnessed the august ceremony. Here, as everywhere at
+this time, we found a crowd of black dresses, with and without veils,
+which, on this occasion, are optional. Another mob of women, small but
+energetic; another rush to see what, under other circumstances, we
+should hold to be but a sorry sight. The pilgrims are waited upon by an
+association of ladies, who wear a sort of feminine overall in scarlet
+cotton, nearly concealing a dress, usually black, of ordinary wear. They
+are also distinguished by a pictorial badge, representing, I think, the
+Easter Lamb, in some connection. Some of these ladies are of princely
+family, others of rank merely civic. Princess Massimo, of first-rate<a name="page_056" id="page_056"></a>
+pretensions, keeps the inner entrance to the rites, and accords it only
+to a limited number in turn. We tumble down the dividing stairs in the
+usual indecorous manner, and walk through two rooms, in each of which
+the pilgrims sit with their feet in tubs of water, the attendant ladies
+being employed either in scrubbing them clean, or in wiping them dry.
+All were working women from the country, their faces mostly empty of
+thought and rude with toil. Some of the heads were not without
+character, and would easily have made, with their folded head-dresses, a
+<i>genre</i> picture. In general, they and their attire were as rough and
+uninteresting as women and their belongings can be. A number of them
+carried infants, whose appearance also invited the cleansing
+ministration, which did not include them. In either room an ecclesiastic
+recited prayers in Latin, and a pretty young lady at intervals rattled a
+box, the signal for the participants to make the sign of the cross,
+which they did in a business-like manner. From this <i>lavanda</i> we passed
+to other rooms, in which the supper tables were in process of
+preparation. The materials for the meal were divided into portions. To
+each one was allotted a plate of salad and sardines, one of <i>bacala</i>, or
+fried salt fish, two small loaves of bread, and a little pitcher of
+wine, together with figs and oranges. The red-gowned ministrants
+bestirred themselves in dividing and arranging these portions, with much
+apparent good nature. Many of them wore diamond earrings, and one young
+lady, whom we did not see at work, was adorned as to the neck with a
+rich collar of jewelled<a name="page_057" id="page_057"></a> lockets, an article of the latest fashion. All
+of these ladies are supposed to be princesses, but several of them
+talked house-gossip in homely Italian. To us the time seemed long, but
+at length arrived the <i>minestra</i> in a huge kettle. This universal
+Italian dish is a watery soup, containing a paste akin to macaroni. And
+now the pilgrims, having had all the washing they could endure, came in
+to take possession of the goods prepared for them. Those of the same
+family tried to sit together, but did not always manage to do so. For
+every babe a double portion is allowed, and the coin (ten cents)
+received at departure is also doubled. We had feared lest the pilgrims
+might have found the presence of numbers a source of embarrassment. But
+it did not prove so. They attacked their victuals with the most
+practical and evident enjoyment. The babies were fed with <i>minestra</i>,
+fish, salad, and wine. Of these one was two weeks old, and its mother
+had walked four days to get to Rome. Each pilgrim carried either a
+bottle or a tin canteen, into which the superior waiting-women decanted
+the wine allowed, that they might carry it home with them. A Latin grace
+was rehearsed before they fell to. Cardinals and <i>monsignori</i> were seen,
+here and there, talking with friends among the spectators. Observing
+that pilgrims eat much like other people, we left them still at table,
+and came away, to find the Prince Massimo in pink cotton, at the bottom
+of the staircase, and a stupid Swiss, with ill-managed bayonet, guarding
+the outer entrance. He, a raw recruit, carried his weapon as carelessly
+as a lady waves a bouquet. Close to the<a name="page_058" id="page_058"></a> eye of the neophyte he thrusts
+it, through inattention. A scream from me makes her aware of the danger,
+but affects him not. Under the weight of my objurgation he falters not,
+but makes a vehement pass at a harmless dog, which runs by unhurt. And
+my reflections upon his sheer brutishness were the closing ones of the
+day.</p>
+
+<h2>E<small>ASTER</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>St. Peter's on Easter called us with the magical summons of the silver
+trumpets, blown at the elevation of the host, and remembered by me
+through these sixteen years. To the tribunes, however, I did not betake
+myself, but, armed with a camp stool, wandered about the church, getting
+now a <i>coup d'&oelig;il</i>, now a whiff of harmony. The neophytes had our
+tickets, and beheld the ceremonies, which, once seen, are of little
+interest to those to whom they are not matters of religion. The pope and
+cardinals officiate at high mass, with the music of the Sistine singers.
+The pope drinks of the consecrated cup through a golden tube, the cup
+itself having previously been tasted of by one commissioned for the
+purpose. This feature clearly indicates the recognized possibility of
+poison. It is probably not observed by most of those present, who have,
+after all, but a glimpse of what passes. The effect of the trumpets is
+certainly magical. The public has no knowledge of their whereabouts, and
+the sound seems to fall from some higher region. Having enjoyed this
+æsthetic moment, one hurries out into the piazza in front of the church,
+where a great assemblage waits to receive the papal benediction. Here
+seats and balconies can be<a name="page_059" id="page_059"></a> hired, and a wretched boy screeches, "<i>Ecco
+luoghi</i>," for half an hour, as if he had a watchman's rattle in his
+head. At last the blessed father in his palanquin is borne to that upper
+window of the church, over which the white canopy rests: his mitres are
+all arranged before him. The triple crown, glittering with jewels, is on
+his head. On either side of him flutter the peacock fans. Cannons clear
+the way for his utterance, and holding up two fingers, he recites the
+apostolic benediction in a voice of remarkable distinctness and power.
+It is received by good Catholics on their knees. Another cannon shot
+closes the performance, and at the same moment two or three papers,
+containing indulgences, fall from the pontiff's hand. Then the crowd
+disperses, and you yourself, having witnessed "the most impressive
+ceremony in the world," become chiefly occupied with the getting home,
+the crowd of carriages being very great, and the bridge of St. Angelo
+reserved for the passage of the <i>legni privilegiati</i>. And on the way,
+query as to this impressiveness. If one could suppose that the pope had
+any special blessing to bestow, or that he thought he had, one would
+certainly be desirous and grateful to share in it. If one could consider
+him as consecrated by anything better than a superstition for anything
+better than the priestly maintenance of an absolute rule, one might look
+in his kindly old face with a feeling stronger than that of personal
+good-will or indifference. But I, standing to see and hear him, was in
+the position of Macbeth.</p>
+
+<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="poetry">
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 0em;">"I had most need of blessing, but Amen</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 0.25em;">Stuck in my throat."</span></td></tr>
+</table>
+<p><a name="page_060" id="page_060"></a></p>
+
+<p>And I concluded that common sense, common justice, and civil and
+religious liberty,&mdash;the noblest gifts of the past and promises of the
+future,&mdash;had been quite long enough</p>
+
+<p class="c">"Butchered to make a Roman holiday."</p>
+
+<p>As for the evening illumination, it was just as I remember it on two
+former occasions, separated from this and from each other by long
+intervals. A magical and unique spectacle it certainly is, with the
+well-known change from the paper lanterns to the flaring <i>lampions</i>.
+Costly is it of human labor, and perilous to human life. And when I
+remembered that those employed in it receive the sacrament beforehand,
+in order that imminent death may not find them out of a state of grace,
+I thought that its beauty did not so much signify.</p>
+
+<p>We have a dome, too, in Washington. The Genius of Liberty poises on its
+top; the pediment below it is adorned with the emblems of honest thrift
+and civic prosperity. May that dome perish ere it be lit at the risk of
+human life, and lit, like this, to make the social darkness around it
+more evident by its momentary aureole.</p>
+
+<h2>W<small>ORKS OF</small> A<small>RT</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>Enough of shows. Galleries and studios are better. Rome is rich in both,
+and with a sort of studious contentment, one embraces one's Murray,
+picks out the palace that unfolds its art treasures to-day, and travels
+up the stairs, and along the marble corridors, to wonderful suites of
+apartments, in which the pasteboard programmes lie about waiting for
+you, while the still drama<a name="page_061" id="page_061"></a> of the pictures acts itself upon the
+thronged wall, yourself their small public, and they giving their
+color-eloquence, whether any one gives heed or not.</p>
+
+<p>They are precious, the Colonna, Doria, Sciarra, Borghese, and we have
+seen them. We have picked out our old favorites, and have carried the
+neophytes before them, saying, "I saw this, dear, before you were born."
+But this past, whose reflex fold inwraps us, does not exist for the
+neophytes, who look at it as out of a moment's puzzle, and then conclude
+to begin their own business on their own responsibility, without any
+reference to these outstanding credits of ours.</p>
+
+<p>Of the pictures it is little useful to speak. Your description enables
+no one to see them, and the narration of the feelings they excite in you
+is as likely to be tedious as interesting to those who cultivate
+feelings of their own. Copies and engravings have done here what you
+cannot do, and the best subjects are familiar to art students and lovers
+in all countries. A little sigh of pleasure may be allowed you at this,
+your third sight of the Francias, the Raphaels, Titian's Bella, Claude's
+landscapes, and the scientific Leonardo's heavily-labored heads and
+groups. But do not therefore put the trumpet to your lips, and blow that
+sigh across the ocean, to claim the attention of ears that invite the
+lesson for the day. The lesson for this day is not written on canvas,
+and though it may be read everywhere in the world, you will scarcely
+find its clearest type in Rome.</p>
+
+<p>And here, perhaps, I may as well carry further the philosophizing which
+I began a week ago with regard to the objects and resources of Roman
+life, and their compatibility<a name="page_062" id="page_062"></a> with the thoughts and pursuits most dear
+and valuable to Americans.</p>
+
+<p>Art is, of course, the only solid object which an American can bring
+forward to justify a prolonged residence in Rome. Art, health, and
+official duty, are among the valid reasons which bring our countrymen
+abroad. Two of these admit of no argument. The sick have a right, other
+things permitting, to go where they can be bettered; a duty perhaps, to
+go where the sum of their waning years and wasting activities admits of
+multiplication. Those who live abroad as ministers and consuls have a
+twofold opportunity of benefiting their country. If honest and able,
+they may benefit her by their presence in foreign lands; if unworthy and
+incompetent, by their absence from home. But our artists are those whose
+expatriation gives us most to think about. They take leave of us either
+in the first bloom or in the full maturity of their powers. The ease of
+living in Southern Europe, the abundance of models and of works of art,
+the picturesque charms of nature and of scenery, detain them forever
+from us, and, save for an abstract sentiment, which itself weakens with
+every year, the sacred tie of country is severed. Its sensibilities play
+no part in these lives devoted to painting and modelling.</p>
+
+<p>Now, an eminent gift for art is an exceptional circumstance. He who has
+it weds his profession, leaves father and mother, and goes where his
+slowly-unfolding destiny seems to call him. Against such a course we
+have no word to say. It presents itself as a<a name="page_063" id="page_063"></a> necessary conclusion to
+earnest and noble men, who love not their native country less, but their
+votive country more. Of the first and its customs they would still
+say,&mdash;</p>
+
+<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="poetry">
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 0em;">"I cannot but remember such things were</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 0.25em;">That were most precious to me."</span></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>Yet of this career, so often coveted by those to whom its attainment
+does not open, I cannot speak in terms of supreme recognition. The
+office of art is always as precious as its true ministers are rare. But
+the relative importance of sculptural and pictorial art is not to-day
+what it was in days of less thought, of smaller culture. Every one who
+likes the Bible to-day, likes it best without illustrations. Were Christ
+here to speak anew, he would speak without parables. In ruder times,
+heavenly fancies could only be illustrated on the one hand, received on
+the other, through the mediation of a personal embodiment. Only through
+human sympathy was the assent to divine truth obtained. The necessity
+which added a feminine personality to the worship of Christ, and
+completed the divided Godhead by making it female as well as male, was a
+philosophical one, but not recognized as such. The device of the Virgin
+was its practical result, counterbalancing the partiality of the
+one-sided personal <i>culte</i> of the Savior. Modern religious thought gets
+far beyond this, makes in spiritual things no distinction of male and
+female, and does not apply sex to the Divine, save in the most vague and
+poetic sense. The inner convictions of heart and conscience may now be
+spoken in plain<a name="page_064" id="page_064"></a> prose, or sung in ringing verse. The <i>vates</i>, prophet
+or reformer, may proclaim his system and publish his belief; and his
+audience will best apprehend it in its simplest and most direct form.
+The wide spaces of the new continent allow room for the most precious
+practical experimentation; and speculative and theoretical liberty keep
+pace with liberty of action. The only absolute restraint, the best one,
+is a moral one. "Thou shalt not" applies only to what is intrinsically
+inhuman and profane. And now, there is no need to puzzle simple souls
+with a marble gospel. Faith needs not to digest whole side-walls of
+saints and madonnas, who once stood for something, no one now knows
+what. The Italian school was to art what the Greek school was to
+literature&mdash;an original creation and beginning. But life has surpassed
+Plato and Aristotle. We are forced to piece their short experiences, and
+to say to both, "You are matchless, but insufficient." And so, though
+Raphael's art remains immortal and unsurpassed, we are forced to say of
+his thought, "It is too small." No one can settle, govern, or moralize a
+country by it. It will not even suffice to reform Italy. The golden
+transfigurations hang quiet on the walls, and let pope and cardinal do
+their worst. We want a world peopled with faithful and intelligent men
+and women. The Prometheus of the present day is needed rather to animate
+statues than to make them.<a name="page_065" id="page_065"></a></p>
+
+<h2>P<small>IAZZA </small>N<small>AVONA&mdash;THE</small> T<small>OMBOLA.</small></h2>
+
+<p>When, O, when does the bee make his honey? Not while he is sipping from
+flower to flower, levying his dainty tribute as lightly as
+love&mdash;enriching the world with what the flower does not miss, and
+cannot.</p>
+
+<p>This question suggests itself in the course of these busy days in Rome,
+where pleasures are offered oftener than sensibilities can ripen, and
+the edge of appetite is blunted with sweets, instead of rusting with
+disuse. In these scarce three weeks how much have we seen, how little
+recorded and described! So sweet has been the fable, that the intended
+moral has passed like an act in a dream&mdash;a thing of illusion and
+intention, not of fact. Impotent am I, indeed, to describe the riches of
+this Roman world,&mdash;its treasures, its pleasures, its flatteries, its
+lessons. Of so much that one receives, one can give again but the
+smallest shred,&mdash;a leaf of each flower, a scrap of each garment, a
+proverb for a sermon, a stave for a song. So be it; so, perhaps, is it
+best.</p>
+
+<p>Last Sunday I attended a Tombola at Piazza Navona&mdash;not a state lottery,
+but a private enterprise brought to issue in the most public manner. I
+know the Piazza of old. Sixteen years since I made many a pilgrimage
+thither, in search of Roman trash. I was not then past the poor
+amusement of spending money for the sake of spending it. The foolish
+things I brought home moved the laughter of my little Roman public. I
+appeared in public with some forlorn brooch or dilapidated earring;<a name="page_066" id="page_066"></a> the
+giddy laughed outright, and the polite gazed quietly. My rooms were the
+refuge of all broken-down vases and halting candelabra. I lived on the
+third floor of a modest lodging, and all the wrecks of art that neither
+first, second, nor fourth would buy, found their way into my parlor, and
+staid there at my expense. I recall some of these adornments to-day. Two
+heroes, in painted wood, stood in my dark little entry. A gouty Cupid in
+bas-relief encumbered my mantel-piece. Two forlorn figures in black and
+white glass recalled the auction whose unlucky prize they had been. And
+Horace Wallace, coming to talk of art and poetry, on my red sofa,
+sometimes saluted me with a paroxysm of merriment, provoked by the sight
+of my last purchase. Those days are not now. Of their accumulations I
+retain but a fragment or two. Of their delights remain a tender memory,
+a childish wonder at my own childishness. To-day, in heathen Rome, I can
+find better amusements than those shards and rags were ever able to
+represent.</p>
+
+<p>Going now to Piazza Navona with a sober and reasonable companion, I
+scarcely recognize it. At the Braschi Palace, which borders it, we
+pause, and enter to observe the square hall and the fine staircase of
+polished marble. This palace is now offered in a lottery, at five francs
+the ticket; and all orders in Rome, no doubt, participate in the venture
+it presents. The immense piazza is so filled and thronged with people
+that its distinctive features are quite lost. Its numerous balconies are
+crowded with that doubtful community<a name="page_067" id="page_067"></a> comprehended in the title of the
+"better class." From many of its windows hang the red cotton draperies,
+edged with gilt lace, which supply so much of the color in Roman
+<i>festas</i>. Soldiers are everywhere mingled with the crowd, so skilfully
+as to present no contrast with them, but so effectually that any popular
+disorder would be instantly suppressed. The dragoons, mounted and
+bearing sabres, are seen here and there in the streets leading to the
+piazza. These constitute the police of Rome; and where with us a civil
+man with a badge interposes himself and says, "No entrance here, sir,"
+in Rome an arbitrary, ignorant beast, mounted upon a lesser brute, waves
+his sabre at you, shrieks unintelligible threats and orders, and has the
+pleasure of bringing your common sense to a fault, and of making all
+understanding of what is or is not to be done impossible. Their greatest
+glory, however, culminates on public <i>festas</i>, when there are foreigners
+as well as Romans to be intimidated. At the Tombola they are only an <i>en
+cas</i>.</p>
+
+<p>Well, the office of the Tombola is solemnized upon a raised stage,
+whereon stand divers officials, two seedy trumpeters, and a small boy in
+fancy costume, whose duty soon becomes apparent. Before him rests a
+rotatory machine, composed of two disks of glass, bound together by a
+band of brass: this urn of fate revolves upon a pivot, and is provided
+with an opening, through which the papers bearing the numbers are put
+in, to be drawn out, one by one, after certain revolutions of the
+machine. Not quite so fast, however,<a name="page_068" id="page_068"></a> with your drawing. The numbers are
+not all in yet. A grave man, in a black coat, holds up each number to
+the public view, calls it in his loudest tones, and then hands it to
+another, who folds and slips it into the receptacle. When all of the
+numbers have been verified and deposited, the opening is closed up, the
+trumpeters sound a bar or two, the wheel revolves, the fancy boy paws
+the air with his right hand, puts the hand into the opening, and draws
+forth a number, which the second black coat presents to the first, who
+unfolds it, and announces it to the multitude. At the same moment, a
+huge card, some two feet square in dimensions, is placed in a frame, and
+upon this we read the number just drawn out. The number is also shown
+upon several large wooden frames in other parts of the square. Upon
+these it remains, so that the whole count of the drawing may be apparent
+to the eager public. This course of action is repeated until a stir in
+one part of the piazza announces a candidate for one of the smaller
+prizes. A white flag, repeated at all the counting frames, arrests the
+public attention. The candidate brings forward his ticket and is
+examined. Finally, a <i>quaterna</i> is announced, formed by the agreement of
+four numbers on a ticket with four in the order of the drawing. The
+crowd applaud, the trumpets sound again, and the drawing proceeds.
+Unhappily, at one moment the persons on duty forget to close the valve
+through which the numbers are taken out. The omission is not perceived
+until several rotations have shaken out many of the precious papers. A
+roar of indignation is heard from the populace; the<a name="page_069" id="page_069"></a> wheel is arrested,
+the numbers eagerly sought, counted, and replaced, under the jealous
+scrutiny of the public eye. Meanwhile, one of two copious brass bands,
+provided with five ophicleides each, and cornets, etc., to match,
+discoursed tarantellas and polkas. And we see the <i>quinquina</i> (formed by
+five numbers) drawn, and then the first Tombola, and the second. And lo!
+there are four tombolas: but we await them not. But in all this crowd,
+busy with emotion and reeking with tobacco and Roman filth in all its
+varieties, who shall interest us like the <i>limonaro</i> with his basket of
+fruit, his bottles of water, his lemon squeezer, and his eager thrifty
+countenance? A father of family, surely, he loves no plays as thou dost,
+Anthony. Pale, in shirt sleeves, he keeps the sharpest lookout for a
+customer, and in voice whose measure is not to be given, hammers out his
+endless sentence, "<i>Chi vuol bere? Ecco, il limonaro.</i>" To the most
+doubtful order he responds, carrying his glasses into the thickest of
+the throng, and thundering, "<i>Chi ha comandato questo limone?</i>" For half
+a <i>bajoco</i> he gives a quarter of a lemon, wrung out in a glass of tepid
+water, which his customers absorb with relish. Sometimes he varies this
+procedure by the sale of an <i>orzata</i>, produced by pouring a few drops of
+a milky fluid into a glass of water. On our way from the piazza we
+encounter other <i>limonari</i>,&mdash;dark, sleepy, Italian, not trenchant nor
+incisive in their offers. But our man, a blond, yet remains a picture to
+us, with his business zeal and economy of time. A thread of good blood
+he possibly has. We adopt and pity him as a misplaced Yankee.<a name="page_070" id="page_070"></a></p>
+
+<h2>S<small>UNDAYS IN</small> R<small>OME</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>Our first Sunday in Rome was Easter, in St. Peter's, of which we have
+elsewhere given a sufficient description. Our second was divided between
+the Tombola just described, in the afternoon, and the quiet of the
+American Chapel in the morning. We found this an upper chamber, quietly
+and appropriately furnished, with a pleasant and well-dressed attendance
+of friends and fellow country-people. The prayers of the Episcopal
+service were simply read, with no extra formality or aping of more
+traditional forms. It was pleasant to find ourselves called upon once
+more to pray for the President of the United States, although in our own
+country he is considered as past praying for. Still, we remembered the
+old adage, "while there is life there is hope," and were able, with a
+good conscience, to beseech that he might be plenteously endowed with
+heavenly grace, although the reception of such a gift might seriously
+compromise him with his own party. The sermon, like others we have heard
+of late, shows a certain progress and liberalization even in the holding
+of the absolute tenets which constitute what has been hitherto held as
+orthodoxy. In our youth, the Episcopal church, like the orthodox
+dissenters, preached atonement, atonement, atonement, wrath of God,
+birth in sin,&mdash;position of sentimental reprobation towards the one fact,
+of unavailing repentance concerning the other. The doctrine of atonement
+in those days was as literal in the Protestant church as in the<a name="page_071" id="page_071"></a>
+Catholic, while the possibility of profiting by it was hedged about and
+encumbered by frightful perils and intangible difficulties. But to-day,
+while these doctrines are not repudiated by the denominations which then
+held them, they are comparatively set out of sight. The charity and
+diligence of Paul are preached, and even the sublime theistic simplicity
+of Jesus is not altogether contraband; though he, alas! is as little
+understood in doctrine as followed in example. For he has hitherto been
+like a beautiful figure set to point out a certain way, and people at
+large have been so entranced with worshipping the figure, that they have
+neglected to follow the direction it indicates.</p>
+
+<p>Well, our American sermon was dry, but sensible and conscientious. It
+did not congratulate those who had accepted the mysterious atonement,
+nor threaten those who had neglected to do so. But it exhorted all men
+towards a reasonable, religious, and diligent life, and thus afforded
+the commonplace man a basis for effort, and a possible gradual
+amelioration of his moral condition. One little old-fashioned phrase,
+however, the preacher let slip. He cast a slight slur upon the moral, as
+distinguished from the religious man. Now, modern ethics do not
+recognize this distinction. For it, true morals are religion. He who
+exemplifies the standard does it more honor than he who praises, and
+pursues it not. And he who prays and plunders is less a saint than he
+who does neither. We passed this, however, and went away in peace.</p>
+
+<p>Our third Sunday morning was passed in <i>S. Andrea<a name="page_072" id="page_072"></a> delta Valle</i>, a large
+and sumptuous church, where we had been promised a fine <i>messa-cantata</i>,
+i.e., a mass performed principally in music. Mustafa, of the pope's
+choir, was there, with some ten other vocalists, who put into their
+<i>Kyrie</i>, <i>Miserere</i>, and so on, as much operatic emphasis and cadence as
+the bars could hold. The organ was harsh, loud, and overpowering, the
+music utterly uninteresting. Mustafa's renowned voice, which has
+suffered by time and use, has something nasal and <i>criard</i> in it, with
+all its power. He still takes and holds A and B with firmness and
+persistence, but his middle notes are unequal and husky. Although the
+sopranos of to-day are merely falsetto tenors, and their unsexed voices
+a fiction, they yet acquire in process of time a tone of old-woman
+quality, which contrasts strangely with their usually robust appearance.
+On this occasion we did not conjecture whose might be the music to which
+we listened. It had a mongrel paternity, and hailed from no noble race
+of compositions. Having, however, our comfortable chairs, and being out
+of the murderous direct reverberation of the organ, we sat and saw as
+outsiders the flux and reflux of life which passed through the church.
+It was obviously, this morning, a place of fashionable resort; and many
+were the good dresses and comfortable family groups that first appeared,
+and then were absorbed among its crowded chairs and their occupants. The
+well-dressed people were mostly, I thought, of <i>medio ceto</i>,&mdash;middling
+class,&mdash;which in Rome is a term of strict reprobation, and answers to
+what we<a name="page_073" id="page_073"></a> used to call Bowery in New York. Their devotion had mostly a
+business-like aspect. They hired their chair, brought it, sat down, made
+their crosses and courtesies, accompanied the priest with their books,
+went down on their knees at the elevation of the host, had benediction,
+and went. Mass was taking place at various side altars, and people were
+coming and going, as their devotions were past or future. Dirty and
+shabby figures mingled with the others; a group of little children from
+the street, holding each other by the hand; a crippled old woman,
+hobbling on two crutches, who, wonderfully, did not beg, of us at least;
+an elderly dwarf, of composed aspect, some thirty-eight inches high, who
+took a chair, but could not get into it, so squatted down beside it, and
+stared at us. A loud bell was rung, and one in yellow satin bore an
+object under yellow satin across the church. This was the sacrament,
+going to one of the altars for the beginning of the mass. Having mused
+sufficiently on the music and on the crowd, we desired to hear a Puritan
+sermon, and, there being none to be had, we went away.</p>
+
+<p>Away to the Farnesina Palace, lovely with Raphael's frescos of Galatea
+and the story of Psyche, with Michael Angelo's grim charcoal head
+looming in the distance. The Psyche series has suffered much by
+restorations; and though the gracious outline and designs remain, the
+coloring, one thinks, is far other than that of the master. The Galatea
+has faded less, and has been less restored. The lovely Sodoma fresco up
+stairs&mdash;the family of Darius&mdash;was undergoing repairs, and<a name="page_074" id="page_074"></a> could not be
+seen. The palace belongs to the ex-king of Naples. It was formerly
+visible at all times, but may now be seen only on Sunday. He himself now
+lives in Rome, and perhaps chooses to tread its banquet halls deserted,
+which possibly accounts for the present restriction. In the afternoon we
+were bidden to see the embalmed remains of an ancient pontiff,&mdash;Pius
+V.,&mdash;who should be happy to make himself useful to Catholic institutions
+at a period so remote from the intentions of Nature. The old body is
+shown in a glass case, upon an altar of Santa Maria Maggiore. He lies on
+his side, his darkened face adorned by a new white beard composed of
+lamb's wool. His hands are concealed by muslin gloves; his garments are
+white, and he wears a brilliant mitre. And the devout crowd the church
+to touch and kiss the glass case in which he resides. There is,
+moreover, a procession of the crucifix, and vespers are sung in pleasing
+style by a tolerable choir; and many <i>pauls</i> and <i>bajocs</i> are dropped
+hither and thither in pious receptacles by the pious in heart. So, I
+repeat it, the mummied pope, sainted also, is of use.</p>
+
+<h2>C<small>ATACOMBS</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>Of all that befell us in the catacombs we may not tell. We betook
+ourselves to the neighborhood of St. Calixtus one afternoon. A noted
+ecclesiastic of the Romish church soon joined our party, with various of
+our countrymen and countrywomen. He wore a white woollen gown and a
+black hat. Before descending, he ranged us in a circle, and harangued us
+much as follows:&mdash;<a name="page_075" id="page_075"></a></p>
+
+<p>"You will ask me the meaning of the word 'catacomb,' and I shall tell
+you that it is derived from two Greek words&mdash;<i>cata</i>, hidden, and
+<i>cumba</i>, tomb. You have doubtless heard that the whole city of Rome is
+undermined with catacombs; but this is not true. The American
+Encyclopædia says this. I have read the article. But intramural burials
+were not allowed in Rome; therefore the catacombs commence outside the
+walls. They are, moreover, limited to an irregular extent of some three
+miles. Why is this? It is because they were possible only in the tufa
+formation. Why only in the tufa? Because it cuts easily and crumbles
+easily, hardening afterwards. And as the burials of the Christians were
+necessarily concealed, it was important for them to deal with a material
+easily worked and easily disposed of. The solid contents of the
+catacombs of Rome could be included within a square mile; their series,
+if arranged at full length, would not measure less than five hundred
+miles. In some places there are no less than seven strata of tombs, one
+below the other." All of this, with more repetitions than I can possibly
+signify, was delivered under the cogent stimulus of a roasting afternoon
+sun of the full Roman power. Being quite calcined as to the head and
+shoulders, we somewhat thankfully undertook the descent. The extreme
+contrast, however, between the outer heat and the inner chill and damp,
+proved an unwelcome alternative to most of us. Had we been allowed a
+somewhat brisk motion, we should have dreaded less its effects. But
+<a name="page_076" id="page_076"></a>Father &mdash;&mdash; fought his ground inch by inch, and continued to carry on a
+stringent controversy with imaginary antagonists. We will not endeavor
+to transcribe the catechism, at once tedious and amusing, with which he
+held captive a dozen of Yankees prepared to sell their lives dearly, but
+uncertain how to deal with his mode of warfare. He kept us long in the
+crypt of the pontiffs, where are found two fragments of marble tablets
+bearing names in mingled Latin and Greek character. One inscription
+records, "<i>Anteros episcopus</i>." The other is of another
+name&mdash;"<i>episcopus et martyr</i>." The father now led us into a narrow
+crypt, where his stout form wedged us all as closely as possible
+together. He showed us on the walls two time-worn frescos, one of
+which&mdash;Jonah and the whale&mdash;represented the resurrection, while the
+other depicted that farewell banquet at Emmaus in which Peter received
+the thrice-repeated charge, "Feed my sheep." To this symbolical
+expression the father added one later and more puzzling. The fish which
+appeared in one of the dishes represented, he told us, the anagram of
+Christ in the Greek language&mdash;<i>icthus</i>, the fish, <i>Jesus Christos
+theos</i>&mdash;I forget the rest. The fish was the only hint of the presence of
+Christ on this occasion, and its significance could be apprehended only
+with this explanation. These pictures, he insisted, sufficiently showed
+us that the early Christians had religious images&mdash;a point of great
+authority and significance in the Catholic church, for us how easily
+disposed of! The pictures and the symbolism of the primitive church are
+both alike features of its time. In periods when culture is<a name="page_077" id="page_077"></a> rare and
+limited, the picture and the parable have their indispensable office.
+The one preserves and presents to the eye much that would otherwise be
+overlooked and forgotten; the other presents to the mind that which
+could not otherwise be apprehended. The painted Christs, Madonnas, and
+so on, were in their time a gospel to the common people. Even in
+Raphael's period, even in the Italy of to-day, how few of the populace
+at large are able to save their souls by reading the New Testament! The
+paintings undoubtedly answered a useful purpose, as all men must
+acknowledge; but the Catholic system, carried out in its completeness,
+would give a melancholy perpetuity to the class of people who cannot
+read otherwise than in pictures. Even where it teaches to read, it
+withholds the power of interpretation. Protestantism means direct and
+general instruction. It gives to the symbolism of the Bible its plainest
+and most practical interpretation, without building upon it a labyrinth
+of types whose threading asks the study of a lifetime.</p>
+
+<p>The fear and danger of early times had, no doubt, much to do with the
+growth of symbolism, both in pictures and in language. The intercourse
+of the early Christians was limited and insecure. It was guarded by
+watchwords. Its bodily presence took refuge in pits and caves. Its
+thought buried itself in similitudes and allusions. But now, when
+Christianity has become the paramount demand of the world, this
+obscurity is no longer needed nor legitimate.</p>
+
+<p>The parables of Christ may be supposed to have had<a name="page_078" id="page_078"></a> a double object. The
+most usually recognized is that of popular instruction, in the form best
+suited to the comprehension of his hearers. Many of his sayings,
+however, point to another meaning; viz., the discrimination between
+those who were fitted to receive his doctrine, and those who were not.
+How many, among the multitudes who heard him, can we suppose to have
+been anxious about the moral lessons intended by his illustrious fables?
+Few indeed; and those few alone would be able to understand his
+teaching, and, in turn, to teach according to his method. So he
+represents the kingdom of heaven which he preached as a net thrown into
+the sea. His sermons were such castings of the net; he made his
+disciples fishers of men. The Christian church, like the Jewish, rapidly
+degenerated into a tissue of legends and observances&mdash;at first
+representative of morality, soon cumbrous, finally inimical to it.</p>
+
+<p>All this time, however, we are standing wedged by Father &mdash;&mdash; in a narrow
+compass, and, while the thought of one undertakes this long, swift
+retrospect, the temper of the others becomes irritated&mdash;not without
+reason. So we insist upon breaking out of the small quadrangle, and are
+led into the crypt in which were found the remains of St. Cecilia. Here
+tradition again holds a long parley with the representatives of modern
+thought. St. Cecilia, a noble Roman lady, was beheaded, but survived the
+stroke of the executioner three days, which she occupied in describing
+and explaining the doctrine of the trinity. (This, therefore, is the
+doctrine of those who have lost their head.) For this<a name="page_079" id="page_079"></a> purpose she
+employed two fingers of the right hand and one of the left. All of this
+passes without controversy. Her body was found lying on its face, in an
+attitude perpetuated by the well-known statue in the church in
+Trastevere. But in this crypt are the relics of an altar, erected over
+the remains of another saint. The early Christian altars, our guide
+says, were always erected above the burial-place of some saint. Hence,
+no Catholic church is allowed to dispense with the presence of
+consecrated bones. Other graves, moreover, cluster around that which is
+supposed to have consecrated this altar: sums of money were paid for the
+privilege of interment in this proximity. This clearly shows the early
+Christians to have supposed that the saint himself had the power to
+benefit them, and the right of intercession. This we concede as quite
+possible; but does this go to show, O father, that the saint <i>had</i> any
+such power? Let us go back after this fashion in other things. Fingers
+were made before knives and forks, skins were worn before tissues, and
+nakedness is of earlier authority than either. A predatory existence has
+older precedent than agriculture or commerce. Let us go backward like a
+crab, if you will, but let us be consistent.</p>
+
+<p>In another crypt we are shown two marble sarcophagi, well carved, in
+each of which lies a mouldering human figure once embalmed, and now
+black, without features, and with only a dim outline of form. Elsewhere
+we are shown a large marble slab handsomely engraved, with the record of
+a Christian martyr on one<a name="page_080" id="page_080"></a> side, and with an inscription concerning the
+Emperor Hadrian on the other, presenting the economic expedient of a
+second-hand tombstone. We passed also through various dark galleries,
+and down one staircase. Some chambers of the catacomb had a
+<i>luminarium</i>, or light from the top; many of them were entirely dark.
+Father &mdash;&mdash;'s style of explanation threatening to prolong itself till
+midnight, impatience became general, and one of our party ventured a
+remonstrance, which was made and met something after the following
+fashion:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p><i>Mr. F.</i> Hem&mdash;hem! Sir, I am old and infirm, and&mdash;</p>
+
+<p><i>Father &mdash;&mdash;.</i> O, sir, ask any questions you like. The more you ask, the
+better I can explain myself. (Repeated over some three times.)</p>
+
+<p><i>Mr. F.</i> But, sir, I do not wish to ask any questions. I only wish&mdash;</p>
+
+<p><i>Father &mdash;&mdash;.</i> Don't make any excuses, sir. I shall be very glad to have
+you ask any questions. I am very ready to answer and explain everything.
+(Several repetitions.)</p>
+
+<p>After a number of efforts, the senior member of the party at length
+obtained the floor, and succeeded in expressing himself to the effect
+that he feared to take death of cold in the catacomb, and would gladly
+be piloted out by the commonplace youth who followed Father &mdash;&mdash; as
+attendant, without views of any kind, except as to a possible <i>buona
+mano</i>. This suggestion of the elder met with so hearty a response from
+the remainder of the party as to bring the present exploration<a name="page_081" id="page_081"></a> to an
+end, and Father &mdash;&mdash; and his public simultaneously dispersed to carriages
+and horses. In view of the whole expedition, I would advise people in
+general to read up on the subject of the catacombs, but not to visit
+them in company with one intent on developing theories of any kind. The
+underground chill is unwholesome in warm weather, and a conversion made
+in these dark galleries and windings would be much akin to baptism at
+the sword's point. Meet, therefore, the theorist above ground, and on
+equal terms; and for the subterraneous proceeding, elect the society of
+swift and prosaic silence.</p>
+
+<h2>V<small>IA</small> A<small>PPIA AND THE</small> C<small>OLUMBARIA.</small></h2>
+
+<p>Since my last visit to Rome, more progress has been made under ground
+than above it. Rome is the true antipodes of America. Our business is to
+build&mdash;her business is to excavate. The tombs on Via Appia are among the
+interesting objects which the spade and mattock, during the last
+seventeen years, have brought to view. I remember well the beginning of
+this work, and the marble tombs and sarcophagi which it brought to
+light. I also remember, in those unconscientious days, a marble head, in
+exceedingly flat relief, which was desired by me, and stolen for me by
+the faithful servant of a friend. At the commencement of the diggings,
+we descended from our carriage, and easily walked to the end of the way
+then opened. Via Appia now affords a long drive, set with tombs on
+either side. Many of these are in brick, and of large dimensions.<a name="page_082" id="page_082"></a> Most
+of the marbles have, however, been removed to the Museum of the Vatican.</p>
+
+<p>On this road, if I mistake not, are the two <i>columbaria</i> discovered and
+excavated some seven years ago. They stand in a vineyard, which I saw in
+its spring bloom. The proprietor, a civil man, answers the little bell
+at the gate, and taking down a bunch of keys, unlocks for you the door
+of the small building erected over the vault. The original roof has
+fallen. All else looks as if it might have been used the day before for
+burial. The descent is by a steep, narrow stairway, of at least thirty
+steps, each of which is paved with a single lamina of coarse brick. The
+walls are honeycombed with small parallelogrammatic niches, in each of
+which was set a funeral vase or box. Over some of these places are such
+inscriptions as, "<i>Non tangite vestes mortales</i>," "<i>Vencrare deos
+manes</i>." There are many names, of which I have preserved but one,
+"<i>Castus Germanicus Cæsaris</i>." This <i>columbarium</i> belonged to the
+Flavian family. It has about it an indescribable gloom, like that of a
+family vault in our own time, but, it must be confessed, more æsthetic.
+One felt the bitter partings that death had made here, the tears, the
+unavailing desire to heap all the remaining goods of life upon the altar
+of departed friendship. Time healed these wounds then, no doubt, as he
+does to-day. The tears were dried, the goods enjoyed again; but, while
+Christianity has certainly lightened the dead weight of such sorrows,
+the anguish of the first blow remains what it was all those dim
+centuries ago. A glance into the <i>columbarium</i> makes you feel this.<a name="page_083" id="page_083"></a></p>
+
+<p>The second <i>columbarium</i> is much like the first, excepting that the
+stair is not so well preserved. On emerging, the proprietor invited us
+to visit an upper room in his own house, in which were a number of
+objects, taken, he averred, from the two <i>columbaria</i>. These were mostly
+vases, tear-bottles, and engraved gems. But I doubted their genuineness
+too much to make any purchases from among them. The trade in antiquities
+is too cheap and easy a thing in Italy to allow faith in unattested
+relics.</p>
+
+<p>Not very far beyond the <i>columbaria</i> stand the catacombs of the ancient
+Hebrews, much resembling in general arrangement those of the Christians.
+We found in several places the image of the seven-branched candlestick
+impressed upon the tufa. In one of the rooms were some remains of
+fresco. At each of its corners was painted a date-palm with its fruit.
+In two other rooms the frescos were in good preservation. Some of the
+graves were sunk in the earth, the head and feet at right angles with
+the others. We were shown the graves of two masters of synagogues. The
+frescos are not unlike those in the Christian and pagan tombs, though as
+I remember them, the Christian paintings are the rudest of all, as
+respects artistic merit.</p>
+
+<p>The subjects were usually genii, peacocks, the cock, fruits, garlands,
+the latter sometimes painted from end to end of the wall. Some of the
+small tombs were still sealed with a marble slab. An entire skeleton was
+here shown us, and a number of sarcophagi. Of these, one was sunk into
+the ground,<a name="page_084" id="page_084"></a> and several graves were grouped around it, much after the
+fashion of those in the Christian catacombs, from which Dr. Smith
+inferred so largely, both concerning the sanctity of the saint's body
+and the post-mortem power of the saint.</p>
+
+<p>We were taken also to see some interesting tombs in the Via Latina.
+These were recently brought to light from their long concealment in a
+tract of the Campagna, belonging to the Barberini family. Descending a
+flight of stone steps, the custode admitted us into two fine vaulted
+chambers, decorated each after its own manner. The ceiling of the first
+was adorned with miniature bas-reliefs in stucco. The small figures,
+beautifully modelled, were enclosed in alternate squares and octagons.
+The designs were exhibitions of genii, griffins, and of centaurs,
+bearing female figures on their backs. The sculptured sarcophagi found
+in this tomb were removed to the Lateran Museum.</p>
+
+<p>In the second tomb the walls and ceilings were adorned with miniature
+frescos, also enclosed in small compartments. Many of these represented
+landscapes, sometimes including a water view, with boats. These were
+rather faint in style, but very good. Peacocks, also, were frequent; and
+in one compartment was painted a glass dessert vase, with the fruit
+showing through its transparency. This design amazed us, both as to its
+subject and execution. Some panels in this tomb bore stucco reliefs on
+grounds of brilliant red and blue. In its centre was found hanging a
+fine bronze lamp, which is now at the Barberini Palace. A large
+sarcophagus<a name="page_085" id="page_085"></a> of stone still remains here, nearly entire, with a pointed
+lid. On looking through a small break in one side of it, we perceived
+two skeletons, lying side by side, supposed, the custode told us, to
+have been husband and wife. These tombs certainly belong to a period
+other than that of the <i>columbaria</i> before described. The presence of
+sarcophagi, and of these skeletons, attests the burial of the dead in
+accordance with the usage of modern society, while the great elegance
+and finish of the ornamentation point to a time of wealth and luxury. I
+have heard no conjecture as to the original proprietorship of these
+tombs. They contain no military or civil emblems, and probably belonged
+to wealthy contractors or merchants. That day, no doubt, had its shoddy,
+and of the tricks practised upon the government one may read some
+account in Titus Livy, who, to be sure, wrote of an earlier time, but
+not a more vicious one.</p>
+
+<p>Rome now boasts an archæological society, not indeed of Romans, but
+composed of foreign residents, mostly of British origin. The well-known
+artist Shakspear Wood is one of its most energetic members. At his
+invitation I attended a lecture given by Mr. Charles Hemans, on the
+subject of the ancient churches and mosaics of the city. Complementary
+to this lecture was an expedition of the society to several of these
+churches, which I very gladly joined. Our first and principal object of
+interest was the old Church of San Clementi, a building dating from the
+eleventh or twelfth century. Here Mr. Hemans first led us to observe an
+ancient fresco in the apsis, which represents the twelve apostles in the
+guise<a name="page_086" id="page_086"></a> of twelve lambs, a thirteenth lamb, in the middle of the row, and
+crowned with a nimbus, representing Christ. Here we saw also an ancient
+marble chair, a marble altar screen, and a pavement in the ribbon
+mosaic, of which archæologues have so much to say. This mosaic is so
+named from the strips of colored stones which form its various patterns
+on the white marble of the pavement.</p>
+
+<p>The church itself, however, occupied us but briefly. Beneath the church
+has recently been discovered and excavated a very extensive basilica, of
+a date far more ancient. This crypt was now lighted for us. Its original
+proportions are marred by walls of masonry built between its long rows
+of columns, and essential to the support of the church above. These
+walls are adorned by curious paintings of saints, popes, martyrs, and
+miracles. Among them is a very rude crucifixion; also a picture of
+Christ giving benediction after the fashion of the Greek church, and of
+a pontiff in the same act. Upon these things Mr. Hemans made many
+interesting comments. From the crypt we descended yet farther into a
+house supposed to date back at least to the empire, if not to the
+republic. It is a small but heavily-built enclosure, of two chambers,
+and contains a curious bas-relief in marble, representing a pagan
+sacrifice. In the narrow descent that led to it Mr. Wood showed me in
+three consecutive strata the tufa of the time of the kingdom, travertine
+of the republic, and brick of the empire.</p>
+
+<p>The presence of the ancient basilica below the ancient<a name="page_087" id="page_087"></a> church was
+suggested to one of the priests of the latter by the presence of a
+capital, rising just above the pavement of the church, and not accounted
+for by any circumstance in its architecture. This capital belonged to
+one of the columns of the basilica; but before so much could be
+ascertained, a long and laborious series of excavations had to be
+instituted. Father &mdash;&mdash;, the priest who first conjectured of the presence
+of this under building, has been indefatigable in following up the hint
+given by the capital, which he alone, in a succession of centuries, was
+clever enough to interpret. Most of the expense of this work has been
+borne by him.</p>
+
+<p>From San Clementi the worshipful society went to the church of Santi
+Quattro. The object of interest here was a small chapel filled with
+curious old frescos, one series of which represents the conversion of
+Constantine. We see first depicted a dream, in which Sts. Peter and Paul
+appear to Constantine, warning him to desist from the murder of innocent
+children, whose blood was supposed to be a cure for his leprosy. Not
+disobedient to the heavenly vision, Constantine relinquishes the
+blood-bath, and releases the children. He sends for St. Sylvester, the
+happy possessor of an authentic portrait of the two apostles. The fresco
+shows us Sylvester responding to this summons, and bringing in his hand
+the portrait, which the emperor immediately recognizes. Farther on we
+see Sylvester riding in papal triumph, the emperor leading his
+palfrey&mdash;a haughty device for those days. Another fresco records the
+finding of the true cross by St. Helena. Coming at one time upon the
+three crosses<a name="page_088" id="page_088"></a> she applied each of them in succession to the body of a
+dying person, who was healed at once by the contact of the true one.</p>
+
+<p>The archæological society also explores the interesting neighborhoods of
+Rome, the villas of emperors, statesmen, and poets. Thus life springs
+out from decay, and the crumbling relics of the past incite new
+activities in minds that cling, like the ivy, about relics and ruins.
+This society, ancient as are the facts about which it occupies itself,
+seemed to me one of the most modern features of Rome, especially as it
+travels by rail, and carries its luncheon with it. I was not fortunate
+enough to join its visits to the environs of the Eternal City, but I
+wish that on one of its excursions it would take with it the oldest
+nuisance of modern society, and forget to bring it back. There is room
+enough outside of Rome for that which, shut within its walls, crowds out
+every new impulse of life and progress. No harm to the old man; no
+violence to his representative immunity; only let him remember that the
+world has room for him, and that Rome has not.</p>
+
+<h2>N<small>APLES&mdash;THE</small> J<small>OURNEY</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>From these brief, sombre notes of Rome, we slide at once to Naples and
+her brilliant surroundings. Here, taking the seven colors as the
+equivalents of the seven notes, we are at the upper end of the octave of
+color. Rome is painted in purple, gold, olive, and bistre&mdash;its shadows
+all in the latter pigment. Naples is clear red, white, and yellow.
+Orange tawny is its deepest shade.<a name="page_089" id="page_089"></a> The sounds of Rome awaken memories
+of devotion. They call to prayer, although the forms now be empty, and
+the religious spirit resident elsewhere. The voice of Naples trills,
+shrieks, scolds, mingling laughter, wail, and entreaty, in a new and
+confused symphony. Little piano-fortes, played like a barrel organ, go
+about the streets, giving a pulse to the quick rhythm of life. The
+common people are pictures, the aristocracy caricatures. When you rise
+above low life, Italian taste is too splendid for good effects in
+costume. The most ill-married colors, the most ill-assorted ornaments,
+deform the pale olive faces, and contradict the dignity of the dark eyes
+and massive hair. This is somewhat the case in Rome, much more in
+Naples. The continual <i>crescendo</i> of glare, as you go southward, points
+to the African crisis of orange and crimson, after which the negro
+nakedness presents an enforced pause, saying, "I can no more."</p>
+
+<p>This land is the antipodes of the Puritan country. There all is
+concentration, inward energy, interior. Here all is external glow and
+glitter. If there be any interior, it can only belong to one of these
+three&mdash;passion, superstition, avarice. Every one who deals with you
+speculates upon your credulity. "Will you give four times the value of a
+thing, or five, or only twice?" is the question which the seller's eyes
+put to the buyer, however the tongue of the one may respond to that of
+the other. And here is a sad deforming of the Scripture parable; and he
+who has five in value gets ten in money for it, he who has three gets
+six, while the one talent, honesty,<a name="page_090" id="page_090"></a>&mdash;the fundamental gift of God to
+man,&mdash;is indeed ignominiously buried in a dirty napkin, and laid nobody
+knows where. And while New England energy is a hundred-armed giant that
+labors, Italian sloth is a hundred-handed lazzaro that begs. If this is
+the result of the loveliest climate, the most brilliant nature, give me
+our snow and ice, ay, the east wind and all.</p>
+
+<p>The journey from Rome to Naples at this season is hot, oppressive.
+Railway carriages, even as administered in Europe, make you acquainted
+with strange way-fellows. We chance upon a Neapolitan prince, with an
+English wife, returning to his own country and possessions after an
+absence of six years, the time elapsed since the inauguration of the new
+rule. He obviously regrets the changes over which the rest of the
+civilized world rejoices. In person, however, he and his partner are
+simple and courteous. Our car confines also a female nondescript
+carrying a dog, herself quite decently got up, but with an extraordinary
+smile, that is either lunatic or wicked, we cannot determine which. A
+certain steadiness and self-possession incline us to the latter theory,
+but we hold it subject to correction at a later day. She is obviously of
+Irish or low English extraction, and may be anything, from a discarded
+lady's maid to a reigning mistress. As we approach Naples, our princely
+friend begins to take notice. Here is Caserta, here its battle-field,
+where poor Francesco would certainly have had the victory, had not the
+French and Piedmontese interfered. "<i>Oh Richard, oh mon Roi!</i>" But we
+remember another saying: "And I tell you, if these had held their peace,
+the very<a name="page_091" id="page_091"></a> stones would have cried out." Ay, those very stones, volcanic
+lava and tufa, worn by the chariot wheels of the wicked, from Tiberius
+to Napoleon and after, would have sobbed, "Let the feet of the messenger
+of peace, the beautiful feet, at last pass this way!" Arrived at the
+station, no warning can have taught you what to expect. It costs you
+forty cents to have your moderate effects transported from the cars to
+the omnibus of the hotel,&mdash;this not through any system, but because
+various people meddle with them, and shriek after you for recompense. At
+the Hotel de Rome, you are shown up many stairs into a dingy little
+room, a sort of spider's web. This will not do. You try the Hotel de
+Russie, opposite. Here you are forced to take an apartment much too fine
+for your means and intentions. The choice being this or none, you shut
+your eyes upon consequences, and blindly issue orders for tea and meats.
+To-morrow you will surely get a cheaper apartment. But to-morrow you do
+not.</p>
+
+<p>The hotel book looks discouraging. Names of your countrymen are in it,
+not of your friends. Better remain apart than run the risk of ungenial
+society, and enforced fellowship. But the dull waters soon break into
+the sparkle of special providences. A bright little Briton, with a mild
+husband, hospitably makes your acquaintance. She is from Ireland, and
+has not the "thorough-bred British stare." All the more of a lady do we
+deem and find her. To her pleasant company is soon added that of an
+American of the sincere kind. He accepts us without fear or condition,
+and while we remain<a name="page_092" id="page_092"></a> under the same roof with him, we have no cause to
+complain for want of sympathy or of countenance.</p>
+
+<h2>T<small>HE</small> M<small>USEUM</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>In the Museum we spend two laborious days. The first we give to the
+world-renowned marbles, finding again with delight our favorites of
+twenty years' standing. Prominent among these are the Amore Delfino, and
+the Faun bearing the infant Bacchus.</p>
+
+<p>The Farnese Bull and the Farnese Hercules are admirable for their
+execution, but their subject has no special interest for us. We observe
+the Atlas, the Athletes, and the Venuses, one of whom is world-famous,
+but inexcusable. Here, too, is the quadriform relic of the Psyche, well
+known by copies, and the whole Balbo family on horseback. These marble
+knights once guarded the Forum of Pompeii. There is a certain melancholy
+in their present aspect, whether of fact or imagination we will not
+determine. One of the most interesting objects, from the vicissitudes
+through which it has passed, is the statue of Caligula, destroyed by the
+people with all other mementos of him after his death, the head having
+served, even in modern times, to steady the wheels of carriages in a
+ferry boat. The Naples Museum does not rival the Vatican in the merit of
+its nude marbles; but in draped statues it is far richer, as well as in
+statues of personal historical interest. The belief of the past has the
+most stately illustration in Rome, its life the most vivid record in
+Naples.</p>
+
+<p>Many new treasures have been added to the collection<a name="page_093" id="page_093"></a> during these years
+of our absence. Among them are some exquisite small bronzes, and three
+statuettes in marble, of which the eyes are colored blue, and the hair
+of a reddish tint. One of them is very pretty. It represents the seated
+figure of a little boy, and almost reconciles us to the strictly
+inadmissible invasion of color into the abstract domain of sculpture.
+Each art has, indeed, its abstraction. Sculpture dispenses with color,
+painting with the materiality of form. The one is to the other as
+philosophy to poetry.</p>
+
+<p>From the marbles we flit to the Pompeian bronzes and mosaics, rich in
+number and in interest. Two tablets in mosaic especially detain us, from
+their representation of theatrical subjects. One of these shows the
+manager surrounded by several of his actors, to whom he dispenses the
+various implements of their art. At his feet, in a basket, lie the comic
+and tragic masks. Of the personages around him, one is pulling on his
+garment, another is trying the double tubes of a wind instrument. The
+second mosaic presents a group of three closely-draped figures. Actor is
+written on their faces, though we know not the scene they enact. The
+bronzes are numerous and admirable. Miniature art seems to have been
+held in great esteem among the Pompeians. Most of these figures are of
+small size, and suggest a florid and detailed style of adornment. Among
+other objects, we are shown the semicircular model of a Pompeian bath,
+on which are arranged the ornaments and water-fixtures just as they were
+found. One of these imitates a rampant lion standing on his hind legs,<a name="page_094" id="page_094"></a>
+and delivering water from his mouth; another a serpent nearly upright.
+In the upper story of the Museum we see whole rooms floored with mosaic
+pavements removed entire from houses in Pompeii. The patterns are mostly
+in black and white, but of an endless variety. The contents of these
+rooms match well in interest with their pavements. Here, in glass cases,
+are carefully ranged and presented the tools and implements of Pompeian
+life; the loaves that never left the baker's shop, still fresh and puffy
+in outline, although calcined in substance; the jewels and silver
+vessels of the wealthy, the painter's colors, the workman's needles and
+thread: baths and braziers, armor in bronze and in iron, scarcely more
+barbaric than that of the middle ages; helmets, with clumsy metal
+network guarding the spaces for the eyes; spades, cooking utensils in
+great variety, fruits and provisions as various. Among the bronze
+utensils is a pretty and economical arrangement which furnishes at once
+hot water, a fire of coals to heat the room, with the convenience of
+performing at the same time the solemn rites of cookery. Hot water, both
+for bathing and drinking, seems to have been a great desideratum with
+the Pompeians. The stone cameos and engraved gems are shown in rows
+under glass cases. This Museum contains a well-known tazza, or flat cup,
+of onyx entire, elaborately carved in cameo on either side. It also
+possesses a vase of double glass, of which the outer or white layer has
+been cut, like a cameo, into the most delicate and elaborate designs.
+The latter is an object of unique interest and value, as is shown by<a name="page_095" id="page_095"></a>
+the magnificence with which it has been mounted on a base of solid
+silver, the whole being placed under glass.</p>
+
+<p>The Cumæan collection is less rich in objects of interest than the
+Pompeian. Its treasures are mostly Etruscan. It possesses many vases,
+Etruscan and Greek, many rude Etruscan sculptures, with household
+articles of various descriptions. It occupies a separate set of rooms,
+and is the gift of the Prince of Carignano.</p>
+
+<p>Among the Pompeian remains we forgot to mention a mosaic tablet
+representing a cock-fight. One cock already bleeds and droops; above him
+the figure of his genius turns desponding away. The genius of the
+victorious cock, on the contrary, bears a crown and palm. The design is
+worthy of the Island of Cuba at the present day.</p>
+
+<p>The frescos brought and transferred from Pompeii are beautiful and
+interesting. One of them shows thirteen dancing figures, all of which
+are frequently copied. Many inscriptions in marble are also preserved,
+but to decipher them would ask much time. We were interested in a small
+painted model of a Pompeian dwelling, called the House of the Poet. It
+shows the quadriform arrangement of the dark chambers around the open
+courts, of which one is the <i>atrium</i>, one the <i>peristylium</i>. The
+window-panes of the house of Diomed are shown,&mdash;not of glass, but talc,
+and only translucent. Windows, however, were rare in Pompeii. Perhaps
+the most pathetic relic that we observe is the skull of the sentinel in
+his helmet, as it was found.<a name="page_096" id="page_096"></a></p>
+
+<p>We have here given only the most hurried and imperfect indication of the
+mines of wealth which this institution offers to the student of art and
+of history. A detailed account of its contents will be found in the
+valuable but prosaic Murray, and would here be superfluous. Its
+guardians, the custodi, are civil, and are not allowed to ask or receive
+any compensation from visitors. Several of them, nevertheless, manage to
+suggest that they would be glad to wait on you at your hotel, with
+books, objects of antiquity, and other small merchandise, which you
+hurriedly decline. You will be fortunate to get out of Naples in any
+state short of utter bankruptcy. How you are ever to get home to
+America, with temptations and expenses multiplying so frightfully upon
+you, sometimes threatens to become a serious question.</p>
+
+<h2>N<small>APLES</small>&mdash;E<small>XCURSIONS.</small></h2>
+
+<p>You have been two days in Naples, the hotel expenses and temptations of
+the street eating into your little capital. For value received your
+intellects have nothing to show. Your eyes and ears have been full, your
+brain passive and empty. You rouse yourself, and determine upon an
+investment. To learn something, you must spend something. These
+cherished napoleons must decrease, and you must, if possible, increase.</p>
+
+<p>The first attempt is scarcely a success. Having heard marvels of the
+conventual church of San Martino, formerly belonging to the Cistercian
+brotherhood, you consult the porter of the hotel, and engage, for seven<a name="page_097" id="page_097"></a>
+francs, a carriage to transport you thither. The drive is one immense
+climb under the heat of the afternoon sun. When you have gained the
+difficult ascent, your driver coolly informs you that the church is
+always closed at four P. M., the present time being 5.30. "Why did you
+not tell me so?" is the natural but useless question. "Because I could
+not in that case have got seven francs from you," would be the real
+answer. The driver shrugs his shoulders, and expects a scolding, which
+you are too indignant to give.</p>
+
+<p>But you are not to be defeated in this way. A second expedition is
+planned and executed. To the gates of Pompeii you fly, partly by steam,
+and partly by horse-aid. You alight from your cloud of dust, demand a
+guide. "Yes; you can have the guide by paying also for the litter. This
+being Sunday, the entrance is free, and the government supplies no
+guide. You must have the <i>portantina</i>, or blunder about alone." The
+litter, with its pink gingham frill and cushion, looks hateful to you.
+You remember it twenty-three years ago with dislike. The sun of noon is
+hot upon you. The men are unpersuadable. Red and fierce as lava, you
+storm through the deserted streets of the ancient capital of seaside
+luxury. Like the lava, you soon cool, as to your temper&mdash;the rest of you
+continuing at 120 Fahrenheit. There are two of your party: one finds the
+litter convenient; the other also gives way, and you ride and tie, as
+the saying is, in very amicable style, and encourage the guide to tell
+you all he knows; but he, alas! has cropped but the very top of the
+clover. The fragments<a name="page_098" id="page_098"></a> of history which he is able to give you, measure
+only his own ignorance and yours.</p>
+
+<p>"Here is the Forum in which the Balbo statues were found. At the upper
+end were the court and seat of justice,&mdash;for a figure was found there
+bearing a balance; underneath were the prisons." Ah, the broken columns!
+Stately did they stand around the mounted statues, that expected to ride
+into perpetual fame on their marble horses&mdash;now most famous because so
+long forgotten. "Wherever four streets met, madam, stood a fountain. The
+Exchange stood also in the Forum. Here is the street of abundance, in
+which was found a marble bust bearing a horn of plenty. Here is the
+Temple of Isis. By this secret staircase the priest ascended and stood
+unseen behind the goddess, making the sounds which she was supposed to
+utter. Here was the bakery; behold the ovens. This was found filled with
+newly baked loaves. [Yes; for I myself beheld them in the Museum at
+Naples.] Ah, madam! the baths, with hot water and cold, and vapor. In
+those niches running around the wall were placed the vases with
+unguents. Here is the House of the Poet; here that of the Faun. See the
+frescos. What forms! what colors! Here is a newly excavated house, large
+and richly appointed. Each of these marble columns surrounding the inner
+court contains a leaden water-pipe with a faucet, so that from all at
+once water might flow to cool the extreme heats of summer. Here still
+stand two fine dragons carved in white marble, which must formerly have
+supported a marble slab. See what a garden this house had!<a name="page_099" id="page_099"></a> What a
+fish-pond! Climb this stair, madam, if you would see the theatre. This
+larger one was for day performances. Yonder was the stage. There are
+still the grooves for the scenes to slide in. There was the orchestra
+[mostly flutes and fiddles]. Here sat the nobles, here the citizens,
+here the plebeians. From this eminence you can look over into the
+smaller theatre close at hand, in which night performances were given."
+And the stately dames, with those jewels which you saw stored at the
+Museo, and dressed and undressed like the frescos we have seen to-day,
+sat on their cushioned benches, and wafted their perfumes far and wide.</p>
+
+<p>Here was the house of Diomed, rich and very extensive. The skeleton of
+Diomed (as is supposed) was found at the garden gate, with the key of
+the house and a purse of money. In one of the subterranean rooms is
+shown the impression of his wife's figure, merely a darker mark on a
+dark wall. Seventeen similar impressions were found. I think it is in
+this house that the walls of one of the rooms have an under-coating of
+lead to keep the moisture from the frescos, which are still brilliant.
+The <i>luxe</i> of fountains was, as is known, great and universal in
+Pompeii, and the arrangement of its leaden conduits is ample and
+skilful. Besides the well-known frescos, with their airy figures and
+brilliant coloring, we are shown a bath, whose vaulted roof is adorned
+with stucco reliefs, arranged in small medallions, octagons alternating
+with squares.</p>
+
+<p>Presently we come to the street of tombs. Among these I best remember
+that which bears the inscription,<a name="page_100" id="page_100"></a> "<i>Diomede, sibi suis</i>." At the upper
+end of this street we find a semicircular seat of stone, for the
+accommodation of the guard. Close by this was found the skeleton of the
+sentinel in armor which we saw in the Museum at Naples. In the prison
+were found the iron stocks, with at least one skeleton in them; others
+chained in divers ways. A feature new to me is that of various
+diminutive temples, with roofs roundly or sharply arched, devoted to the
+household gods. These usually stand upon an elevated projection, and
+might measure three feet in height and four in depth. The guide pointed
+out to us some small, square windows, which are simply open squares in
+the masonry, defended by iron gratings, deeply rusted. They are not
+numerous. Our guide suggests that there may have been a tax upon
+windows, accounting for their rare occurrence. One he shows us still
+nearly entire, a narrow slit, measuring, perhaps, eight inches by three,
+with a slab of talc in place of glass.</p>
+
+<p>And presently we come to a small museum, whose contents are much the
+same in kind with the household remains seen by us in the Museum at
+Naples. And farther on is a room in which we are shown the <i>quattro
+morti</i>&mdash;the four dead bodies whose impress on the hardened cinders which
+surrounded them has been so ingeniously utilized. It is known that the
+masses of cinder within which these bodies had slowly mouldered were
+filled with liquid plaster, and the forms of the bodies themselves,
+writhing in their last agonies, were thus obtained. One of these
+figures&mdash;that of a young<a name="page_101" id="page_101"></a> woman&mdash;is full of pathetic expression. She
+lies nearly on her face, her hand near her eyes, as if weeping. Her
+back, entirely exposed, has the fresh and smooth outline of youth. The
+forms of two elder women and one man complete the sad gallery. Of these
+women one wears upon her finger a silver ring, the plaster having just
+fitted within it. This figure and that of the man are both swollen,
+probably from the decomposition that took place before the crust of
+ashes hardened around them into the rigid mould which to-day gives us
+their outlines.</p>
+
+<p>These four plaster ghosts were the last sights seen by us in Pompeii.
+For by this time we had walked and ridden three hours, and those three
+the most fervent of the day, beginning soon after noon. The heat was
+cruel and intense, but we had not given ourselves time to think of it.
+The umbrella and <i>portantina</i> helped us as they could, but the feeling
+that the work had to be done now or never helped us most of all. Our
+vexation against our guides had long ago cooled into a quiet good will.
+Relinquishing the fiery journey, which might have been prolonged some
+hours further, we paid the rather heavy fee. The second carrier of the
+litter demanded a few extra pence, reminding us that at our first
+arrival he had brushed the dust from our dresses with a zeal which then
+appeared mysterious, but whose object was now clear. Parting from these,
+we passed into the little inn, quite bare and dirty, whose coolness
+seemed delicious. We here ordered an afternoon <i>déjeûner</i>, and ate,
+drank, and rested.<a name="page_102" id="page_102"></a></p>
+
+<h2>T<small>HE</small> C<small>APUCHIN</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>While we waited for our dinner, a Capuchin at another table enjoyed a
+moderate repast. Bologna sausage, cheese, fruit, and wine of two sorts
+contented him. His robust countenance beamed with health, his eyes were
+intelligent. This was one of the personalities of which the little shown
+makes one desirous to know more. His refreshment consumed and paid for,
+he began a rambling conversation with the <i>garçon</i> who attended us, as
+well as with the proprietor of the <i>locanda</i> in which we were. Capuchin
+and Garçon mutually deplored the poverty of the poor in Naples. Capuchin
+showed two blue silk handkerchiefs which he had been forced to purchase,
+for compassion, of a poor woman. Both obviously considered the new state
+of things as partly accountable for this poverty, which is, on the
+contrary, as old as the monastic orders. The Capuchin had been preaching
+Lenten sermons in Greece, and had been well received. Garçon rejoined
+that there were good Catholics in Greece, agreeing harmoniously with the
+man in brown. But at this juncture another face looks in at the door.
+"That is the man who plagues me to give him lucky numbers for play,"
+says the <i>frate</i>. Here I can keep out of the company no longer. "What
+does he play at&mdash;cards or dice?" I ask. "Neither, madam; that man ruins
+himself with playing at the lottery." Capuchin continues: "If I had the
+gift of fortunate numbers, I would not withhold them. I should wish to
+benefit my fellow-creatures in this way,<a name="page_103" id="page_103"></a> if I were able to do so. But I
+have it not, this gift of prophecy." And if you had it, thought I, I am
+not so sure of the ultimate benefit of gambling to your
+fellow-creatures, even were they to win, instead of losing.</p>
+
+<p>The Capuchin and I, however, talk of other things&mdash;of monasteries, and
+rich libraries, closed to women. "So, father, you consider us the allies
+of the devil." "No, signora; the inhibition is mutual: we may not enter
+any nunnery." The <i>padrone</i> of the inn here breaks in with the robust
+suggestion that these restrictions ought to be removed, and that monks
+and nuns should have liberty to visit each the establishments of the
+other. While this talk proceeds, I occasionally glance into the smoky
+depths of the kitchen opposite, where a mysterious figure, in whose
+cleanliness I desire to believe, wafts a frying-pan across a dull fire,
+which he stimulates by fanning with a turkey's wing. After each of his
+gymnastics, a dish is brought out, and set upon our table&mdash;first fish,
+then omelet, then cutlet; and we discover that the Capuchin and
+ourselves have a mutual friend at Fuligno, the good, intelligent,
+accomplished Count &mdash;&mdash;, in whose praises each of us is eloquent. We
+part, exchanging names and addresses. Our Pompeian guide urges us to
+return and make the ascent of Vesuvius under his care. But we depart
+untrammelled. Every one was satisfied with us except the cripple who
+rolled himself in the dust, and the weird, white-haired women with
+spindles, who followed us shrieking for a largess. We gave nothing, and
+they commented upon us with a gravity of moral reprobation<a name="page_104" id="page_104"></a> quite fit to
+make one's hair stand on end, even with New England versus beggar behind
+one. But the train came, and mercifully took us away; and whether in not
+giving we did well or ill, is a point upon which theorists will not
+agree; so we may be pardoned for giving ourselves the benefit of a
+doubt.</p>
+
+<p>After Pompeii a little good fortune awaited us. As before said, we had
+encountered an American of the right sort,&mdash;kindly, sincere, and of
+adequate education. Joining forces with him, we no longer shivered
+before the hackman, nor shrank from the <i>valet de place</i>. We at once
+engaged the latter functionary, ordered the <i>remise</i> of the hotel to
+wait for us, and started upon two days of eager but weary sight-seeing.
+Our first joint act was to scale again the height of San Martino, this
+time to enter the church and convent, and view their boasted riches. A
+pleasant court, with a well in the centre of it; a church whose chapels
+and altars were gorgeous with lapis lazuli, jasper, agate, and all
+precious marbles; a row of seats in wooden mosaic, executed by a monk of
+the Cistercian order, vowed to silence; cloisters as spacious and
+luxurious as can well be imagined; a great array of relics in golden
+boxes, shielded from dust and common sight by rich curtains of heavy
+silk and gold&mdash;this is all of the establishment that remains in our
+recollection. The present government has dismissed the saintly idlers of
+the monasteries, saying, perhaps, in the style of Henry VIII., "Go
+plough, you drones, go plough." But in what field and for what wages
+they henceforth labor is not known to me.<a name="page_105" id="page_105"></a></p>
+
+<p>Hence to the Grotto of Siana, half a mile long, and some eight feet
+wide. The chill of this long, damp passage, in contrast with the high
+temperature from which we entered it, so alarmed us that we turned back
+at half the distance, and gave up seeing the den or cave that lay
+beyond. At Pozzuoli we view Caligula's Bridge, of which but a few large
+stones remain: the guide points out the place at which Paul and Peter
+landed. Here are the ruins of a fine amphitheatre. The underground
+arrangements still show us the pits in which the wild beasts and the
+gladiators were kept. Square openings at the top ventilated each of
+these, and a long, open space in the middle separated the cells of the
+beasts from those of the gladiators. On public occasions all of these
+openings were closed by heavy plates of metal, so as to present the
+solid surface desired for the combats.</p>
+
+<p class="c">"Arise, ye Goths, and glut your ire!"</p>
+
+<p>In this neighborhood we visited what is left of the temple of Jupiter
+Serapis. The salt water formerly covered its columns to such a height as
+to corrode them badly. The smell caused by the evaporation of the
+sea-water in the hot sun was so offensive that the government found it
+necessary to apply a thorough drain. These time and tide worn marbles
+were of the choicest kinds&mdash;African marble, <i>rosso antico</i>, and so on.
+Their former beauty little avails them now. We drive further to the
+cavern with the stratum of carbonic acid gas, and see the dog
+victimized, which cruel folly costs us two<a name="page_106" id="page_106"></a> francs. And then we visit
+the sulphur vapor baths, whose fiery, volcanic breath frightens us.
+These are near the Lake of Agnano, an ancient volcanic crater. In its
+neighborhood are the royal game preserves, in which fratricidal V. E.
+hunts and slays the wild boar. Returning, we climb to Virgil's tomb, a
+small, empty enclosure, with a stone and inscription dating from 1840.</p>
+
+<p class="c">"Cecini pascua, rura, duces,"</p>
+
+<p class="nind">says the poet, through his commemorator. Item, this steep journey under
+a scorching sun did not pay very well. Yet, having ascended the fiery
+stair, and stood in the small, dark enclosure, and read the tolerable
+inscription, I felt that I had done what I could to honor the great
+Mantuan: so, with a good conscience, I returned through cool,
+ill-smelling Posilippo, to the hotel, dinner, and the afternoon
+meditation.</p>
+
+<h2>B<small>AJA</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>The excursion to Baja called us up early in the morning. With a tender
+hush, a mysterious remembrance of our weaker and still sleeping
+brethren, we stole through the hotel, swallowed coffee, and issued forth
+with carriage and <i>valet de place</i> for a day's campaigning. As the
+functionary just mentioned had invented a hitherto unpatented language,
+supposed by him to present some points of advantage over the Queen's
+English, I will here, <i>en passant</i>, serve up a brief sample, for the
+study of those inclined to the practical pursuit of linguistics.<a name="page_107" id="page_107"></a></p>
+
+<p>"Zat is ze leg Agnano [lake of.] In vinter he is full of vile dog [wild
+duck]." Of Lake Avernus: "Zis was de helty [hell]." Of the ruins of the
+amphitheatre at Pozzuoli: "Ruin by de barbions [barbarians]. Zey brok
+him in piece and pushed him down. Zar is Caligole's [Caligula's] Bridge.
+Tis de Sibyl's Cave, where she gib de ragle [oracle]. Temple Diana,
+temple Neptune, ze god of ze sea and ze god of ze land." Here was a
+mythological <i>aperçu</i> thrown in. This individual rarely condescended to
+speak his native language&mdash;Italian. In ours, it required no little
+adjustment of the perceptive faculties to meet his views.</p>
+
+<p>Passing through Posilippo, we come first to a piece of ground which
+bears the form of an amphitheatre, although the whole structure, if it
+exist at all, is thickly overgrown with trees and shrubs. A rustic
+proprietor cultivates the vine here, but cannot pass the nights during
+July, August, and September, on account of the bad air. The wines, white
+and red, are nevertheless excellent. The right of excavation here vests
+in a Frenchman, who has purchased the same.</p>
+
+<p>Our next point of exploration is the Temple of Mercury, at Baja&mdash;a
+circular building, with fine columns partly overthrown. Here exists a
+perfect whispering gallery, for at a certain spot in the wall the
+slightest utterance is instantly heard at the point directly opposite.
+Here two forlorn women, with a tambourine and without costume, dance a
+joyless <i>tarantella</i>, which costs us a franc. They urge us, also, to buy
+sea-shells, and small fragments of mosaic, together with skeletons<a name="page_108" id="page_108"></a> of
+the sea-horse, a queer little fish, some two inches long. After this, we
+are shown some <i>columbaria</i>, and a bath with stucco reliefs. Adjacent is
+the well preserved ruin of a large bathing establishment. Besides the
+baths, we here find places for reclining, where vapor baths were
+probably enjoyed.</p>
+
+<p>Now come Nero's prisons, gloomy, under-ground galleries, in which he
+kept his slaves. Torches here became necessary. These galleries,
+destitute of daylight, were quite extensive, frequently crossing each
+other at right angles. And then we visited the Piscina Mirabilis, an
+immense reservoir which formerly supplied the Roman fleet at Marina with
+fresh water. Its tall columns, still entire, are deeply corroded by
+water. This was a work of surprising extent and finish. Thereafter,
+mindful of Murder considered as a Fine Art, we gave some heed to the
+whereabouts of Agrippina's villa, and inquired concerning those
+matricidal attempts of her son, which were finally crowned with so
+entire a success. The villa of Hortensius, in this neighborhood, lies
+chiefly under water, the level of the ground having changed. Perhaps
+this villa was anciently built on ground reclaimed from the sea, as
+Horace says,&mdash;</p>
+
+<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="poetry">
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 0em;">"Marisque Baiis obstrepentis urges</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 0.25em;">Summovere litora. Parum locuples continente ripa."</span></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>We next visited the Lake of Avernus, and Lake Fusano, the River Styx of
+Virgil and the Romans. Bordering upon this we found a whole hill-side
+honeycombed with<a name="page_109" id="page_109"></a> <i>columbaria</i>. Then came the long sulphurous gallery
+leading to the hot spring in which eggs are boiled for your instruction.
+Each of these visitations has its fee, so that the pilgrimage, even if
+made on foot, would be a costly one. Cuma next claimed us. A long, dark
+gallery leads to the cave of the Cumæan Sibyl, described by Virgil. But
+the presence of water here makes it necessary for visitors to sit upon
+the shoulders of two or three shaggy and uncleanly-looking sprites. We
+stoutly decline this adventure, and are afterwards sorry. From this
+neighborhood was taken the Cumæan collection, which figures at the
+<i>Museo Nazionale</i>, presented by the Prince of Carignano. Somewhere in
+the course of this crowded and heated day, a dinner was slidden in,
+which gave our labor a brief interval of rest and refreshment. It
+consisted mostly of dirt, in various forms, flavored with cheese,
+garlic, and a variety of savors equally choice. To facilitate its
+consumption, we drank a sour-sweet fluid, called white Capri. I found
+none of the Italian wines joyous. Despite their want of body, they give
+one's nerves a decided shake.</p>
+
+<p>Well, I have narrated all that took place on the day set apart for Baja.
+Its results may be prosaically summed up as heat, haste, and headache,
+with a confused vision of the past and a most fragmentary sense of the
+present.<a name="page_110" id="page_110"></a></p>
+
+<h2>C<small>APRI</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>I have a fresh chapter of torment for a new Dante, if such an one could
+be induced to apply to me. I will not expatiate, nor exhale any
+Francesca episodes, any "<i>Lasciate ogni spiranza!</i>" I will be succinct
+and business-like, furnishing the outlines from which some more
+leisurely artist, better paid and employed, shall do his hell-painting.</p>
+
+<p>We leave enchanting Naples,&mdash;tear ourselves from our hotel, whose very
+impositions grow dear to us; the precious window, too, which shows the
+bay and Capri, and close at hand the boats, the fish-market, and the
+chairs on which the populace sit at eventide to eat oysters and drink
+mineral water. A small boat takes us to a very small steamer, on whose
+deck we pay ten francs each to a stout young man, in appearance much
+like a southern poor Buckra, who departs in another small boat as soon
+as he has plundered us. The voyage to Capri is cool and reasonably
+smooth. A pleasant chance companion, bound to the same port, beguiles
+the time for us. We exchange our intellectual small wares with a certain
+good will, which remains the best part of the bargain. When quite near
+the island, the small steamer pauses, and lowers a boat in which we
+descend to view the famous Blue Grotto. At the entrance, we are warned
+to stoop as low as possible. We do so, and still the entrance seems
+dangerous. With some scratching and pushing, however, the boat goes
+through, and the lovers of blue feast their eyes<a name="page_111" id="page_111"></a> with the tender color.
+The water is ultramarine, and the roof sapphire. The place seems a toy
+of nature&mdash;a forced detention of a single ray of the spectrum. Dyes
+change with the fashion; the blue of our youth does not color our
+daughter's silks and ribbons. The purples of ten years ago cannot be met
+with to-day. But this blue is constant, and therefore perfect.</p>
+
+<p>Our enjoyment of it, however, is marred by an old beast in human form
+who rushes at us, and insists upon being paid two francs for diving. He
+promises us that he will show us wondrous things&mdash;that he will fill the
+azure cave with silver sparkles. Wearied with his screeching, and a
+little deluded by his promises, we weakly offer him a franc and a half;
+whereupon he throws off some superfluous clothing, and softly glides
+into the deep, without so much as a single sparkle. He certainly
+presents an odd appearance; his weird legs look as if twisted out of
+silver; his back is dark upon the water. But the refreshing bath he
+takes is so little worth thirty sous to us that we feel tempted to
+harpoon him as he dodges about, sure that, if pierced, he can shed
+nothing more solid than humbug. On our return to the steamer we pay two
+francs each for this melancholy expedition, and presently make the
+little harbor of Capri.</p>
+
+<p>And here the promised Hell begins. The way to it, remember, is always
+pleasant. No sooner does our boat touch the land than a nest of human
+rattlesnakes begins to coil and hiss about us, each trying to carry us
+off, each pouring into our ears discordant, rapid jargon.<a name="page_112" id="page_112"></a> "My donkey,
+siora." "And mine." "And mine." "How much will you give?" "Will you go
+up to Tiberio?" But all this with more repetition and less music than a
+chorus of Handel's or an aria of Sebastian Bach. "My donkey," flourish;
+"My do-n-onkey," high soprano variation; "My donkey," good grumbling
+contralto. "How much?" "How much?" "How much?" "How much?" shriek all in
+chorus. And you, the unhappy star in this hell opera, begin with
+uncertain utterance&mdash;"Let me see, good people. One at a time. What is
+just I will pay"&mdash;the <i>motivo</i> also repeated; chorus renewed&mdash;"Money;"
+"Three francs;" "Four francs;" "Five francs;" "A <i>bottiglia</i>;" "A <i>buona
+mano</i>." A <i>buona mano</i>? Good hand&mdash;would one could administer it in the
+right way, in the right place! By this time each of you occupies the
+warm saddle of a donkey, and at one P. M., less twenty, the thermometer
+at 90 Fahrenheit or more, and being warned to reach the steamer by three
+P. M., at latest, the punishment of all your past, and most of your
+future sins begins.</p>
+
+<p><i>Facile descensus Averni.</i> Yes; but the <i>ascensus</i>? To climb so high
+after Tiberio, who went so low! For this is the ruined palace of
+Tiberius Cæsar himself, which you go to seek and see, if possible. He
+still plagues the world, as he would have wished to do. Your expedition
+in search of his stony vestiges is a long network of torment, spun by
+you, the donkey, and the donkey-driver, undisguised Apollo standing by
+to weld the golden chains by which you suffer. As often as you seem to
+approach the object, a new<a name="page_113" id="page_113"></a> <i>détour</i> leads you at a zigzag from the
+straight direction. But this is little. At every turn in the road a
+beggar, in some variety, addresses you. Now a deformed wretch shows you
+his twisted limbs, and shrieks, "<i>co cosa, siora</i>." Now, a
+wholesome-looking mother, with a small child, asks a contribution to the
+wants of "<i>questa creatura</i>" Now, a grandam, with blackened face and
+bleached hair, hobbles after you. Children oppress you with flowers,
+women with oranges,&mdash;all in view of the largest <i>quid</i> for the smallest
+<i>quo</i>. You grow afraid to look in a pretty face or return a civil nod,
+lest the eternal signal of beggary should make itself manifest. And such
+women and children!&mdash;every one a picture. Such intense eyes, such
+sun-ripened complexions! I take note of them, handsome devils that they
+are, all foreordained as a part of my fiery probation. For all this time
+I am making a steep ascent. Sometimes the donkey takes me up a flight of
+stone steps, clutching at each with an uncertain quiver, but stimulated
+by the nasal "n&mdash;a&mdash;a&mdash;a," which follows him from the woman who by turns
+coaxes and threatens him. Now we clamber along a narrow ledge, whose
+height causes my dizzy head to swim; there is nothing but special
+providence between me and perdition. A little girl, six years of age,
+pulls my donkey by the head; a dignified matron behind me holds the
+whip. The little girl leads carelessly, and I quake and grow hot and
+cold with terror; but it is of no use. The matron will not take the
+rein; her office is to flog, and she will do<a name="page_114" id="page_114"></a> nought else. And the
+sun?&mdash;the sun works his miracles upon us until we wish ourselves as well
+off as the Niobides, who, at least, look cool. Finally, after an hour of
+jolting, roasting, quivering, and general exasperation, we reach the
+top. Here we are passively lifted from our donkeys; we mechanically
+follow our guide through a white-washed wine-shop into a small outer
+space, with a low wall around it, over which we are invited to look down
+some hundreds of feet into the sea. This is called the Leap of Tiberio:
+from this height, says the barefooted old vagabond who guides us, he
+pitched his victims into the deep. The descent here is as straight as
+the wall of a house. Farther on, we find some very fragmentary ruins, in
+the usual Roman style. Among them is a good mosaic pavement, with some
+vaults and broken columns. A sloping way is shown us, carefully paved,
+and with a groove on either side. Into this, say they, fitted the wheels
+of a certain chariot, in which guests were invited to seat themselves.
+The chariot, guided by two cords, then started to go down to the sea.
+But at a certain moment the vehicle was arrested by a sudden shock.
+Those within it were precipitated into the water, after which the cords
+comfortably drew the chariot back.</p>
+
+<p>I have never heard any of the evidence upon which is based the modern
+rehabilitation of Tiberius and Nero. I have, however, found in the
+stately Tacitus, and even in gossipy Suetonius, a shudder of horror
+accompanying the narration of their deeds. The world has seen cruelty in
+all ages, and sees it still; but I cannot believe<a name="page_115" id="page_115"></a> that the average
+standard of humanity can justly be lowered so far as to make the acts of
+Tiberius simply rigorous, those of Nero a little arbitrary. Mr. Carlyle,
+in dealing with the French revolution, reprobates the hysterical style
+of reviewing painful events; but in the history of Rome under the Cæsars
+we hear too plainly the sobs and shrieks of the victims to be satisfied
+with the modern philosophizing which would deprive them of our
+compassion. Man is naturally cruel; superstition makes him more so. A
+genuine religion alone softens his ferocious instincts, and places the
+centre of action and obligation elsewhere than in his own pleasure or
+personal advantage. Man is also compassionate; but without the
+systematic formation of morals, his weak compassion will not compensate
+the ardor of his self-assertion, which may involve all crimes. Luxury
+exaggerates cruelty, because it intensifies the action of the selfish
+interests, and loosens the rein of restraint&mdash;its objects and the
+objects of morals being incompatible. The most cruel characters have
+been those presenting this admixture of luxury and ferocity. The silken
+noose gives finer and more atrocious death than the iron sword.</p>
+
+<p>I think that the (unless vilified) wretch Tiberius built this palace in
+fear, and dwelt in it in torment. In its fastnesses he felt himself safe
+from the knife of the assassin. In the leisure of its isolation he could
+meditate murders with æsthetic deliberation, and hurl his bolts of death
+upon the world below, remorseless and unattainable as Jove himself.<a name="page_116" id="page_116"></a></p>
+
+<p>Here is an episode of philosophizing in the hell I promised you. But
+hell itself would not be complete without the button-bore&mdash;the man or
+woman who holds you by a theory, and detains you amid life's intensity
+to attend the slow circlings of an elaborative brain.</p>
+
+<p>I have now finished Tiberio. The donkeys brought us down with more
+danger, more heat, more fear and clatter. Only beggary diminishes, a
+little discouraged, in our rear. It seems to have been given out that we
+have no small change, as is indeed the fact; so the young and old only
+grumble after us enough to keep their hand in. In compensation for this,
+however, a new trouble is added, viz., the danger of losing the small
+steamboat, which threatens to leave at three P. M., a period by this
+time scarce half an hour distant. Yet a bit of bread we must have at the
+hotel. It is the former palace of Queen Joanna; but we do not know it at
+the moment, and nothing leads us to suspect it. Here two good-natured
+English faces make us for the moment at home. A cup of tea,&mdash;the English
+and American restorative for all fatigues,&mdash;a wholesome slice of bread
+and butter, a moderate charge, and ten minutes of cool seclusion, make
+the Hotel di Tiberio pleasant in our recollection. And then we remount,
+and, the little steamer beginning to man&oelig;uvre, our haste and anxiety
+become extreme; so we take no more heed of steep or narrow, but the
+donkeys and we make one headlong business of it down to the beach, where
+we have still to make a secondary embarkation before reaching the
+steamer. Here, as we had foreseen,<a name="page_117" id="page_117"></a> the final crush attends us. The
+guide and each of the donkey girls and women insist upon separate
+payment. With grim satisfaction I fling a five-franc note for the whole.
+It is too much, but the whole island cannot or will not give change for
+it. And then ensues much shrieking, expostulation, and gesticulation, in
+the midst of which I plunge into the boat, make my bargain with Charon,
+and am for the time out of hell. As I looked back, methought I saw
+Stefano the guide and the women having it out pretty well with reference
+to the undivided fee. Stefano leaped wildly into the sea after me, and
+extorted five more <i>soldi</i> from my confusion. Finally, I exhort all good
+Christians to beware of Capri, and on no account to throw away a trip
+thither, but to undertake the same as a penance, for the mortification
+of the flesh and the good of the immortal soul. The island is to-day in
+as heathen a condition as Tiberius himself could wish; only from a
+golden, it has descended to the perpetual invoking of a copper rain.
+That the Beggar's Opera should have been written out of the kingdom of
+Naples is a matter of reasonable astonishment to the logically inferring
+mind. I could improvise it myself on the spur of the moment, making a
+heroine out of the black-eyed woman who drove my animal&mdash;black-haired
+also, and with a scarlet cotton handkerchief bound around her head in
+careless picturesqueness. Gold ear-rings and necklace had she who
+screamed and begged so for a penny more than her due. And when I cried
+aloud in fear, she replied, "<i>Non abbia timor&mdash;donkey molt' avezzo</i>;"
+which diverted my mind,<a name="page_118" id="page_118"></a> and caused me to laugh. As we went up and as we
+went down, she encountered all her friends and gossips in holiday
+attire; for yesterday was <i>Festa</i>, and to-day, consequently, is <i>festa</i>
+also&mdash;a saint's day leaving many small arrearages to settle, in the
+shape of headache, fight, and so on, so that one does not comfortably
+get to work again until the third day. This fact of the antecedent
+<i>festa</i> accounted for the unusual amount of good clothes displayed
+throughout the island. Our eyes certainly profited by it, and possibly
+our purses; for we just remember that one or two groups in velvet
+jackets and gold necklaces did not beg.</p>
+
+<p>But all of this is a superfluous after-digression, as I am really, in my
+narrative, already on board of the little steamer, with the charitable
+waves between me and the brigand Caprians. A pleasant sail&mdash;not so
+smooth but that it made the Italian passengers ill&mdash;brought us to
+Sorrento. Here our trunk was hoisted on the head of a stout fellow, all
+the small fry of the harbor squabbling for our minor luggage. We climbed
+a long, steep flight of stone steps, walked through a shady orange
+garden, and came out upon a cool terrace fronting the sea, with the
+Rispoli Hotel behind it. Here we were to stay; our bargain was soon
+made, with the divine prospect thrown in. Our room was on the ground
+floor, behind a shallow arcade paved with majolica. Shaking off the dust
+of travel, and ranging our few effects in the rather narrow quarters, we
+at once took possession of the prospect, and regulated ourselves
+accordingly.<a name="page_119" id="page_119"></a></p>
+
+<h2>S<small>ORRENTO</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>Ugh! after the roasting, hurried day at Capri, how delicious was the
+first morning's rest at Sorrento! The coral merchant came and went. We
+did not allow him to trouble us. They offered us the hotel asses; we did
+not engage them. The blue sea, the purple mountains, the green, rustling
+orange groves,&mdash;these were enough for us, pieced with the writing of
+these ragged notes, and a little dipping into our Horace, who, it must
+be confessed, goes lamely without a dictionary. A day of lights and
+shadows, of sunshine and silence, of pains caressed, and fatigues whose
+healing was sweeter than fresh repose. And we dreamed of novels that we
+could write beneath this romance-forging sun, and how the commonplace
+men and women about us should take grandiose shapes of good and ill, and
+figure as ideals, no longer as atoms. We would forsake our scholastic
+anatomy, and make studies of real life, with color and action. For this,
+as we know, we should need at least six months of freedom, which perhaps
+the remnant of our mortal lives does not offer. Meantime we sit and
+dream. Each sees the content of the landscape reflected in the other's
+eyes. We sit just within our room, the little writing-table half within,
+half without the window, that reaches to the ground. The soft breeze
+flutters our pages to and fro. We scold it caressingly, as one reproves
+the overplay of a gracious child. With the exception of an occasional
+straggling visitor, the whole terrace is ours. Now and then we forsake
+the<a name="page_120" id="page_120"></a> writing-table, rush to the railing that borders the terrace, and
+take a good look up and down, to assure ourselves that what we see is
+real, and founded on terra firma. Here our wearied nerves shall bathe in
+seas of heavenly rest. As to our suffering finances, too,&mdash;if one word
+is not too often profaned for us to profane it, we will quote Horace's</p>
+
+<p class="c">"mox reficit rates quassas,"</p>
+
+<p class="nind">not</p>
+
+<p class="c">"indociles pauperiem pati"</p>
+
+<p>Here our rapture will cost nothing. We will feed our eyes. The sea and
+sky shall wear sapphires and diamonds for us. Our shabbiness will be the
+æsthetic complement to their splendors. Do you not remember the figures
+in brown or olive green that always lurk in the corners of pictures in
+whose centre the Madonna, or some saint, is glorified? They also serve,
+who only stand and wait in the shadow. So will we do now. We will lie
+forgotten in the corner of this splendid picture, while our time and our
+remaining credit equalize themselves a little. The days in Naples
+considerably outran our estimate; the days here must make up for it. And
+we want nothing; and all is delightful.</p>
+
+<p>It is true, we do not carry out those good intentions quite literally.
+Who ever does? But we adhere to our proposed outline of rigid economy
+with only an occasional break. We soon begin to take note of small
+temptations that lie about the streets. Here we see the little
+neck-ribbons that are so cheap and pretty. A<a name="page_121" id="page_121"></a> handful of them twisted
+around the neck of Economy give her something of a choke. Further on in
+our days and walks, a sound of saws in motion arrests our attention;
+while a sign and tempting show-case urge us at least to <i>look</i> at the
+far-famed Sorrento woodwork. We enter; we set the tenth clause of the
+Decalogue at nought, coveting wildly. Brackets, tea, glove, and cash
+boxes are displayed there for our overthrow; watch-cases, on a new
+principle, all either brave with mosaic, or smooth and shining in the
+simple beauty of the olive wood. Something of all this we snatched and
+fled. We took far too little for our wishes, rather too much for our
+means. Silk stockings we did resist by that simplest and best of
+measures&mdash;not entering the shops in which they were pressingly
+advertised. The very passing of those shops gave us, however, vague
+dreams of swimming about in silken movements; how grateful in a world of
+heat! But the line has to be drawn somewhere, and we draw it here.</p>
+
+<p>A donkey excursion pleasantly varies our experience in Sorrento. Do you
+know how much a donkey ride means in Sorrento? It does not mean a
+perpetual jolt, and horrible inter-asinicidal contest between the ass
+who carries the stick and the ass who carries you. The donkeys of
+Sorrento are fat and well-liking: smooth and gray are the pair that come
+for us, comfortable as to the saddle and the bridle. And our
+donkey-driver is a handsome youth, with a bold, frank countenance, and
+the ripest olive and vermilion complexion. His walk is graceful and
+robust; he knows every one he meets, and has his<a name="page_122" id="page_122"></a> bit of fun with sundry
+of the groups who pass us. These consist of men and women bearing on
+their heads large flat baskets filled with cocoons, or in their hands
+bundles of the same; girls leading mules, or carrying household burdens;
+soldiers, beggars, Neapolitan princes, the syndic of Sorrento, and other
+varieties of the species vaguely called human. He takes us up a steep
+and rough ascent to the telegraph station. There are many bad bits in
+the road; he is but one, and the donkeys are two; but he has such a
+clever way, at critical moments, of holding on to the head of the second
+donkey in conjunction with the tail of the first, that he gets the two
+cowardly riders through many difficulties and more fears. Once on level
+ground, the donkeys amble along delightfully. So pleasant is the whole
+in remembrance, that, sitting here, at an interval of many miles in
+distance, and ten days in time, we feel a sincere twinge in remembering
+that we gave him only a franc for himself, paying by agreement two
+francs for either donkey. Forgive us, beauteous and generous Gaetano,
+and do not curse us in <i>aggio</i> and <i>saggio</i>, the open-mouthed <i>patois</i>
+of your country.</p>
+
+<h2>F<small>LORENCE</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>A week is little for the grandeurs of Florence, much for the discomforts
+of its summer weather. The last week of May, which we passed there,
+mistook itself for June, and governed itself accordingly. We went out as
+early as human weakness, unsubdued by special discipline, permitted. We
+struggled with church, gallery,<a name="page_123" id="page_123"></a> painting, sculpture, and antiquities.
+We breathlessly read sensible books, guides, and catalogues, in the
+little intervals of our sight-seeing. We dropped at night, worn and
+greedy for slumber; and the day died, and made no sign.</p>
+
+<p>A hot week, but a happy one. To be overcome in a good cause is glorious,
+and our failure, we trust, was quantitative, not qualitative. Good
+friends helped us, took away all little troubles and responsibilities;
+took us about in carriages of dignity and ease, and landed us before
+royal, imperial works of art. With all their aid and cherishing,
+Florence was too many for us. So, of her garment of splendors, we were
+able only to catch at and hold fast a shred here and there, and whether
+these fragments are worth weaving into a chapter at all, will better
+appear when we shall have made the experiment of so combining them.</p>
+
+<p>Our first view of her was by night; when, wearied with a day's shaking,
+a hot and a long one, we tumbled out of railroad car into arms of
+philanthropic friend, who received us and our bundles, selected our
+luggage, conquered our porter and hackman, pointed to various
+interesting quadrangles of lamps, and said, "This is Florence." But we
+had seen such things before, and gave little heed&mdash;our thought machinery
+being quite run down for lack of fuel. The aspect which we first truly
+perceived, and still remember, was that of a clean and friendly
+interior, a tea-table set, a good lamp bright with American <i>petrolio</i>
+(O shade of Downer!), and, behind an alcove, the dim, inviting
+perspective of a comfortable bed,<a name="page_124" id="page_124"></a> which seemed to say, "Come hither,
+weary ones. I have waited long enough, and so have you."</p>
+
+<p>PALAZZO PITTI.</p>
+
+<p>The second aspect of Florence was the Pitti Palace, brown and massive;
+and the bridges numerously spanning the bright river; and the gay, busy
+streets, shady in lengths and sunny only in patches; the picturesque
+<i>mélange</i> of business and of leisure, artisans, country people, English
+travellers and dressed-up Americans; the jeweller's bridge, displaying
+ropes of pearls and flashes of diamonds, with endless knottings and
+perplexities of gold and mosaic; alabaster shops, reading-rooms,
+book-stores, fashions, cabinets of antiquities&mdash;all leading to a welcome
+retirement within the walls of the Palazzo Pitti.</p>
+
+<p>Well content was the Medici to live in it, ill content to exchange it,
+even for the promised threshold of Paradise. A good little sermon here
+suggests itself, of which the text was preached long ago, "For where
+your treasure is, there will your heart be also." And Medici's
+investments had been large in Pitti, and trifling in Paradise; hence the
+difficulty of realizing in the latter. Within the Pitti Palace are
+things that astonish the world, and have a right to do so, as have all
+the original results of art. The paintings are all&mdash;so to speak&mdash;set on
+doors that open into new avenues of thought and speculation for mankind.
+The ideal world, of which the real is but a poor assertion, has, in
+these glimpses, its truest portraiture. Their use and dignity have also
+limits which the luxury and enthusiasm of<a name="page_125" id="page_125"></a> mankind transgress. But
+indispensable were they in the world's humanization and civilization:
+that is enough to say of them.</p>
+
+<p>O, unseen in twenty-three years, and never to be seen again with the
+keen relish of youth. What have I kept of you? What good seed from your
+abundant harvest has ripened in my stony corner of New England? Your
+forms have filled and beautified the blank pages of life, for every life
+has its actual blanks, which the ideal must fill up, or which else
+remain bare and profitless forever. And you are here, my Seggiola, and
+you, my Andreas and Peruginos and Raphael; and Guercino's woman in red
+still tenderly clasps the knees of the dead Savior. But O! they have
+restored this picture, and daubed the faded red with savage vermilion.</p>
+
+<p>Scarcely less ungrateful than the restoration of a beautiful picture is
+the attempt to restore, after the busy intervals of travelling, the
+precious impressions made by works and wonders of art. The incessant
+labor of sight-seeing in Florence left little time for writing up on the
+spot, and that little was necessarily given to recording the then recent
+recollections of Naples and Rome. It was in Venice that I first tried to
+overtake the subject of Florence. It is in Trieste that I sit down and
+despair of doing the poorest justice to either. My meagre notes must
+help me out; but, in setting them down, I forgot how rapidly and
+entirely the material, of which they gave the outline, would disappear.
+I thought that I held it, so far as mind possession goes, forever. At
+the feast of the gods we think our joys eternal.<a name="page_126" id="page_126"></a></p>
+
+<p>On reference to the notes, then, I find that the best Andreas and Fra
+Bartolomeos are to be found here, and quite a number of them in the
+Pitti. Some of the first Raphaels also are here, and some Titians. The
+Seggiola looked to me a little dim under her glass. The Fates of Michael
+Angelo were strong and sincere. Two of the Andreas are the largest I
+remember, and very finely composed. Each represents some modification of
+the Madonna and Saints, subjects of which we grow very weary. Yet one
+perceives the necessity of these pictures at the time in which they were
+painted. The æsthetic platform of the time would have them, and accepted
+little else. A much smaller picture shows us the heads of Andrea and his
+beautiful wife, the <i>Lucia</i>, made famous by Browning. The two heads look
+a little dim now, both with age, and one with sorrow. Raphael's
+pictures, seen here in copious connection with those of his
+predecessors, appear as the undoubted culmination of the Florentine
+school, grandly drawn, and conceived with the subtlest grace and spirit.
+The Florentine school, as compared with others, has a great weight of
+æsthetic reason behind it. It reminds me of some rare writing in which
+what is given you represents much besides itself. The best Peruginos
+share this merit, so do, in a different manner, the works of Beato
+Angelico, whose wonderful faces deserve their gold background. How to
+overtake these supreme merits in the regions of prose and of verse, one
+scarcely knows. By combining bold and immediate conception with untiring
+energy, unflinching criticism, and a nicety that stops before no<a name="page_127" id="page_127"></a>
+painfulness, one might do it. Life runs like a centiped; one dreams of
+being an artist, and dies.</p>
+
+<p>Here it may not be amiss for me to recur to the form of my diary, whose
+inartistic jottings will best give the order of my days and movements.</p>
+
+<p>Wednesday, May 29.&mdash;Walked to Santa Croce, hearing that a mass was to be
+celebrated there for the Florentine victims of '48. When I arrived, the
+mass was nearly over; the attendance had been very numerous, and we
+found many people still there. Near the high altar were wreaths and
+floral trophies. I should be glad to know whether the priests who
+celebrated this mass did so with a good will. The ideas of '48 are the
+deadly enemies of the absolute and unbounded assumptions of the Roman
+papacy and priesthood. I hear that many of the priests desire a more
+liberal construction of their office. Would to God it might be so. It is
+most mournful that those who stand, in the public eye, for the religion
+of the country, should be pledged to a course utterly out of equilibrium
+with the religious ideas of the age. Thus religious forms contradict the
+spirit and essence of religion, and the established fountain-heads of
+improvement shut the door against social and moral amelioration.</p>
+
+<p>In Santa Croce we hastily visited the monument erected to Alfieri by the
+Countess of Albany, and the tombs of Machiavelli, Galileo, and Raphael
+Morghen. The last has a mural background of florid marble, of a light
+red color, with a recumbent figure in white marble, and an elaborate
+medallion of the same material, representing<a name="page_128" id="page_128"></a> the Madonna, infant and
+saints. I fully hoped and intended to revisit this venerable and
+interesting church, but was never able to do so. It has lately received,
+as all the world knows, a fine front in pure white marble, adorned by
+bas-reliefs executed by the popular sculptor Fedi. In the square before
+the church stands the new statue of Dante, which I found graceful, but
+not grandiose, nor indeed characteristic. The face bears no trace of the
+great poem; the awe and dignity of super-human visions do not appear in
+its lines. He, making hell and heaven present to our thoughts, did a far
+deeper and more difficult work than those accomplished who made their
+material semblance present to our eyes.</p>
+
+<p>The remainder of this morning we devoted to the gallery of the Uffizi,
+the artistic <i>pendant</i> of the Pitti. We hastily make its circuit with a
+friend who points out to us the portraits of Alfieri and the Countess of
+Albany, his lady and companion. The head of Alfieri is bold and
+striking, the hair red, the temperament showing more of the northern
+energy than of the southern passion. The sobriety of his works and
+laborious character of his composition also evince this. The countess,
+painted from mature life, shows no very marked characteristic. Hers is
+the face of an intelligent woman, but her especial charm does not appear
+in this portrait.</p>
+
+<p>The Uffizi collection appears to have been at once increased and
+rearranged during the three and twenty years of our absence. We find the
+Niobides grouped in an order different from that in which we remember
+them. The portrait gallery of modern artists is for us a new<a name="page_129" id="page_129"></a> feature,
+and one which, alas! we have not time to study, seeing that the great
+<i>chefs-d'&oelig;uvres</i> imperiously challenge our attention, and that our
+time is very short for them. We spend a dreamy hour in the Tribune,
+whose very circumscription is a relief. Here we are not afraid of
+missing anything. This <i>étui</i> of gems is so perfectly arranged and
+inventoried that the absence of any one of them would at once be
+perceived. Here stands the Venus, in incomparable nudity. Here the Slave
+still sharpens his instrument&mdash;the classic Boxers hold each other in
+close struggle. Raphael, Correggio, Michael Angelo, Carlo Dolce, are all
+here in concentration. You can look from one to the other, and read the
+pictorial language of their dissents and arguments. A splendid Paul
+Veronese, in half figures, merits well its place here. It represents a
+Madonna and attendant female saint: the hair and costumes are of the
+richest Venetian type; and though the crinkles of the one and the
+stripes of the other scarcely suggest the fashions of Palestine, they
+make in themselves a very gorgeous presentment. In the other rooms we
+remember some of the finest Raphaels, a magnificent Perugino, Sodoma's
+beautiful St. Sebastian, a famous Salutation of Mary and Elizabeth, by
+Albertinelli, a very tipsy and impudent Silenus by Rubens, with other
+pictures of his which I cannot characterize. The Vandykes were all hung
+too high to be well seen. They did not seem nearly so fine as the
+Vandykes in the Brignoli Palace in Genoa. Here are some of Beato
+Angelico's finest works, among others his famous triptych, from whose
+bordering of miniature<a name="page_130" id="page_130"></a> angels so many copies are constantly made. Here
+is also a well-known Leonardo da Vinci, as well as Raphael's portraits
+of Leo Tenth, attended by a cardinal and another dignitary. A narrow
+gallery is occupied by numerous marble alto relievos by Luca della
+Robbia and Donatello; here is also a marble bas-relief of the Madonna
+and Child, the work of the great Michael.</p>
+
+<p>By knocking at a side door you gain admittance into a small chamber,
+whose glass cases contain works of art in gold, crystal, and precious
+stones. Here is a famous cup, upon whose cover a golden Hercules
+encounters the many heads of the Hydra, brilliant with varied enamels,
+the work of Benvenuto Cellini. Miniature busts in agate and jasper,
+small columns of the same materials,&mdash;these are some of the features
+which my treacherous memory records. It has, however, let slip most of
+what is precious and characteristic in this collection. The Uffizi
+demands at least a week's study for even the slightest sketch of its
+contents. We had but a week for all Florence, and tasted of the great
+treasure only on this day, and a subsequent one still more hurried. In
+remembrance, therefore, we can only salute it with a free confession of
+our insufficiency.</p>
+
+<p>Thursday.&mdash;A <i>dies non</i> for the galleries. It was a Festa, and they were
+all closed. So was the Bargello. The Boboli gardens were not open till
+noon, at which time the heat made them scarcely occupable. We visited
+the Church of San Michele, which was formerly a Loggia, or building with
+open sides and arches, like others still existing in various parts of
+the<a name="page_131" id="page_131"></a> city. The filling up of these open arches changed it into a church.
+They tell us that it is to be reconverted into a Loggia, to answer the
+present necessities of the over-crowded city. Here we found a curious
+tabernacle, carved in marble&mdash;a square enclosure, with much detail of
+execution, and, on the whole, a Gothic effect. Tombs, monuments, and old
+mosaic pavement this temple also contains; but I cannot recall its
+details.</p>
+
+<p>The afternoon of this day we employed partly in a visit to the two tombs
+beside which American feet will be sure to pause. Here, in this
+sculptured sarcophagus, sleeps the dust of E. B. B. Here, beneath this
+granite cross, lie the remains of Theodore Parker. At the first, I
+seemed to hear the stifled sobs that mourned a private sorrow too great
+to take account of the public loss. For what she gave the world, rich
+and precious as it was, was less than that inner, unalienable jewel
+which she could not give but in giving herself. And he who had both, the
+singer and her song, now goes through the world interrogating the ranks
+of womanhood for her peer. Seek it not! She was unique. She died and
+left no fellow.</p>
+
+<p>A soberer <i>cortege</i>, probably, followed Theodore to his final
+resting-place. The grief of poets is ecstatic, and cannot be thought of
+without dramatic light and shade, imagined, if not known of. A
+sorrowing, patient woman, faithful through all reverses, stood beside
+the grave of the great preacher, the mighty disputant. She remembered
+that it had always been peace between her and this church militant. From
+every raid, every foray, into the disputed grounds of theory and<a name="page_132" id="page_132"></a>
+opinion, she kept open for him a return to the orthodoxy of domestic
+life. The basis of his days was a calm, well-ordered household, whose
+doors were opened or shut in accordance with his desire of the moment.
+Would he receive his whole congregation, or a meeting of the clergy, or
+a company more mixed and fashionable? The simple, well-appointed rooms
+were always in order; the lights were always clear; the carpets swept;
+the books and engravings in nice order. The staid New England
+women-servants brought in the refreshments, excellent of their kind, and
+carefully selected for their suitableness to the occasion. The wife sat
+or moved unobtrusively among her guests; but she loved Theodore's
+friends, and made his visitors welcome. If Theodore had war without, and
+it became his business to have it, he had ever peace within. And this it
+was pleasant and exemplary to remember, standing beside his grave.</p>
+
+<p>How often have I, in thought, linked these two graves together, striving
+to find a middle term or point of meeting for them both! The distant
+image of the spot was sacred and dear to me. The person of the one, the
+character of the other, were fixed among my affections. For let me say
+here that though I have criticised Parker's theology, adopting neither
+his methods nor his conclusions, of Parker himself I have never ceased
+to think as of a person with a grand and earnest scope, of large powers
+and generous nature. He was tender in large and in little, a sympathist
+in practice as well as a philanthropist in theory. My heart still<a name="page_133" id="page_133"></a> warms
+and expands at the remembrance of what he was in the pulpit and at the
+fireside. Nor was he the less a stern moralist because he considered the
+ordinary theories of sin as unjust and insufficient. No one would better
+console you for a sin deplored, no one could more forcibly deprecate a
+sin contemplated. He painted his time more wicked than it was, and saw
+it so. A modern Dante, all in the force of prose, E. B. B. lies here
+like the sweet Beatrice, who was at hand when the cruel task of
+criticism was over, to build before the corrected vision of the great
+pilgrim the silvery shrines and turrets of the New Jerusalem. So will we
+leave them&mdash;a lesser Dante, a greater Beatrice, and one who has borne
+record of herself.</p>
+
+<h2>V<small>ENICE</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>Venice, which I seek to hold fast, is already a thing of yesterday.
+"Haste is of the devil," truly says the Koran, whose prophet yet knew
+its value. But the strokes of the pen need deliberation as much as those
+of the sword need swiftness. Strength goes with Time, and skill against
+him.</p>
+
+<p>Little of either had I after a night in the cars between Florence and
+Venice,&mdash;hot, dusty Florence, and cool, glassy Venice,&mdash;a night of
+starts and stops, morsels of sleep set in large frames of uneasy waking.
+The steep ascent of the Apennines is only partially descried through the
+darkness. It begins at Pistoia, and when it ends, Pistoia lies
+vertically under you, at the bottom of what seems in the darkness an
+abyss, in which its<a name="page_134" id="page_134"></a> lights shine brightly. Tunnels there are in plenty
+on this road, and one of these threatens us with suffocation. For the
+engine was unduly replenished with coal at Pistoia in view of the hard
+task before it, and the undigested food vented itself in unwholesome
+gases, which the constraints of the tunnel drove in upon us, filling the
+lungs with mephitic stuff which caused them to ache for more than an
+hour afterwards. This part of the journey was made pleasant to us by the
+presence of a Venetian lady, handsome, intelligent, and cordial. At
+Bologna we lost her, making also a long stop. The hour was three in the
+morning; the place, a bare railroad depot. The hour passed there would
+not have been patiently endured by an American public. But Italians
+endure every possible inconvenience from the railway management, which
+is clearly conducted on <i>pessimistic</i> principles. On reaching the cars
+again, another pleasant companion shortened the time with easy
+conversation. Not but that we dozed a little after the weary night; and
+the priest in the opposite compartment fell asleep over his morning
+prayers. But my new companion and I made our way through a shoal of
+general remarks to the <i>terra firma</i> of a mutual acquaintance, in whose
+praises both of us grew warm. And at length we began to see marshes, and
+waters, and a fortress. "That is Venice," said the captain; and I
+replied with sincere surprise, "Is it possible?" For Venice, as
+approached by the railroad, makes no impression, presents no <i>coup
+d'&oelig;il</i>. And this marks a precaution for which the devisers of
+railroads in this<a name="page_135" id="page_135"></a> country may deserve praise. Being pure men of
+business, and not sentimentalists, they do not wish to find themselves
+mixed up with any emotions consequent upon the encounter of the sublime
+and beautiful. They cannot become responsible for any enthusiasm. And
+so, in their entrances and exits, they sedulously avoid the picturesque,
+and lead the traveller into no temptation towards stopping and lingering
+by the way. Of two possible routes, they, on principle, choose the more
+prosaic; so that the railroad traveller nowhere gets less beauty for his
+money than in this same Italy, the flower-garden of the world.</p>
+
+<p>The arrival even in Venice becomes, therefore, vulgar and commonplace in
+their management. And soon one gets one's luggage out of the clutches of
+guardians and porters, and cheaply, in an omnibus gondola, one swashes
+through a great deal of middling water, landing finally at Hotel
+Barbesi, where breakfast and the appliances of repose are obtained.</p>
+
+<p>We did not prudently devote this first day to sleep, as we ought to have
+done. The energy of travel was still in us, and we aroused ourselves,
+and went forth. The <i>valet de place</i>, with high cheek-bones, a fresh
+color, and vivacious eyes, led us on foot to the Place and Cathedral of
+St. Mark, the Ducal Palace, the Bridge of Sighs, and prisons of the
+condemned. We visited the great council-halls, superb with fretted
+gilding, and endless paintings by Tintoretto and Bellini. We saw the
+Lion's Mouth, into which anonymous accusations were dropped; the room of
+the Ten; the staircase all in<a name="page_136" id="page_136"></a> white and gold, sacred to the feet of
+Doge and Dogaressa alone. As magnificent as is the palace, so miserable
+are the prisons, destitute of light, and almost of air&mdash;a series of
+small, close parallelograms, with a small hole for a window, opening
+only into a dark corridor, containing each a stony elevation, on which,
+perhaps, a pallet of straw was placed. Heaven forbid that the blackest
+criminal of our day should confront the justice of God with so poor a
+report to make of the mercy of man! In the dreaminess of our fatigue, we
+next visited a bead factory, and inspected some of its delicate
+operations. And then came the <i>table d'hôte</i>, and with it a little whiff
+of toilet and hotel breeding, sufficiently irksome and distasteful. In
+the evening there was to be a Fresco, or procession of gondolas on the
+great canal, with lanterns and music, in honor of Prince Plomplon, who
+was at Danieli's hotel. Uncertain whether to engage a gondola or not, I
+sat in the garden balcony of Barbesi's, immediately over the canal. I
+saw the gondolas of high society flit by, gay with flags and colored
+lanterns, the gondoliers in full livery. Their attitude in rowing is
+singular. They stand slanting forward, so that one almost expects to see
+them fall on their faces. In the gondola, however, one becomes aware of
+the skill and nicety with which they impel and guide their weird-looking
+vehicles.</p>
+
+<p>The Fresco was to be at nine o'clock; but by an hour earlier the
+gondolas were frequent. And soon a bark, with lanterns and a placard
+announcing an association of artists, stopped beneath our balcony, while
+its<a name="page_137" id="page_137"></a> occupants, with vigorous lungs, shouted a chorus or two in the
+Venetian dialect. The effect was good; but when one of the singers asked
+for a "<i>piccola bottiglia</i>" and proceeded, hat in hand, to collect from
+each of us a small contribution, we felt that such an act was rather
+compromising for the artists. In truth, these men were artisans, not
+artists; but the Italian language has but one word for the two meanings,
+contriving to distinguish them in other ways.</p>
+
+<p>The stream of gondolas continued to thicken on the canal, and at nine
+o'clock, or thereabouts, a floating theatre made its appearance&mdash;a large
+platform, brilliantly lighted, and bearing upon it a numerous orchestra
+and chorus. The <i>chef d'orchestre</i> was clearly visible as he passed,
+energetically dividing the melody and uniting the performers. This
+lovely music floated up and down the quiet waters, many lesser lights
+clustering around the greater ones. Comparison seems to be the great
+trick of descriptive writing; but I, for my part, cannot tell what the
+Fresco was like. It was like nothing that I have ever seen.</p>
+
+<p>And I saw it in the intervals of a leaden stupor; for, after the
+sleepless night and active day, the quiet of Barbesi's balcony was too
+much for me. Fain would I have hired a gondola, have gone forth to
+follow the musical crusade, albeit that to homage a Napoleon be small
+business for an American. But by a new sort of centaurship, my chair and
+I were that evening one, and the idea of dividing the two presented
+itself only in the light of an impossibility. Roused by the
+exclamations<a name="page_138" id="page_138"></a> of those about me, I awoke from time to time, and
+mechanically took note of what I have here described, returning to sleep
+again, until a final wrench, like the partition of soul and body, sent
+me with its impetus to the end of all days&mdash;bed.</p>
+
+<p>The fatigue of this day made itself severely felt in the waking of the
+next morning. Shaking off a deadly stupor and dizziness, I arose and
+armed for the day's warfare. My first victim was the American consul,
+who, at the sight of a formidable letter of introduction, surrendered at
+discretion. Annexing the consul, I bore him in triumph to my gondola,
+but not until I had induced him to find me a lodging, which he did
+speedily; for of Barbesi and many francs <i>per diem</i> I had already
+enough, and preferred charities nearer home to that of enriching him. I
+do, moreover, detest hotel life, and the black-coated varlets that
+settle, like so many flies, upon your smallest movement. I have more
+than once intrenched myself in my room, determining to starve there
+rather than summon in the imps of the bell. With the consul's aid, which
+was, I must say, freely given, I secured to myself the disposal of a
+snug bedroom and parlor, with a balcony leading into a music-haunted
+garden, full of shiny foliage, mostly lemon and myrtle trees, having
+also a convenient access to the grand canal. After this, we proceeded to
+the Church of the Frari, rich with the two monuments of Titian and
+Canova. Both are architectural as well as sculptural. That of Canova is
+a repetition of his own model, executed in the well-known Vienna
+monument, with the addition, I thought,<a name="page_139" id="page_139"></a> of a winged lion and one or two
+figures not included in the other. The monument of Titian stands
+opposite to that already described. The upper portion of it presents a
+handsome façade enclosed in three arches, each of which contains a
+bas-relief of one of his great pictures. The middle one presents the
+Assumption, in sculpture; that on the right the Entombment of Christ;
+that on the left the St. Peter Martyr&mdash;the picture itself being in the
+sacristy of the Church of Santi Giovanni e Paolo. The Frari also
+contains a curious and elaborate monument to a doge whose name I forget.
+Above sits the doge in his ducal chair; below, four black slaves clad in
+white marble, their black knees showing through their white trousers,
+support the upper part of the monument upon their heads. Two bronze
+Deaths, between the doge and the slaves, bear each a scroll in white
+marble, with long inscriptions, which we did not read. The choir was
+adorned with the usual row of seats, richly carved in black walnut. From
+this rich and interesting temple we passed to the Academia delle belle
+Arti.</p>
+
+<p>This institution contains many precious and beautiful works of art. The
+Venetian school is, however, to the Florentine much as Rossini's
+Barbière to Dante's Divina Commedia. Here all is color, vitality,
+energy. The superabundance of life and of temperament does not allow the
+severer deliberations of thoughtful art. The finest picture of this
+school, the Assumption of Titian, is the intense embodiment of the
+present, an ideal moment that presupposes no antecedent and no
+successor.<a name="page_140" id="page_140"></a> It is as startling as a sudden vision. But it is a vision of
+life, not of paradise. The Madonna is a grand, simple, human woman,
+whose attitude is more rapt than her expression. She stands in the
+middle of the picture, upon a mass of clouds, which two pendent cherubs
+deliciously loop up. Above, the Eternal Father, wonderfully
+foreshortened, looks down upon her. Beneath, the apostles are gazing at
+the astonishing revelation. All is in the strongest drawing, the most
+vigorous coloring. Yet the pale-eyed Raphaels have more of the inward
+heaven in them. For this is a dream of sunset, not of transfiguration.
+So great a work of art is, however, a boon beyond absolute criticism.
+Like a precious personality, its value settles the account of its being,
+however widely it may depart from the standard recognized in other
+things.</p>
+
+<p>In the same hall is the last work of Titian, a Pieta, or figure of the
+dead Christ upon his mother's knees. This picture is so badly placed
+that its effects can only be inferred, absolute glare and darkness
+putting out its light and shade. Far from the joyous allegro of Titian's
+characteristic style, the coloring presents a greenish pallor, rather
+negative and monotonous. The composition of the picture is artistic,
+tonic, and harmonious; its expression high and pathetic. The ebbing tide
+of the great master's vitality left this pearl on the shore of time.</p>
+
+<p>The Presentation of the Virgin in the Temple, by Titian, is another of
+the famous pictures in this collection. The Virgin is represented as a
+maiden of ten<a name="page_141" id="page_141"></a> years, ascending the steps of the temple at Jerusalem.
+The figure and the steps are both of them seen in profile. Her pale-blue
+dress is relieved by an oblong glory which surrounds her from head to
+foot. More famous is a large Paul Veronese, representing Christ at
+supper in the house of the Pharisee. The richness of the Venetian
+costumes, the vigor and vitality of the figures, give this picture its
+great charm. It is no nearer to Christ and Jerusalem "than I to
+Hercules." A large painting by a French artist, in this hall, replaces
+the great Paul Veronese taken to Paris by Napoleon I.,&mdash;the Cena,&mdash;and,
+to my mind, replaces it very poorly. The huge paintings of Tintoretto
+are among the things that amaze one in Venice. How one hand, guided by
+one brain, could, in any average human life, have covered such enormous
+spaces of canvas, is a problem and a puzzle. The paintings themselves
+are full of vigor, color, and variety. But one naturally values them
+less on account of their great number. Of course, in the style of
+Raphael or Perugino, a single life could not have produced half of them.
+The Venetian school is sketchy, and its figures often have more toilet
+than anatomy.</p>
+
+<p>I am almost ashamed to speak of these pictures at all, since I speak of
+them so inadequately. Yet, gentle reader, all is not criticism that
+criticises, all is not enthusiasm that admires. Copious treatises are
+written on these subjects by people who know as little of them as is
+possible for a person of average education. Americans have especially to
+learn that a general tolerable<a name="page_142" id="page_142"></a> intelligence does not give a man special
+knowledge in matters of art. Among the herd of trans-Atlantic travellers
+who yearly throng these galleries, they know most who pretend least to
+know.</p>
+
+<p>A brief interval of rest and dinner enabled us to visit the Armenian
+Convent at San Lazzaro. For this excursion two rowers were requisite.
+Starting at five P. M., we reached the convent in half an hour. It
+stands upon an island which its walls and enclosures fill. The porter
+opens to us. We have a letter of introduction from Ex-Consul Howills to
+Padre Giacomo, and bring also a presentation copy of the late consul's
+work on Venice. The padre receives us with courteous gravity. We make
+acquaintance with his monkey before we make acquaintance with him. The
+monkey leaps on the neophyte's hat, tears off a waxen berry, and eats
+it. His master thoughtfully leads us through the dreamy rooms and
+passages of the convent. Here is the room that Byron occupied; here is
+his name, written in Armenian in his own hand. Here also is Prince
+Plonplon's name, written by him in the book of illustrious visitors.
+After showing it, the padre offers another book, for commonplace
+visitors, in which he invites me to enter my name: I humbly comply. We
+visit the chapel, which is handsome, and the pleasant garden. The
+printing establishment interests us most. These Armenian fathers are
+great polyglots, and print books in a variety of languages. Padre
+Giacomo, who speaks good English, shows us an Armenian translation of
+Napoleon's Life of Julius Cæsar, which we are surprised<a name="page_143" id="page_143"></a> and rather
+sorry to see. We afterwards hear it suggested that the expense of this
+work has probably been borne by the French emperor himself, with a view
+to the Eastern question. Among the antiquities of the convent we find a
+fine Armenian manuscript of the fourth century; among its modern
+curiosities, a book of prayers in thirty languages. In the refectory is
+a pulpit, from which one monk reads aloud, while the others dine.
+Connected with this convent is a college for the education of Armenian
+youths, either for the priesthood or for active life. Another
+institution, in Venice proper, receives from this those scholars who
+decide upon an ecclesiastical profession. Padre Giacomo had already
+bought Consul Howill's book for the convent library. He led us, lastly,
+into a small room, in which are kept the publications of the convent, to
+be sold for its benefit. Here we made a few purchases, and took leave,
+trusting to see Padre Giacomo again.</p>
+
+<p>One of my earliest acts in Venice, after the first preliminaries of
+living, was to get from a circulating library the first volume of Mr.
+Ruskin's Stones of Venice. I have never been a reader of Mr. Ruskin, and
+my position towards him is that of an outside unbeliever. I shun his
+partisans and disbelieve his theories. The title of this book, however,
+seemed to promise a key to the architectural mysteries of the mirror
+city, and I, taking him at his word, reached out eagerly after the same.
+But Mr. Ruskin's key opens a great many preliminary doors before
+admitting you to the point desired, and my one busy week was far too
+short to follow the intricacies of<a name="page_144" id="page_144"></a> his persuasions. I could easily see
+that the book, right or wrong, would add to the pleasure and interest of
+investigating the city. Mr. Ruskin is an author who gives to his readers
+a great deal of thought and of study. His very positive mode of
+statement has this advantage; it sums up one side of the matter so
+exhaustively as to make comparatively easy the construction of the
+opposite argument, and the final decision between the two. Yet, while
+the writer's zeal and genius lead us to follow his reasonings with
+interest, and often with pleasure, his judgment scarcely possesses that
+weight and impartiality which would lead us to acquiesce in his
+decisions. Those who fully yield to his individual charm adopt and
+follow his opinions to all extremes. This already shows his power. But
+they scarcely become as wise as do those who resist, and having fully
+heard him, continue to observe and to think for themselves. And as, in
+Coleridge's well-known lines, anxiety is expressed as to the human
+agency that can cleanse the River Rhine when that river has cleansed the
+city of Cologne, we must confess that our expectations always desire the
+man who shall criticise Mr. Ruskin, when he has criticised to his full
+extent. For there is one person whom he cannot criticise, and that is
+himself. To do this would involve a deliberation of thought, an
+exactness of style, to which even Mr. Ruskin cannot pretend.</p>
+
+<p>With his help, however, I did observe the two granite columns in the
+Piazzetta, to whose shafts he gives fifteen feet of circumference, and
+to their octagonal bases fifty-six, a discrepancy exceeding the
+difference<a name="page_145" id="page_145"></a> which the eye would measure. But he certainly ought to know.
+And I found also the columns brought from St. Jean d'Acre, which are, as
+he does not mention, square, and of a dark marble, with Oriental
+capitals and adornments. And I sought out, in the church of SS. Giov. e
+Paolo, two dogal monuments, of which he praises one and criticises the
+other with stress. The one praised is that of Doge Mocenigo; the other,
+that of Doge Vendramin. I did not find in either a significance to
+warrant the extensive notice he gives them. Having learned, with great
+satisfaction, that the artist of the monument which "dislikes" him was
+afterwards exiled from Venice for forgery, he proceeds to speak of "this
+forger's work," allowing no benefit of doubt. And this was my account
+with Mr. Ruskin, so far as the Stones of Venice are concerned; for time
+so shortened, and objects so multiplied, that I was constrained
+thereafter to dispense with his complicated instruments of vision, and
+to look at things simply with my own eyes.</p>
+
+<p>We made various visits to the Cathedral of San Marco, whose mosaic
+saints, on gold backgrounds, greet you in the portico with delight. The
+church is very rich in objects of art and in antiquities. It has columns
+from Palestine, dogal monuments, tessellated pavements, in endless
+variety. But the mosaics in the sacristy were for me its richest
+treasure. They comprise the conscientious labors mentioned by George
+Sand, in her Maîtres Mosaistes. The easy arch of the ceiling allows one
+to admire them without the painful straining usually<a name="page_146" id="page_146"></a> entailed by the
+study of fresco or other ceiling adornment. In a small chapel we were
+shown a large baptismal font brought from Palestine, and the very stone
+on which John Baptist's head was cut off!</p>
+
+<p>We went in, one Sunday, hoping to see the famous <i>palle d'oro</i>, an
+altar-covering in massive gold, exhibited only on rare Festas, of which
+this day was one. But while we wedged ourselves in among the crowd, one
+of our party descried a boy with the pustules of small pox still fresh
+upon his face. We fled in precipitation, marvelling at the sanitary
+negligence which allows such exposures to take place at the public risk.</p>
+
+<p>We visited the Church of the Scalzi (Barefooted Friars), and found it
+very rich in African and other marbles. It boasts some splendid columns
+of <i>nero antico</i>. One of the side chapels has four doors executed in
+Oriental alabaster, together with simulated hangings in <i>rosso antico</i>,
+the fringe being carved in <i>giallo</i>. Another was adorned with oval slabs
+of jasper, very beautiful in color and in polish. The ceiling, painted
+in fresco by Tiepolo, was full of light and airy grace.</p>
+
+<p>From this, we went to the Church of the Gesuiti, in high repute for the
+richness of its adornments. We found it a basilica, its sides divided by
+square piers, and the whole interior, piers and walls, covered with a
+damasked pattern wrought in verd antique upon a ground of white marble.
+The capitals of the piers were heavily gilded. The baldecchino of the
+high altar was dome-shaped, and covered on the outside with a scolloped
+pattern in verd antique, each scollop having a<a name="page_147" id="page_147"></a> slender bordering of
+white marble. The baldecchino is supported by four twisted columns
+formed of small rounded pieces of verd antique closely joined together.
+The pulpit has a heavy marble drapery, with simulated fringe, all in the
+pattern already mentioned. The whole is more luxurious than beautiful.
+Its art bears no proportion to its expense. To those who think of the
+Jesuits in general as I do, it will hardly stand as a monument of
+saintly service and simplicity. Near the high altar rest the ashes of
+the last Doge of Venice. The spot is designated by a simple slab,
+forming part of the pavement. On it is written, "<i>Æternitate su&oelig;
+Manini cineres</i>."</p>
+
+<p>We visited two very good collections of antiquities, in one of which we
+found the door of the Bucentaur, and its banner of crimson silk, with
+gilded designs. Here were portraits of doges, curious arms, majolicas,
+and old Venetian glass, much finer than that of the present day. Here
+also are collected many relics of Canova, the most interesting of which
+are the small designs for his great works. Over the door of this museum
+stands a pathetic inscription to the effect that Michel Correr,
+"<i>vedendo cadere la patria</i>" had collected here many things of patriotic
+and historical interest.</p>
+
+<p>But these prosaic recounts are only the record of actual steps. The
+charm, the delight of Venice they do not and cannot express. My
+recollections of the city invest her with a solemn and stately
+personality. I did not see her bowed beneath the Austrian yoke,
+betrayed,<a name="page_148" id="page_148"></a> but not sold, refusing to be cajoled and comforted. That
+cloud was removed. The shops were busy and prosperous, the streets
+thronged with people, the canals gay with gondolas, bearing also barges
+and large and small boats of very various patterns. The Piazza was
+filled at night with social groups of people, less childish, methought,
+than other Italians, and with a more visible purpose in them. Still, the
+contrast of the past and present, no longer shameful and agonizing, was
+full of melancholy. Venice can never be what she has been. The present
+world has no room for a repetition of her former career. But she can be
+a prosperous and happy Christian commonwealth, with her offices and
+dignities vested in her own sons, with education and political rights
+secured to all her children. And this is better, in the present day,
+than to be the tyrant of one half of the world, the fear and admiration
+of the other. For Peace, now, with open hands, bestows the blessings
+which War formerly compelled with iron grasp and frowning brow. The true
+compulsion now is to compel the world to have need of you, by the
+excellence of your service. Industry has a deeper mine of wealth than
+piracy or plunder can ever open. A man's success is in strict proportion
+to his use; and the servant of all is the master of all. So the new
+Venice for which I look is to be no more like the old Venice than the
+new Jerusalem will be like the city of David. Moral grandeur must make
+her great. Justice must make her people happy. And so beautiful and
+delightful is she, that I cannot help echoing the Psalmist's
+exclamation,<a name="page_149" id="page_149"></a> "Pray for the peace of Jerusalem! They shall prosper who
+love thee!"</p>
+
+<p>A wash of waters, a play of lights, a breeze that cools like the
+perfumed water of the Narguilé, a constant interchange of accents
+musically softened from the soft Italian itself, which seems hard in
+comparison with them; rows of palaces that have swallowed their own
+story; churches modelled upon the water like wax-flowers upon a mirror;
+balconies with hangings of yellow-brown and white; dark canals, that
+suggest easy murders and throwing over of victims; music on the water;
+robust voices, of well-defined character; columns and arches, over which
+Mr. Ruskin raves, and which for him are significant of religion or
+irreligion; resolute-looking men and women; a world of history and
+legend which he who has to live in to-day can scarcely afford time to
+decipher,&mdash;this is Venice as I have seen her, and would see her again.
+Rejoice, O sister cities, that she is free. Visit her with your golden
+rain, O travellers; with your golden sympathy, O poets! Enrich her,
+commerce! Protect her, Christian faith of nations, for she is
+free&mdash;free!</p>
+
+<p>To me she is already a recollection. For after the days of which I have
+so briefly told, a far summons carried me to an elder land, a more
+mournful mystery. Looking, but not loving my last, I packed the
+wearisome trunk, paid for the nights and dinners, owing little else at
+my lodging. A certain nightingale, who, at eight precisely every
+morning, broke in upon my slumbers with delicious singing, did not
+figure in the bill. But<a name="page_150" id="page_150"></a> remembering his priceless song, I almost regret
+my objections to certain items set down in the account against me. And I
+had a last row in the gondola, and a last ice in the Piazzetta, and,
+last of all, a midnight embarkation on board the Austrian steamer for
+Trieste. Farewell, Sebastiano, my trusty gondolier. I shall not hear you
+cry, "Oh, juiné" (giovine) again. I see the line of the Piazzetta,
+defined by the lamps. Brightly may they burn; glad be the hearts that
+beat near them. And now they are all out of sight, and the one outside
+light is disappearing, too. Farewell, wonderful Venice. Thou wert
+painfully gotten together, no doubt, like other dwelling-places of man.
+Thou camest of toiling and moiling, planning, digging, and
+stone-breaking. But thou lookest to have risen from the waters like a
+dream. And this wholeness of effect makes thee a great work of art, not
+henceforth to be plundered by the powerful ones of the earth, but to be
+cherished by the lovers of beauty, studied by the lovers of art.</p>
+
+<p>I will return upon my steps to mention one feature in the new Venice, a
+small and obscure one, whose significance greatly interested me. Having
+heard of a Protestant Italian congregation in the neighborhood of one of
+the great Catholic temples, I turned my steps one evening towards one of
+its meetings, and found, in a large upper chamber, a numerous assemblage
+of Italians of various grades, chiefly people of the poorer class, who
+listened with attention to a fervent address from a young clergyman of
+their own nation. The discourse had much of the spirit of religion,
+little of its<a name="page_151" id="page_151"></a> technic, and was thereby, I thought, the better adapted
+to the feeling of the congregation. A sprinkling of well-dressed men was
+observable. A prayer followed the discourse, in which the auditors
+joined with a hearty amen. This little kernel of Protestantism, dropped
+in a field so new, gave me the assurance of the presence of one of the
+most important elements in the progress and prosperity of any state, to
+wit, that of religious liberty.</p>
+
+<p>It is quite true that the sects under whose protection the Protestant
+Venetian church has sprung up&mdash;the Scotch and Swiss Presbyterians&mdash;can
+in no sense be considered as exponents of liberal ideas in religion.
+Calvinism, <i>per se</i>, is as absolute as Catholicism, and as cruel. The
+Calvinistic hell is but an adjourned Inquisition, in which
+controversialists have as great satisfaction in tormenting the souls of
+their opponents as Torquemada had in tormenting their bodies. Yet
+Calvinism itself is a rough and barbaric symbolization of great truths
+which the discipline of Catholicism tended ever more and more to
+distance from the efficient lives of men. The principle of individual
+responsibility, the impossibility of moral action without religious
+liberty, the inward character of religious acts and experiences, in
+contradistinction to the precepts and practice of a religion which had
+become all form, all observance. These ideas, gathered together by a
+vigorous mind, and made efficient by the constitution of a sect or
+party, were capable of regenerating modern Europe, and did so. For it
+will be found that all of its Protestant piety ran within the bounds of
+this somewhat narrow channel. But even<a name="page_152" id="page_152"></a> here, the liberalizing
+influences of time are irresistible, and although the cruel and
+insufficient doctrines are still subscribed to by zealous millions, the
+practice and culture of the church itself become more and more liberal.
+The zeal for propagandism, which characterizes the less tolerant portion
+of the Protestant sects, makes their ministration on new ground
+efficient and valuable. The material hell, from which, in good faith,
+they seek to deliver those who hear them, symbolizes the infinite danger
+and loss to man of a life passed without the impulses and restraints of
+religion. A more philosophic statement would be far less tangible to the
+minds alike of teacher and disciple. Their intervention in communities
+characterized by a low grade of religious culture is therefore useful,
+perhaps indispensable. And while I value and prize my own religious
+connections beyond aught else, I am thankful to the American missions
+that support Waldense preaching in Italy. They at least teach that a man
+is to think for himself, pray for himself; and their worship, even when
+rudest and most uncultured, is more an instruction of the multitude than
+a propitiation of the infinite love which is always ready to do for us
+more and better than we can ask.</p>
+
+<p>So, little Protestant congregation in Venice, my heart bids you God
+speed! But may the love of God be preached to you rather than the
+torment of fear, and may the simplicity and beauty of the Christian
+doctrine and example preserve you alike from the passional and the
+metaphysical dangers of the day.<a name="page_153" id="page_153"></a></p>
+
+<h2>G<small>REECE AND THE</small> V<small>OYAGE</small> T<small>HITHER.</small></h2>
+
+<p>"in a transition state."</p>
+
+<p>We have left Venice. We have passed an intolerable night on board the
+Austrian steamer, whose state-rooms are without air, its cabin without
+quiet, and its deck without shelter. So inconvenient a transport, in
+these days of steamboat luxury, makes one laugh and wonder. Trieste, our
+stopping-place, is the strangest mongrel, a perfect cur of a city
+(cur-i-o-sity). It is neither Italian, Greek, nor German, but all three
+of these, and many more. The hotel servants speak German and Italian,
+the shop-keepers also. Paper money passes without fight or <i>agio</i> upon
+the prices demanded. It seems to be par, with gold and silver at a
+premium. Much Oriental-looking merchandise is seen in the shop windows.
+The situation is fine, the port first rate.</p>
+
+<p>Our consul here, Mr. Alex. Thayer, is the author of the Life of
+Beethoven, already favorably known to the world as far as the first
+volume. The second, not yet completed, is looked for with interest. Mr.
+Thayer's kind attentions made our short stay in Trieste pleasant, and
+our transit to the Austrian Lloyd's steamer easy, and within thirty-six
+hours after our arrival we found ourselves embarked on board the latter,
+<i>en route</i> for Syra, where we should find another Austrian Lloyd waiting
+to convey us to the Piræus, the well-known port of Athens.</p>
+
+<p>Our voyage began with a stormy day. Incessant rain soaked the deck. A
+charming little upper cabin, cushioned<a name="page_154" id="page_154"></a> and windowed like a luxurious
+carriage, gave us shelter, combined with fresh air&mdash;the cordial of those
+who "<i>c&oelig;lum et animum mutant, quia trans mare current</i>." Here I
+pillowed myself in inevitable idleness, now become, alas! too familiar,
+and amused myself with the energetic <i>caquet</i> of my companions.</p>
+
+<p>An elderly Greek gentleman, Count Lunzi of Zante, with a pleasing
+daughter; a young Austrian, accompanied by a pretty sister; an elderly
+Neapolitan bachelor,&mdash;these were our fellow-passengers in the first
+cabin. In the second cabin were eleven friars, and an intelligent
+Venetian apothecary, with whom I subsequently made acquaintance. The
+captain, a middle-aged Dalmatian, came and went. He wore over his
+uniform a capote of India rubber cloth, which he laid aside when he came
+into our deck-parlor for a brief sitting and a whiff of tobacco. The
+gentlemen all smoked without apology. The little Greek lady soon became
+violently seasick, and the Austrian maiden followed. The neophyte and
+the Austrian brother felt no pang, but the neophyte's mother was dizzy
+and uncomfortable. Count Lunzi and the Neapolitan kept up a perpetual
+conversation in French, having many mutual acquaintances, whose absence
+they found it worth while to improve. I blessed their loquacity, which
+beguiled for me the weary, helpless hours. We went down to dinner; at
+tea-time we were <i>non compos mensis</i>. The state-rooms below being
+intensely hot and close in consequence of the rain, we all staid up
+stairs as long as possible, and our final retreat was made in the order
+of our symptoms.<a name="page_155" id="page_155"></a></p>
+
+<p>The following morning brought us the sun. The rain was at an end, and
+the sea grew less turbulent. The day was Sunday, and the unmistakable
+accents of theological controversy saluted my ears as I ascended the
+companion-way, and took my place in the deck-parlor. Count Lunzi, a
+liberal, and a student of German criticism, was vigorously belaboring
+three of the friars, who replied to him whenever they were able to get a
+word in, which was not often. His arguments supported the action of the
+Italian government in disbanding all monastic fraternities throughout
+its dominions, giving to each member a small pension, and inviting all
+to live by exercising the duties of their profession as secular priests.
+Our friars had concluded to expatriate, rather than secularize,
+themselves, and were now <i>en route</i> for Kaiafa, a place concerning which
+I could only learn that it was in Syria. They were impugned, according
+to the ancient superstition, as the causes of our bad embarkation and
+rough voyage. They were young and vigorous men, and the old count not
+unreasonably urged them to abandon a career now recognized as useless
+and obsolete, and to earn their bread by some availing labor. The circle
+of the controversy widened. More friars came up from below. The ship's
+surgeon joined himself to them, the Venetian siding with the count. The
+Neapolitan stood by to see fair play, and a good part of the day of rest
+was occupied by this symphony of discord.</p>
+
+<p>I confess that, although the friars' opinions were abhorrent to mine, I
+yet wished that they might have been<a name="page_156" id="page_156"></a> let alone. Even Puritan Milton
+does not set a Calvinistic angel to argue with Adam and Eve concerning
+the justice of their expulsion from Paradise. The journey itself was
+pain enough, without the reprobation. As the friars had been turned out
+of their comfortable nests, and were poor and disconsolate, I myself
+would sooner have given them an obolus unjustified by theory than a
+diatribe justified by logic. But the old count was sincere and able, and
+at least presented to them views greatly in advance of their bigotry and
+superstition. While this conversation went on, we passed Lissa, where
+the Italian fleet was repulsed by the Austrians, during the war of
+Italian unity. Our fellow-passenger of the nation second named quietly
+exults over this event. He does well. Austrian victories have been rare
+of late. Of the day following my diary says,&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>June 17.&mdash;In sight of the Acroceraunian mountains and shore of Albania.
+Vessel laboring with head wind, I with Guizot's Meditations, which also
+have some head wind in them. They seem to me inconclusive in statement,
+and insufficient in thought, presenting, nevertheless, some facts and
+considerations of interest. At a little before two P. M., we pass Fano,
+the island in which Calypso could not console herself; and no wonder. At
+two we enter the channel of Corfu, but do not reach the shore itself
+until five o'clock. A boat conveys us to the shore, where, with our
+Austrian friends, we engage a carriage, and drive to view the environs.</p>
+
+<p>This is my first experience of Greece. The streets are narrow and
+irregular, the men mostly in European<a name="page_157" id="page_157"></a> costume, with here and there a
+<i>fustanella</i>. Our drive took us to a picturesque eminence, commanding a
+lovely prospect. It led us through a sort of Elysian field, planted with
+shade trees, where the populace on gala days go to sip coffee, and meet
+their friends and neighbors. Returning to the town, we pass several
+large hotels and cafés, at one of which we order ices. I puzzle myself
+in vain with the Greek signs over the shop windows. Our leave of absence
+having expired, we hasten back to the steamer, but find its departure
+delayed by the labor of embarking a Turkish dignitary, Achmed Pacha,
+who, with a numerous suite, male and female, is to take passage with us
+for the Dardanelles.</p>
+
+<p>A steamer, bearing the Crescent flag at her mast-head, was anchored
+alongside of our own. Our hitherto quiet quarters were become a little
+Babel of strange tongues and costumes. Any costume artist would have
+gone mad with delight over the variety of coats and colors which our new
+visitors displayed. Those wonderful jackets and capotes, which are the
+romance of stage and fancy-ball attire, here appeared as the common
+prose of every-day dress. Every man wore a fez. I remember a handsome
+youth, whose crimson head-gear contrasted with a white sheepskin jacket
+with wide, hanging sleeves&mdash;the sleeves not worn on the arms, but at the
+back; the close vest, loose, short skirt, and leggings were also
+white&mdash;the whole very effective. He was only one figure of a brilliant
+panorama, but treacherous memory does not give me the features of the
+others.<a name="page_158" id="page_158"></a></p>
+
+<p>Our vessel, meanwhile, was engaged in swallowing the contents of the
+Turkish steamer with the same deliberation with which an anaconda
+swallows a bullock. The Turks and Albanians might scream and chatter,
+and declaim the whole Koran at their pleasure, the great crane went
+steadily on&mdash;hoisting bale after bale, and lowering the same into our
+hold. This household stuff consisted principally of rugs and bedding,
+with trunks, boxes, and kitchen furniture, and some mysterious bundles
+whose contents could not be conjectured.</p>
+
+<p>The sight of this unwholesome-looking luggage suggested to some of us
+possible communication of cholera, or eastern plague. The neophyte and I
+sat hand in hand, looking ruefully on, and wondering how soon we should
+break out. But when the dry goods were disposed of, the transfer of the
+human merchandise from one vessel to the other seized our attention, and
+put our fears out of sight.</p>
+
+<p>Our first view of the pacha's <i>harem</i> showed us a dozen or more women
+crouching on the deck of the Turkish steamer, their heads and faces
+bundled up with white muslin veils, which concealed hair, forehead,
+mouth, and chin, leaving exposed to view only the triangle of the eyes
+and nose. Several children were there, who at first sight all appeared
+equally dirty and ill-dressed. We were afterwards able to distinguish
+differences between them.</p>
+
+<p>The women and children came on board in a body, and took up a position
+on the starboard side of the<a name="page_159" id="page_159"></a> deck. With them came an old man-servant,
+in a long garment of whitish woollen cloth, who defined their boundaries
+by piling up certain bales of property. In the space thus marked off,
+mattresses were at once laid down and spread with coverlets; for these
+women were to pass night as well as day on deck. Five ladies of the
+pacha's family at once intrenched themselves in one of the small cabins
+below, where, with five children, they continued for the remainder of
+the voyage, without exercise or ventilation. Too sacred to be seen by
+human eyes, these ladies made us aware of their presence by the sound of
+their incessant chattering, by the odor of their tobacco, and by the
+screaming of one of their little ones, an infant of eight months.</p>
+
+<p>When these things had been accomplished, our captain sent word to the
+pacha that he was ready to depart. The great man's easy-chair&mdash;by no
+means a splendid one&mdash;was then carried on board, and the great man
+himself, accompanied by his son-in-law and his dragoman, came among us.
+He was a short, stout person, some fifty years of age, and wore a dark
+military coat, with a gold stripe on the shoulder, and lilac trousers.
+His dragoman was a Greek. He and his suite smoked vigorously, and stared
+somewhat, as, with the neophyte on one side and the little Austrian lady
+on the other, I walked up and down the deck. The women and the old
+servant all slept <i>à la belle étoile</i>. The pacha and his officers had
+state-rooms in the saloon; the other men were in the third cabin. I
+forgot to say that at Corfu we left Count Lunzi and his amiable
+daughter,<a name="page_160" id="page_160"></a> whose gracious manners and good English did credit to Mrs.
+Hills's excellent tuition, which the young lady had enjoyed for some
+years at her well-known school in Athens.</p>
+
+<p>When we came on deck the next morning, we found some of the Turkish
+women still recumbent, others seated upon their mattresses. Two of the
+children, a girl of ten years and a boy of twelve, went about under
+orders, and carried dishes and water-vessels between the cabin and the
+deck. We afterwards learned that these were Albanian slaves. The girl
+was named Haspir, the boy Ali. The first had large dark eyes and a
+melancholy expression of countenance; the boy also had Oriental eyes,
+whose mischievous twinkle was tempered by the gravity of his situation.
+The old servant, whom they called Baba, ate his breakfast in a corner.
+He had a miscellaneous looking dish of fish, bread, and olives. The
+women fed chiefly, as far as I could judge, on cucumbers and radishes,
+which they held and munched. Water was given from a brazen pitcher, of a
+pattern decidedly Oriental. Coffee was served to the invisible family in
+the small cabin. I did not see the women on deck partake of it. But from
+this time the scope of my observations was limited. A canvas partition,
+made fast to the mast overhead, now intervened, to preserve this portion
+of the <i>harem</i> from the pollution of external regards. Henceforth, we
+had glimpses of its members only when a lurch of the steamer swayed the
+canvas wall far out of equilibrium. The <i>far niente</i> seemed to be their
+fate, without alternative. Nor book<a name="page_161" id="page_161"></a> nor needle had they. The children
+came outside, and peeped at us. Baba, grim guardian of the household,
+sat or squatted among his bales, oftenest quite unoccupied, but
+sometimes smoking, or chattering with the children. I took my modest
+drawing-book, and, with unsteady hand, began to sketch him in pen and
+ink. He soon divined my occupation, and kept as still as a mouse until
+by a sign I released him, when he begged, in the same language, to see
+what I had drawn. I next tried to get a <i>croquis</i> of a pretty little
+girl who played about, wearing a pink wadded sack over a gown and
+trousers of common flowered calico, buff and brown. She was disposed to
+wriggle out of sight; but Baba threatened her, and she was still.</p>
+
+<p>Presently, the slave-boy, Ali, came up from the select cabin below,
+bearing in his arms an ill-conditioned little creature, two years of
+age, who had come on board in a cashmere pelisse lined with fur, a pink
+wadded under-jacket, and a pair of trousers of dirty common calico. He
+had now discarded the fur-pelisse. On his round little head he wore a
+cap of pink cashmere, soiled and defaced, with a large gold coin
+attached to it. A natural weakness drew me towards the little wretch,
+whom I tried to caress. Ali patted him tenderly, and said, "Pacha." This
+was indeed the youngest member, save one, of the pacha's family&mdash;the
+true baby being the infant secluded down stairs, whose frequent cries
+appealed in vain for change of air and of scene. The two-year-old had
+already the title of bey.</p>
+
+<p>"Can a baby a bey be?" I asked, provoking the disgust<a name="page_162" id="page_162"></a> which a pun is
+sure to awaken in those who have not made it.</p>
+
+<p>We met the pacha at meals, interchanging mute salutations. He had a
+pleasant, helpless sort of smile, and ate according to the orthodox
+standard of nicety. On deck some attendant constantly brought him a pipe
+composed of a large knob of amber, which served as a mouth piece, and a
+reed some eight inches in length, bearing a lighted cigar.</p>
+
+<p>As we sat much in our round house, it was inevitable that I should at
+last establish communication with him through the mediation of a young
+Greek passenger, who spoke both Turkish and French.</p>
+
+<p>It was from the pacha that I learned that Haspir and Ali were slaves.
+The little girl whom I had sketched was his daughter. I inquired about a
+girl somewhat younger, who played with this one. The pacha signified
+that he had given the mother of his daughter to one of his men, and that
+the second little girl was born of this connection. The two younger
+children already spoken of were born of another mother, probably each of
+a different one.</p>
+
+<p>"O Christian marriage!" I thought, as I looked on this miscellaneous and
+inorganic family, "let us not complain of thy burdens."</p>
+
+<p>With us the birth of a child is the strongest bond of union between its
+parents; with the Oriental it is the signal for separation. No society
+will ever permanently increase whose structure rests on an architecture
+so feeble. The Turkish empire might spread by conquest<a name="page_163" id="page_163"></a> and thrive by
+plunder. But at home it can never compete with nations in which family
+life has individuality of centre and equality of obligation. With Greeks
+and Albanians to work for them, and pay them tribute, the Turks are able
+to attain a certain wealth. It is the wealth, however, which
+impoverishes mankind, exhausting the sources of industry and of
+enterprise. Let the Turk live upon what he can earn, and we shall hear
+little of him.</p>
+
+<p>The women sometimes struggled out from their canvas enclosure, and went
+below on various errands. On these occasions they were enveloped in a
+straight striped covering, white and red, much like a summer
+counterpane. This was thrown over the head, held together between the
+teeth, and reached to the feet. It left in view their muslin
+head-dresses, and calico trousers, gathered at the ankle, nothing more.
+A few were barefoot&mdash;one or two only wore stockings. Most of them were
+shod with <i>brodequins</i>, of a size usually worn by men.</p>
+
+<p>At a late hour in the afternoon, Ali brought to their enclosure a round
+metal dish of stewed meat, cut in small pieces for the convenience of
+those whose customs are present proof that fingers were made before
+knives and forks. A great dish of rice simultaneously made its
+appearance. Baba chattered very much, Ali made himself busy, and a
+little internal commotion became perceptible behind the canvas wall.</p>
+
+<p>My opportunity of observing Turkish manners was as brief as it was
+limited. Having taken the Moslems on board on Monday, well towards
+evening, the Wednesday<a name="page_164" id="page_164"></a> following saw, at ten A. M., my exit from the
+steamer. For we were now in the harbor of Syra. When I came on deck,
+soon after five A. M., the pacha sent me coffee in a little cup with a
+silver stand. It was prepared after the Turkish manner, and was fragrant
+and delicious. While we were at breakfast, Mr. Saponzaki, American
+consul at Syra, came on board in search of me, followed soon by an old
+friend, Mr. Evangelides. With real regret I took leave of the friendly
+captain and pleasant companions of the voyage. I shook hands with the
+pacha, not unmindful of the miseries of Crete. Baba also gave me a
+parting salutation. He was a nice observer of womanly actions, and his
+farewell gesture seemed to say, "Although barefaced, you are
+respectable;" which, if he really meant it, was a great deal for him to
+allow. Our luggage was now transferred on board the smaller steamer,
+which was to sail at six P. M. for the Piræus, and the neophyte and
+myself soon found ourselves under the shelter of Mr. Evangelides' roof,
+where his Greek wife made us cordially welcome.</p>
+
+<h2>S<small>YRA</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>Mr. Evangelides was one of a number of youths brought to the United
+States, after the war of Greek independence, for aid and education. The
+latter was the chief endowment with which his adopted country returned
+him to his native land. The value of this gift he was soon to realize,
+though not without previous hardships and privations. After a year or
+two of trial, he commenced a school in Syra. This school was soon
+filled<a name="page_165" id="page_165"></a> with pupils, and many intelligent and successful Greeks of the
+present day are among his old scholars. Besides methods of education, he
+brought from America a novel idea&mdash;that of the value of real estate.
+Looking about Syra, and becoming convinced of its inevitable growth, he
+invested the surplus of his earnings in tracts of land in the immediate
+neighborhood of the then small town, to the utter mystification of his
+neighbors. That one should invest in jewels, arms, a house, or a
+vineyard, would have seemed to them natural enough; but what any man
+should want of mere land scarcely fit for tillage, was beyond their
+comprehension. The expected growth was not slow in coming. Mr.
+Evangelides soon began to realize handsomely, as we should say, from his
+investment, and is now esteemed a man of wealth. His neighbors
+thereafter named him "the Greek Yankee;" and I must say that he seems to
+hold equally to the two belongings, in spite of the Scripture caution.</p>
+
+<p>Under the escort of my old friend, I went out to see the town, and to
+make acquaintance with the most eminent of the inhabitants, the custom
+of the country making the duty of the first call incumbent upon the
+person newly arrived.</p>
+
+<p>Unfurling a large umbrella, and trembling with the fear of sun-stroke, I
+proceeded to climb the steep and narrow streets of the town. We first
+incommode with our presence the governor of the Cyclades, a patriotic
+Greek, who speaks good English and good sense. We talk of Cretan
+affairs; he is not sanguine as to the efficient intervention of the
+European powers.</p>
+
+<p>We next call upon the archbishop, at whose house we<a name="page_166" id="page_166"></a> are received by a
+black servant in Frank dress, speaking good French. Presently the
+prelate appeared&mdash;a tall, gentlemanly person in a rich costume, one
+feature of which was a medallion, brilliant with precious stones of
+various colors. His reverence had made his studies in Germany, and spoke
+the language of that country quite fluently. Tholuck had been his
+especial professor, but he had also known Bauer; and he took some pains
+to assure me that the latter was not an irreligious man, in spite of the
+hardihood of his criticism. He deplored the absence of a state religion
+in America. I told him that the progress of religion in our country
+seemed to establish the fact that society attains the best religious
+culture through the greatest religious liberty. He replied that the
+members should all be united under one head. "Yes," said I, "but the
+Head is invisible;" and he repeated after me, "Indeed, the Head is
+invisible." I will here remark that nothing could have been more
+refreshing to the New England mind than this immediate introduction to
+the theological opinions of the East.</p>
+
+<p>Other refreshment, however, was in store for me&mdash;the sweetmeats and
+water which form the somewhat symbolical staple of Greek hospitality. Of
+these I partook in the orthodox manner. One dish only is brought in, but
+many spoons, one of which each guest dips into the <i>gliko</i> (sweet), and,
+having partaken, drops the spoon into the glass of fresh water which
+always follows. Turkish coffee was afterwards served in small cups
+without spoons. And now, not knowing what sermons or other duties my
+presence might impede, I took leave, much gratified by the interview.<a name="page_167" id="page_167"></a></p>
+
+<p>We passed from hence to the house of the Austrian consul, Dr. Hahn, a
+writer of scientific travels, and a student of antiquities. He had not
+long before visited the Island of Santorin, whose recently-awakened
+volcano interests the world of science. He told me of a house newly
+excavated in this region, containing tools and implements as old, at
+least, as those of the Lacustrine period, and, in his opinion, somewhat
+older. This house had been deeply buried in ashes by an ancient
+eruption, so violent as to have eviscerated the volcano of that time,
+which subsequently collapsed. The depth of ashes he stated as
+considerably greater than that found in any part of the Pompeian
+excavation, being at least thirty yards. Hewn stones were found here,
+but no metal implements, nor traces of any. Caucasian skulls were also
+found, and pottery of a finer description than that belonging to the
+Lacustrine period. He gave me a model of a small pitcher discovered
+among the ruins, of which the nose was shaped like the beak of a bird,
+with a further imitation of the eye on either side. Another small vessel
+was ornamented by the model of a human breast, to denote plenty. He had
+also plaster casts of skulls, arm and jaw bones, and flint saws, upon
+which he descanted with great vivacity.</p>
+
+<p>Dr. Hahn's courteous and charming manners caused me to remember him as
+one of the many Austrians whose amiable qualities make us doubly regret
+the <i>onus</i> which the untimely policy of their government throws upon
+them.</p>
+
+<p>These visits at end, Mr. Evangelides took me home to dinner, where the
+best Greek dishes were enhanced<a name="page_168" id="page_168"></a> by Samian wine. We had scarcely dined
+when the archbishop, followed by an attendant priest, came to return our
+visit. The Greeks present all kissed his hand, and <i>gliko</i> and coffee
+were speedily offered. We resumed our conversation of the morning, and
+the celibacy of the clerical hierarchy came next in order in our
+discussion. The father was in something of a strait between the
+Christian dignification of marriage and its ascetic depreciation. The
+arrival of other visitors forced us to part, with this interesting point
+still unsettled. We next visited the wife of the American
+vice-consul&mdash;Mr. Saponzaki&mdash;a handsome person, who received us with
+great cordiality. After a brief sojourn, we walked down to the landing,
+visiting the foundery, where they were making brass cannon, and the
+<i>Acadi</i>, the smart little steamer given by the Greeks of London to the
+Cretan cause. She ran our blockade in the late war, but is now engaged
+in a more honest service, for she runs the Turkish blockade, and carries
+the means of subsistence to the Cretans. Here we met Mr. DeKay, a
+youthful Philcandiote of our own country. He had already made himself
+familiar with the state of things in Candia, and, like the
+blockade-runner, was serving in his second war, with the difference that
+his former record showed him to have been always on the side of
+Christian loyalty.</p>
+
+<p>Finally, amid thanks and farewells, a small boat took us alongside of
+the Austrian steamer, which carried us comfortably, and by magnificent
+moonlight, to the Piræus.<a name="page_169" id="page_169"></a></p>
+
+<h2>P<small>IRÆUS</small>&mdash;A<small>THENS.</small></h2>
+
+<p>We were still soundly asleep when the cameriere knocked at the door of
+our cabin, crying, "Signora, here we are at the Piræus." The hour was
+four of the morning, but we were now come to the regions in which men
+use the two ends of the day, and throw away the middle. We, therefore,
+seized the end offered to us, and as briefly as possible made our way on
+deck, where we found a commissionaire from the Hotel des Etrangers, at
+Athens. We had expected to meet here the chief of our party, who had
+gone before us to Athens. The commissionaire, however, brought us a
+note, telling of an accident whose fatigues did not allow him to wait
+upon us in person. We were soon in the small boat, and soon after in the
+carriage, intent upon reaching Athens. Pireo, as they call the classic
+port, is quite a bustling place, the harbor gay with shipping and flags
+of all nations. The drive to the Capitol occupies three quarters of an
+hour. The half-way point of the distance is marked by two rival <i>khans</i>,
+at one of which the driver of a public vehicle always stops to water his
+horses and light his cigar. Here a plate of <i>lokumia</i>, a sweetmeat
+something like fig-paste, and glasses of fresh water, were brought out
+and offered to us. Soon we came in sight of the Acropolis, not without
+an indescribable puzzle at beholding, in commonplace existence, one of
+those dreams whose mystical beauty we never expect to realize, and fear
+to dissipate. Now we drive through many streets and squares, and
+finally<a name="page_170" id="page_170"></a> stop at a hotel in front of one of the prettiest of the latter,
+from whose door our chief issues to welcome us. With him is the elder
+neophyte, who has so far shared his wanderings, and latterly the near
+danger of shipwreck. Under her guidance we walk out, after breakfast, to
+look at the shops in Hermes Street, but the glaring sun soon drives us
+back to our quarters. We take the midday nap, dine, and at sunset drive
+to the Acropolis. On our way thither, we pass the remaining columns of
+the Temple of Jupiter Olympius, a Roman-Greek structure, the work of
+Adrian. These columns, sixteen in number, stand on a level area of some
+extent. One of them, overthrown by an earthquake, lies in ruins, its
+separate segments suggesting the image of gigantic vertebræ. The spine
+is indeed a column, but it has the advantage of being flexible, and the
+method and principle of its unity are not imitable by human architects.
+At the Acropolis a wooden gate opens for our admission, and a man in
+half-military costume follows our steps.</p>
+
+<p>We visit first the Propylea, or five gates, then the Parthenon. Our
+guide points out the beauty of its Doric columns, the perfection of
+their execution&mdash;the two uniting faces of each of their pieces being
+polished, so as to allow of their entire union. Here stood the great
+statue of Minerva Medica; here, the table for sacrifice. Here are the
+ways on which the ponderous doors opened and shut. And Pericles caused
+it to be built; and this, his marble utterance, is now a lame sentence,
+with half its sense left out. In this corner is<a name="page_171" id="page_171"></a> the high Venetian
+tower, a solid relic, modern beside that which it guards. And worse than
+any wrong <i>dénouement</i> of a novel is the intelligence here given you
+that the Parthenon stood entire not two hundred years ago, and that the
+explosion of a powder magazine, connected with this Venetian
+fortification, shattered its matchless beauty.</p>
+
+<p>Here is the Temple of Victory. Within are the bas-reliefs of the
+Victories arriving in the hurry of their glorious errands. Something so
+they tumbled in upon us when Sherman conquered the Carolinas, and
+Sheridan the valley of the Shenandoah, when Lee surrendered, and the
+glad president went to Richmond. One of these Victories is untying her
+sandal, in token of her permanent abiding. Yet all of them have trooped
+away long since, scared by the hideous havoc of barbarians. And the
+bas-reliefs, their marble shadows, have all been battered and mutilated
+into the saddest mockery of their original tradition. The statue of
+Wingless Victory that stood in the little temple, has long been absent
+and unaccounted for. But the only Victory that the Parthenon now can
+seize or desire is this very Wingless Victory, the triumph of a power
+that retreats not&mdash;the power of Truth.</p>
+
+<p>I give heed to all that is told me in a dreamy and desolate manner. It
+is true, no doubt&mdash;this was, and this, and this; but what I see is none
+the less emptiness&mdash;the broken eggshell of a civilization which Time has
+hatched and devoured. And this incapacity to reconstruct the past goes
+with me through most of<a name="page_172" id="page_172"></a> my days in Athens. The city is so modern, and
+its circle so small! The trumpeters who shriek around the Theseum in the
+morning, the <i>café</i> keeper who taxes you for a chair beneath the shadow
+of the Olympian columns, the <i>custode</i> who hangs about to see that you
+do not break the broken marbles further, or carry off their piteous
+fragments, all of these are significant of modern Greece; but the ruins
+have nothing to do with it.</p>
+
+<p>Poor as these relics are in comparison with what one would wish them to
+be, they are still priceless. This Greek marble is the noblest in
+descent; it needs no eulogy. These forms have given the model for a
+hundred familiar and commonplace works, which caught a little gleam of
+their glory, squaring to shapeliness some town-house of the west, or
+southern bank or church. So well do we know them in the prose of modern
+design, that we are startled at seeing them transfigured in the poetry
+of their own conception. Poor old age! poor columns!</p>
+
+<p>And poor Greece, plundered by Roman, Christian, and Mussulman. Hers were
+the lovely statues that grace the halls of the Vatican&mdash;at least the
+loveliest of them. And Rome shows to this day two colossal groups, of
+which one bears the inscription, "<i>Opus Praxitelæ</i>," the other that of
+"<i>Opus Phidiæ</i>." And Naples has a Greek treasure or two, one thinks,
+besides her wealth of sculptural gems, of which the best are of Greek
+workmanship. And in England those bas-reliefs which are the treasure of
+art students and the wonder of the world, were pulled from the pediment
+of the<a name="page_173" id="page_173"></a> Parthenon, like the pearly teeth from a fair mouth, the mournful
+gaps remaining open in the sight of the unforgiving world. "Thou art old
+and decrepit," said England. "I am still in strength and in vigor. All
+else has gone, as well thy dower as thy earnings. Thou hast but these
+left. I want them; so give them me."</p>
+
+<p>Royal Munich also had his share. The relict of Lola Montes did to the
+temple at Egina what Lord Elgin did to the Parthenon, inflicting worse
+damage upon its architecture. At the time, the unsettled state of the
+country, and the desire to preserve things so costly and beautiful, may
+be accepted as excuses for such acts. But when Greece shall have a
+museum fit to preserve the marbles now huddled in the Theseum, or left
+exposed on the highways, then she may demand back the Elgin and Bavarian
+marbles. She will then deserve to receive them again. Nor could she,
+methinks, do better than devote to this noble purpose some of the
+superfluous extent of Otho's monstrous palace, whose emptiness afflicts
+the visitor with sad waste of room and of good material. Making all
+allowance for the removal of the Penates of its late occupants, it is
+still obvious that these two luxurious wrens occupied but a small
+portion of this eagle's nest. A fine gallery could as easily be spared
+from its endless apartments as are the public galleries from the
+Vatican.</p>
+
+<p>Nor should this new kingling and his Russian bride be encouraged to
+people such an extent of masonry with smart aid-de-camps, lying
+diplomats, and plundering stewards and <i>dames d'honneur</i>. For pity's
+sake, let<a name="page_174" id="page_174"></a> the poor kingdom have a modest representative, who shall
+follow the spirit of modern reform, and administer the people's revenues
+with clean hands. A sculpture gallery, therefore, in the palace by all
+means, open to the public, as are the galleries of Italian palaces. And
+these marbles in the Theseum and elsewhere&mdash;fie upon them! Not only are
+they so crowded that one cannot see them, but so dirty that one cannot
+discern their features. "Are they marble?" one asks, for a thick coating
+of the sand and dust in which they were embodied for ages still envelops
+them, and can only be removed by careful artistic intervention.</p>
+
+<p>A little money, please, king and Parliament, for these unhappy ones. The
+gift would repay itself in the end, for a respectable collection of
+authentic Greek remains on the very soil in which they were found would
+bring here many of the wide-ranging students of art and antiquity. A
+little money, please, for good investment is good economy. Moreover,
+despite the velvet flatteries and smiling treasons of diplomacy, the
+present government of Greece is, as every government should be, on good
+behavior before the people. Wonderfully clever, enterprising, and
+liberal have the French people made the author of the Life of Julius
+Cæsar. Wonderfully reformative did the radicals of twenty years since
+make the pope. And the Greek nation, taken in the large, may prove to
+have some common sense to impart to its symbolical head, of whom we can
+only hope that the something rotten in the state of Denmark may not have
+been taken from it to corrupt the state of Greece.<a name="page_175" id="page_175"></a></p>
+
+<h2>E<small>XPEDITIONS</small>&mdash;N<small>AUPLIA.</small></h2>
+
+<p>A few days of midsummer passed in Athens make welcome any summons that
+calls one out of it. Majestic as the past is, one likes to have its grim
+skeleton a little cushioned over by the æsthetic of the present, and, at
+the present season, this is not to be had, even in its poorest and
+cheapest forms. The heat, moreover, though tempered by healthful
+breezes, is yet of a kind and degree to tell heavily upon a northern
+constitution. To take exercise of any kind, between ten A. M. and six P.
+M., is uncomfortable and far from safe. How delightful, therefore, to
+pack one's little budget, and start upon a cruise!</p>
+
+<p>For the government, we must confess, is very hospitable to us. Our chief
+veteran goes about to distribute clothing to the Cretan refugees, who,
+in advanced stages of nakedness, congregate in Egina, Syra, Argos, and
+other places, as well as in Athens. And he asks the government, and the
+government lends its steamer, the Parados, for the philanthropic voyage.
+So we drive down to the Pireo and embark, and are on our way. A pleasant
+little Athenian lady accompanies us, together with her father, a Cretan
+by birth, and a man who has been much in the service of the government.
+Our travelling library for this occasion is reduced to a copy of
+Machiavelli's Principe, a volume of Muir's Greece, and a Greek
+phrase-book on Ollendorff's principle. We have also some worsted work;
+but one of us, the writer of these notes, has added to these another
+occupation, another interest.<a name="page_176" id="page_176"></a></p>
+
+<p>Take note that the beds of the hotel at Athens are defended by
+mosquito-nets, which show, here and there, the marks of age. Take note
+that we close these nettings the first night a little carelessly,
+remembering Cuba, and expecting nothing worse. Take note that we neither
+wear gloves at night, nor bandage our arms and wrists, and then take
+note of what follows.</p>
+
+<p>A fiery stinging of needle points in every accessible part of your body.
+Each new bite is like a new star of torment in the milky way of your
+corporeal repose. These creatures warn not, like the honest American
+mosquito, rattlesnake, or bore, of their intended descent upon you. In
+comparison with their silent impudence, the familiar humming of our
+Yankee torments becomes an apologetic murmur, significant of, "We are
+very sorry indeed, but we cannot well do otherwise." This is the
+language of the dun&mdash;the Greek insect has the quiet of the thief.</p>
+
+<p>So much for the action; now for the result. You awake uncomfortably,
+and, provoked here and there, begin to retort upon your skin a little.
+Never was more salient illustration of the doctrine of the forgiveness
+of injuries. Let by-gones be by-gones; suffer the bites to rest. Ah! the
+warning comes too late. The fatal process has begun. At every touch you
+get worse, but cannot stop. You now realize what a good gift your
+Anglo-Saxon skin was, and so clean, and so comfortable! and it cost you
+so little! But just because it was so good, these foreign vermin
+insisted on sharing it with you. And you exemplify in little the fate of
+Italy<a name="page_177" id="page_177"></a> and of Greece, which have been feasted on for ages, and cursed by
+the absolute mosquito for not continuing in perpetuity to yield their
+life-blood without remonstrance. This for the moral aspect of the case.
+The material aspect is that of intolerable pain and itching,
+accompanying a distinct suppuration of every spot punctured by the
+insect. For some days and nights the principal occupation of the writer
+of these notes was to tear the unhappy hands and arms that aid in their
+production. A remedy is casually mentioned&mdash;vinegar. Bandages dipped in
+this fluid, and closely wrapped around the suffering members, give
+instant relief, but have to be frequently renewed, the fever of the skin
+rapidly drying them. The sufferings of Job were now understood, and his
+eminent but impossible virtue appreciated. Even he, however, had
+recourse to a potsherd. Never were my human sympathies so called out
+towards the afflicted Scotch nation! Well, let this subject rest.
+Recovery is now an established fact. From the height of experience we
+can look down upon future sufferers and say, "This, too, shall pass
+away."</p>
+
+<p>But now, to return to the deck of the Parados. Scenery, worsted work,
+the Principe, and a little conversation caused the time to pass very
+agreeably. We took also the Ollendorff book, and made a short trial of
+its lumbering machinery. And we had <i>déjeûner</i> on board, and dinner. And
+Georgi, the cameriere, had the features of Edwin Booth&mdash;the strong eyes,
+the less forcible mouth, something even of the general expression. At
+about 7.30 P. M., we made the harbor of Nauplia, otherwise<a name="page_178" id="page_178"></a> called
+Napoli de Romania. The harbor being shallow, the steamer anchored at
+some distance from the land, whither its boats conveyed us. On the quay
+stood a crowd of people, waiting to see us. They had discerned the
+steamer afar, and had flocked together from mere curiosity. Something in
+the landing made me think of that portion of the quay at Naples which
+lies before the Hotel de Russie. Much of the present town was built by
+the Turks. The streets are narrow and irregular, and many of the houses
+have balconies. One of these streets is nearly blocked by a crowd. We
+inquire, and learn that the head of a brigand has just been brought in.
+For the brigands, long tolerated in some regions by usage and indolence,
+have now set foot in a region in which they will not be endured. The
+Peloponnesus will not have them, and the peasants, who elsewhere aid the
+brigands, here aid the <i>gens d'armes</i>. Upon the head of their leader,
+Kitzos, a large price has been set. But the head which causes the
+commotion of this evening is not that of Kitzos. Getting through the
+crowd at length, we come upon a pretty square, surrounded by houses, and
+planted with pepper-trees.</p>
+
+<p>Here is the house of the prefect, at whose door we knock, imploring
+shelter. Our Cretan friend, M. Antoniades, is well known to the prefect;
+hence the daring of this summons. The prefecture receives us. The
+prefect&mdash;a vivacious little man, with blue eyes and light hair&mdash;capers
+about in great excitement. He has to do with the war against the
+brigands, and joy at the bringing in of the head before mentioned nearly
+causes him to<a name="page_179" id="page_179"></a> lose his own. His large <i>salon</i> is thronged with
+visitors, who come partly to talk over these matters, partly to see the
+strangers. We, the ladies, meanwhile take refuge on a roomy balcony,
+where we have chairs, and where <i>gliko</i> and cold water are offered to
+us. I make my usual piteous request for vinegar, and renew my bandages,
+while the others enjoy cool air and starlight. The prefect goes off to
+supper at nine, having first signified to us that his wife is occupied
+with a baby two days old, and cannot wait upon us; that his house is at
+our disposal, and that he will send out among his neighbors and obtain
+all that we may require. One of his visitors&mdash;M. Zampacopolus, a major
+of cavalry&mdash;promises to wait upon us at five in the morning, to conduct
+us up the steep ascent of the fortress Palamides. By ten o'clock the
+mattresses are brought. They are spread in a row on the floor, and we
+weary women, four in number, lie down and sleep as only weary people
+can.</p>
+
+<p>The summons that arouses us at five the next morning does not awaken
+enthusiasm. We struggle up, however, and get each a minimum of the
+limited basin and towel privilege. Descending, we find Major
+Zampacopolus in full uniform, and are admonished by him for being so
+late. He came for us at four o'clock; but the chief veteran would not
+suffer us to be disturbed. The sun had already risen, and the ascent
+looked most formidable. Invoking the courage of our ancestors, we
+unfolded the umbrellas and began. We had six hundred steps to climb, and
+steep ones at that. The labor<a name="page_180" id="page_180"></a> caused such perspiration that at any turn
+commanding the breeze we were forced to shield ourselves, the sudden
+evaporation being attended with great danger. The ascent is everywhere
+guarded by loopholes for musketry, and could not be carried by any party
+of human assailants. There is, however, another route of access to the
+fortress, which may be pursued on horseback. It was by this latter path
+that the Greeks ascended during the war of independence. They took the
+fortress from the Turks, but were admitted within the gates by
+treachery. After weary efforts and pauses, we reach the plane of the
+main structure, which consists of a number of independent bastions in
+strong positions, commanding each other and the pass. It was built by
+the Venetians, and vouches for their skill and thoroughness in military
+architecture. The officers receive us, and accommodate us in an airy
+bedroom, whose draughts of air we avoid, being <i>en nage</i> with
+perspiration. We cool by degrees, and enjoy the balcony. A pot of basil
+is offered us for fragrance, at which we smell with little pleasure. We
+are then told the legend of the discovery of the true cross beneath a
+growth of this plant, which circumstance consecrates it among Eastern
+traditions forever. In the mean time a functionary enters, and furtively
+carries away a small box. Not very long afterwards its contents are
+returned in the shape of a cup of delicious coffee for each of us, with
+a piece of the ration bread of the garrison. "This bread," said the
+major, "is made with the hands, as we know, for it is made by the
+soldiers; but the bread you commonly<a name="page_181" id="page_181"></a> eat in Greece is made with the
+feet." Here was indeed a heightening of present enjoyment by a somewhat
+unwelcome disparagement of unavoidable past and future experiences. We
+now proceeded to visit the bastions in detail. Each of them has its own
+name. One is called Miltiades. The most formidable one is called Satan.
+The view from the highest parapet is very grand. We go about, wondering
+at the grim walls and the manifold openings for musketry. They show us
+an enormous cistern for rain water. The place contains several of these,
+and is thus capable of standing a very long siege. We pass an enclosure
+in which are detained "the military prisoners," whoever they may be. As
+a <i>bonne bouche</i> we are promised a sight of the criminals condemned to
+death. These are kept in the strongest recess of the fortress. They lead
+us to it, and bid us look down into a court below, in which we perceive
+twenty-five or more unfortunates refreshing themselves in the open air.
+At the door and grated window of the prison behind them appear the faces
+of others. Stationed on a narrow bridge above stand the military guard,
+whose muskets command the court. These men have all been convicted of
+crimes of violence against the person. Sentence has been passed upon
+them, and its execution follows the convenience and pleasure of the
+officers of the law. At short intervals a little group of them is led
+out to endure the last penalty. "Do not pity them, madam," said the
+major; "they have all done deeds worthy of death." But how not to pity
+them, when they and we are made of the same fragile<a name="page_182" id="page_182"></a> human stuff, that
+corrupts so easily to crime, and is always redeemable, if society would
+only afford the costly process of redemption. A sad listlessness hung
+over the melancholy group. Some of them were busied in preparing
+breakfast&mdash;coffee, probably. Most of them sat or stood quite idly, with
+the terrible guns bristling above them. They looked up in our women's
+faces as if they sought there something, some compassionate glance that
+might recall mother or sweetheart&mdash;if such people have them. One old
+brigand lifted his voice, and petitioned the officers that his single
+daily hour of fresh air might be extended to two hours, pleading the
+pain he suffered in his eyes. This was granted. Our guides directed our
+attention to a man of elastic figure and marked face&mdash;tall, athletic,
+and blond. All that they could tell us was, that there seemed to be
+something remarkable about this man, as, indeed, his appearance
+indicated. In his face, more than in those of the others, we observed
+the blank that Hope leaves when her light is extinguished. All days, all
+things, were alike to him now; the dark, close prison behind, before him
+only the day when one in command shall say, "This is thy last!" If the
+priest shall then have any hidden comfort to bestow upon him! Shade of
+Jesus, we will hope so!</p>
+
+<p>These men, however, go to death with bold defiance, singing and
+laughing. A rude sympathy and admiration from the multitude gives them
+the last thrill of pleasure. As I looked at them, I was struck by a
+feeling of their helplessness. What is there in the world<a name="page_183" id="page_183"></a> so helpless
+as a disarmed criminal? No inner armor has he to beat back the rude
+visiting of society; no secure soul-citadel, where scorn and anger
+cannot reach him. He has thrown away the jewel of his manhood; human law
+crushes its empty case. But the final Possessor and Creditor is unseen.</p>
+
+<p>In our wanderings we catch glimpses of a pretty little garden, disposed
+in terraces, and planted with flowers, vegetables, and vines. This
+garden recalls to memory a gentle-hearted commandant who planted it,
+loving flowers, and therefore not hating men. It is a little gone to
+decay since he left it, but its presence here is a welcome and useful
+boon. After visiting its beds and borders, we take leave of the
+hospitable officers, and by rapid and easy descent return to the
+prefecture, where the breakfast-table is set, and where a large tea-pot
+and heaped dish of rice attest the hospitable efforts of our host.</p>
+
+<p>I have only forgotten to say that on one of the ramparts of the fortress
+they showed us two old Venetian cannon, both of which served in the last
+revolution; and further, that, in returning, passing through the old
+gate of the town, we saw sculptured in stone the winged lion of St.
+Mark, the valorous device of Venice.</p>
+
+<h2>A<small>RGOS</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>We found the prefect at the very maximum of excitement. Another telegram
+concerning the brigands, and yet another. Kitzos is closely beleaguered
+by peasants and gens-d'armes; he cannot get away. Another head<a name="page_184" id="page_184"></a> will be
+brought in, and the country will be free of its scourge. With much
+jumping up and declaiming, our entertainer shared the morning meal with
+us. We feed the discontented servant, whose views of life appeared to be
+dismal, kissed the sweet-eyed children of the family, and, as a party,
+leaped into two carriages, leaving the prefect intent upon welcoming
+with grim hospitality the prospective heads of bandits, which did not
+hinder him from shaking hands with us, cordially inviting us to return
+to the shelter of his roof. But shelter was not for us under any roof,
+save the ambulating cover of the carriage. We were now <i>en route</i> for
+Argos. Our drivers were clothed alike, in well-worn bags of blue
+homespun, peaked babouches without stockings, and handkerchiefs bound
+about the head. The thermometer was ranging in the upper regions. Dust
+and overwhelming heat assail us. Stopping to water the well-flogged
+horses, we take refuge for a few minutes in a shady garden, planted with
+flowers, vines, and merciful trees with flat, not pointed, foliage. We
+sit around a tiny fountain, at whose small spouts the smaller bees
+refresh themselves on the wing. This sojourn is brief; our next halt is
+on the burning, dusty high-road, where the chief veteran says, "Tiryns,"
+and leads a very forlorn hope across thorny fields and stony ditches to
+a Cyclopean ruin&mdash;a side and angle of old wall, built after the manner
+so denominated, and so solidly that it outlasts at least three thousand
+years. We stand and consider this grim old remnant as long and as
+attentively as the fear of sun-stroke will permit. The<a name="page_185" id="page_185"></a> veteran,
+however, leads us farther in pursuit of a cave in which, during the war
+of Greek independence, he was wont to seek shelter from sun and rain.
+This cave is probably one of the galleries of the ancient fortress; for
+that the ruin was a fortress, they say who know. It is perhaps twenty
+yards in length, and three in its greatest height; for it has a pointed
+roof, laboriously formed by the fitting and approximation of the two
+sides, no arch being then invented. The stones that form this roof are
+very large, rather broken than hewn, and are laid together with great
+care. Some of them are of very hard material. From these most venerable
+relics we creep back, under the deadly fire of the sun, to the carriage.
+The remainder of our drive leads across the plain of Argos, the "courser
+feeding," as Homer denominates it. We come in sight of its lofty
+Acropolis long before we reach the town, through whose narrow streets we
+drive, and after a brief pause at the prefecture, find rest and shelter
+in a private house.</p>
+
+<p>The proprietors of this house ranked among the best people of the
+place&mdash;<i>oi megaloi</i>, as the multitude naively denominate them. They
+received us in a large <i>salon</i> without carpets, darkened by green
+blinds, and furnished with a mahogany centre table and chairs, all of a
+European pattern, with a cushioned divan occupying one corner of the
+room, according to the favorite fashion of these parts. The lady of the
+house wore a dress of ordinary figured jacconet, open at the neck, and a
+red fez, around which her own hair was bound in a braid. Her husband
+appeared in full Palicari dress, with an<a name="page_186" id="page_186"></a> irrepproachable fustanella,
+and handsome jacket and leggings. They welcomed us with great
+cordiality, and bestirred themselves to minister to our necessities.
+Gliko and water were immediately brought us, together with the vinegar
+for my fevered hands. We next begged for mattresses, which were brought
+and spread on the floor of a bedroom adjoining. The four feminines, as
+usual, dropped down in a row. In the drawing-room mattresses were
+arranged for the gentlemen. We rested from 12.30 until 2 P. M., the hour
+appointed for the distribution of clothing to the destitute Cretans, of
+whom there is a large settlement at Argos. For I may as well mention
+here that our pursuit of pleasures and antiquities in the terms of this
+expedition was entirely secondary to the plans of our veteran for
+clothing the nakedness of these poor exiles. In his energetic company we
+now walked to a large building with court enclosed&mdash;a former convent, in
+whose corridors our eager customers, restrained by one or two officials,
+were in waiting. We were ushered into a well-sized room, in which lay
+heaps of cotton under-clothing, and of calico dresses, most of them in
+the shape of sacks and skirts. These were the contents of one or two
+boxes recently arrived from Boston. Some of them were recognized as
+having connection with a hive of busy bees who used to gather weekly in
+our own New England parlor. And what stress there was! and what
+hurrying! And how the little maidens took off their feathery bonnets and
+dainty gloves, wielding the heavy implements of cutting, and eagerly
+adjusting the<a name="page_187" id="page_187"></a> arms and legs, the gores and gathers! With patient pride
+the mother trotted off to the bakery, that a few buns might sustain
+these strenuous little cutters and sewers, whose tongues, however active
+over the charitable work, talked, we may be sure, no empty nonsense nor
+unkind gossip. For charity begins indeed at home, in the heart, and,
+descending to the fingers, rules also the rebellious member whose
+mischief is often done before it is meditated. At the sight of these
+well-made garments a little swelling of the heart seized us, with the
+love and pride of remembrance so dear. But sooner than we could turn
+from it to set about our business, the Cretans were in presence.</p>
+
+<p>Here they come, called in order from a list, with names nine syllables
+long, mostly ending in <i>poulos</i>, a term signifying descent, like the
+Russian "witzch." Here they come, the shapely maiden, the sturdy matron,
+the gray-haired grandmother, with little ones of all small sizes and
+ages. Many of the women carried infants at the breast; many were
+expectant of maternity. Not a few of them were followed by groups of
+boys and girls. Most of them were ill-clothed; many of them appeared
+extremely destitute of attire. A strong, marked race of people, with
+powerful eyes, fine black hair, healthy complexions, and symmetrical
+figures. They bear traces of suffering. Some of the infants have pined;
+but most of them promise to do well. Each mother cherishes and shows her
+little beggar in the approved way. The children are usually robust,
+although showing in their appearance the<a name="page_188" id="page_188"></a> very limited resources of
+their parents. Some of the women have tolerable gowns; to these we give
+only under-clothing. Others have but the rag of a gown&mdash;a few stripes of
+stuff over their coarse chemises. These we make haste to cover with the
+beneficent growth of New England factories. They are admitted in groups
+of three or four at a time. As many of us fly to the heaps of clothing,
+and hastily measure them by the length and breadth of the individual. A
+papa, or priest, keeps order among them. He wears his black hair uncut,
+a narrow robe much patched, and holds in his hand a rosary of beads,
+which he fingers mechanically. We work at this distribution for a couple
+of hours, and return to the house to take some necessary refreshment. We
+find a dinner-table set for us in one of the sleeping-rooms, and are
+cordially invited to partake of fish cooked in oil, bread, acrid cheese,
+cucumbers, olives, and cherries, together with wine which our Greek
+companions praised as highly stomachic, but which to us seemed at once
+bitter, sour, and insipid&mdash;a wine without either sugar or sparkle, dull
+as a drug, sufficient of itself to overthrow the whole Bacchic
+dispensation. Having enjoyed the repast, we returned to the Cretan
+settlement, and continued the distribution of the clothing until all
+were provided. The dresses did not quite hold out, but sufficed to
+supply the most needy, and, in fact, the greater number. Of the
+under-clothes we carried back a portion, having given to every one. To
+an old papa (priest) who came, looking ill and disconsolate, I sent two
+shirts and a good dark woollen jacket. Among all of these, only one<a name="page_189" id="page_189"></a>
+discontented old lady demurred at the gift bestowed. She wanted a gown,
+but there was none; so that she was forced to content herself, much
+against her will, with some under-clothing. The garments supplied, of
+which many were sent by the Boston Sewing Circle, under the
+superintendence of Miss Abby W. May, proved to be very suitable in
+pattern and in quality. The good taste of their assortment gave them an
+air of superiority over the usual dress of the poor in this and other
+countries of the old world. The proportion of children's clothing was
+insufficient; but who could have foreseen that the Cretans would have
+had such large families of such little children? Finally, we rejoiced in
+the philanthropic energy of our countrywomen, and in the good appearance
+of our domestic manufactures. As we descended the steps, we met with
+some of the children, already arrayed in their little clean shirts, and
+strutting about with the inspiration of fresh clothing, long unfelt by
+them.</p>
+
+<p>We now went on foot to visit a fine amphitheatre in the neighborhood of
+the town, called by the ignorant "the tomb of Helen." The seats are hewn
+out of the solid rock, and occupy the whole ascent of a lofty hill-side.
+From the ground to the middle row they were faced with fine white
+marble. The remainder consisted simply of the stone itself, without
+covering. The division first mentioned is in better condition than the
+second, the marble incasement having protected the softer stone against
+the action of the elements. In front are some remains which probably
+represent the stage and its background. The extent embraced is
+unusually<a name="page_190" id="page_190"></a> large; and as we sat in the chief seats and looked towards
+the proscenium, we wondered a little as to what manner of entertainment
+could be given to an assembly so vast. The ancient masks were indeed
+necessary to enable the distant portion of the audience to have any idea
+of the expression of countenance intended to be conveyed. But I should
+suppose that games of strength and agility, races, combats of wild
+beasts, would have been best suited to such an arena. To us it was
+sufficiently melancholy in its desertion and desecration&mdash;grass and
+thorny shrubs growing profusely between its defaced stones, the heavy
+twilight forming the background, while the stars that enlivened the
+evening were real ones, not their human symbols. As we descended,
+however, from our half hour of contemplation, we received notice of the
+incursion of busy western life even into this charmed domain. In a field
+hard by, a threshing machine was winnowing the Argive grain,&mdash;a thing of
+wonder to the inhabitants, probably an object of suspicion,&mdash;the
+property of a rich land-owner. Beggars are rare in Greece; but the Argos
+children followed us both to and from the amphitheatre with mendicant
+solicitations. They went thither under the plea of showing us the way,
+and pursued our return under that of being paid for the same. We
+endeavored to satisfy two or three of them; but, the whole troop
+following and tormenting, one of our companions appealed in Greek to the
+parents, as we passed their thatched dwellings. These called off the
+little hounds with threats of the bastinado. We reached the<a name="page_191" id="page_191"></a> hospitable
+roof of our entertainers, first taking a lemonade at a little booth in
+the dark street. The mattresses were spread, the sick hands bathed, and
+we lay down to rest as we could, an early start being before us. A
+variety of insects preyed upon us, and made not very unwelcome the
+dawning of the early hour that saw us roused and dressed.</p>
+
+<p>But here I have forgotten to make mention of a fact which had much to do
+with our immediate movements at this time. The evening of our sojourn in
+Argos saw an excitement much like that which blocked the street in
+Nauplia. The occasion was the same&mdash;the bringing home of a brigand's
+head; but this the very head and front of all the brigands, Kitzos
+himself, upon whose head had been set a prize of several thousand
+drachmas. Our veteran with difficulty obtained a view of the same, and
+reported accordingly. The robber chief, the original of Edmond About's
+"Hadji Stauros," had been shot while sighting at his gun. He had fallen
+with one eye shut and one open, and in this form of feature his
+dissevered head remained. The soldier who was its fortunate captor
+carried it concealed in a bag, with its long elf-locks lying loose about
+it. He showed it with some unwillingness, fearing to have the prize
+wrested from him. It was, however, taken on board of our steamer, and
+carried to Athens, there to be identified and buried.</p>
+
+<p>All this imported to us that Mycenæ, which we desired to visit, had for
+some time been considered unsafe on account of the presence of this very
+Kitzos and his band. But at this moment the band were closely besieged<a name="page_192" id="page_192"></a>
+in the mountains. They wanted their Head, and so did Kitzos. We, in
+consequence, were fully able to visit the treasure of Atreus and the
+ruins of Mycenæ without fear or risk from those acephalous enemies.
+Taking leave therefore of our friendly entertainers with many thanks,
+"polloi, polloi," we sprang again into the dusty carriages, and the
+sunburnt youths in blue bagging drove us out upon the wide plain to a
+spot where we were desired to dismount and make our way over a thorny
+and flinty hill-side to the spot in question. Such walking, in all of
+Greece with which I became acquainted, is difficult and painful. It is
+scarcely possible to avoid treading on the closely-growing bushes of
+nettles. To come in contact with these is like putting one's foot on a
+cushion of needles whose sharp points should be uppermost. Where you
+shun these, the small, pointed stones present difficulty as great.
+Creeping up from the plain, crying out for assistance and sympathy,
+beneath a sun already burning, we came to the entrance of the cave to
+which they give the name of the tomb of Agamemnon. This is an opening in
+the hill-side. Its door has long been wanting, but the formidable
+door-posts still remain. Two heavily-built stone sides support a single,
+horizontal stone, twenty-seven feet in length, by perhaps eight in
+breadth, and about the same in thickness. The door obviously swung open
+from the bottom; the traces in the stone-work make this clear. The cave
+itself is hollowed out from the height and depth of the hill. It is
+lined with large stones, carefully fitted to each other, and is in the
+shape of a rounded cone, whose gradual diminution to<a name="page_193" id="page_193"></a> the top is very
+symmetrical. Here a small aperture, partly covered by a stone, admits
+the light. The perfection of the work in its kind is singular. From this
+outer chamber, an opening admits you to an inner cave, without light, in
+which they suppose the treasure to have been kept. This is much smaller
+than the first chamber, and, like it, is heavily lined with squared
+stone. A fire of dry brush enables us to distinguish so much; but our
+observations are somewhat hurried, for the chill of these interterranean
+passages, acting upon the perspiration that bathes our limbs, suggests
+terrible fears of an untimely end to be attained in some inflammatory
+and painful way.</p>
+
+<p>The outer structure, of which I have endeavored to give some idea, is,
+however, indescribable, and the manner of its building scarcely
+comprehensible in these days. It suggests a time whose art must be as
+far removed from ours as its nature, and whose solid and simple
+construction takes little heed of the passage of time.</p>
+
+<p>From the treasure of Atreus to the old citadel and gate of Mycenæ, we
+pass, by a few painful steps, through thorns, stones, and dust. Here we
+sit and meditate, as well as we are able. Mycenæ was in ruins in Homer's
+time. This gate and citadel go back at least to the time of Agamemnon.
+In one of the tragedies of Sophocles, Electra and Orestes meet before
+the gate of Mycenæ, which we naturally suppose to have been this one.
+Its heavy stone masonry is surmounted by a curious sculpture, a
+bas-relief, representing two lions aspiring to a column that stands
+between them. The column is one<a name="page_194" id="page_194"></a> of the ancient symbols of Apollo, and
+is met with in some of the coins of the period. Agamemnon, Cassandra,
+Clytemnestra,&mdash;this trio of ghosts will serve to fill up for us the
+ancient gateway. Of the city nothing remains save the walls of the
+citadel, the space within being now piled up and grassed over by the
+action of time. At the present day, this citadel would be of little
+avail, being itself commanded by an adjacent hill, from which artillery
+would soon knock it into pieces. The walls just mentioned are solidly
+built of squared stone, laid together without mortar. The briefness of
+our time hurried us away before we had taken in half the significance of
+the spot. But so it was, and we turned with regret from a mere survey of
+objects that deserve much study.</p>
+
+<p>We were now to find our way back to Nauplia, but our fasting condition
+compelled us to pause for a moment at a little khan, whose energetic
+mistress bestirred herself, with small materials, to make us
+comfortable. The morning shadow threw her window in the dark. We
+gathered around it, escaping for the moment the scorching heat of the
+sun. Near us a traveller on a donkey rested himself and his patient
+beast. The little woman had blue eyes and chestnut hair, bound with a
+handkerchief. She offered us cold fish, fried in oil, from her frying
+pan. Each of us took a fish by the tail, and devoured it as we could.
+Cucumbers were next handed to us. Of these we ate with salt, which the
+mistress strewed with her fingers on the wooden window-sill, together
+with a little pepper. Wine and water she<a name="page_195" id="page_195"></a> dipped out for us, the one
+from a barrel, the other from an earthen jar. We had brought with us two
+large loaves of bread from Argos, which greatly assisted our pedestrian
+meal. The mistress rinsed the glasses with her own hands, not over
+clean. When we had eaten, she poured water over our hands, offering us a
+piece of soap and a towel. As we laughed, she laughed&mdash;we at her want of
+accommodation, she probably rejoicing in its sufficiency. We now
+returned to our carriages, and drove back to Nauplia, and through
+Nauplia down to the quay, where our boats were waiting for us. The
+remainder of the day we passed on board the steamer, reaching Porus at
+sunset, and going on shore to visit its fine arsenal, and narrow, dirty
+streets. In the arsenal, with other heroes, hangs the portrait of
+Bouboulina, the famous woman who did such good naval service in the war
+of Greek independence. She commanded a ship, and her patriotic efforts
+were acknowledged by conferring on her the style and title of admiral.</p>
+
+<p>From the roof of the arsenal we enjoyed a beautiful view of the harbor.
+The town, as seen at a little distance, has rather an inviting aspect.
+On a nearer view, it offers little to detain the traveller. We passed
+along the quay, looking at the groups of men, occupied with coffee or
+the narghilé, and soon regained our boat and steamer. The Greeks, we are
+told, give Porus a nickname which signifies "Pig-city," just as our
+Cincinnati is sometimes called "Porkopolis." But the pigs in Porus are
+human.<a name="page_196" id="page_196"></a></p>
+
+<h2>E<small>GINA</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>We passed this night on board of the steamer, first supping luxuriously
+on deck, by the light of various lanterns fastened to the masts and
+bulwarks of the ship. The next morning saw us early awake and on foot to
+visit the Temple of Egina. The steamer came to anchor near the shore,
+and its boats soon conveyed us to land. We found on the shore two
+donkeys with pack-saddles, upon which two of us adventured to ascend the
+long and weary eminence. The temple is one of the most beautiful remains
+that we have seen. Its columns are of the noblest Doric structure. A
+number of them are still standing. His majesty of Munich and Montes
+robbed this temple, at some convenient moment of political confusion. He
+had a statue or so, perhaps several, and pulled down the architrave to
+obtain the bas-reliefs. Can we wonder that the Greeks do not punish
+brigandage after such royal precedents in its favor. A fine lion in
+marble, twenty feet in length, was taken from this temple, either by
+this or a similar marauding. The lion was sawn in three pieces, that it
+might be more conveniently conveyed by boat. But, being left over night,
+the peasants, in their rage, came and destroyed with their hammers what
+they were not able to protect. Here no diplomatic interference was
+possible, and the fact accomplished had to be accepted.</p>
+
+<p>This temple stands upon one of those breezy eminences so often selected
+by the Greeks for their places of worship and defence. It commands a
+wide view of<a name="page_197" id="page_197"></a> the sea and surrounding islands. On the opposite island of
+Salamis they show you Xerxes' Seat, the spot from which he contemplated
+the land he intended to enslave. Here the inexorable veteran conceded to
+us a pleasant half hour, enabling us to survey the fine columns from
+various points of view, and to enjoy fully the beauty of their
+surroundings. Too soon, however, came the summons to descend. I again
+mounted the ass, but found my sideward and unsupported seat only
+maintainable by a gymnastic of the severest order. I yielded, therefore,
+this uneasy accommodation to one who might bestride the beast at his
+ease, being quite of the opinion of the Irishman, who, having been
+regaled with a ride in a bottomless sedan chair, said that, if it was
+not for the name of it, it was not much better than walking. In the same
+way I concluded that to be so badly carried by the ass was almost as bad
+as to carry him myself. We were soon on board and afloat again, and a
+few hours of sea travel, cherished for their coolness, brought us back
+to busy Piræus, and thence to torrid Athens, where the great heats now
+begin. We had meditated a change of hotel at the time of our leaving
+Athens, and had contemplated a fine apartment at lower charges in an
+establishment opposite to our own. But our hitherto landlord was too
+much for us. He was down at Piræus to receive us. The veteran yielded to
+his dangerous smile, and after a brief parley, implying a slight
+enlargement in accommodations, we found ourselves bagged, and carried
+back to the Hotel des Etrangers. Here the servants cordially welcomed
+us, and made us much at<a name="page_198" id="page_198"></a> home. I regretted a certain beautiful view of
+the Acropolis commanded by the hotel opposite, but my view was outvoted;
+and we gave ourselves up again to the imprisonment of our small rooms,
+and to the darkness which is a necessary attendant upon summer life in
+Athens. And the gallant vision of the Parados, with its prow turned to
+the sea, and of lofty climbings, and monument-seeking wanderings, faded
+from all but these notes, in which so much of it as may live is
+faithfully preserved.</p>
+
+<h2>D<small>AYS IN</small> A<small>THENS</small>.</h2>
+
+<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="poetry">
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 0em;">"As idle as a painted ship</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 0.25em;">Upon a painted ocean."</span></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>O, there were many of them, each hotter and stiller than the other. All
+night we steamed and sleepily suffered beneath the mosquito-net. In the
+morning we arose betimes. We smiled to each other at breakfast, sighed
+at dinner, were dumb at tea-time. The whole long day held its flaming
+sword at our door. Sun-stroke and fever threatened us, should we cross
+the threshold. Visits were tame, and carriages expensive. For many days
+we sat still, doing little. This is what people call "being thrown upon
+one's own resources." But to those accustomed to active and energetic
+life it is rather a being thrown off from all that usually renders the
+passage of time pleasurable and useful. Even those dull days had,
+however, their distinctions. And, like a picture of our Indian summer,
+hazy, dreamy, and indistinct, so will I try to give a color picture of
+that unheroic time, in which we grew ungrateful for classic
+surroundings,<a name="page_199" id="page_199"></a> forgetful of great names and histories, and sat and
+sewed, and said, "How long?"</p>
+
+<p>First, the little newsboys in the street who shriek, "<i>Pende leptà!</i>"
+calling the price of the paper for the paper itself. This music one may
+hear at any hour of the day when there is news from Crete, or when a
+steamer has arrived from England for the Cretan service, or when
+anything takes place that can motive the publishing of an extra. The
+veteran catches one day one of these curious little insects. He is
+barefoot, his hair is wild, his eyes are wilder. His extra is a single
+column, scarcely ten inches long; and over this he dares to make as much
+noise as if it were an issue of the New York Herald, or the Tribune
+itself, with white-haired Greeley at its back.</p>
+
+<p>Next, the funerals, starting always with music, and bearing flat disks
+of gilded metal, something in the style of the Roman eagles. At one time
+a mortality prevailed among children, and the little coffins were
+carried through the street, with mournful sounds of wind instruments. We
+saw several military funerals. In these the deceased is carried by hand
+in a crimson velvet coffin, bound with silver lace. A glass cover shows
+him at full length. The velvet cover that corresponds with the coffin
+itself is carried before in an upright position. The hearse, drawn by
+four or five horses, follows. Priests walk along, and chant prayers in
+the intervals of the music, which on these occasions is supplied by a
+full band. A body of soldiers also makes part of the pageant. Friends
+and relatives walk after, carrying the<a name="page_200" id="page_200"></a> large cambric parasols so much
+in vogue here. As the cemetery is at some distance from the town, the
+hearse probably serves later for the transport of the body. But I from
+my window always saw it following in empty state. The friends all go to
+the church, where the prayers and orations occupy from one to two hours.
+The deceased is usually in full dress, and the countenance is often
+painted in white and red. The gilded symbols which are carried, and the
+wild tones of the wind instruments, give to those processions a somewhat
+barbaric aspect, as compared with the sober mourning of countries more
+familiar to ourselves. But there is nothing grim in the Greek funeral;
+it seems rather a cheerful and friendly attendance, and compares
+favorably with the <i>luxe</i> of English burials, their ingenious ugliness
+and tasteless exaggeration of all that is gloomy and uncongenial to
+life.</p>
+
+<p>Next, the out-of-door life and music. The first is, of course, limited
+by the severe heat of the day. Eight A. M. is a fashionable hour for
+being abroad. You will then find the market thronged. You will encounter
+seated groups, who take their coffee or smoke their cigar. Many
+carriages drive past, conveying people in easy circumstances to Faleran,
+a small harbor three miles distant from Athens, where the luxury of
+sea-bathing is enjoyed. At nine A. M. the best of the military bands
+begins to play before the palace. I have their <i>repertoire</i> pretty well
+in mind, having listened to its repetition for three weeks past. They
+play most of the airs from the Barbiere di Seviglia, the overture to
+Othello, and<a name="page_201" id="page_201"></a> sundry marches and polkas. With the early morning period
+begins the crying of fruit in the streets. These cries proceed from men
+who drive before them donkeys laden with rude baskets, in which you see
+potatoes, tomatoes, small squashes, apricots, and other fruits. They
+stop at various doors in our neighborhood, and serve their customers.
+The maid-servants come out. From one of those doors issues with his
+nurse a little child, who is set upon the donkey's back, and allowed to
+stay there while the dealer supplies the houses in the vicinity. This
+little one wears a white cambric weed on his hat to prevent sun-stroke,
+after the manner of greater people.</p>
+
+<p>From ten A. M. to five P. M., the streets are quiet. After the latter
+hour the carriages begin again to roll, though the fashionable drive
+scarcely begins earlier than six o'clock. One drives to Faleran, to the
+Piræus, or, if it be Sunday, to the Polygonon, where the band plays, and
+whither the regent, mounted on a well-bred steed, is sure to betake
+himself. This Polygonon is simply a several-sided pavilion, at a
+distance of a mile and a half from the palace. A crowd of people flock
+to it on Sunday afternoons, either in carriages or on foot, and all in
+their best clothes. At a little distance stands a small café, where
+lemonade and lokumia may be enjoyed, but no ince. The view of the
+Acropolis from this spot is a very pleasant one. But to return to our
+Athenian streets. Carriages are very dear in the afternoon, being in
+request for drives to the bath, which is taken either at Faleran or at
+Pireo. A visit to either place<a name="page_202" id="page_202"></a> refreshes after the long, hot day. When
+you return in the evening, you see the streets and squares about the
+cafés thronged with people sitting at little tables and enjoying ices or
+coffee. The narghilé, or water-pipe, is much in use here. At these
+tables one often sees it. The sacred herb basil, also, whose legend we
+have elsewhere recounted, appears upon these tables, growing in earthen
+pots. You will somewhere encounter the military band, which nightly
+performs in some stated place. But the café opposite our hotel has a
+band every evening, and our discussions of Greek politics and of Cretan
+prospects are frequently interrupted by strains from Norma, Trovatore,
+Traviata, and other late abortions of the muse. From this phrase let me,
+however, even in passing, deliver Norma. This statement carefully
+enumerates the external resources of Athens during waking hours.</p>
+
+<p>Within doors, besides our grave studies, we have visits. Many Greeks and
+Cretans wait upon the veteran, together with American consuls, and
+Cretan women bringing silks, laces, and stockings of their own
+manufacture, or petitioning for little special helps over and above the
+forty lepta per diem allowed to each of them by the committee. Some
+mysterious consultations are there, bent on merciful conspiracies and
+Heaven-approved stratagems. Omer Pacha and his army have surrounded the
+unhappy Island of Candia, and are tightening their folds like a huge
+serpent. The severity of the blockade is starving to death the women and
+children who are shut up in the towns, or hidden in caves and<a name="page_203" id="page_203"></a> recesses
+of the mountains. England meanwhile feasts the sultan, and pledges the
+bloody toast of non-interference. How comfortable is the water-proof by
+which my Lords Derby and Stanley ward off the approach of any fact that
+might induce compassion or compel indignation! Sympathy at every
+entrance quite shut out, and at every appeal for mercy a fat English
+laugh, echoed by the House, which may make the angels weep. Smart Argyle
+keeps heart of grace against this squad of the heartless. He even takes
+the trouble to get facts from Greece from sources less poisoned with
+prejudice than the Times' correspondent.<a name="FNanchor_A_1" id="FNanchor_A_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_A_1" class="fnanchor">[A]</a> And I am fain to believe
+that a Scotch Presbyterian may easily have more heart, brains, and
+religion than one who combines church and state with the betting-book,
+and, among all races, honors least the human race.</p>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_A_1" id="Footnote_A_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_A_1"><span class="label">[A]</span></a> It is only fair to state here that the Times'
+correspondent, minus his Mishellenism, is a most genial, accomplished,
+and hospitable person.</p></div>
+
+<p>Our war upon the Turks is a war of biscuit and of cotton cloth. We run
+every permissible risk to feed the hungry and clothe the naked, both of
+these terms being of literal application. Our agent lands his
+insufficient cargo, and before his errand is known, the moan and wail of
+the suffering ones break out from hill-side and cavern. <i>Psomi!</i>
+<i>psomi!</i> for God's sake, bread! And here comes the sad procession. The
+merciful man is ashamed to look at the women; their rags do not cover
+them. Hunted are they and starved like beasts. But the sultan feasts in
+England well. O, brave and merciful hearts of men and women, be lifted<a name="page_204" id="page_204"></a>
+up to help them. And O, noble people, poor and hard-working,
+unsophisticated by theories which make the Turk's dominion a necessary
+nuisance, and his religion a form of Christianity, do you come forward,
+and make common cause with Christ's poor and oppressed, whose faces are
+ground, whose chains are riveted, in his name.</p>
+
+<p>Last evening the veteran received his Cretan mail. The biscuits arrived
+safely. The letters which acknowledge them begin with, "Glory to the
+triune God!" They then invoke blessings on the American people, and
+fervently thank the veteran, who has been at once the provoker of their
+zeal and the distributor of their bounty. Such thanks are painful; they
+make us feel the agonized suffering to which our small largess gives a
+momentary relief. The Arkadi, our blockade-runner, after landing her
+cargo, took on board more than three hundred women and children, fleeing
+from the last extremities of want and misery. This morning appears at
+the door of our hotel a little group of these unfortunates&mdash;a mother
+with four small children, the youngest a little nursing babe. Bread we
+give them, and a line to the committee. We ask the woman if she would
+not go back to Crete. "O God! no," she replies: "the Turks would murder
+us."</p>
+
+<p>Before the letters came, last evening, we heard continual cries of
+"Pende lepta," betokening the issue of an extra. The servant buys one
+and brings it. The news from Crete is, that Mechmet Pacha has been in a
+measure surrounded by the Cretans. Our veteran shakes his head, and
+fears that it is otherwise. A little later come in some of our Cretan
+friends, together with<a name="page_205" id="page_205"></a> one or two new faces. They are hopeful and in
+some excitement. In the midst of this arrives the Cretan budget, as
+before mentioned. Eagerly indeed are the letters devoured. But the
+veteran remains thoughtful, and not sanguine. And when we are alone, I
+find that he will go at once to France and England, jog the easy
+conscience of diplomacy, and appeal to the sense and sympathy of the
+people. I utter a hearty "God speed!" We had intended visiting
+Constantinople; but that is now given up, and scarcely regretted, so
+urgent is the need of doing all that can be done for Crete.</p>
+
+<h2>E<small>XCURSIONS</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>To return to matters purely personal. I must not set down the heat and
+monotony of long days in Athens without stating also the <i>per contras</i>
+of freshness and enjoyment which have been paid in by various small
+undertakings and excursions. First among these I will mention a morning
+meeting under the columns of Jupiter Olympius. A small party of us, by
+appointment, started at five A. M., and reached the columns, some ten
+minutes later. They stand quite flatly on a large plain, lifting their
+Corinthian capitals high in the blue empyrean. But this we have already
+described elsewhere. On this occasion we take seats in the comforting
+shadow, around a little table, and call for coffee, lemonade, and
+lokumias. The early morning is very beautiful. A company of soldiers
+goes through its drill quite near us. Presently its officers also
+retreat under the shadows, take chairs and a table, and call for what
+pleases them best. The regimental band plays an<a name="page_206" id="page_206"></a> air or two, perhaps in
+compliment to the neophytes, who are of our company. We enjoy the unique
+scene and combination&mdash;the picturesque costumes, the beauties and
+associations of the spot. So rampant does this effort make us, that we
+determine to have a meeting in the Acropolis in the afternoon of this
+very day, of cloudless promise, like its fellows.</p>
+
+<p>We disperse and return home before the severe heat of the morning sets
+in; and this is well, for between the shade of the pepper-tree walk and
+the shade of the columns there is a long tract of sunny expanse. At this
+hour it is quite endurable; an hour later it becomes overpowering. We
+pass the day after the usual fashion. At six o'clock in the afternoon we
+do meet in the Acropolis, and hold poetic session in a sheltered corner
+of the Parthenon. She who was there invited to read her own and other
+verses felt an especial joy and honor in so doing. And we had
+recitations besides, and singing, and Bengal lights, which the fairest
+of moons put to shame. And we went home afterwards with great
+reluctance.</p>
+
+<p>We had three windy days in Athens, really of a cool and boisterous
+quality. We took advantage of one of them to visit Eleusis, where stood
+the great Temple of Ceres, famous as the scene of initiation into the
+Eleusinian mysteries, which formed an epoch in the youth of every Greek.
+The road to it leads through Daphne, the spot on which Apollo is
+supposed to have chased the classic nymph. The rose laurels (oleanders)
+still bloom on its somewhat barren soil. The way leads also by the sea,<a name="page_207" id="page_207"></a>
+commanding a refreshing outlook on the same. A modern Albanian village
+covers the greater part of the space formerly occupied by the temple. As
+the day is Sunday, we find the inhabitants walking about in picturesque
+costumes, the men in embroidered jackets or goatskin capotes, the
+shoulder of the garment expanding into a wide, short sleeve; the women
+in narrow skirts, wearing long, narrow redingotes without sleeves, in a
+coarse white woollen material, with two rows of black embroidery down
+the back, between which falls their long, braided hair, tied at the end
+with a black ribbon. Some of them wore at the waist large girdle-clasps,
+composed of two disks of silvered copper, not unlike a belt ornament
+worn by ladies in our own country. We asked leave to enter one of the
+small thatched cottages. It consisted of a single room. The walls were
+neatly whitewashed. An earthen pot was boiling upon a fire of sticks. I
+saw no furniture except a low wooden chest, on which was seated an old
+woman, the grandmother of the family. Several young women occupied the
+hut with her; all had small children with them. They stood about, all
+but one, who sat on the floor in a corner, soothing a sick and crying
+child. Of the ruins of the temple a small angle only is exposed. It
+includes some square yards of marble pavement, fragments of pillars, and
+one very large and fine Corinthian capital. It shows, besides this, some
+remnants of masonry indicating a number of small chambers. Near it is a
+wall, piled up of large pieces of the finest Greek marble, roughly
+broken with a hammer&mdash;the wreck, obviously,<a name="page_208" id="page_208"></a> of former walls or columns.
+The magnitude of the temple is marked by some stones lying quite at the
+other end of the village street: the space between these and those first
+mentioned would indicate a building of enormous extent. Much of its
+ruined material probably underlies the little village, and will scarcely
+be brought to light in these times. A small cabin adjacent is dignified
+with the title of museum. To this we were admitted by a custode, an old
+soldier, who has it in charge. The collection consists of a mass of
+small fragments, some of which formerly belonged to statues, some to
+architectural sculptures. We saw little to move the cupidity of the
+visitor, but tried to bargain for one relic less ugly than the rest; in
+vain, however. A Frenchman, not long ago, took from these ruins many
+valuable objects, marbles, and even jewelry; since which time the
+government has strictly forbidden these Elgin thefts. The custode's
+domestic arrangements amused me more than did his museum. There was one
+very poor little tin, in which he boiled his coffee; another, smaller
+and more miserable, held oil and a wick. He had gunpowder in a gourd.
+His bed was small and much dilapidated. A fragment of mat thrown upon a
+heap of stones was his only seat. Few beggars in America are, probably,
+so ill provided with the appliances of life.</p>
+
+<p>One of the women of the cabin I had visited followed me to the museum,
+and naturally held out her hand for "pende lepta." Yet beggary is very
+rare in Greece, and this petitioner asked in rather a shamefaced
+manner,<a name="page_209" id="page_209"></a> pointing to the little baby on her arm. And this is all that
+there is to narrate of the expedition to Eleusis.</p>
+
+<p>Of a more stately character was the expedition to Kephissia. We started
+at seven in the morning. There were two carriage-loads of our party;
+for, in addition to the veteran's six-syllabled secretary, we were
+accompanied by an amiable Greek family, whose guests we became for the
+day. In the villages that surround Athens there are no hotels or
+lodging-houses of any description. The traveller perforce implores
+hospitality, and usually receives it. On this occasion our friends had
+asked and obtained the key of a large and sumptuous house at Kephissia,
+whose owners are absent. They had also secured the company of three
+<i>gens d'armes</i>, who galloped along the dusty road beside us. The drive
+at this early hour was cool and most refreshing. The only drawback to
+its comfort was the dust, which the foremost carriage could not avoid
+sending back to that which followed. We reached first the village of
+Maroussi, a pretty, shady little place, in whose café we saw a group of
+peasants playing at cards. The usual appliances, coffee and tobacco,
+were also visible. Here we stopped to water the horses. A handsome
+marble fountain, beneath a shady clump of trees, bears the names of the
+family who caused it to be erected for the public good. Shade and water
+are, indeed, the two luxuries of regions such as these. A little farther
+on, we came to Kephissia, and stopped at the door of the palatial
+residence that was to give us shelter for the day. We entered a hall
+paved with white marble, and ascended<a name="page_210" id="page_210"></a> a marble staircase. We now found
+ourselves in a spacious set of apartments, well kept, and furnished
+according to the Greek theory of summer furniture. Roomy divans extended
+with the walls of each <i>salon</i>, of which there were three, opening one
+into the other. Tables and chairs there were; and, had the proprietors
+resided there, handsome Turkish mats would, no doubt, have variegated
+the bare floors. The chief <i>salon</i> opened upon a balcony commanding an
+extensive view. The fresh wind blew to quite a gale, greatly raising our
+languid energies. On the walls of this apartment hung two
+portraits&mdash;those of the former master and mistress of the house. She was
+sumptuous in dark blue velvet, with a collar of Valenciennes lace and a
+fastening bow of blue plaid ribbon. Her fingers were adorned with rings.
+Her husband appeared in his best broadcloth, wearing on his head a red
+fez with a white under edge. He had begun life in a humble station, and
+had raised himself to great opulence by his own exertions. Something of
+the consciousness of this was expressed in his countenance, which was a
+good-natured one. He and his wife did not long enjoy the fortune so
+justly earned. They died almost before the house at Kephissia was
+finished, bequeathing its magnificence to two young nephews, also rich,
+but resident in Italy.</p>
+
+<p>The freedom of our day here made amends for the many days of hot
+imprisonment passed in the hotel at Athens. Breakfast was necessary on
+first arriving. We then surveyed the bedrooms and made arrangements for
+our midday nap. We found comfortable bedsteads<a name="page_211" id="page_211"></a> of bright metal. The
+servants brought clean mattresses, and unrolled them for us. Water and
+towels we enjoyed in abundance. We then walked out to view the environs.
+And first our steps brought us to an enormous plane tree, under whose
+far-reaching shade the gossips of the village hold their daily meetings.
+The boughs of this tree, with the cleared space under them, formed a
+sort of rustic <i>salon</i>, cool and delightful even in the heat of the day.
+The unfailing café was near at hand; its chairs and tables were
+scattered about these rustic purlieus, and its servants waited for
+orders. Here our companions encountered various acquaintances from the
+city, who have come hither to pass the season of the great heats. They
+wore white veils on their straw hats, as is much the custom here, and
+had altogether the enfranchised air which city men are wont to assume in
+country retirement. Mail and public conveyance they had none. One of our
+party brought them letters, and took the answers back to Athens. We now
+went in search of the source of the Kephisus, called Kefalari. We found
+a deep spring of the purest water, very cool for these parts, and
+constantly welling up. So clear was this pool that one saw without
+impediment the smallest objects at the bottom of the water. There were
+waving trees beside it. We sat down, and drank, and rested. Our walk
+next brought us to a wine factory, and, as we entered to look at it, the
+sound of a grand piano, skilfully touched, arrested us. Our friends
+guessed the unseen artist, and knocked at her door for admittance.
+Entering, we found two ladies,<a name="page_212" id="page_212"></a> mother and daughter, of whom the elder
+was the mistress of the musical instrument. The daughter, very young,
+but already married, bears the historical name of Colocotroni, her
+husband being the grandson of the old revolutionary chieftain of that
+name. These ladies own extensive possessions in this vicinity, and the
+establishment in which we were belonged to them. They have a large villa
+at some distance; but fear of the brigands induces them to be satisfied
+with the shelter of two or three rooms, divided off from the rest of the
+factory, in which they live in comfortable simplicity. The table was
+laid for their <i>déjeûner</i> in a little arbor made of pine tree branches.
+Dinner they took at twilight, without shelter. They entertained us with
+the invariable <i>gliko</i> and water, and, at our request, the elder lady
+gave us a specimen of her skill in dealing with the piano-forte. Madame
+Colocotroni speaks both French and English, and the books and pamphlets
+in her drawing-room had quite a cosmopolitan air of culture.</p>
+
+<p>After these doings, we returned to the great house, and sheltered
+ourselves in its shady rooms. Here reading, worsted work, and
+conversation beguiled the time until dinner was announced. The
+gentlemen, meanwhile, had retired to smoke and discuss political
+questions. The dinner was much too well-appointed for a country picnic.
+Our munificent entertainers had sent out their own valets and <i>chef de
+cuisine</i>. And so we had potage, and entrées, and dessert, with Kephissia
+wine, both white and red, of which I found the former much like a
+Sauterne wine, and very mild and pure in quality.<a name="page_213" id="page_213"></a> One of the guests was
+an Asiatic Greek from Broussa. His politics were of the backward
+sort&mdash;those of the Greek Greeks were radical and progressive. The dinner
+arena developed therefore some amicable differences of opinion. He from
+Broussa gave me a few characteristic particulars of his life. When he
+was but a year old, his father chartered a ship, put much of his
+property on board of her, and sent therewith his children to be educated
+in Europe. After many years of absence, M. L. returned to Broussa, to
+seek some traces of his family. Such as remained of them had been
+compelled by the pressure of circumstances to adopt the Turkish
+language, and to profess Mohammedanism. Their Christian prayers they
+always continued to recite in private, but were fain by every outward
+expedient to escape the ill treatment which Christians receive in a
+country in which Turkish authority is dominant. He told me&mdash;what I hear
+strongly corroborated by other testimony&mdash;that the Turks had often cut
+out the tongues of Greek women, in order that they should not be able to
+teach their children either their own language or their own religion.
+Under these circumstances the gradual absorption of the race in those
+regions seems almost inevitable.</p>
+
+<p>An after-dinner nap and a ramble completed our experience of Kephissia.
+At sunset we started homeward, the carriages all open, the <i>gens
+d'armes</i> galloping, the dust playing a thousand solid antics, and
+writing hieroglyphics of movement all over our garments and faces. We
+found the little village of Maroussi cool<a name="page_214" id="page_214"></a> with the evening shadows, and
+the women and children with their pitchers gathered around the marble
+fountain. We ourselves came back to Athens in a cooled and consoled
+condition, and said at parting, commanding the little Greek we knew,
+<i>Poly kalá-evkaristò</i>.</p>
+
+<h2>H<small>YMETTUS</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>It happened that the next day was fixed upon for a visit to Hymettus,
+whose water is celebrated, as well as its honey. A certain monkless
+monastery on the side of the mountain receives travellers within its
+shady courts, and allows them to feed, rest, and amuse themselves
+according to their own pleasure. We started on this classic journey soon
+after five A. M., carrying with us a basket containing cold chicken,
+bread, and fruit. We filled one carriage; a party of friends accompanied
+us in another. The road to Hymettus is hilly and difficult; and our own
+troubles in travelling it were augmented by those of our friends in the
+foremost carriages, whose horses, at an early period in the ascent,
+began to back and balk. As these horses, who go so ill, insist upon
+going first, and refuse to stir the moment we take the lead, it comes to
+pass that in some steep ascents they press back upon us, to our
+discomfort and danger.</p>
+
+<p>An anxious hour brings us to the convent, which stands at no great
+elevation on the side of the mountain. The sun is already burning, and
+we are glad to take refuge in the shady inner court of the convent,
+where we are to pass the day. Our friends of the other carriage have
+brought with them Hatty, a child two years<a name="page_215" id="page_215"></a> of age, and Marigo, a little
+servant of thirteen. The latter has somewhat the complexion of a
+potato-skin, with vivacious eyes, and dark hair, bound, after the Greek
+fashion, with a handkerchief. A young brother follows on a slow donkey,
+which he belabors to his heart's content.</p>
+
+<p>The court just spoken of is a small enclosure, surrounded on all sides
+by whitewashed walls, of which one includes a small chapel, with its
+tapers and painted images. In one corner a doorway leads into a den
+which must once have served as a kitchen. It is roughly built of stone,
+with no chimney, its roof presenting various apertures for the issue of
+smoke. Here a fire of sticks is hastily kindled on a layer of stones,
+and the coffee, boiled at home, is made hot for us. A wooden table is
+allowed us from the convent, which we decorate with a white cloth and
+green leaves. Rolls, butter, hard-boiled eggs, and fruits, together with
+the coffee, constitute a very presentable breakfast. We have around us
+the shade of vines and of lemon trees. Our repast is gay. When it is
+ended, we amuse ourselves with books, work, and conversation of a scope
+suited to the weather. An Athenian Plato could discourse philosophy in
+the present state of the thermometer. We need it more than ever he did,
+but we cannot attain it.</p>
+
+<p>While we sit cheerful and quiescent, dodging the sharp sunlight, which
+slyly carries one position after another, sounds of laughter from the
+outer court reach our ears. This is a feast day, and in this outer court
+a company<a name="page_216" id="page_216"></a> of Athenian artisans, of the Snug and Bottom order, are
+keeping it after their fashion. Following their voices, we come to a
+shady terrace, where some eight or ten men are seated on the ground
+around a wooden table, one foot in height, while two or three of their
+comrades are employed in cutting up a lamb newly roasted, spitted on a
+long, slender pole.</p>
+
+<p>The cooking apparatus consisted of two or three stones, on which the
+fire of sticks was kindled, and of two forked stakes, planted upright,
+across which the spit and roast were laid. While the two before
+mentioned were hacking the paschal lamb with rude anatomy, a third was
+occupied with the salad, consisting of cucumbers sliced, with green
+herbs, oil, and vinegar. Olives, bread, and wine completed the repast.
+As we stood surveying them, one of their number approached us, bearing
+in one hand a plate containing choice morsels of the roasted meat. This
+he offered to each of us in turn, with great courtesy. In the other hand
+he carried a rather dirty fragment of cotton cloth, which he also
+presented to each in turn, as a towel. We took the meat with our
+fingers, and ate it standing, in true Passover fashion. The doubtful
+accommodation of the table napkin also we were glad to accept. Having
+fed each of us, he presently returned with a glass and bottle of wine,
+which he poured out and offered, saying, "<i>Eleuthera, eleuthera</i>" which
+signifies "free, free." The wine, however, was a little out of rule for
+us, and was therefore declined.<a name="page_217" id="page_217"></a></p>
+
+<p>This man wore neither coat nor shoes, but his manners were full dress.
+His comrades, meanwhile, had fallen to attacking their provisions with a
+hearty good will. When the wine was poured out, a toast was proposed,
+and "<i>Eleutheria tis Cretis</i>" ("the liberty of Crete") rang from every
+lip. "Amen, amen," answered we, and the <i>entente cordiale</i> was at once
+established. Having eaten and drunk, they began to sing in a monotonous
+strain, keeping time by clapping their hands. Retiring to our court, we
+still heard this cadence from theirs. Their song, though little musical,
+had no brutal intonations. It breathed a rather refined good nature and
+hilarity. When we again visited our neighbors, they were dancing. All,
+save two of them, formed a line, joining hands, the leader and the one
+next him holding together by a pocket handkerchief. They sang all the
+while, stepping rather slowly. The leader, at intervals, made as though
+he would sit upon the ground, and then suddenly sprang high, with an
+<i>oich!</i> something like the shout in a Highland fling. In another figure,
+they all lay upon their backs, springing up again quite abruptly, and
+continuing their round.</p>
+
+<p>These doings, together with talking, writing, and needle-work, brought
+on the hour at which, in these climates, sleep becomes necessary. In
+Greece, if you have risen early in the morning, by noon, or soon after,
+you are sensible of a sudden ebb of energy. The marrow seems to forsake
+your bones, the volition your muscles. You may not feel common
+sleepiness, but your skeleton demands instant release from its upright<a name="page_218" id="page_218"></a>
+effort. You ask to become a heap, instead of a pile, and on the offer of
+the first accommodation, you fall like the disjointed column of Jupiter
+Olympius, more fortunate only in the easier renewal of your
+architecture. Such a fall, at this moment, the stiffest of us coveted.</p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile, an ancient hag, from the inner recesses of the building, had
+waited upon us, with copious chattering of her pleasure in seeing us,
+and of the drawback which the brigands had offered to her little
+business of serving the strangers who used to visit the convent before
+Kitzos and others made them afraid. For, the convent no longer
+containing monks, those who occupy it are glad to accommodate visitors
+from Athens and elsewhere. And the hag brought some heavy mats and
+quilts, and spread them on the floor of a little whitewashed out-house.
+And on these the little two-year-old child and others of the party lay
+down and slept. But "<i>e megale kyrie</i>"&mdash;meaning here the elder
+lady,&mdash;said the hag, "cannot sleep on the floor. I have a good bed up
+stairs; she shall lie there."</p>
+
+<p>So up stairs mounted the <i>megale kyrie</i>, and found a quiet room, and a
+bed spread with clean sheets in one corner. A rude chintz lounge, a
+wooden chest, and an eight-inch mirror completed the furniture of this
+apartment. Here, in the bed-corner, the Olympian column of <i>e megale</i>
+fell, and barbarian sleep, sleep of the <i>middle ages</i>, at once seized
+upon it and kept it prostrate. After a brief interval of Gothic
+darkness, the column rose again, and confronted the windows commanding a
+view of the court. On one of its wooden settles lay the<a name="page_219" id="page_219"></a> young Greek
+secretary in wholesome slumber. Not far from him rested the Greek
+missionary, a graduate of Amherst, and a genial and energetic man. And
+presently the two-year-old, waking, desires to waken these also, and
+makes divers attempts against their peace, causing <i>e megale</i> to descend
+for their protection. On her way, in an outer passage, she encounters a
+poor woman, lying on a heap of cedar boughs, and bewailing a bitter
+headache. Dinner-time next arrives. The wooden tables are once more set
+out with meat and fruit. We exert ourselves to give the feast a
+picturesque aspect, and are not altogether unsuccessful in so doing. The
+true feast, however, seems to consist in saying over to one's self,
+"This is Greece&mdash;this is Hymettus. I am I, and I am here." And now the
+greatest heat of the day being overpast, a ramble is proposed.</p>
+
+<p>The young people, escorted by the missionary, climb half the steep
+ascent of the mountain. <i>E megale</i> and the secretary pause in the outer
+court, to whose festivities a new feature is now added. Our friends, the
+artisans, have feasted again, and little of the lamb remains save the
+bones. They are singing and dancing as before, but a strange figure from
+the mountain has joined them. He calls himself a shepherd, but looks
+much like a brigand. He wears a jacket, fustanella, and leggings, of the
+dirtiest possible white&mdash;a white which mocks at all washings, past and
+future. He has taken the leadership of the coryphées, and now executes a
+dance which is called the "Klepht." His sly movements express cunning,
+to which the twinkle of his<a name="page_220" id="page_220"></a> sinister eyes responds. Now he pretends to
+be stabbed from behind; now he creeps cautiously upon a pretended foe.
+His dancing, which is very quiet, fatigues him extremely; but before
+making an end, he performs the feat of carrying a glass of wine on his
+head through various movements, not spilling a drop of it. The artisans
+are now intending to break up. They cork the bottles of wine and
+vinegar, empty and repack the dishes. We have brought them some fruit
+from our dessert. One of them makes a little speech to us, in behalf of
+all, thanking for our interest in the freedom of Crete and in the
+prosperity of their country. And "<i>Zeto! zeto!</i>" (live! live!) was the
+pleasant termination of the discourse, to which we were obliged to
+respond through the medium of a friendly interpretation.</p>
+
+<p>Finally the day began to wane, and we to pack and embark. The bell of
+the little church now made itself heard, and, looking in, we saw the
+priest engaged in going through his service, while a very homespun
+assistant stood at the reading-desk, wearing spectacles upon his nose,
+and making responses through it. A circlet of tapers was burning before
+the altar. One old woman or so, a peasant mother with her child,&mdash;these
+were the congregation. The idea of the Greek as of the Catholic mass is,
+that it effects a propitiation of the Divine Being; so the priest
+performs his office, often with little or no following. As to those who
+should attend, I believe that one pays one's money and has one's choice;
+there is nothing absolute about it. And now <i>e megale</i> bestows a
+trifling largess upon<a name="page_221" id="page_221"></a> the hag, who has also dined off the relics of our
+feast. The books and work are gathered, the carriages summoned. Item,
+our driver wore a Palicari dress, and took part, very lamely, in the
+dances we witnessed. Farewell, Hymettus! farewell, shady convent, clear
+and sparkling water! We kiss our hands to you, and cherish you in our
+remembrance.</p>
+
+<p>On our homeward way we soon passed the Athenian party, riding ten or
+twelve in a one-horse cart, carrying with them for an ensign the pole on
+which their lamb had been spitted. They saluted us, and we shouted back,
+"<i>Eleutheria tis Kritis!</i>" Amen, simple souls! your instincts are wiser
+than the reasons of diplomatists.</p>
+
+<h2>I<small>TEMS</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>My remaining chronicles of Athens will be brief and simple&mdash;gleanings at
+large from the field of memory, whose harvests grow more uncertain as
+the memorizer grows older. In youth the die is new and sharp, and the
+impression distinct and clean cut. This sharpness of outline wears with
+age; all things observed give us more the common material of human life,
+less its individual features. In this point of view it may well be that
+I shall often speak of things trivial, and omit matters of greater
+importance. Yet even these trifles, sketched in surroundings so
+grandiose, may serve to shadow out the features of something greater
+than themselves, always inwardly felt, even when not especially
+depicted. It is in this hope that I bind together my few and precious
+reminiscences of Grecian life, and<a name="page_222" id="page_222"></a> present them, inadequate as they
+are, as almost better than anything else I have.</p>
+
+<h2>T<small>HE</small> P<small>ALACE</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>Armed with a permit, and accompanied by a Greek friend, we walked, one
+bitter hot afternoon, to see the royal palace built by King Otho, it is
+said, out of his own appanage, or private income. As an investment even
+for his own ultimate benefit, he would have done much better in
+expending the money on some of the improvements so much needed in his
+capital. The salary of the King of Greece amounts to two hundred and
+fifty thousand dollars; and this sum is sufficiently disproportionate to
+the slender monetary resources of the kingdom, without the additional
+testimony of this palatial monument of a monarch who wished to live like
+a rich man in a poor country. The palace is a very large one. It not
+only encloses a hollow square, but divides that square by an extension
+running across it. The internal arrangements and adornments are mostly
+in good taste, and one can imagine that when the king and queen held
+their state there, the state apartments may have made a brave show. The
+rooms now appear rather scantily furnished; the hangings are faded; and
+one can make one's own reflections upon the vanity and folly of
+ambitious expense, unperverted by the witchery of present luxury, which
+always argues, "Yes, the peasants have no beds, but see&mdash;this arm-chair
+is so comfortable!" Now, luxury was for the time absent on leave, and
+we<a name="page_223" id="page_223"></a> thought much of the peasant, and little of the prince. For the
+peasant is a fact, and the prince but a symbol, and a symbol of that
+which to-day can be represented without him; viz., the unity of will and
+action essential to the existence of the state. This unity to-day is
+accomplished by the coöperation of the multitude, not by its exclusion.
+The symbol remains useful, but no longer sublime. No need, therefore, to
+exaggerate the difference between the common symbol and the common man.
+Fortify your unity in the will and understanding of the people, not in
+their fear and imagination. And let the king be moderate in his
+following, and illustrious in his character and office. So shall he be a
+leader as well as a banner&mdash;a fact as well as a symbol.</p>
+
+<p>While I thought these things, I admired Queen Amalia's blue, pink, and
+green rooms, the lustres of fine Bohemian glass, the suite of apartments
+for royal visitors, the ball-room and its marble columns, running
+through two stories in height, and altogether well-appointed. "The court
+balls were beautiful," said my companion, "and the hall is very
+brilliant when lighted and filled." "Is the queen regretted?" I asked.
+"Not much," was the moderate reply.</p>
+
+<p>The theatre interested me more, with its scenes still standing. In the
+same hall, at the other end, is a frame and enclosure for "tableaux
+vivants," of which the court were very fond. The prettiest girls in
+Athens came here, and <i>posed</i> as Muses, Minervas, and what not. I have
+the photograph of one, with her white<a name="page_224" id="page_224"></a> robe and lyre. And this brings to
+me the only good word I can say for Otho and Amalia, in the historic
+light in which I view them. They were not gross, nor cruel, nor
+sluttish. Their tastes and pleasures were of the refined, social order,
+and in so far their influence and example were softening and civilizing
+in tendency. The temporary prevalence of the German element has
+introduced a tendency towards German culture. And while the Greeks who
+seek commercial education very generally migrate to London or Liverpool,
+the men most accomplished in letters and philosophy have studied in
+Germany. All this may not have hindered the German patronage from
+becoming oppressive, nor the German rule from becoming intolerable to
+the people at large. But, with the examples of this and other ages
+before one, one thanks a monarch for not becoming either a beast or a
+butcher. Otho was neither. But neither was he, on the other hand, a
+Greek, nor a lover of Greeks. Nor could he and his queen present the
+people with a successor Greek in birth, if not in parentage. This
+absence of offspring, which is said to have sorely galled the queen, was
+really a weak point in their case before the people. To be ruled by a
+Greek is their natural and just desire.</p>
+
+<p>Europe, which has so little charity for their divergence from her
+absolute standard, must remember that it is not at their request that
+this expensive and uncongenial condition of a foreign prince has been
+annexed to their system of government. The superstitions of the old
+world have here planted a seed of mischief in<a name="page_225" id="page_225"></a> the gardens of the new.
+England finds it most convenient to be governed by a German; France, by
+an Italian; Russia, by a Tartar line. What more natural than that they
+should muffle new-born Greece in their own antiquated fashions? The
+Greeks assassinated Capo d'Istrias for acts of tyranny from which they
+knew no other escape. For, indeed, the head of their state was very
+clumsily adjusted to its body by the same powers who left out of their
+construction several of its most important members. An arbitrary
+president was no head for a nation which had just conquered its own
+liberty. A foreign absolute prince was only the same thing, with another
+name and a larger salary. By their last resolution the Greeks have
+attained a constitutional government. If their present king cannot
+administer such a one properly, he will make room for some one who can.
+To his political duties, meanwhile, military ones will be added. Greece
+for the Greeks,&mdash;Candia, Thessaly, and Epirus delivered from the Moslem
+yoke,&mdash;this will be the watchword, to which he must reply or vanish.</p>
+
+<p>It is in the face of America that the new nations, Greece and Italy,
+must look for encouragement and recognition. The old diplomacy has no
+solution for their difficulties, no cure for their distresses. The
+experience of the present century has developed new political methods,
+new social combinations. In the domestic economy of France and England
+these new features are felt and acknowledged. But in the foreign policy
+of those nations the element of progress scarcely<a name="page_226" id="page_226"></a> appears. In this,
+force still takes the place of reason; the right of conquest depends
+upon the power of him who undertakes it; and in the farthest regions
+visited by their flags, organized barbarism gets the better of
+disorganized barbarism. The English in India, the French in Algeria,
+were first brigands, then brokers. Of these two, we need not tell the
+civilized world that the broker plunders best.</p>
+
+<p>Greece is a poor democracy; America, a rich one. The second commands all
+the luxuries and commodities of life; the first, little more than its
+necessaries. Yet we, coming from our own state of things, can understand
+how the Greek values himself upon being a man, and upon having a part in
+the efficient action of the commonwealth. Greece is reproached with
+giving too ambitious an education to her sons and daughters. Her
+institutions form teachers, not maids and valets, mistresses and
+masters, not servants. But for this America will not reproach
+her&mdash;America, whose shop-girls take music lessons, whose poorest menials
+attend lectures, concerts, and balls. A democratic people does not
+acquiesce either in priestly or in diplomatic precedence. Let people
+perform their uses, earn their bread, enjoy their own, and respect their
+neighbors; these are the maxims of good life in a democratic country.
+"Love God, love thy neighbor," is better than "fear God, honor the
+king." As to the sycophancy of snobs, the corruption of office, the
+contingent insufficiency alike of electors and elected,&mdash;these are the
+accidents of all human governments, to be arrested only by the constant<a name="page_227" id="page_227"></a>
+watchfulness of the wiser spirits, the true pilots of the state.</p>
+
+<p>By the time that I had excogitated all this, my feet had visited many
+square yards of palace, comprising bed-room, banqueting-room, chief
+lady's room, chapel, and so on. I had seen the queen's garden, and the
+<i>palmas qui meruit ferat</i>, and which she has left for her successor. I
+had seen, too, the fine view from the upper windows, sweeping from the
+Acropolis to the sea. I had exchanged various remarks with my Athenian
+companion. New furniture was expected with the Russian princess, but
+scarcely new enthusiasm. The little king had stopped the movement in
+Thessaly, which would have diverted the Turkish force now concentrated
+upon Crete, giving that laboring island a chance of rising above the
+bloody waters that drown her. Little love did the little king earn by
+this course. One might say that he is on probation, and will, in the
+end, get his deserts, and no more. And here my friend has slipped some
+suitable coin into the hand of the smiling major-domo, who showed us
+over the royal house. Farewell, palace: the day of kings is over.
+Peoples have now their turn, and God wills it.</p>
+
+<h2>T<small>HE</small> C<small>ATHEDRAL</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>In close juxtaposition with the state is the church. In America we have
+religious liberty. This does not mean that a man has morally the right
+to have no religion, but that the very nature of religion requires that
+he should hold his own convictions above the ordinances<a name="page_228" id="page_228"></a> of others. The
+Greeks have religious liberty, whose idea is rather this, that people
+may believe much as they please, provided they adhere outwardly to the
+national church. The reason assigned for this is, that any change in the
+form or discipline of this church would weaken the bond that unites the
+Greeks out of Greece proper with those within her limits. This outward
+compression and inward latitude is always a dangerous symptom. It points
+to practical irreligion, an ever widening distance between a man's
+inward convictions and his outward practice. Passing this by, however,
+let us have a few words on the familiar aspect and practical working of
+the Greek church as at present administered. Like other bodies politic
+and individual already known to us, it consists of a reconciled
+opposition, which, held within bounds, secures its efficiency. The same,
+passing those bounds, would cause its annihilation. Like other churches,
+it is at once aristocratic and democratic. It binds and looses. It is
+less intellectual than either Catholicism or Protestantism; perhaps less
+intolerant than either, so far as dogma goes. I still think it narrower
+than either in the scope of its sympathies, lower than either in its
+social and individual standard. Taken with the others, it makes up the
+desired three of human conditions; but before it can meet them
+harmoniously, it has a long way to go.</p>
+
+<p>Refusing images, but clinging to pictures; allowing the Scriptures to
+the common people, but discouraging their use of the same; with an
+unmarried hierarchy of some education, and a married secular clergy of
+none,&mdash;the<a name="page_229" id="page_229"></a> Greek church seems to me to be too flatly in contradiction
+with itself and with the spirit of the age to maintain long a social
+supremacy, a moral efficiency. The department of the clergy last
+mentioned receive no other support than that of the contingent
+contributions of the people, paid in small sums, as the wages of
+services better withheld than rendered. Exorcisms, benedictions, prayers
+recited over graves, or secured as a cure for sick cattle,&mdash;these are
+some of the sacerdotal acts by which the lesser clergy live. Those who
+wish to keep these resources open must, of course, discourage the
+reading of the New Testament, whose great aim and tendency are to
+substitute a religion of life and doctrine for a religion of
+observances. Congregations reading this book for themselves, no matter
+how poor or ignorant in other matters, will ask something other of the
+priest than the exorcism of demons or the cure of cattle.</p>
+
+<p>Of the higher clergy, some have studied in Germany, and, reversing Mr.
+Emerson's sentence, must know, one thinks, better than they build.
+Orthodox their will may be, firm their adherence to the establishment,
+strict their administration of it. But they must be aware of the limits
+that it sets to religious progress. And so long as they cannot preach to
+their congregations the full sincerity and power of their inward
+convictions, their ministration loses in moral power,&mdash;the house is
+divided against itself.</p>
+
+<p>I visited the Cathedral of Athens but once. It is a spacious and
+handsome church, in what I should call a<a name="page_230" id="page_230"></a> modern Eastern style. It was
+on Sunday, and mass was going on. The middle and right aisles were
+filled with men, the left aisle with women. I do not know whether I have
+mentioned elsewhere that in the Greek and Russian, as in the Quaker
+church, men and women stand separately&mdash;stand, for seats are neither
+provided nor allowed. I found a place among the women, commanding a view
+of the high altar. The archbishop, a venerable-looking man, in gold
+brocade and golden head-dress, went through various functions, which,
+though not identical with those of the Romish mass, seemed to amount to
+about the same thing. There were bowings, appearings and retirings, the
+swinging of censers, and the presentation of tapers fixed in silver
+candelabras, and tied in the middle with black ribbon, so as to form a
+sheaf. These candelabras the archbishop from time to time took, one
+under each arm, and made a step or two towards the congregation. The
+dresses of the assistant priests were very rich, and their heads
+altogether Oriental in aspect. One of them, with his gold-bronzed face
+and golden hair, looked like pictures of St. John. The vocal part of the
+performance consisted of a sort of chant, with responses intensely nasal
+and unmusical. This psalmody, which is little relished by Greeks of
+culture, is yet maintained, like the discipline, intact, lest the most
+trifling amelioration should weaken the tie of Christian brotherhood
+between the free Greek church and the church that is in bondage with her
+children. To one familiar with the pretexts of conservatism, this plea
+of union before improvement<a name="page_231" id="page_231"></a> is not new nor availing. One laughs, and
+remembers the respectabilities who tried to paralyze the American
+intellect and conscience in order to save the Union, which, after all,
+was saved only by the measures they abhorred and denounced. I had soon
+enough of what I was able to hear and see of the Greek mass. As I stole
+softly away, I passed a sort of lesser altar, before which was burning a
+circular row of tapers. An old woman had similar tapers on a small
+table, for sale, I suppose. I was invited, by gesture, to consummate a
+pious act by the purchase of some of these, but declined, not without
+remembering that I was some time since elected a lay delegate from a
+certain Unitarian church to a certain Unitarian conference. This fact,
+if communicated, would not have heightened my standing in the
+approbation of the sisters who then surrounded me. "What, no candle?"
+said their indignant glances. I was silent, and fled.</p>
+
+<h2>T<small>HE</small> M<small>ISSIONARIES</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>In the presence of the contradictions alluded to above, the position of
+the Greek church and of American Protestant missionaries becomes one of
+mutual delicacy and difficulty. The church allows religious liberty, and
+assumes religious tolerance. Yet it naturally holds fast its own
+children within its own borders. The Protestants are pledged to labor
+for the world's Christianization. When they see its progress opposed by
+antiquated usage and insufficient method, they cannot acquiesce in these
+obstacles, nor teach others to revere them. Here<a name="page_232" id="page_232"></a> we must say at once
+that no act is so irreligious as the resistance of progress. Thought and
+conscience are progressive. Christ's progressive labor carried further
+the Jewish faith and tenets which were religious before he came, but
+which became irreligious in resisting the further and finer conclusions
+to which he led. "I come not to destroy, but to fulfil." Progress does
+fulfil in the spirit, even though it destroy in the letter.
+Protestantism acknowledges this, and this acknowledgment constitutes its
+superiority over the Greek and Catholic churches. The sincere reader of
+the New Testament will be ever more and more disposed to make his
+religion a matter lying directly between himself and the Divine Being.
+His outward conformity to all just laws and good institutions will be,
+not the less, but the more, perfect because his scale of obligation is
+an individual one, the spring and motive of his actions a deeply inward
+one. Church and state gain in soundness and efficiency by every
+individual conscience that functions within their bounds. Religion of
+this sort leads away from human mediations, from confessions,
+benedictions, injunctions, and permissions of merely human authority. It
+confesses first to God, afterwards, if at all, to those whom its
+confessions can benefit. It brings its own thought to aid and illustrate
+the general thought. It cannot abdicate its own conclusions before any
+magnitude either of intellect or of age.</p>
+
+<p>The Protestant, therefore, would be much straitened within the Greek
+limits. He is forced to teach those who will listen to him that God is
+much nearer than<a name="page_233" id="page_233"></a> the priest, and that their own simple and sincere
+understanding of Christian doctrine is at once more just and more
+precious than the fallacies and sophisms of an absolute theology. Such
+teaching will scarcely be more relished by the Greek than by the Romish
+clergy; yet the Protestant must teach this, or be silent.</p>
+
+<p>And this, after their fashion, the American missionaries do set forth
+and illustrate. Their merits and demerits I am not here to discuss. How
+much of polite culture, of sufficient philosophy, goes with their honest
+purpose, it is not at this time my business to know or to say. Neither
+is their special theology mine. They believe in a literal atonement,
+while I believe in the symbolism which makes a pure and blameless
+sufferer a victim offered in behalf of his enemies. They look for a
+miraculous, I for a moral regeneration. They make Christ divine of
+birth, I make him simply divine of life. Their dogmas would reconcile
+God to man, mine would only reconcile man to God. Finally, they revere
+as absolute and divine a book which I hold to be a human record of
+surpassing thoughts and actions, but with the short-comings, omissions,
+and errors of the human historiographer stamped upon them. With all this
+diversity of opinion between the church of their communion and that of
+mine, I still honor, beyond all difference, the Protestant cause for
+which they stand in Greece, and consider their representation a just and
+genuine one.</p>
+
+<p>In writing this I have had in mind the three dissenting missionaries,
+Messrs. Kalopothaki, Constantine, and<a name="page_234" id="page_234"></a> Zacularius. The older mission of
+Dr. and Mrs. Hill is an educational one. I believe it to have borne the
+happiest fruits for Greece. Whenever I have met a scholar of Mrs. Hill,
+I have seen the traces of a firm, pure, and gentle hand&mdash;one to which
+the wisest and tenderest of us would willingly confide our daughters. In
+raising the whole scale of feminine education in Greece, she has applied
+the most potent and subtle agent for the elevation of its whole society.
+She herself is childless; but she need scarcely regret it, since whole
+generations are sure to rise up and call her blessed.</p>
+
+<p>Dr. Hill is at present chaplain to the English embassy, at whose chapel
+he preaches weekly. Mrs. Hill and himself seem to stand in very
+harmonious relations with Athenian society, as well as with the
+travelling and visiting world.</p>
+
+<p>The missionaries preach and practise with unremitting zeal. They also
+publish a weekly religious paper. Their wives labor faithfully in the
+aid and employment of the Cretan women and children, and, I doubt not,
+in other good works. But of these things I have now told the little that
+I know.</p>
+
+<h2>T<small>HE</small> P<small>IAZZA</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>Venice has a Piazza, gorgeous with shops, lights, music, and, above all,
+the joyous life of the people. Athens also has a Piazza, bordered with
+hotels and cafés, with a square of trees and flowering shrubs in the
+middle. It lies broadly open to the sun all day long, and gives back his
+rays with a torrid refraction. When day declines,<a name="page_235" id="page_235"></a> the evening breezes
+sweep it refreshingly. Accordingly, as soon as the shadows permit, the
+spaces in front of the cafés&mdash;or, in Greek, <i>cafféneions</i>&mdash;are crowded
+with chairs and tables, the chairs being filled by human beings, many of
+whom have ripened, so far as the head goes, into a fez&mdash;have unfolded,
+so far as the costume goes, into pali-kari petticoats and leggings.
+Between the two hotels is mortal antipathy. Ours&mdash;"Des Etrangers"&mdash;has
+taken the lead, and manages to keep it. The prices of the other are
+lower, the <i>cuisine</i> much the same, the upper windows set to command a
+view of the Acropolis, which is in itself an unsurpassable picture.
+Where the magic resides which keeps our hotel full and the other empty,
+I know not, unless it be in the slippery Eastern smile of the
+landlord&mdash;an expression of countenance so singular that it inevitably
+leads you, from curiosity, to follow it further. In our case it led to
+no profound of wickedness. We were not cheated, nor plundered, nor got
+the better of in any way that I remember. Our food was good, our rooms
+proper, our charges just. Yet I felt, whenever I encountered the smile,
+that it angled for me, and caught me on a hook cunningly baited.</p>
+
+<p>I must say that our landlord was even generous. Besides our three meals
+<i>per diem</i>,&mdash;which grew to be very slender affairs, so far as we were
+concerned,&mdash;we often required lemonades and lokumia, besides sending of
+errands innumerable. For these indulgences no extra charge was made. In
+an Italian, French, or English hotel, each one of them would have had
+its penitentiary<a name="page_236" id="page_236"></a> record. So the mystery of the smile must have had
+reference to matters deeply personal to its wearer, and never made known
+to me.</p>
+
+<p>The cafés seemed to maintain a thrifty existence. But one of them took
+especial pains to secure the services of a band of music. Hence, on the
+evenings when the public band did not play, emanated the usual
+capriccios from Norma, Trovatore, and the agonies of Traviata. Something
+better and worse than all this was given to us in the shape of certain
+ancient Greek or Turkish melodies, obviously composed in ignorance of
+all rules of thorough-bass, with a confusion of majors and minors most
+perplexing to the classic, but interesting to the historic sense. I
+rejoiced especially in one of these, which bore the same relation to
+good harmony that Eastern dress bears to good composition of color. It
+was obviously well liked by the public, as it was usually played more
+than once during the same evening.</p>
+
+<p>Before the shadows grew quite dark, a barouche or two, with ladies and
+livery, would drive across the Piazza, giving a whiff of fashion like
+the gleam of red costume that heightens a landscape. And the people sat,
+ate and drank, came and went, in sober gladness, not laughing
+open-mouthed&mdash;rather smiling with their eyes. From our narrow hotel
+balcony we used to look down and wonder whether we should ever be cool
+again. For though the evenings were not sultry, their length did not
+suffice to reduce the fever of the day. And the night within the
+mosquito-nettings was an agony of perspiration. I now sit in Venice, and
+am cool;<a name="page_237" id="page_237"></a> but I would gladly suffer something to hear the weird music,
+and to see the cheerful Piazza again. Yet when I was there, for ten
+minutes of this sea-breeze over the lagoons I would have given&mdash;Heaven
+knows what. O Esau!</p>
+
+<h2>D<small>EPARTURE</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>Too soon, too soon for all of us, these rare and costly delights were
+ended. We had indeed suffered days of Fahrenheit at 100° in the shade.
+We had made experience of states of body which are termed bilious, of
+states of mind more or less splenetic, lethargic, and irritable. We
+dreamed always of islands we were never to visit, of ruins which we
+shall know, according to the flesh, never. We pored over Muir and Miss
+Bremer, and feebly devised outbreaks towards the islands, towards the
+Cyclades, Santorini, but especially towards Corinth, whose acropolis
+rested steadily in our wishes, resting in our memory only as a wish.
+Towards Constantinople, too, our uncertain destinies had one moment
+pointed. But when the word of command came, it despatched us westward,
+and not eastward. By this time our life had become somewhat too
+literally a vapor, and our sublimated brains were with difficulty
+condensed to the act of packing. Perpetual thirst tormented us. And of
+this as of other Eastern temptations, I must say, "Resist it." Drinking
+does not relieve this symptom of hot climates. It, moreover, utterly
+destroys the tone of the stomach. A little tea is the safest
+refreshment; and even this should not be taken in copious draughts.
+Patience and self-control are<a name="page_238" id="page_238"></a> essential to bodily health and comfort
+under these torrid skies. The little food one can take should be of the
+order usually characterized as "nutritious and easy of digestion." But
+so far as health goes, "Avoid Athens in midsummer" will be the safest
+direction, and will obviate the necessity of all others.</p>
+
+<p>In spite, however, of all symptoms and inconveniences, the mandate that
+said, "Pack and go," struck a chill to our collective heart. We visited
+all the dear spots, gave pledges of constancy to all the kind friends,
+tried with our weak sight to photograph the precious views upon our
+memory. Then, with a sort of agony, we hurried our possessions, new and
+old, into the usual narrow receptacles, saw all accounts discharged,
+feed the hotel servants, took the smile for the last time, and found
+ourselves dashing along the road to the Piræus with feelings very unlike
+the jubilation in which we first passed that classic transit. It was all
+over now, like a first love, like a first authorship, like a honey-moon.
+It was over. We could not say that we had not had it. But O, the void of
+not having it now, of never expecting to have it again!</p>
+
+<p>Kind friends went with us to soften the journey. At the boat, Dr. and
+Mrs. Hill met and waited with us. I parted from the apostolic woman with
+sincere good-will and regret. Warned to be on board by six P. M., the
+boat did not start till half-past seven. We waved last adieus. We clung
+to the last glimpses of the Acropolis, of the mountains; but they soon
+passed out of sight. We savagely went below and to bed. The<a name="page_239" id="page_239"></a> diary bears
+this little extract: "The Ægean was calm and blue. Thus, with great
+pleasure and interest, and with some drawbacks, ends my visit to Athens.
+A dream&mdash;a dream!"</p>
+
+<h2>R<small>ETURN</small> V<small>OYAGE</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>To narrate the circumstances of our return voyage would seem much like
+descending from the poetic <i>dénouement</i> of a novel to all the prosaic
+steps by which the commonplace regains its inevitable ascendency after
+no matter what abdication in favor of the heroic. Yet, as travel is
+travel, whether outward or inward bound, and as our homeward cruise had
+features, I will try, with the help of the diary, to pick them out of
+the vanishing chaos of memory, premising only that I have no further
+<i>dénouement</i> to give.</p>
+
+<p class="c">"Story? Lord bless you, I have none to tell, sir."</p>
+
+<p>On referring, therefore, to Clayton's quarto, of the date of July 21,
+1867, I find the day to have been passed by us all in the hot harbor of
+Syra, on board the boat that brought us there. At seven A. M. we did
+indeed land in a small boat with Vice-Consul Saponsaki, and betake
+ourselves through several of the steep and sunny streets of the town. At
+one of the two hotels we staid long enough to order lemonades and drink
+them. The said hotel appeared, on a cursory survey, to be as dirty and
+disorderly as need be; but we soon escaped therefrom, and visited the
+theatre, the Casino, and the Austrian consul. The Casino is spacious and
+handsome,<a name="page_240" id="page_240"></a> giving evidence at once of wealth and of taste in those who
+caused it to be built. Such an establishment would be a boon in Athens,
+where there is no good public reading-room of any kind. The theatre is
+reasonable. Here, in winter, a short opera season is enjoyed, and, in
+consequence, the music books of the young ladies teem with arrangements
+of Verdi and of Donizetti. We found the square near the quay lively with
+the early enjoyers of coffee and the narghilé. Every precious inch of
+shade was, as usual, carefully appropriated; but the sun was rapidly
+narrowing the boundaries of the shadow district. Our chief errand
+resulted in the purchase of an ok of <i>lokumias</i>, which we virtuously
+resolved to carry to America, if possible. The little boat now returned
+us to the steamer, where breakfast and dinner quietly succeeded each
+other, little worthy of record occurring between. One interesting half
+hour reached us in the shape of a visit from Papa Parthenius, a young
+and active member of the Cretan Syn-eleusis. He came with tidings for
+our chief veteran,&mdash;tales of the Turks, and how they could get no water
+at Svakia; tidings also of brave young DeKay, and of his good service in
+behalf of the island. While these, in the dreadful secrecy of an unknown
+tongue, impart he did, I seized pen and ink, and ennobled my unworthy
+sketch-book with a <i>croquis</i> of his finely-bronzed visage. His
+countenance was such as Miss Bremer would have called dark and
+energetic. He wore the dress of his calling, which was that of the
+secular priesthood. He soon detected my occupation, and said, in Greek,
+"I<a name="page_241" id="page_241"></a> regret that the kyrie should make my portrait without my arms."</p>
+
+<p>We parted from him very cordially. Consul Campfield afterwards gave us a
+refreshing row about the harbor, bringing us within view of the two
+iron-clads newly purchased and brought out to run the Turkish blockade.
+One of these was famous in the annals of Secessia. Both served that more
+than doubtful cause. Then we went back to the vessel, and the rest of
+the day did not get beyond perspiration and patience.</p>
+
+<p>Towards evening a spirited breeze began to lash the waters of the harbor
+into hilly madness. White caps showed themselves, and we, who were to
+embark on board another vessel, for another voyage, took note of the
+same. The friendly Evangelides now came on board, and scolded us for not
+having sent him word of our arrival. We pleaded the extreme heat of the
+day, which had made dreadful the idea of visiting and of locomotion of
+any sort. He was clad from head to foot in white linen, and looked most
+comfortable. While he was yet with us, the summons of departure came. In
+our chief's plans, meanwhile, a change had taken place. Determining
+causes induced him to return to Athens, minus his female <i>impedimenta</i>:
+so the little boat that danced with us from the Lloyd's Syra to the
+Lloyd's Trieste steamer danced back with him, leaving three disconsolate
+ones, bereft of Greece, and unprotected of all and any. Nor did we make
+this second start without a <i>contretemps</i>. Having bidden the chief
+farewell, we proceeded at once to take account of our luggage;<a name="page_242" id="page_242"></a> and lo!
+the shawl bundle was not. Now, every knowing traveller is aware that
+this article of travelling furniture contains much besides the shawl,
+which is but the envelope of all the odds and ends usually most
+essential to comfort. For the second in command, therefore, previously
+designated as <i>a megale</i>, there was but one course to pursue. To hire a
+boat, refuse to be cheated in its price, tumble down the ship's side,
+row to the Syra steamer, pick up the missing bundle, astonish the chief
+in a pensive reverie, "<i>sibi et suis</i>," on the cabin sofa, and return
+triumphant, was the work of ten minutes. But the sea ran high, the
+little boat danced like a cockle-shell, and the neophytes were afraid,
+and much relieved in mind when the ancient reappeared.</p>
+
+<p>The America (the Trieste steamer) did not weigh anchor before midnight.
+Soon after the adventure of the shawl bundle, the Syra steamer fired a
+gun, and slipped out to sea. We had seen the last of the chief for a
+fortnight at least, and our attention was now turned to the quarters we
+were to occupy for four days to come. These did not at first sight seem
+very promising. Our state-rooms were small, and bare of all furniture,
+except the bed and washing fixtures. Just outside of them, on the deck,
+was the tent under which the Turkish women horded. For we found, on
+coming on board, a Turkish pacha and suite, bound from Constantinople to
+Janina, to take the place of him whom we had, a month before,
+accompanied on his way from Janina to Constantinople, via Corfu, where
+we were to<a name="page_243" id="page_243"></a> be quit of the present dignitary. But before I get to the
+Turks, I must mention that good Christian, the Austrian consul at Syra,
+who came on board before we left, and introduced to me a young man in an
+alarming condition of health, a Venetian by birth, and an officer in the
+Austrian navy. His illness had been induced by exposure incident to his
+profession in the hot harbor of Kanea.</p>
+
+<p>The first night we made acquaintance only with various screaming babies,
+the torment of young mothers who did not know how to take care of them,
+their nurses having been left at home. The night was sufficiently
+disturbed up to the period of departure, and these little ones vented
+their displeasure in tones which argued well for their lungs. The next
+morning showed us a rough sea, the vessel pitching and tossing, the
+ladies mostly sea sick&mdash;we ourselves well and about, but much incommoded
+by heat and want of room. A tall member of the pacha's suite came into
+our little round house, dressed principally in a short, quilted sack of
+bright red calico. He carried in his arms a teething baby, very dirty
+and ill-dressed, and tried to nurse and soothe it on his knee, the
+mother being totally incapacitated by seasickness. This man was tall and
+fair. I thought he might be an Albanian. I made some incautious remarks
+in French concerning his dress, which he obviously understood, for he
+disappeared, and then reappeared dressed in a handsome European suit,
+with a bran-new fez on his head, but carrying no baby. Another of the
+suite, unmistakably a Turk, pestered the<a name="page_244" id="page_244"></a> round-house. This individual
+wore white cotton drawers under a long calico night shirt of a faded
+lilac pattern, which was bound about his waist with a strip of yellow
+calico. The articles of this toilet were far from clean. Glasses and a
+fez completed it. The wearer we learned to be a fanatical Turk, who came
+among us in this disorderly dress to show his contempt for Christians in
+general. His motive was held to be, in his creed, a religious one. It
+further caused him to take his meals separately from us&mdash;a circumstance
+which we scarcely regretted. He was much amazed at the worsted work in
+the hands of one of the neophytes, and went so far as to take it up, and
+to ask a bystander who spoke his language whether the young girl spun
+the wools herself before she began her tapestry. He then asked the price
+of the wools, and on hearing the reply exclaimed, "What land on earth
+equals Turkey, where you can buy the finest wool for twelve píastres an
+ok!"</p>
+
+<p>Besides these not very appetizing figures, we had on board some
+Fanariote Greeks, of aristocratic pretensions and Turkish principles;
+some Hellenes of the true Greek stamp; a Dalmatian sea captain, his wife
+and daughters, who spoke Italian and looked German; an Armenian lady and
+young daughter from Constantinople, bound to Paris; several Greeks
+resident in Transylvania, speaking Greek and German with equal facility;
+two Armenian priests returning from an Eastern mission, and <i>en route</i>
+for Vienna; the Austro-Italian before spoken of; a Bohemian glass
+merchant; and an array of deck passengers as varied and motley as those
+already enumerated<a name="page_245" id="page_245"></a> as belonging to the first cabin. With all of the
+latter we made acquaintance; but although we moved among them with
+cordiality and good-will, the equilibrium of sympathy was difficult to
+find. The Fanariotes were no Philhellenes, the Armenian ladies were
+frequenters of the sultan's palace; the Italian was thoroughly German in
+his inclinations, and spoke in utter dispraise of his own country when
+his feeble condition allowed him to speak. Of the Armenian priests, one
+was quite a man of the world, and somewhat reserved and suspicious. The
+other showed something of the infirmity of advanced age in the prolixity
+of his speech, as well as in its matter. In this Noah's ark <i>e megale</i>
+moved about, mindful of the bull in the china shop, and tried not to
+upset this one's mustard-pot and that one's vase of perfume. And as all
+were whole when she parted from them, she has reason to hope that her
+efforts were tolerably successful.</p>
+
+<p>In the human variety shop just described, I must not forget to speak of
+my sisters, the Turkish women, imprisoned in a small portion of the
+deck, protected by a curtain from all intrusion or inspection. As this
+sacred precinct lay along the outside partition of the ladies' cabin, I
+became aware of a remote window, through which a practicable breach
+might be made in their fortress. Thither, on the first day, I repaired,
+and paid my compliments. They were, I think, five in number, and lay
+along on mattresses, disconsolately enough. With the help of the
+stewardess, I inquired after their health, and learned that seasickness
+held them prostrate and helpless. Nothing ate they, nothing<a name="page_246" id="page_246"></a> drank they.
+Two of them were young and pretty. Of these, one was the wife of the bey
+who accompanied the pacha. She had a delicate cast of features,
+melancholy dark eyes, and dark hair bound up with a lilac crape
+handkerchief. The other was the mother of the teething child spoken of
+above, and the wife of the tall parent who nursed it. By noon on the
+second day the sea had sunk to almost glassy smoothness. All of the
+patients were up and about; the children were freshly washed and
+dressed, and became coaxable. One of the Armenian ladies now volunteered
+to go with me to look in upon our Turkish friends. We found them up and
+stirring, making themselves ready to land at Corfu. And to my companion
+they told what good messes they had brought from Constantinople, and
+thrown into the blue Ægean; for the heat of the vessel spoiled their
+victuals much faster than they, being seasick, could keep them from
+spoiling. And they laughed over their past sufferings much after the
+fashion of other women. The pretty mother now appeared in a loose gown
+of yellow calico, holding up her baby. I made a hasty sketch of the pair
+as they showed themselves at the cabin window; but the flat, glaring
+light did not allow me to do even as well as usual, which is saying
+little. The oval face, smooth, black brows, and long, liquid eyes, were
+beautiful, and her smile was touchingly child-like and innocent. The
+bey's wife wore a lilac calico; another wore pale green. These dresses
+consisted of loose gowns, with under-trousers of the same material; they
+were utterly unneat and tasteless.<a name="page_247" id="page_247"></a> I presently saw them put on their
+yashmacs, and draw over their calicoes a sort of cloak of black stuff,
+not unlike alpaca. They now looked very decently, and, being covered,
+were allowed to sit on deck until the time of the arrival in Corfu. The
+pretty one whom I sketched begged to look at my work. On seeing it she
+exclaimed, "Let no man ever behold this!" Nor could I blame her, for it
+maligned her sadly. Concerning the landing in Corfu, the meagre diary
+shows this passage:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Went on shore at Corfu at 5.45 P. M., returning at 6.50. Expenses in
+all, ten francs, including boat, ices, and <i>valet de place</i>. The steamer
+was so hot that this short visit on shore was a great relief, Corfu
+being at this hour very breezy and shady. Every one says that the Ionian
+Islands are going to ruin since the departure of the English. This is
+from the want of capital and of enterprise. So it would seem as if
+people who have no enterprise of their own must be content to thrive
+secondarily upon that of other people. The whole type of Greek life,
+however, is opposed to the Occidental type. Its luxury is to be in
+health, and to be satisfied with little. We Westerns illustrate the
+multiplication of wants with that of resources, or <i>vice versa</i>. [The
+diary, prudently, does not attempt to decide the question of antecedence
+and consequence between these two.] The Greeks seem, so far, to
+illustrate the converse. Whether this opposition can endure in the
+present day, I cannot foresee. But this I can see&mdash;that Greece will not
+have more luxury without more poverty. The circle of wealth, enlarging,
+will more and more<a name="page_248" id="page_248"></a> crowd those who are unfitted to attain it, and who
+must be content with the minimum even of food and raiment."</p>
+
+<p>So far the pitiful, sea-addled diary. It does not recount how mercifully
+the captain of our steamer found a <i>valet de place</i> for us, and told him
+to take care of us, and bring us back at a given moment. Nor how our
+payment of ten francs for three persons, instead of Heaven knows what
+exorbitation, was owing to this circumstance. For it may not be known to
+the inexperienced that the boatmen of Corfu are wont to make a very
+moderate charge for setting people ashore on the island. This is done in
+order to disarm suspicion: <i>facile descensus Averni&mdash;sed revocare
+gradum</i>! But when you wish to return to your vessel, the need being
+pressing, and the time admitting of no delay, the same boatmen are wont
+to demand fifteen or twenty francs <i>per capita</i>, and the more you swear
+the more they laugh. Among the arrearages of justice adjourned to that
+supreme chancery term, the Day of Judgment, I fear there must be many of
+English et al. <i>vs.</i> boatmen. But under the captain's happy
+administration, I made bold, when the boatman insisted on being paid for
+the return trip in mid-sea, to refuse a single copper. Now, the gift of
+unknown tongues sometimes resides in the person who hears them. And I
+received it as a decided advantage that I understood no phrase of the
+boatmen's low muttering and grumbling. So they were forced to carry us
+to the gangway of the steamer, where the captain stood to receive us.
+And I paid<a name="page_249" id="page_249"></a> the men and the valet under the captain's supervision, and
+when the former demanded a <i>bottiglia</i>, the captain cried out, in
+energetic tones, "Get off of my ship at once, you scoundrels; you have
+been well paid already;" the which indeed befell.</p>
+
+<p>Neither does the diary recount how the drivers of public carriages
+followed us up and down the streets, insisting upon our engaging them,
+first at their price, and then at ours, for a trip which we had neither
+time nor mind to make, desisting after half an hour's annoyance; nor how
+a money changer, given a napoleon, contrived to make up one of its
+francs by slipping in two miserable Turkish <i>paras</i>, not worth half a
+franc; nor how the whistle of the steamer made our return very anxious
+and hurried, the passengers accusing us of having delayed the departure,
+while the captain confided to us that he had assumed this air of extreme
+hurry, in order to stimulate the disembarkation of the Turks, whose
+theory of taking one's own time was somewhat loosely applied in the
+present instance. Well, this is all I know of Corfu. It is little
+enough, and yet, perhaps, too much.</p>
+
+<h2>F<small>ARTHER</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>Corfu was the last of Greece to us. A tightening at our heartstrings
+told us so. We consented to depart, but conquered the agony of making
+farewell verses, dear at any price, in the then state of the
+thermometer. Our feelings, such as they were, were mutely exchanged with
+the bronze statue of that late governor, who<a name="page_250" id="page_250"></a> brought the water into the
+town. Unless he should prove as frisky as the Commendatore in Don
+Giovanni, they will never be divulged.</p>
+
+<p>We now set our faces, in conjunction with the tide of conquest,
+westward. We all suffered heat, ennui, and baby-yell. The Italian
+invalid languished in his hot state-room, or in our cabin, his weak
+condition increasing the dangerous discomfort of perspiration&mdash;a grave
+matter when a chill would be death. Worsted work progressed, the hungry
+sketch-book got a nibble or two, and the mild good-wills of the voyage
+ripened, never, we fear, to bear future harvests of profit and
+intercourse. Not the less were we beholden to them for the time. And we
+will even praise thee here, Armenian Anna, with thy young graces, thy
+Eastern beauty, thy charming English, and thoroughly genial behavior.
+Mother and daughter had <i>distinction</i>, in the French sense of the word.
+From the former I had many <i>aperçus</i> of Eastern life. She was married at
+the early age of fourteen, and wore on that occasion the traditional
+veiling of threads of gold, bound on her brow and falling to her feet.
+"How glad I was to remove it," she said, "it was so heavy!" "What did
+you do with it?" I asked. "I divided it into several portions, and
+endowed with them the marriage of poorer girls, who could not afford it
+for themselves." But madame informed me that this cumbrous ornament has
+now passed out of fashion, the tulle veil and orange flowers of French
+usage having generally taken its place. This lady was supposed by most
+people to be the elder sister of<a name="page_251" id="page_251"></a> her pretty daughter. In her soberer
+beauty one seemed to see the dancing eyes and pouting cheeks of the
+other carried only a little farther on. And both were among the chief
+comforts of the voyage.</p>
+
+<p>Of the two Armenian priests, the younger held himself aloof, as if he
+understood full well the inconveniences of sympathy&mdash;a dry, steely,
+well-balanced man, without enthusiasm, but fine in temperament, well
+bred, and with at least the culture of a man of the present world. But
+Père Michel, the elder, was more willing to impart his mental gifts and
+experiences to such as would hear them. And he was a man of another age,
+with obsolete opinions, which he produced like the unconscious bearer of
+uncurrent coin.</p>
+
+<p>Here is a little specimen of his talk, the subject being that of dreams
+and revelations: "What is to happen, that God alone can know. But that
+which is already happening, or which has happened at a distance, this
+the <i>demonio</i> may know and reveal. And he will reveal it to you in a
+dream, or in a vision, or by a presentiment."</p>
+
+<p>"But what does the <i>demonio</i> get, Père Michel, for the trouble of
+revealing it to us?"</p>
+
+<p>"The satisfaction of making men superstitious?"</p>
+
+<p><i>Non c'e male, Père Michel.</i> And what, thought I, is the chief advantage
+of being pope, cardinal, arch-priest, confessor? The satisfaction of
+making men superstitious. At another time I remarked upon the fact that
+the monasteries in Greece are usually situated at some height on a
+mountain side. "They are of the order of St. Basil," said the old man;
+"he always loved the retirement<a name="page_252" id="page_252"></a> of the mountains, and his followers
+imitate him in this." Père Michel had a pleasant smile, with just enough
+of second childhood to be guileless, not foolish. And I may here say
+that the Armenian priesthood appear to me to have quite an individuality
+of their own, corresponding to no order of the Romish priesthood with
+which I am acquainted.</p>
+
+<p>The excessive heat of the cabins and after deck one day induced me to
+head a valorous invasion of the forward deck, followed by as many of the
+sisterhood as I was able to recruit. The steamer being a very long one,
+we had to make quite a journey before we entered that almost interdicted
+region, crossing a long bridge, and passing the captain's sacred office.
+We carried books and work; our <i>fauteuils</i> followed us. And here we
+found cool breezes and delicious shade. The sailors and deck passengers
+lay in heaps about the boards, taking their noonday nap in a very
+primitive manner. We profited by this discovery so far as to repeat the
+invasion daily while the voyage lasted.</p>
+
+<p>But it came to end sooner than one might suppose from this long
+description. We had left Syra on Sunday night; on Thursday afternoon we
+landed in Trieste. Farewell, Turco-Italians, Austro-Italians, Sieben
+Gebirgers, Transylvanians, Dalmatians, ladies, babies, priests, and all.
+When shall we meet again? Scarcely before that great and final analysis
+which promises to distinguish, once for all, the sheep from the goats.
+And even for that supreme consummation and its results, all of you may
+command my best wishes.<a name="page_253" id="page_253"></a></p>
+
+<h2>F<small>RAGMENTS</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>Up to the point last reached, my jottings down had been made with
+tolerable regularity. Living is so much more rapid than writing, that an
+impossible babe, who should begin his diary at his birth, would be sure
+to have large arrears between that period and the day of his death,
+however indefatigable he might be in his recording. A man cannot live
+his life and write it too; hence the work that men who live much leave
+to their biographers. So, of the space that here intervened between
+Trieste and Paris, I lived the maximum and wrote the minimum; that is,
+the little death's-head and cross-bone mementos with which the diary is
+forced to record the spot at which each day fell and lay, together with
+the current expenses of its interment. In some places even these are
+wanting, and the stricken soul, looking over the diary, cries out, "O,
+my leanness!" or words to that effect. Yet the poor document referred to
+shall help us what it can, beginning with the return from cheap, cosy
+Trieste to that polished jewel of the Adriatic, which now shines doubly
+in its new setting of liberty.</p>
+
+<p>We went, as we came, in the Lloyd steamer, declining, however, to engage
+a state-room, mindful of the exceeding closeness of that in which we
+suffered on our outward voyage. The embarkation was made, like that from
+Venice, at the mysterious hour of midnight; and we, coming on board at
+half past ten, secured such sofa and easy-chair privileges as moved the
+wrath of a high-talking<a name="page_254" id="page_254"></a> German party who came at the last moment, and
+shouted for a quarter of an hour the assertion that his Damen were fully
+equal, if not superior, to any other Damen on board the steamer, and
+that if the other Damen had places, his surely ought much more to have
+them. The cameriere merely shrugged his shoulders, and we failed to be
+convinced that our first duty would be to vacate our limited
+accommodations, and stand at large for the benefit of these or any other
+virgins of the tardy and oily description. The blatant champion thereon
+took himself and his Damen up stairs. We reserved to ourselves the good
+intention of sharing our advantages with them at a later period, when
+the passage of the present acerbity should make intercourse possible.
+The cabin soon became insufferably hot and close. After various
+ineffectual attempts at repose, in a cramped position on the sofa, with
+a shawl bundle for a pillow, I went on deck, where I at least found
+fresh air and darkness, the blazing lamp in the cabin being enough, of
+itself, to banish sleep. Every available spot here was occupied by
+groups or single figures, whose <i>tout ensemble</i>, what with the darkness
+and their draping, constituted a very respectable gallery of figures,
+much resembling the conspirators in Ernani, or Mme. Tussaud's Chamber of
+Horrors, in the absence of the illuminating medium. I unconsciously
+seated myself on one sleeping figure, which kicked and cried, O! With
+difficulty I found a narrow vacancy on one of the side benches, after
+occupation of which I wrapped my shawl about me, and gave up to the
+situation.</p>
+
+<p class="c">"For we were tired, my back and I."</p>
+
+<p><a name="page_255" id="page_255"></a></p>
+
+<p>Seasick women sobbed and gasped around me, not having, as we, graduated
+in the great college of ocean passage. The night was very black.
+Presently a form nestled at my right. It was the elder neophyte,
+disgusted with the cabin, and willing to be anywhere else. The moon rose
+late, a de-crescent. The whole time was amphibious, neither sleeping nor
+waking, neither day nor night. Suddenly, a perceptible chill seized upon
+us; a little later the black sky grew gray, and the series of groups
+that filled the deck were all revealed, like hidden motives in the light
+of some new doctrine. The sunrise was showery, and attended by a
+rainbow. The people bestirred themselves, stretched their benumbed
+limbs, and shook their tumbled garments into shape. Black coffee could
+now be had for ten sous a cup, and <i>café au lait</i> for twenty, with a
+crust of bread which defied gnawing. The diary says, "L. and I grew
+quite tearful as we saw beautiful Venice come out of the water, just as
+we had seen her disappear. At the health station we were fumigated with
+chloride of lime&mdash;an unpleasant and useless process. We arrived opposite
+the Piazzetta at half past seven A. M. The captain was kind in helping
+us to find our effects and to get off. The gondoliers asked five francs
+for bringing us to our lodgings, and got them. The Barbiers could not
+receive us at our former snug abode, but monsieur went round to show us
+some rooms in Palazzo Gambaro, which he offered for seven francs <i>per
+diem</i>. We were glad to take them. Went to Florian's café for breakfast,
+visited San Marco, and then proceeded to<a name="page_256" id="page_256"></a> install ourselves in our new
+lodging. Ordered a dinner for six francs, which proved abundant. Took a
+long sleep,&mdash;from one to four P. M.,&mdash;having only dozed a little during
+the night. Our lodgings are very roomy and pleasant&mdash;two large rooms
+well furnished, and two smaller ones. We expect to enjoy many things
+here, and all the more because we now know something of what is to be
+seen."</p>
+
+<p>This expectation was fully realized during the week that followed,
+although the meagre entries of the diary give little assistance in
+recalling the strict outlines of the brilliant picture. It was now
+height of season in Venice. The grand canal was brilliant, every
+evening, with gondolas, and gondoliers in costumes. Now we admired full
+suits of white, with scarlet sashes, trimmed with gold fringe, now gray
+and blue, edged with silver. Now an ugly jockey costume, got up by some
+Anglo-maniac, insulted the Italian <i>beau-idéal</i>, and, indeed, every
+other. For the short coat and heavy clothes, suited at once to the
+saddle and the English climate, were utterly unsuited to the action of
+rowing, as well as to the full bloom of an Italian summer. I cannot help
+remarking upon this unsightly livery, because it was an eyesore, and
+because it was obviously considered by its proprietor as a brilliant
+success. In stylish gondolas, the rowers are two in number, and always
+dressed in livery. The fashionables, in height of millinery bliss, float
+up and down the grand canal, until it is time for the rendezvous on the
+Piazza. As you pass the palaces, you often see the gondola in waiting
+below, while in a<a name="page_257" id="page_257"></a> balcony or arched window above, the fresh, smiling
+faces make their bright picture; and the domestic stands draped in the
+white opera-cloaks or bournooses. And I remember a hundred little
+nonsensical songs about this very passage in Venetian life.</p>
+
+<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="poetry">
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 2em;">"Prent'e la gondoletta,</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 3.25em;">Tutt'e serena il mar,</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 3.25em;">Ninetta, mia diletta,</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 3.25em;">Vieni solcar il mar</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 0em;">Il marinar, che gioja&mdash;che gioja il marinar!"</span></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>Which I translate into English equivalency as follows:&mdash;</p>
+
+<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="poetry">
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 0em;">The two-in-hand is waiting,</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 1em;">The groom is in his boots;</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 0em;">The lover's fondly prating,</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 1em;">The lady's humor suits:</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 2em;">Susanna! Susanna!</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 1em;">What joy to flog the brutes!</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 0em;">What joy, what joy in driving!</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 0em;">What joy, what joy to drive!</span></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>Like all other poetical visions, these, once seen, speedily become
+matters of course. Still, we found always a fairy element in the "<i>Gita
+in gondoletta</i>." Our gondolier had always a weird charm in our eyes. He
+seemed almost a feudal retainer, a servant for life or death. His shrewd
+glance showed that he was not easily to be astonished. He could tip over
+an obnoxious person in the dark, stab at a street corner, carry the most
+audacious of letters, and deliver the contraband answer under the very
+nose of high-snuffing authority.<a name="page_258" id="page_258"></a> Nought of all this did we desire of
+him: in fact, nothing but safe conduct and moderate charges. Yet we
+admired his mysterious talents, and wondered in what unwritten novels he
+might have figured. For, indeed, the watery streets of Venice, no less
+than her gondoliers, suggest the idea of romantic and desperate
+adventure. What balconies from which to throw a rival, dead or alive!
+What silent, know-nothing waters to receive him! What clever assistants
+to aid and abet!</p>
+
+<p>But enough of the evening row, which ends at the Piazzetta. Here you
+dismiss your man-at-oars, naming the hour at which you shall require his
+presence, he being meanwhile at liberty to sleep in his gondola, or lo
+leave it in charge with a friend, and to follow you to the Piazza, where
+you will amuse yourself after your fashion, he after his. Here the
+banners are floating, the lights glancing, the band stormily performing.
+Florian's café is represented by a crowd of well-dressed people sitting
+in the open air, with the appliances of chair and table covered by their
+voluminous draperies. If you arrive late, you may wait some time before
+a table, fourteen inches by ten, is vouchsafed to you. Ices are very
+good, very cheap, and very small. Tea and bread and butter are
+excellent. While you wait and while you feast, a succession of venders
+endeavor to impose upon you every small article which the streets of
+Venice show for sale. Shoes, slippers, alabaster work, shell work, tin
+gondolas concealing inkstands, nets, bracelets, necklaces,&mdash;all these
+things are offered to you in succession, together with allumettes,
+cigars,<a name="page_259" id="page_259"></a> journals, and caramels, or candied fruits strung upon straws.
+If you are mild in your discouragement of these venders, they will
+fasten upon you like other vermin, and refuse to depart until they shall
+have drawn the last drop of your change. I found a brisk charge
+necessary, with appeals to Florian's <i>garçon</i>, after whose interference,
+life on the Piazza became practicable.</p>
+
+<p>To the mere enjoyment of good victuals, with squabbles intervening, may
+be superadded the perception of fashionable life, as it goes on in these
+regions. When your eyes have taken the standard of light of the Piazza,
+you recognize in some of the groups about you persons whom you have
+seen, either in the balcony or in the gondola. Here are two young women
+whom I saw emerge from a narrow passage, this evening, rowed by a
+fine-looking servant, who stood bareheaded, and one other. They have
+diamond earrings, fashionable bonnets, and dresses dripping from a
+baptism of beads. One by one a group of young men, probably of the first
+water, forms about them. One of the ladies is handsome and quiet, the
+other plain and voluble. The latter becomes perforce the prominent
+figure in what goes on, which indeed amounts to nothing worth repeating.
+These were on my right. On my left soon appeared a lady of a certain
+age, with "world" written in large letters all over her countenance. She
+chaperons a daughter, got up with hair <i>à l'Anglaise</i>, whose pantomimic
+countenance suggests that she has been drilled by an English governess
+with <i>papa</i>, <i>prunes</i>, <i>prism</i>, or some equivalent gymnastic. When
+addressed,<a name="page_260" id="page_260"></a> she looks down into her fan, and rolls her eyes as if she
+saw her face in it. And lady friends come up: "Ah, marchesa! ah, signora
+contessa!" and the young bloods, hat in hand. So here we are, really, on
+the borders of high life, without intending it. And the baroness
+introduces a female relative&mdash;<i>una sorella maritata</i>&mdash;who has been
+handsome, and whose smile seems accustomed to fold the cloak of her
+beauty around the poverty of her character. And there is coffee, and
+there come ices. The ladies sip and gossip, the beaux come and go,
+talking of intended <i>villeggiaturas</i>; for the greatest social
+illustration for an Italian is that of travel. A third group immediately
+in front of us shows a young lady in an advanced stage of ambition,
+attired in a conspicuous tone, accompanied by quieter female relatives
+and a young boy. She regards with envious eyes the two popular
+associations on my right and left. She is dying to be noticed, and does
+not know how to manage it. And while I take note of these and other
+vanities, beggars whine for pence, or insist upon carrying off our
+superfluous bread or cake, for which, indeed, we must pay; but they eat
+the bread before your eyes with such evident relish that you are
+satisfied.</p>
+
+<p>By and by this palls upon you. You have seen and heard enough. The
+society to which you belong is over the water. Here your heart finds no
+place; and from the crowd of strangers even your lodging and quiet bed
+seem a refuge. So you settle with Florian's <i>garçon</i>, close your account
+with all beggars for the night, wander to the Piazzetta, and cry,
+"Bastiano!" and he of<a name="page_261" id="page_261"></a> the mysterious intelligence sooner or later
+responds. You give a penny to the crab,&mdash;the man who superfluously holds
+the boat while you get in,&mdash;and are at home after a brief dream of
+smooth motion under a starry sky. And in this way end all midsummer days
+in Venice. Not so smooth, however, is your climbing of three flights of
+stone stairs in the dark, with thumping and bumping. But you are up at
+last, and Gianetta&mdash;the shrewd maid&mdash;receives you with a candle-end.
+Frugal orders for breakfast, and to rest, with the cherubs of the
+mantel-piece watching over you.</p>
+
+<p>For over the said mantel-piece, two fair, fat babes, modelled in
+flat-relief, playfully contended for the mastery, their laughing faces
+near together, their swinging heels wide apart, as the festoon required.
+Elsewhere in the same relief were arabesques with birds and flowers.
+This bedroom of ours has been a room of state in its day. A passage-way
+and dressing-room have been taken from its stately proportions, and
+still it remains very spacious for our pretensions. Our <i>salon</i> is
+larger still, and largely mirrored. Two of its windows give upon a leafy
+garden, whose tree-tops lie nearer to us than to their owners. Its
+furniture has been hastily thrown together, and is mostly composed of
+odds and ends. But one of its pieces moves our admiration. It is a
+toilet table, enclosing a complete set of utensils in the finest
+Venetian glass&mdash;basins, ewers, toilet bottles and glasses, and the
+little boxes for soap and powder, all cut after the finest pattern. This
+toilet was made for a royal personage, a queen of something, whose<a name="page_262" id="page_262"></a>
+effects somehow seem to have been sold at auction in these parts.
+Another relic of her we discover in a bureau entirely incrusted with
+mother-of-pearl, an article that makes one's mouth water, if one has any
+mouth, which all men, like all horses, have not. The doors which divide
+our sitting from our sleeping room are at once objects of wonder and of
+fear to us. Their size is monstrous, and each of them hangs, or rather
+clings, by the upper hinge, the lower being dismounted. These doors are
+left all day at a conciliatory angle between closing and opening. We
+fear their falling on our heads whenever we approach them. We hear
+vaguely of some one who shall come to put them in order; but he never
+appears. Our own veteran, arriving at last, sets this right in as
+summary a manner as he has dealt with other nuisances. For the veteran,
+worn with travel, does arrive from Greece one morning, rowing up to our
+palace just as we have stepped from it to meet our gondola. He has a
+tale to tell like the wanderings of Ulysses. But between this event and
+those that precede it, the diary shows the following important entry:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Thursday, Aug. 1.&mdash;To Malamocco this A. M., with three rowers&mdash;our own,
+and two others, who received one florin between them. The row, both in
+going and returning, was delightful. Arrived at Malamocco, the men
+demanded one franc for breakfast, and disappeared within the shades of
+the Osteria. This is a small settlement at the very entrance of the
+lagoons. It was strongly fortified by the Austrians. The heat,<a name="page_263" id="page_263"></a> however,
+did not permit us to inspect the fortifications. We saw little of
+interest, but visited the church and a peasant's house. One of the
+daughters was engaged in stringing beads for sale. The beads were in a
+tray, and she plunged into them a bunch of wire needles some six inches
+in length, each carrying its slender thread. The merchant, she said,
+came weekly to bring the beads, and to take away those ready strung for
+the market. "To earn a penny, signora," said the mother, a
+substantial-looking person, wearing large gold earrings. The houses here
+looked very comfortable for people of the plain sort. The men seemed to
+be mostly away, whether engaged in fishing, or following the sea to
+foreign parts. On our way back we stopped at San Clementi, an ancient
+church upon a little island, now undergoing repairs. Within the church
+we found a marble tabernacle with solid walls, built behind the high
+altar. It may have been forty feet in length by twenty in breadth, and
+twelve or more feet in height. A massive door of bronze gave entrance to
+this huge strong-box, which was formerly used as a prison for refractory
+priests. We found the interior divided into two compartments. The larger
+of these was fitted up as a chapel; the smaller had served as the cell
+of confinement. The altar was erected at the partition which separated
+the two, and a grating inserted behind the altar figure allowed the
+prisoner the benefit of the religious services carried on in the chapel.
+The dreariness of this little prison can scarcely be described. No light
+had it, unless that of a lamp was allowed. A<a name="page_264" id="page_264"></a> church within a church,
+and within the inner church a place of torment! This arrangement seemed
+to violate even the Catholic immunity of sanctuary. Think of the
+unfortunate shut up within on a feast day, when faint sounds of outward
+jubilee might penetrate the marble walls, and heighten his pain by its
+contrast with the general joyous thrill of life. Think of the cheerless
+mass or vespers vouchsafed to him,&mdash;no friendly face, no brother voice,
+to sweeten worship. And if he continued recalcitrant, how convenient was
+this isolation for the final disposition to be made of him! <i>De
+profundis clamavit</i>, doubtless, and the church did not know that God
+could hear him.</p>
+
+<p>The diary does not record our second visit to the Armenian convent,
+which took place in these days. I do not even find in its irregular
+columns any mention of a franc which I am sure I paid to the porter, and
+which, I faintly hope, has been put to my credit elsewhere. Despite this
+absence of <i>pièces justificatives</i>, the visit still remains so freshly
+in my memory that I may venture to speak of it. The elder neophyte not
+having been with us before in Venice, the convent was new ground to her.
+We who had already seen it felt much more at home on the occasion of our
+second visit than of our first. For Padre Giacomo had answered our
+invasion by a friendly call; and did we not now know him to be a most
+genial and hospitable person? Had we not, moreover, made ourselves
+familiar with his religion, on our late voyage, by frequent converse
+with two priests of his profession? Did I not possess Father<a name="page_265" id="page_265"></a> Michel's
+views concerning the <i>demonio</i>, as well as his version of the Book of
+Job? And of Père Isaak did I not know the polished, uncommunicative side
+which covered his intimate convictions, whatever they may have been? The
+Armenian ladies, too,&mdash;had they not made me free of the guild? One of
+them had shown me her prayer-book. The other, being but fifteen years of
+age, had no prayer-book. So, with an assured step, we entered the sacred
+parlor, and demanded news of Padre Giacomo, and of his monkey. And the
+father came, smiling a little better than before, but with a sweet
+Oriental gravity. And he showed us again the library, and hall, and
+chapel, with the refectory, from whose cruel pulpit one brother is set
+to read while the others feast. We saw again the printing presses,
+worked by hand. And in the sacristy he commanded two of the younger
+brethren to bring the chiefest embroidered garments, reserved for high
+occasions, judging of us unjustly by our sex. And these satin and velvet
+wonders were, indeed, embossed with lambs, and birds, and flowers, in
+needlework of silver and gold, and of various colors, meet for the necks
+of them that divide the spoil. And we saw also a very fine mummy, as
+black, and dried, and wizened, as any old Pharaoh could be. A splendid
+bead covering lay over him, in open rows of blue and white, with
+hieroglyphic-looking men in black and yellow. This covering had been
+lately cleaned and repaired at the glass-works of Murano, as Padre
+Giacomo recounted with pride. He showed us in the old part of the work
+some curious<a name="page_266" id="page_266"></a> double beads, which Venice itself, he said, was unable to
+imitate. The colors were as fresh and clear as if the mummy had clothed
+himself from the last fancy fair, with a description of afghan well
+suited to the Egyptian climate.</p>
+
+<p>Having done justice to this human preserve, the padre now regaled us
+with a preparation of rose leaves embalmed in sugar. He also bestowed
+upon us one of the convent publications, a tolerable copy of verses
+composed on the spot itself by the late Louis of Bavaria, celebrating
+its calm and retirement. I myself could have responded to the royal
+<i>suspiria</i> with one distich.</p>
+
+<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="poetry">
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 0em;">"Here no people comes to beg thee,</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: 0.25em;">Here no Lola comes to plague thee."</span></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>As we passed from the building to the garden, the wicked monkey, chained
+and lying in wait, sprang at my hat, and, snatching my lilac veil, bore
+it off with a flying leap of animal grace and malice. Padre Giacomo
+anxiously apologized for his pet's misconduct, which was certainly
+surprising. But the monkey's education, as every one knows, is
+dependent, not upon precept, but upon example, and Padre Giacomo's
+example, to the monkey, was only a negative. We parted from our
+cloistered friend, sincerely desiring, if not hoping, to see him again.</p>
+
+<p>Of our last day in fairest Venice the diary gives this meagre account:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Sunday, August 4. Early to Piazza, where we encountered the Bishop of
+Rhode Island. At San<a name="page_267" id="page_267"></a> Marco's, visited Luccati's beautiful mosaics in
+the sacristy. The three figures over the door are especially
+fine&mdash;Madonna in the middle, and a saint on either side. A colossal
+cross adorns the ceiling, and the wall on one side is occupied by
+figures of twelve prophets; on the other, by the twelve disciples. The
+cross almost seems to bloom with beautiful devices. Luccati was
+imprisoned, they say, in the Piombi.</p>
+
+<p>To the Italian Protestant service, held in a good hall in the
+neighborhood of the Church of San Giovanni e Paolo. The hall was densely
+crowded. I found no seat, and barely room to stand. The audience seemed
+a mixed one, so far as worldly position goes, but was entirely
+respectable in aspect and demeanor, the masculine element largely
+predominating. Signor Comba, a young man, is quite eloquent and taking.
+He delivers himself clearly, and with energy. He criticised at some
+length the unchristian doctrines of the Romish church&mdash;this is part of
+his work.</p>
+
+<p>The service ended, I passed into the Church of San Giovanni e Paolo, and
+enjoyed my visit unusually. The vivid light of the day and hour made
+many of the monuments appear new to me. The doges in this, as in other
+churches, are stowed away on shelves, like mummies. Found a monument to
+Doge Sterno, dated early in the fifteenth century, and beside it the
+effigy of a youth designated as Aloysius Trevisano, æt. 23, deeply
+regretted, and commemorated for his attainments in Greek, Latin, and
+philosophy. The figure is recumbent, the face of a high and refined
+character, with the unmistakable<a name="page_268" id="page_268"></a> charm of youth impressed upon it. The
+date is also of the fifteen century. From the church to the sacristy, to
+take a last look at the two pictures, Titian's Death of St. Peter,
+martyr, and a fine Madonna of Gian Bellini. The Titian was glorious
+to-day. It has great life and action. The Dominican in the foreground,
+who has his arm raised as if appealing to heaven and earth against the
+barbarous act, seems to have communicated a touch of his passion to the
+two cherubs above, who bear the martyr palm. They are stormy little
+cherubs, and seem in haste to bring in sight the recompense of so much
+suffering.</p>
+
+<p>Of the Protestant preaching I will once more and finally say, that it is
+a genuine missionary work, and commend it to the good wishes and good
+offices of those whose benefactions do not fear to cross the ocean. May
+it permanently thrive and prosper.</p>
+
+<p>Of the pictures I can only say, that I doubly congratulate myself on
+having paid them my last homage before leaving Titian's lovely city.
+For, not long after, a cruel fire broke out in or near that sacristy,
+precious with carvings in wood and marble bas-reliefs; and all the
+treasures were destroyed, including the two pictures, only temporarily
+bestowed there, and many square yards of multitude by Tintoretto,
+bearing, as usual, his own portrait in a sly corner, representative, no
+doubt, of his wish to watch the effect of his masterpieces upon humanity
+at large. The Madonna by Bellini was a charming picture, but the St.
+Peter is a loss that concerns the world. The saint, one hopes,<a name="page_269" id="page_269"></a> has been
+comfortable in Paradise these many years. But the artist? What Paradise
+would console him for the burning of one of his <i>chefs-d'&oelig;uvre</i>? He
+would be like Rachel weeping for her children, which reminds me that
+ideal parentage is of no sex. The artist, the poet, the reformer, are
+father and mother, all in one.</p>
+
+<p>We left Venice, the diary tells me, on the 5th of August, with what
+regret we need not say. The same venerable authority records a grave
+disagreement with the custom-house officers, of whose ministrations we
+had received no previous warning. So, two very modest pieces of dress
+goods, delayed in the making, caused me to be branded as a
+<i>contrabandista</i>, with a fine, and record to my discredit. I confess to
+some indecorous manifestations of displeasure at these circumstances.
+The truth is, forewarned is forearmed. Venice is a free port, and the
+traveller who leaves her by railroad for the first time may not be aware
+of the strict account to which he will be held for every little
+indulgence in Venetian traffic. Now, to have the spoons presented to you
+in the house, and to be arrested as a thief when you would pass the
+door, is a grievous ending to a hospitable beginning. So it came to pass
+that I anathematized beautiful Venice as I departed, gathering up the
+broken fragments of my peace, past diamond cement. But here, in
+trunk-upsetting Boston, I bethink me, and confess. I was wrong, utterly
+wrong, O custom-house officers, when I frowned and stormed at you,
+contending inch by inch and phrase by phrase. You were neither unjust
+nor uncivil, although I was both. Only<a name="page_270" id="page_270"></a> I still attest and obsecrate to
+the fact that I did not intend to smuggle, and entered your jealous
+domain with no sense of contraband about me. Yet to such wrath did your
+perquisitions bring me, that the angry thoughts slackened only at
+Verona, where the tombs of the Scaligers and the rounds of the
+amphitheatre compelled me to quiet small distempers with great thoughts.</p>
+
+<p>At railroad speed, however, we visited these rare monuments. Can Grande
+and his horse looked flat and heavy from their eminence. We admired the
+beautiful iron screen of one of the tombs, hammer-wrought, and flexible
+as a shirt of mail. And we remembered Dante, paid two francs to the
+guardian of the enclosure, and drove away. The afternoon's journey
+whirled us past some strange antique towns, with walls and battlements,
+and at night we were in Bolsena, Germanicè <i>Bottsen</i>. And when we asked
+the hotel maid if she had ever been in Verona, she replied, "O, no; that
+is in Italy." And so we knew that we were not.</p>
+
+<h2>F<small>LYING</small> F<small>OOTSTEPS</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>The journey which we now commenced was too rapid to allow of more than
+the briefest record of its route. The breathlessness of haste, and the
+number of things to be seen and visited, left no time for writing up on
+the subjects suggested by the meagre notes of the diary. To the latter,
+therefore, I am forced to betake myself, piecing its fragmentary
+statements, where I can do so, from memory.</p>
+
+<p>Tuesday, August 6. Started with vetturino for Innspruck,<a name="page_271" id="page_271"></a> via Brenner
+pass. A splendid day's journey. Stopped to dine at a pretty
+village,&mdash;name forgotten,&mdash;at whose principal inn a smart, bustling
+maid-servant in costume, very clean and civil, came to the carriage,
+helped us to alight, and carried our travelling bags up stairs to a
+parlor with a stout bed in it, upon which our chief threw himself and
+slept until the cutlets were ready. This old-fashioned zeal and civility
+were pleasant to contemplate once more, probably for the last time. For
+a railroad has been built over the Brenner pass, the which will go into
+operation next week. Then will these pleasant manners insensibly fade
+away, with the up-to-time curtness of modern travel. The porter who
+helps you to carry your hand luggage from the car to the depot will
+sternly demand his fee for that laborious service. All officials will
+grow as reticent of doing you the smallest pleasure as if civility were
+a contraband of war. And it does indeed become so, for the railroad
+develops the antagonisms of trade. Its flaming sword allows of no
+wanderings in wayside Paradises. Its steam trumpet shrieks in your ear
+the lesson that the straight line is the shortest distance between two
+points. It swallows you at one point and vomits you at another, with
+extreme risk of your life between. And it vulgarizes every place that it
+touches. The mixed stir and quiet of the little town become concentrated
+into fixed crises of excitement. For the postilion's horn and whip, and
+the pleasant rattling of the coming and going post-chaise, you will
+have, three or four times in the day, those shrill bars whose infernal<a name="page_272" id="page_272"></a>
+symphony is mercifully allowed to proceed no farther; and a cross and
+steaming crowd; and a cool and supercilious few in the first or second
+class <i>wart-saal</i>; and then a dull and dead quiet in the little town, as
+if steam and stir came and went together, and left nothing behind them.</p>
+
+<p>The buxom maid-servant mourned over the impending ruin of the small
+tavern business, as she showed us the curious arrangements of the old
+house. It had formerly been a convent of nuns, and was very solidly put
+together. The back windows commanded a lovely view of the mountains. In
+the garden we found a pleasant open house, no doubt formerly a place for
+devout assemblages and meditations, but now chiefly devoted to the
+consumption of beer.</p>
+
+<p>After dinner we walked to the church near by, and looked at the curious
+iron crosses and small mural tablets which marked the final
+resting-place of the village worthies. Their petty offices and cherished
+distinctions were all preserved here. All of them had received the "holy
+death sacrament," and had started on the mysterious voyage in good hope.
+Through this whole extent of country, the crucifixes by the wayside were
+numerous. Resuming our journey, we reached Mittelwald, a picturesque
+hamlet, composed of a small church, a stream, a bridge, and a short
+string of houses. Here we defeated the future machinations of all
+officers of customs, by causing the two offending dress-patterns,
+already twice paid for, and treated at length in various printed and
+written documents, to be cut into breadths,<a name="page_273" id="page_273"></a> which we hastily managed to
+sew up, reserving their fuller treatment for the purlieus of civilized
+life.</p>
+
+<p>Our two days' drive over the mountains was refreshing and most charming.
+Our vetturino was not less despondent than the maid-servant before
+alluded to. In our progress we were much in sight of the scarcely
+completed railroad, whose locomotive and working cars constantly
+appeared and disappeared before us, plunging into the numerous tunnels
+that defeat the designs of the mountain fortresses, and mocking our slow
+progress, as the money-getting train of success and sensation mocks the
+tedious steps of learning and the painful elaboration of art.</p>
+
+<p>"This is my last journey," said the vetturino; "the railway opens on
+Monday of next week."</p>
+
+<p>"What will you do thereafter?" I inquired.</p>
+
+<p>"Sell all out, and go to work as I can," he answered; adding, however,
+"In case you should intend going as far as Munich by carriage, I beg to
+be honored,"&mdash;of which the Yankee rendering would be, "I shouldn't mind
+putting you through."</p>
+
+<p>This, however, was hardly to be thought of, and at Innspruck we took
+leave of this honest and polite man, whose species must soon become
+extinct, whether he survive or no. Here recommenced for us the prosaic
+chapter of the railroad. Our route, however, for a good part of the way,
+lay within sight of the mountains. The depots at which we took fiery
+breath were in the style of Swiss châlets, quite ornamental in
+themselves, and further graced by vines and flowers. The travellers<a name="page_274" id="page_274"></a> we
+encountered were not commonplacely cosmopolite. The young women were
+often in Tyrolese costume, wearing gilt tassels on their broad, black
+felt hats. We encountered parties of archers going to attend shooting
+matches, attired in picturesque uniforms of green and gold. At the
+depots, too, we encountered a new medium of enlivenment. We were now in
+a land of beer, and foaming glasses were offered to us in the cars, and
+at the railway buffets. Mild and cheerful we found this Bavarian
+beverage,&mdash;less verse-inspiring than wine,&mdash;and valuable as tending to
+reduce the number of poets who tease the world by putting all its
+lessons into rhymes, chimes, and jingles. Whatever we ourselves may have
+done, it is certain that our companions of both sexes embraced these
+frequent opportunities of refreshment, and that the color in their
+cheeks and the tone of their good-natured laughter were heightened by
+the same. One of these, a young maiden, told us how she had climbed the
+mountain during four hours of the day before, visiting the huts of the
+cowherds, who, during summer, pasture their cows high up on the green
+slopes. The existence of these people she described as hard and solitary
+in the extreme. The rich butter and cheese they make are all for the
+market. They themselves eat only what they cannot sell, according to the
+rule whereby small farmers live and thrive in all lands. The young girl
+wore in her hat a bunch of the blossom called <i>edelweiss</i>, which she had
+brought from her lofty wanderings. It is held in great esteem here, and
+is often offered for sale.<a name="page_275" id="page_275"></a></p>
+
+<p>In the afternoon we turned our back upon the mountains. A flat land lay
+before us, green and well tilled. And long before sunset we saw the
+spires of Munich, and the lifted arm of the great statue of Bavaria. Our
+arrival was prosperous, and through the streets of the handsome modern
+city we attained the quiet of an upper chamber in a hotel filled with
+Americans.</p>
+
+<h2>M<small>UNICH</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>Our two days in Munich were characterized by the most laborious
+sight-seeing. A week, even in our rapid scale of travelling, would not
+have been too much for this gorgeous city. We gave what we had, and
+cannot give a good account of it.</p>
+
+<p>My first visit was to the Pinakothek, which I had thoroughly explored
+some twenty-three years earlier, when the galleries of Italy and the
+Louvre were unknown to me. Coming now quite freshly from Venice, with
+Rome and Florence still recent in my experience, I found the Munich
+gallery less grandiose than my former remembrance had made it. The diary
+says, "The Rubenses are the best feature. I note also two fine heads by
+Rembrandt, and a first-rate Paris Bordone&mdash;a female head with golden
+hair and dark-red dress; four peasant pictures by Murillo, excellent in
+their kind, quite familiar through copies and engravings; some of the
+best Albert Dürers. The Italian pictures not all genuine. None of the
+Raphaels, I should say, would be accepted as such in Italy. The Fra
+Angelicos not good. Two good Andrea del Sartos; a Leonardo da Vinci,<a name="page_276" id="page_276"></a>
+which seems to me a little caricatured; a room full of Vander Wertes,
+very smooth and finely finished; many Vandycks, scarcely first rate."</p>
+
+<p>The afternoon of this day we devoted to the Glyptothek, or gallery of
+sculpture. Here our first objects of interest were the Æginetan marbles,
+whose vacant places we had so recently seen on the breezy height of the
+temple from which they were taken.</p>
+
+<p>We found these rough, and attesting a period of art far more remote than
+that of the Elgin marbles. They are arranged in the order in which they
+stood before the pediment of the temple, a standing figure of Minerva in
+the middle, the other figures tapering off on either side, and ending
+with two seated warriors, the feet of either turned towards the outer
+angle of his side of the pediment. All seemed to have belonged to a
+dispensation of ugliness; they reminded us of some of the Etruscan
+sculptures.</p>
+
+<p>This gallery possesses a famous torso called the Ilioneus, concerning
+which Mrs. Jamieson rhapsodizes somewhat in her Munich book. The
+Barberini Faun, too, is among its treasures. As my readers may not be
+acquainted with the artistic antecedents of this statue, I will subjoin
+for their benefit the following narration, which I abridge from the
+"Ricordi" of the Marquis Massimo d' Azeglio, recently published.</p>
+
+<p>At the time of the French domination in Italy, the Roman nobles were
+subjected to the levying of heavy contributions. The inconvenience of
+these requisitions often taxed the resources of the wealthiest families,
+and<a name="page_277" id="page_277"></a> led to the sale of furniture, jewels, and the multifarious
+denomination of articles classed together as <i>objets d'art</i>. Among
+others, the Barberini family, in their palace at the Quattro Fontane,
+exposed for sale various antiquitties, and especially the torso of a
+male figure, of Greek execution and in Pentelican marble, a relic of the
+palmy days of Hellenic art.</p>
+
+<p>A certain sculptor, Cavalier Pacetti, purchased this last fragment, sold
+at auction for the sum of seven or eight hundred dollars. The arms and
+legs were wholly wanting&mdash;the narrator is uncertain as to the head.
+Pacetti had made this purchase with the view of restoring the mutilated
+statue to entireness. He proceeded to model for himself the parts that
+were wanting, and in time produced the sleeping figure known as the
+Barberini Faun.</p>
+
+<p>This work was esteemed a great success. Besides the value of its long
+and uncertain labor must be mentioned the difficulty of matching the
+original marble. To effect this the artist was obliged to purchase and
+destroy another Greek statue, of less merit, whose marble supplied the
+material for the restoration.</p>
+
+<p>In the mean time the Napoleonic era had passed away; the pope had
+returned to Rome. Foreigners from all parts now flocked to the Eternal
+City, and to one of these Pacetti sold his work for many thousands of
+dollars. Before it could be packed and delivered, however, a
+governmental veto annulled the sale, directing the artist to restore the
+statue to the Barberini family, under the plea of its being subject to a
+<i>fidei commissa</i>,<a name="page_278" id="page_278"></a> and offering him the sum of money expended by him in
+the first purchase, together with such further compensation for his
+labor and materials as a committee of experts should award.</p>
+
+<p>The unfortunate Pacetti resisted this injustice to the extent of his
+ability. He demonstrated the sale of the torso to have been made without
+reserve, the money for its purchase to have been raised by him with
+considerable effort. The further expense of the secondary statue was a
+heavy item. As an artist, he could not allow any one but himself to set
+a price upon his work.</p>
+
+<p>In spite of these arguments, the Barberinis, remembering that possession
+is nine points of the law, managed to confiscate the statue by armed
+force. Before this last measure, however, a mandate informed the artist
+that the pitiful sum offered to him in exchange (not in compensation)
+for his work, had been placed in the bank, subject to his order, and
+that from this sum a steady discount would mark every day of his delay
+to close with the shameful bargain.</p>
+
+<p>Pacetti now fell ill with a bilious fever, the result of this bitter
+disappointment. His recovery was only partial, and his death soon
+followed. His sons commenced and continued a suit against the Barberini
+family. They obtained a favorable judgment, but did not obtain their
+property, which the Barberinis sold to the King of Bavaria.</p>
+
+<p>I have thought it worth while to quote this history of a world-renowned
+work of art. I do not know that a more perfect and successful
+combination of modern with<a name="page_279" id="page_279"></a> ancient art exists than that achieved in
+this Munich Faun. The mutilated honor of the Barberini name is, we
+should fear, beyond restoration by any artist.</p>
+
+<p>The Glyptothek closed much too soon for us. With the exception of the
+sculptures just enumerated, it possesses nothing that can compete in
+interest with the noted Italian galleries, or perhaps with the Louvre.
+But the few valuables that it has are first rate of their kind, and it
+contains many duplicates of well-known subjects. The building and
+arrangements are very elegant, and seem to cast a certain pathos over
+the follies of the old king, to whom it owes its origin, making one more
+sorry than angry that one who knew the Graces so well should not have
+fraternized more with the Virtues. The Æginetan Minerva is stern and
+hideous, however, and may have exercised an unfortunate influence over
+her <i>protegé</i>.</p>
+
+<p>We closed the labors of this day by visiting the colossal statue of
+Bavaria, who, with a strange hospitality, throws open her skull to the
+public. The external effect of the figure is not grandiose, and the
+sudden slope of the ground in front makes it very difficult to get a
+good view of it. With the help of a lamp, and in consideration of a
+small fee, we ascended the spinal column, and made ourselves comfortable
+within the sacred precincts of phrenology. The circulation, however,
+soon became so rapid as to produce a pressure at the base of the brain.
+Calling to the guardian below to impede for the moment all further
+ascent, we flowed down, and the congestion was relieved. Of this statue<a name="page_280" id="page_280"></a>
+an artist once said to us, "As for such a thing as the Munich Bavaria,
+the bigger it is, the smaller it is"&mdash;a saying not unintelligible to
+those who have seen it.</p>
+
+<p>Our remaining day we devoted, in the first place, to the new Pinakothek.
+Here we saw a large picture, by Kaulbach, representing the fall of
+Jerusalem. Although full of historical and artistic interest, it seemed
+to me less individual and remarkable than his cartoons. A series of
+small pictures by the same artist appeared quite unworthy of his great
+powers and reputation. They were exceedingly well executed, certainly,
+but poorly conceived, representing matters merely personal to artistic
+and other society in Munich, and of little value to the world at large.</p>
+
+<p>Here was also a holy family by Overbeck, closely imitated from Raphael.
+The diary speaks vaguely of "many interesting pictures, the religious
+ones the poorest." I remember that we greatly regretted the limitation
+of our time in visiting this gallery. In the vestibule of the building
+we were shown a splendid Bavaria, in a triumphal car, driving four lions
+abreast, the work of Schwanthaler. This noble design so far exists only
+in plaster; one would wish to see it in fine Munich bronze. Apropos of
+which I must mention, but cannot describe, a visit to the celebrated
+foundery in which many of the best modern statues have been cast. Here
+were Crawford's noble works; here the more recent compositions of
+Rogers, Miss Stebbins, and Miss Hosmer. An American naturally first
+seeks acquaintance here with the works of his countrymen. He<a name="page_281" id="page_281"></a> finds them
+in distinguished company. The foundery keeps a plaster cast of each of
+its models, and the ghosts of our heroes appear with tie-wig princes and
+generals of other times, as also with poets and <i>littérateurs</i>. The
+group of Goethe and Schiller, crowned and hand in hand, suggests one of
+the noblest of literary reminiscences&mdash;that of the devoted and genuine
+friendship of two most eminent authors, within the narrow limits of one
+small society. The entireness and sincerity of each in his own
+department of art alone made this possible. He who dares to be himself,
+and to work out his own ideal, fears no other, however praised and
+distinguished.</p>
+
+<p>We visited the new and old palaces in company with a small mob of
+travellers of all nations, whose disorderly tendencies were restrained
+by the palace <i>cicerones</i>. These worthies did the honors of the place,
+told the stories, and kept the company together. In the new palace we
+were shown the frescos, the hall of the battlepieces, the famous gallery
+of beauties, and the throne-room, whose whole length is adorned with
+life-size statues of royal and ducal Bavarian ancestors in gilded
+bronze. The throne is a great gilded chair, cushioned with crimson
+velvet, the seat adorned with a huge <i>L</i> in gold embroidery.</p>
+
+<p>Of the gallery mentioned just before, I must say that its portraits are
+those of society belles, not of artist beauties. However handsome,
+therefore, they may have been in their ball and court dresses, there is
+something conventional and unlovely in their <i>toute ensemble<a name="page_282" id="page_282"></a></i>, as a
+collection of female heads. I would agree to find artists who should
+make better pictures from women of the people, taken in their ordinary
+costume, and with the freedom of common life in their actions and
+expressions. An intangible armor of formality seems to guard the persons
+of those great ladies. One imagines that one could understand their
+faces better, were they translated into human nature.</p>
+
+<p>In the old palace, which has now rather a deserted and denuded aspect,
+we still found traces of former splendor. Among these, I remember a
+state bed with a covering so heavily embroidered with gold, that eight
+men are requisite to lift it. The <i>valet de place</i> astonished us with
+the price of this article; but having forgotten his statement, I cannot
+astonish any one with it. Of greater interest was a room, whose walls
+bore everywhere small brackets, supporting costly pieces of porcelain,
+cups, <i>flacons</i>, and statuettes. Beyond this was a <i>boudoir</i>, whose
+vermilion sides were nearly covered by miniature paintings, set into
+them. Many of these miniatures were of great beauty and value. Clearly
+the tastes of the Bavarian family were always of the most expensive.
+They looked after the flower garden, and allowed the kitchen garden to
+take care of itself. Of this sort was the farming of Otho and Amalia.
+But peace be to them. Otho is just dead of measles, Amalia nearly dead
+of vexations.</p>
+
+<p>Our two days allowed us little time for the churches of Munich. The
+Frauenkirche has many antiquities more interesting than its splendid
+restorations. On one<a name="page_283" id="page_283"></a> of its altars I found the inscription, "Holy
+mother Ann, pray for us." I suppose that ever since the dogma of the
+immaculate conception has become part of church discipline, the sacred
+person just mentioned has found her clientele much enlarged. The new
+Basilica is quite gorgeous in its adornments, but I have preserved no
+minutes of them.</p>
+
+<p>We had the satisfaction of seeing a number of Kaulbach's drawings, among
+which were his Goethe and Schiller series, very fine and full of
+interest.</p>
+
+<p>One of the last of these represents Tell stepping from Gessler's boat at
+the critical moment described in Schiller's drama. One of the newest to
+me was a figure of Ottilie, from the Wahlverwandtschaften, hanging with
+mingled horror and affection over the innocent babe of the story. The
+intense distress of the young girl's countenance contrasts strongly with
+the reposeful attitude of the little one. It made me ponder this
+ingenious and laboriously achieved distress. The very exuberance of
+Goethe's temperament, I must think, caused him to seek his sorrows in
+regions quite remote from common disaster. The miseries of his
+personages (vide Werther and the Wahlverwandtschaften) are far-fetched;
+and the alchemy by which he turns wholesome life into sentimental
+anguish brings to light no life-treasure more substantial than the fairy
+gold which genius is bound to convert into value more solid.</p>
+
+<p>And this was all of Munich, a place of polite tastes surely, in which
+life must flow on, adorned with many pleasantnesses. Neither would
+business seem to be<a name="page_284" id="page_284"></a> deficient, judging from the handsome shops and
+general air of prosperity. Our view of its resources was certainly most
+cursory. But life is the richer even for adjourned pleasures, and we
+shall never think of Munich without desiring its better acquaintance.</p>
+
+<h2>S<small>WITZERLAND</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>Travelling in Switzerland is now become so common and conventional as to
+invite little comment, except from those who remain in the country long
+enough to study out scientific and social questions, which the hasty
+traveller has not time to entertain in even the most cursory matter. I
+confess, for one, that I was content to be enchanted with the wonderful
+beauty which feasts the eye without intermission. I was willing to
+believe that the mountains had done for this people all that they should
+have done, giving them political immunities, and a sort of necessary
+independence, while the hardships of climate and situation keep
+stringent the social bond, and temper the fierceness of individuality
+with the sense of mutual need and protection. It would be, I think, an
+instructive study for an American to become intimately acquainted with
+the domestic features of Swiss republicanism. It is undoubtedly a system
+less lax and more carefully administered than our own. The door is not
+thrown open for beggary, ignorance, and rascality to vote themselves, in
+the shape of their representatives, the first places in outward dignity
+and efficient power. The old traditions of breeding and education are
+carefully held to. Without the nonsense of aristocratic<a name="page_285" id="page_285"></a> absolutism,
+there is yet no confusion of orders. The mistress is mistress, and the
+maid is maid. Wealth and landed property persevere in families. Great
+changes of position without great talents are rare.</p>
+
+<p>To our American pretensions, and to our brilliant style of
+man&oelig;uvring, the Swiss mode of life would appear a very slow business.
+It seems rather to develop a high mediocrity than an array of startling
+superiorities. It has, moreover, no room for daring theories and
+experiments. It cannot afford a Mormon corner, a woman's-rights
+platform, an endless intricacy of speculating and swindling rings.
+Whether we can afford these things, future generations will determine.
+There is a great deal of moral and political fancy-work done in America
+which another age may put out of sight to make room for necessary
+scrubbing, sweeping, and getting rid of vermin. Meantime the poor
+present age works, and deceives, and dawdles, hoping to be dismissed
+with the absolving edict, "She hath done what she could."</p>
+
+<p>Hotels, railways, and depots in Switzerland are comfortable, and managed
+with great order and system. The telegraph arrangements are admirable,
+cheap, and punctual, as they might be here, if they were administered
+for the people's interest, and not for the aggrandizement of private
+fortunes. Living and comfort are expensive to the traveller, not
+exorbitant. Subordinates neither insult nor cringe. Churches are well
+filled; intelligent and intelligible doctrine is preached. Education is
+valued, and liberal provision is made for those<a name="page_286" id="page_286"></a> classes in which
+natural disability calls for special modes of instruction. I dare not go
+more into generals, from my very limited opportunity of observation.
+Everything, however, in the aspect of town and country, leads one to
+suppose that the average of crime must be a low one, and that the
+preventing influences&mdash;so much more efficient than remedial
+measures&mdash;have long, been at work. It is Protestant Switzerland which
+makes this impression most strongly. In the Catholic cantons, beggary
+exists and is tolerated as a thing of course; yet the Protestant element
+has everywhere its representation and its influence.</p>
+
+<p>Swiss Catholicism has not the slavish ignorance of Roman Catholicism.
+The little painted crucifixes by the wayside indeed afflict one by their
+impotence and insignificance. Not thus shall Christ be recognized in
+these days. In some places their frequency reminded me of the recurrence
+of the pattern on a calico or a wall paper. Yet, as a whole, one feels
+that Switzerland is a Protestant power.</p>
+
+<p>For specials, I must have recourse to the insufficient pages of the
+diary, which give the following:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>August 13. Museum at Zurich. Lacustrine remains, in stone, flint, and
+bronze; fragments of the old piles, cut with stone knives. Hand-mill for
+corn, consisting of a hollow stone and a round one, concave and convex.
+Toilet ornaments, in bone and bronze; a few in gold.&mdash;The Library. Lady
+Jane Grey's letters, three in number; Zwingle's Greek Bible.&mdash;The
+Armory. Zwingle's helmet and battle-axe; three suits of female<a name="page_287" id="page_287"></a> armor;
+curious shields, cannon, pikes, and every variety of personal defence.</p>
+
+<p>August 14. Left Zurich at half past six A. M. for Lucerne, reaching the
+latter place at half past eight. Visited Thorwaldsen's lion, whose
+majestic presence I had not forgotten in twenty-three years. Yet the
+Swiss hireling under foreign pay is a mischievous institution. At two P.
+M. took the boat for Hergeswyl, intending to ascend from that point the
+Mount Pilatus. At half past three began this ascension. The road is very
+fine, and my leader was excellent; yet I had some uncomfortable moments
+in the latter part of the ascent, which was in zigzag, and very steep.
+Each horse cost ten francs, and each leader was to have a <i>trink-geld</i>
+besides. We stopped very gladly at the earliest reached of the two
+hotels which render habitable the heights of the mountain. We learned
+too late that it would have been better to proceed at once to that which
+stands nearly on the summit. We should thus have gained time for the
+great spectacle of the sunrise on the following morning. Our view of the
+sunset, too, would have been more extended. Yet we were well content
+with it. Near the hotel was a very small Catholic chapel, through whose
+painted windows we tried to peep. A herd of goats feeding near by made
+music with their tinkling bells. Swiss sounds are as individual as Swiss
+sights. Voices, horns, bells, all have their peculiar ring in these high
+atmospheres.</p>
+
+<p>We lay down at night with the intention of rising at a quarter of four
+next morning, in order to witness the sunrise from the highest point of
+the mountain. Mistaking<a name="page_288" id="page_288"></a> some sounds which disturbed my slumbers for the
+guide's summons, I sprang out of bed, and having no match, made a hasty
+toilet in the dark, and then ran to arouse my companions. One of these,
+fortunately, was able to strike a light and look at his watch. It was
+just twelve, and my zeal and energy had been misdirected. When I again
+awoke, it was at four A. M., already rather late for our purpose. We
+dressed hastily, and vehemently started on the upward zigzag. As the
+guide had not yet appeared, I carried our night bundle, but for which I
+should have kept the lead of the party. Small as was its weight, I felt
+it sensibly in this painful ascent, and was thankful to relinquish it
+when the tardy guide came up with us. In spite of his aid, I was much
+distressed for breath, and suffered from a thirst surpassing that of
+fever. My ears also ached exceedingly in consequence of the rarefaction
+of the atmosphere. The last effort of the ascent was made upon a ladder
+pitched at such an angle that one could climb it only on hands and
+knees. We reached the last peak a little late for the sunrise, but
+enjoyed a near and magnificent view of the snow Alps. The diary contains
+no description of this prospect. I can only remember that its coloring
+and extent were wonderful. But a day of fatigue was still before us.
+Breakfasting at six o'clock, we soon commenced the painful downward
+journey. No "<i>facilis descensus</i>" was this, but a climbing down which
+lasted three full hours. We had kept but one horse for this part of our
+journey, but this was such an uncertain and stumbling beast that we
+gladly surrendered him to<a name="page_289" id="page_289"></a> our chief, who, in spite of this assistance,
+was found more than once lying on a log, assuring us that his end was at
+hand. We had little breath to spare for his consolation, but gave him a
+silent and aching sympathy. A pleasant party of English girls left the
+hotel when we did, one on horseback and three on foot. The hardships of
+the way brought us together. I can still recall the ring of their
+voices, and the freshness and sparkle of their faces, which really
+encouraged my efforts. The pleasures of this descent were as intense as
+its pains. The brilliant grass was enamelled with wild flowers,
+exquisite in color and fragrance. The mountain air was bracing and
+delightful, the details of tree and stream most picturesque. For some
+reason, which I now forget, we stopped but little to take rest. At a
+small châlet half way down, we enjoyed a glass of beer, and were waited
+upon by a maiden in white sleeves and black bodice, her fair hair being
+braided with a strip of white linen, and secured in its place by a large
+pin with an ornamented head. We reached Alpenach in a state of body and
+of wardrobe scarcely describable. But our minds at least were at ease.
+We had done something to make a note of. We had been to the top of Mons
+Pilatus.</p>
+
+<p>Of Interlaken the diary preserves nothing worth transcribing. The great
+beauty of the scenery made us reluctant to leave it after a few hours of
+enjoyment. The appalling fashionable and watering-place aspect of the
+streets and hotels, on the other hand, rendered it uncongenial to quiet
+travellers, whose strength did not lie in<a name="page_290" id="page_290"></a> the <i>clothes</i> line. Our brief
+stay showed us the greatest mixture and variety of people; the hotels
+were splendid with showy costumes, the shops tempting with onyx,
+amethyst, and crystal ornaments. We saw here also a great display of
+carvings in wood. The unpaved streets were gay with equipages and donkey
+parties. A sousing rain soon made confusion among them, and reconciled
+us to a speedy departure.</p>
+
+<p>Of Berne and Fribourg I will chronicle only the organ concerts, given to
+exhibit the resources of two famous instruments. At both places we found
+the organ very fine, and the musical performance very trashy. No real
+organ music was given on either occasion, the <i>pièce de resistance</i>
+being an imitation of a thunderstorm. Both instruments seemed to me to
+surpass our own great organ in beauty and variety of tone. The larger
+proportions of the buildings in which they are heard may contribute to
+this result. Both of these are cathedrals, with fine vaulted roofs and
+long aisles, very different from the essentially civic character of the
+music hall, whose compact squareness cannot deal with the immense volume
+of sound thrown upon its hands by the present overgrown incum&mdash;bent.</p>
+
+<h2>T<small>HE</small> G<small>REAT</small> E<small>XPOSITION</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>It would be unfair to American journalism not to suppose that all
+possible information concerning the Great Exposition has already been
+given to the great republic. There have doubtless been quires upon
+quires of brilliant writing devoted to that absorbing theme. Columns<a name="page_291" id="page_291"></a>
+from the most authentic sources have been commanded and paid for.
+American writing is rich in epithets, and we may suppose that all the
+adjective splendors have been put in requisition to aid imagination to
+take the place of sight. Yet, as the diversities of landscape painting
+show the different views which may be taken of one nature, even so the
+view taken by my sober instrument may possibly show something that has
+escaped another.</p>
+
+<p>I here refer to the pages of my oft-quoted diary. But alas! the wretch
+deserts me in the hour of my greatest need. I find a record of my first
+visit only, and that couched in one prosaic phrase as follows:
+Exposition&mdash;valet, six francs.</p>
+
+<p>Now, I am not a Cuvier, to reconstruct a whole animal from a single
+fossil bone; nor am I a German historian, to present the picture of a
+period by inventing the opposite of its records. Yet what I can report
+of this great feature of the summer must take as its starting-point this
+phrase: Exposition&mdash;valet, six francs.</p>
+
+<p>This extravagant attendance was secured by us on the occasion of our
+first visit, when, passing inside the narrow turnstile, with ready
+change and eager mind, we encountered the great reality we had to deal
+with, and felt, to our dismay, that spirit would help us little, and
+that flesh and blood, eyes and muscles, must do their utmost, and begin
+by acknowledging a defeat. Looking on the diverse paths, and flags and
+buildings, we sought an Ariadne, and found at least a guide whom Bacchus
+might console. Escorted by him, we entered the first<a name="page_292" id="page_292"></a> great hall, with
+massive machines partially displayed on one side. A <i>coup d'&oelig;il</i> was
+what we sought on this occasion, and our movements were rapid. The Sèvre
+porcelains, the magnificent French and English glasses, the weighty
+majolicas, the Gobelin tapestries, and the galleries of paintings,
+chiefly consumed our six francs, which represented some three hours.
+Magnificent services of plate, some in silver, and some in imitation of
+silver, were shown to us. In another place the close clustering of men
+and women around certain glass cases made us suspect the attraction of
+jewelry, which may be called the sugar-plummery of æsthetics.
+Insinuating ourselves among the human bees, we, too, fed our eyes on
+these sweets. Diadems, necklaces, earrings, sufficient, in the hands of
+a skilful Satan, to accomplish the damnation of the whole female sex,
+were here displayed. I was glad to see these dangerous implements of
+temptation restrained within cases of solid glass. I myself would fain
+have written upon them, "Deadly poison." There are enough, however, to
+preach, and I practised by running off from these disputed
+neighborhoods, and passing to the contemplation of treasures which to
+see is to have.</p>
+
+<p>Among the Gobelins I was amazed to see a fine presentation of Titian's
+Sacred and Profane Love, a picture of universal reputation. The
+difficulty of copying so old and so perfect a work in tapestry made this
+success a very remarkable one. Very beautiful, too, was their copy of
+Guido's Aurora, and yet less difficult than<a name="page_293" id="page_293"></a> the other, the coloring
+being at once less subtile and more brilliant.</p>
+
+<p>I remember a gigantic pyramid of glass, which arose, like a
+frost-stricken fountain, in the middle of the English china and glass
+department. I remember huge vases, cups as thin as egg-shell, pellucid
+crystals in all shapes, a glory of hard materials and tender colors. And
+I remember a department of raw material, fibres, minerals, germs, and
+grains, and a department of Eastern confectionery, and one of Algerine
+small work, to wit, jewelry and embroidery. An American soda fountain
+caused us to tingle with renewed associations. And we hear, with
+shamefaced satisfaction, that American drinks have proved a feature in
+this great phenomenon. Machines have, of course, been creditable to us.
+Chickering and Steinway have carried off prizes in a piano-forte tilt,
+each grudging the other his share of the common victory. And our
+veteran's maps for the blind have received a silver medal. Tiffany, the
+New York jeweller, presents a good silver miniature of Crawford's
+beautiful America. And with these successes our patriotism must now be
+content. We are not ahead of all creation, so far as the Exposition is
+concerned, and the things that do us most credit must be seen and
+studied in our midst.</p>
+
+<p>Our longest lingerings in the halls of the Exposition were among the
+galleries of art. Among these the French pictures were preëminent in
+interest. The group of Jerome's paintings were the most striking of
+their kind, uniting finish with intensity, and both with<a name="page_294" id="page_294"></a> ease. In his
+choice of subjects, Jerome is not a Puritan. The much admired Almée is a
+picture of low scope, excusable only as an historic representation. The
+judgment of Phryne will not commend itself more to maids and matrons who
+love their limits. Both pictures, however, are powerfully conceived and
+colored. The "Ave Cesar" of the <i>morituri</i> before Vitellius is better
+inspired, if less well executed, and holds the mirror close in the cruel
+face of absolute power.</p>
+
+<p>Study of the Italian masters was clearly visible in many of the best
+works of the French gallery. I recall a fine triptych representing the
+story of the prodigal son in which the chief picture spoke plainly of
+Paul Veronese, and his Venetian life and coloring. In this picture the
+prodigal appeared as the lavish entertainer of gay company. A banquet,
+shared by joyous <i>hetairæ</i>, occupied the canvas. A slender compartment
+on the right showed the second act of the drama&mdash;hunger, swine-feeding,
+and repentance. A similar one on the left gave the pleasanter
+<i>dénouement</i>&mdash;the return, the welcome, the feast of forgiveness. Both of
+the latter subjects were treated in <i>chiaro-scuro</i>, a manner that
+heightened the contrast between the flush of pleasure and the pallor of
+its consequences. Rosa Bonheur's part in the Exposition was scarcely
+equal to her reputation. One charming picture of a boat-load of sheep
+crossing a Highland loch still dwells in my memory like a limpid
+sapphire, so lovely was the color of the water. The Russian, Swedish,
+and Danish pictures surprised me by their good points. If we may judge
+of Russian art by<a name="page_295" id="page_295"></a> these specimens, it is not behind the European
+standard of attainment. Of the Bavarian gallery, rich in works of
+interest, I can here mention but two. The first must be a very large and
+magnificent cartoon by Kaulbach, representing a fancied assemblage of
+illustrious personages at the period of the Reformation. Luther,
+Erasmus, and Melanchthon were prominent among these, the whole belonging
+to a large style of historical composition.</p>
+
+<p>The second was already familiar to us through a photograph seen and
+admired in Munich. It is called Ste. Julie, and represents a young
+Christian martyr, dead upon the cross, at whose foot a young man is
+depositing an offering of flowers. The pale beauty and repose of the
+figure, the massive hair and lovely head, the modesty of attitude and
+attire, are very striking. The sky is subdued, clear, and gray, the
+black hair standing out powerfully against it. The whole palette seems
+to have been set with pure and pearly tints. One thinks the brushes that
+painted this fair dove could never paint a courtesan. A single star, the
+first of evening, breaks the continuity of the twilight sky. This
+picture seemed as if it should make those who look at it thenceforward
+more tender, and more devout. Among the English pictures, the Enemy
+sowing Tares, by Millais, was particularly original&mdash;a malignant sky,
+full of blight and destruction, and a malignant wretch, smiling at
+mischief, and scowling at good,&mdash;a powerful figure, mighty and mean.
+This picture makes one start and shudder; such must have been its
+intention, and such is its success.<a name="page_296" id="page_296"></a></p>
+
+<p>Among sculptures, the most conspicuous was one called the Last Hour of
+Napoleon&mdash;a figure in an invalid's chair, with drooping head and worn
+countenance, the map of the globe lying spread upon his passive knees.
+Every trait already says, "This <i>was</i> Napoleon," the man of modern times
+who longest survived himself, who was dead and could not expire. Wreaths
+of immortelles always lay at the foot of this statue. It is the work of
+an Italian artist, and the only sculpture in the whole exhibition which
+I can recall as easily and deservedly remembered.</p>
+
+<p>Our American part in the art-exhibition was not great. William Hunt's
+pictures were badly placed, and not grouped, as they should have been,
+to give an adequate idea of the variety of his merits. Bierstadt's Rocky
+Mountains looked thin in coloring, and showed a want of design. Church's
+Niagara was effective. Johnston's Old Kentucky Home was excellent in its
+kind, and characteristic. Kensett had a good landscape. But America has
+still more to learn than to teach in the way of high art. Success among
+us is too cheap and easy. Art-critics are wordy and ignorant, praising
+from caprice rather than from conscience. It would be most important for
+us to form at least one gallery of art in which American artists might
+study something better than themselves. The presence of twenty
+first-rate pictures in one of our great cities would save a great deal
+of going abroad, and help to form a sincere and intelligent standard of
+æsthetic judgment. Such pictures should, of course, be constantly<a name="page_297" id="page_297"></a> open
+to the public, as no private collection can well be. We should have a
+Titian, a Rubens, an Andrea, a Paul Veronese, and so on. But these
+pictures should be of historical authenticity. The most responsible
+artists of the country should be empowered to negotiate for them, and
+the money might be afforded from the heavy gains of late years with far
+more honor and profit than the superfluous splendors with which the
+fortunate of this period bedizen their houses and their persons.</p>
+
+<p>Among American sculptures I may mention a pleasing medallion or two by
+Miss Foley. Miss Hosmer's Faun is a near relative in descent from the
+Barberini Faun, and, however good in execution, has little originality
+of conception. And these things I say, Beloved, in the bosom of our
+American family, because I think they ought to be said, and not out of
+pride or fancied superiority.</p>
+
+<p>I am ashamed to say that I have already told the little I am able to
+tell of the Exposition as seen by daylight&mdash;the little, at least, that
+every one else has not told. But I visited the enclosure once in the
+evening, when only the cafés were open. Among these I sought a beer-shop
+characterized as the Bavarian brewery, and sought it long and with
+trouble; for the long, winding paths showed us, one after the other,
+many agglomerations of light, which were obviously places of public
+entertainment, and in each of which we expected to find our Bavarian
+brewery, famous for the musical performances of certain gypsies much
+spoken of in Parisian circles. In the pursuit of this we entered half a
+dozen buildings, in each of which some characteristic<a name="page_298" id="page_298"></a> entertainment was
+proceeding. Coming finally to the object of our search, we found it a
+plain room with small tables, half filled with visitors. Opposite the
+entrance was a small orchestral stage, on which were seated the wild
+musicians whom we sought. A franc each person was the entrance fee, and
+we were scarcely seated before a functionary authoritatively invited us
+to command some refreshment, in a tone which was itself the order of the
+day. In obedience, one ordered beer, another <i>gloria</i>, a third
+cigars&mdash;all at extortionate prices. But then the music was given for
+nothing, and must be paid for somehow. And it proved worth paying for.
+At first the body of sound seemed overpowering, for there was no
+pianissimo, and not one of the regular orchestral effects. A
+weird-looking leader in high boots stood and fiddled, holding his violin
+now on a level with his eyes, now with his nose, now with his stomach,
+writhing and swaying with excitement, his excitable troupe following the
+ups and downs of his movement like a track of gaunt hounds dashing after
+a spectre. The café gradually filled, and orders were asked and given.
+But little disturbance did these give either to the band or its hearers.
+They played various wild airs and symphonies (not technical ones), being
+partially advised therein by an elegant male personage who sat leaning
+his head upon his jewelled hand, absorbed in attention. These melodies
+were obviously compositions of the most eccentric and accidental sort.
+Not thus do great or small harmonists mate their tones and arch their
+passages. But there was a vivacity and<a name="page_299" id="page_299"></a> a passion in all that these men
+did which made every bar seem full of electric fire; and these must be,
+I thought, traditional vestiges of another time, when music was not yet
+an art, but only nature. Here Dwight's Journal has no power. Beethoven
+or Handel may do as he likes; these do as they please, also. This is the
+heathendom of art, in which feeling is all, authority nothing; in which
+rules are only suspected, not created. After an hour or more of this
+entertainment, we left it, not unwillingly, being a little weary of its
+labyrinthine character and unmoderated ecstasy. Yet we left it much
+impressed with the musical material presented in it. Our civilized
+orchestras have no such enthusiasts as that nervous leader, with his
+leaping violin and restraining high boots. And this, with the lights and
+shadows, and broken music of the outside walks, is all that I saw of
+evening at the Exposition.</p>
+
+<h2>P<small>ICTURES IN</small> A<small>NTWERP</small>.</h2>
+
+<p>As you cannot, with rare exceptions, see Raphael out of Italy, so, I
+should almost say, you cannot see Rubens and Vandyck out of Belgium.
+This is especially true of the former; for one does, I confess, see
+marvellous portraits of Vandyck's in Genoa and in other places. But one
+judges a painter best by seeing a group of his best works, which show
+his sphere of thought with some completeness. A single sentence suffices
+to show the great poet; but no one will assume that a sentence will give
+you to know as much of him as a poem or volume. So the detached
+sentences<a name="page_300" id="page_300"></a> of the two great Flemish painters, easily met with in
+European galleries, bear genuine evidence of the master's hand; but the
+collections of Antwerp and Bruges show us the master himself. Intending
+no disrespect to Florence, Munich, or the Medicean series at the Louvre,
+I must say that I had no just measure of the dignity of Rubens as a man
+and as an artist, until I stood before his two great pictures in the
+Cathedral of Antwerp. One of these represents the Elevation of the
+Cross. Mathematically it offends one&mdash;the cross, the principal object in
+the picture, being seen diagonally, in an uneasy and awkward posture. On
+the other hand, the face of the Christ corresponds fully to the heroism
+of the moment; it expresses the human horror and agony, but, triumphing
+over all, the steadfastness of resolve and faith. It is a
+transfiguration&mdash;the spiritual glory holding its own above all
+circumstances of pain and infamy. A sort of beautiful surprise is in the
+eyes&mdash;the first deadly pang of an organism unused to suffer. It is a
+face that lifts one above the weakness and meanness of ordinary human
+life. This soul, one sees, had the true talisman, the true treasure. If
+we earn what he did, we can afford to let all else go. The Descent from
+the Cross is better known than its fellow-picture. It had not to me the
+wonderful interest of the living face of Christ in the supreme moment of
+his great life; for I shall always consider that the Christ represented
+in the Elevation is a true Christ, not a mere fancy figure or dramatic
+ghost. The Descent is, however, more grand and satisfactory in its
+grouping, and<a name="page_301" id="page_301"></a> the contrast between the agony of the friendly faces that
+surround the chief figure and the dead peace of his expression and
+attitude is profound and pathetic. The head and body fall heavily upon
+the arms of those who support it, and who seem to bear an inward weight
+far transcending the outward one. The pale face of the Virgin is
+stricken and compressed with sorrow. Each of the pictures is the centre
+of a triptych, the two smaller paintings representing subjects in
+harmony with the chief groups. On the right of the Descent we have Mary
+making her historical visit to the house of Elisabeth; on the left, the
+presentation of the infant Christ in the temple. On the right of the
+Elevation is a group of those daughters of Jerusalem to whom Christ
+said, "Weep not for me." The subject on the left is less significant.</p>
+
+<p>With these pictures deserves to rank the Flagellation of Christ, by the
+same artist, in the Church of St. Paul. The resplendent fairness of the
+body, the cruel reality of the bleeding which follows the scourge, and
+the expression of genuine but noble suffering, seize upon the very quick
+of sympathy, weakened by mythicism and sentimentalism. This fair body,
+sensitive as yours or mine, endured bitter and agonizing blows. This
+great heart was content to endure them as the penalty of bequeathing to
+mankind its priceless secret.</p>
+
+<p>The churches of Antwerp are rich in architecture, paintings, and
+marbles. In the latter the Church of St. Jacques excels, the high altar
+and side chapels being adorned with twisted columns of white marble, and
+with<a name="page_302" id="page_302"></a> various sculptures. The Musée contains many pictures of great
+reputation and merit. Among these are a miniature painting of the
+Descent from the Cross, by Rubens himself, closely, but not wholly,
+corresponding with his great picture; the Education of the Virgin, and
+the Vierge au Perroquet, both by Rubens, in his most brilliant style.
+Another composition represents St. Theresa imploring the Savior to
+release from purgatory the soul of a benefactor of her order. Rubens is
+said to have given to this benefactor the features of Vandyck, and to
+one of the angels releasing him those of his young wife, Helena Forman;
+while the face of an old man still in suffering represents his own.</p>
+
+<p>This gallery contains three Vandycks of first-class merit, each of which
+will detain the attention of lovers of art. The one that first meets
+your eye is a Pietà, in which the body of Christ is stretched
+horizontally, his head lying on the lap of his mother. The strongest
+point of the picture is the Virgin's sorrow, expressed in her pallid
+face, eyes worn with weeping, and outstretched hands. The second is a
+small crucifix, very harmonious and expressive. The third is a life-size
+picture of the crucifixion, with a very individual tone of color. The
+Virgin, at the foot of the cross, has great truth and dignity, but is
+rather a modern figure for the subject. But the pride of the whole
+collection is a unique triptych by Quintin Matsys, his greatest work,
+and one without which the extent of his power can never be realized. The
+central picture represents a dead Christ, surrounded by the men and
+women who<a name="page_303" id="page_303"></a> ministered to him, preparing him for sepulture. The right
+hand of the Christ lies half open, with a wonderful expression of
+acquiescence. The faces of those who surround him are full of intense
+interest and tenderness; the Virgin's countenance expresses heart-break.
+The whole picture disposes you to weep, not from sentimentalism, but
+from real sympathy. Of the side pieces, one represents the wicked women
+with the head of John the Baptist, the other the martyrdom of Ste.
+Barbe. Add to these some of the best Teniers, Ostades, Ruysdaels, and
+Vanderweldes, with many excellent works of second-class merit, and you
+will understand, as well as words can tell you, what treasures lie
+within the Musée of Antwerp.</p>
+
+<p>
+<br />
+</p>
+
+<p>Copy is exhausted, say the printers. Perhaps patience gave out first. My
+MS. is at end&mdash;not handsomely rounded off, nor even shortened by a
+surgical amputation, but broken at some point in which facts left no
+room for words. Observation became absorbing, and description was
+adjourned, as it now proves, forever. The few sentences which I shall
+add to what is already written will merely apologize for my sudden
+disappearance, lest the clown's "Here we are" should find a comic
+<i>pendant</i> in my "Here we are not."</p>
+
+<p>I have only to say that I have endeavored in good faith to set down this
+simple and hurried record of a journey crowded with interests and
+pleasures. I was afraid to receive so freely of these without attempting
+to give what I could in return, under the advantages and disadvantages<a name="page_304" id="page_304"></a>
+of immediate transcription. In sketches executed upon the spot, one
+hopes that the vividness of the impression under which one labors may
+atone for the want of finish and of elaboration. If read at all, these
+notes may be called to account for many insufficiencies. Some pages may
+appear careless, some sentences Quixotic. I am still inclined to think
+that with more leisure and deliberation I should not have done the work
+as well. I should, perhaps, like Tintoretto, have occupied acres and
+acres of attention with superfluous delineation, putting, as he did, my
+own portrait in the corner. Rejoice, therefore, good reader, in my
+limitations. They are your enfranchisement.</p>
+
+<p>Touching Quixotism, I will plead guilty to the sounding of various
+parleys before some stately buildings and unshaken fortresses. "Who is
+this that blows so sharp a summons?" may the inmates ask. I may answer,
+"One who believes in the twelve legions of angels that wait upon the
+endeavors of faithful souls." Should they further threaten or deride, I
+will borrow Elizabeth Browning's sweet refrain,&mdash;</p>
+
+<p class="c">"I am no trumpet, but a reed,"&mdash;</p>
+
+<p class="nind">and trust not to become a broken one.</p>
+
+<p>Conscious of my many shortcomings, and asking attention only for the
+message I have tried to bring, I ask also for that charity which
+recognizes that good will is the best part of action, and good faith the
+first condition of knowledge.</p>
+
+<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="poetry">
+<tr><td align="center">The following typogrphical errors were corrected by the etext</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">transcriber:</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">embarassment=>embarrassment</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">Minature=>Miniature</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">procesison=>procession</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">pivations=>privations</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">the shonlder of the garment=>the shoulder of the garment</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">fortutunate=>fortunate</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">Bronner pass.=>Brenner pass.</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">Pinakethek=>Pinakothek</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">antiquitties=>antiquities</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">Macchiavelli's Principe=>Machiavelli's Principe</td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<hr class="full" />
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's From the Oak to the Olive, by Julia Ward Howe
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+</body>
+</html>
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of From the Oak to the Olive, by Julia Ward Howe
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: From the Oak to the Olive
+       A Plain record of a Pleasant Journey
+
+Author: Julia Ward Howe
+
+Release Date: November 24, 2011 [EBook #38127]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FROM THE OAK TO THE OLIVE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was
+produced from images available at The Internet
+Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+FROM THE
+
+OAK TO THE OLIVE.
+
+A PLAIN RECORD OF A PLEASANT JOURNEY.
+
+BY
+JULIA WARD HOWE
+
+BOSTON:
+LEE AND SHEPARD.
+1868.
+
+Entered, according to Act of Congress, In the year 1868, by
+
+JULIA WARD HOWE,
+
+In the Clerk's Office of the District Court
+of the District of Massachusetts.
+
+STEREOTYPED AT THE
+BOSTON STEREOTYPE FOUNDRY,
+19 Spring Lane.
+
+
+
+
+TO
+
+S. G. H.,
+
+_THE STRENUOUS CHAMPION OF GREEK LIBERTY
+AND OF HUMAN RIGHTS_,
+
+IS OFFERED SUCH SMALL HOMAGE AS THE
+DEDICATION OF THIS VOLUME
+CAN CONFER.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+                                   PAGE
+
+PRELIMINARIES.                        1
+
+THE VOYAGE.                           3
+
+LIVERPOOL.                            9
+
+CHESTER--LICHFIELD.                  11
+
+LONDON.                              17
+
+ST. PAUL'S--THE JAPANESE.            23
+
+SOCIETY.                             28
+
+THE CHANNEL.                         36
+
+PARIS AND THENCE.                    37
+
+MARSEILLES.                          42
+
+ROME.                                45
+
+ST. PETER'S.                         50
+
+SUPPER OF THE PILGRIMS.              55
+
+EASTER.                              58
+
+WORKS OF ART.                        60
+
+PIAZZA NAVONA--THE TOMBOLA.          65
+
+SUNDAYS IN ROME.                     70
+
+CATACOMBS.                           74
+
+VIA APPIA AND THE COLUMBARIA.        81
+
+NAPLES--THE JOURNEY.                 88
+
+THE MUSEUM.                          92
+
+NAPLES--EXCURSIONS.                  96
+
+THE CAPUCHIN.                       102
+
+BAJA.                               106
+
+CAPRI.                              110
+
+SORRENTO.                           119
+
+FLORENCE.                           122
+
+PALAZZO PITTI.                      124
+
+VENICE.                             133
+
+GREECE AND THE VOYAGE THITHER.      153
+
+SYRA.                               164
+
+PIRAEUS--ATHENS.                     169
+
+EXPEDITIONS--NAUPLIA.               175
+
+ARGOS.                              183
+
+EGINA.                              196
+
+DAYS IN ATHENS.                     198
+
+EXCURSIONS.                         205
+
+HYMETTUS.                           214
+
+ITEMS.                              221
+
+THE PALACE.                         222
+
+THE CATHEDRAL.                      227
+
+THE MISSIONARIES.                   231
+
+THE PIAZZA.                         234
+
+DEPARTURE.                          237
+
+RETURN VOYAGE.                      239
+
+FARTHER.                            249
+
+FRAGMENTS.                          253
+
+FLYING FOOTSTEPS.                   270
+
+MUNICH.                             275
+
+SWITZERLAND.                        284
+
+THE GREAT EXPOSITION.               290
+
+PICTURES IN ANTWERP.                299
+
+
+
+
+FROM THE OAK TO THE OLIVE.
+
+
+
+
+PRELIMINARIES.
+
+
+Not being, at this moment, in the pay of any press, whether foreign or
+domestic, I will not, at this my third landing in English country, be in
+haste to accomplish the correspondent's office of extroversion, and to
+expose all the inner processes of thought and of nature to the gaze of
+an imaginary public, often, alas! a delusory one, and difficult to be
+met with. No individual editor, nor joint stock company, bespoke my
+emotions before my departure. I am, therefore, under no obligation to
+furnish for the market, with the elements of time and of postage
+unhandsomely curtailed. Instead, then, of that breathless steeple chase
+after the butterfly of the moment, with whose risks and hurry I am
+intimately acquainted, I feel myself enabled to look around me at every
+step which I shall take on paper, and to represent, in my small literary
+operations, the three dimensions of time, instead of the flat disc of
+the present.
+
+And first as to my pronoun. The augmentative _We_ is essential for
+newspaper writing, because people are liable to be horsewhipped for what
+they put in the sacred columns of a daily journal. _We_ may represent a
+vague number of individuals, less inviting to, and safer from, the
+cowhide, than the provoking _egomet ipse_. Or perhaps the _We_ derives
+from the New Testament incorporation of devils, whose name was legion,
+for we are many. In the Fichtean philosophy, also, there are three
+pronouns comprised in the personal unity whose corporeal effort applies
+this pen to this paper, to wit, the _I_ absolute, the _I_ limited, and
+the _I_ resulting from the union of these two. So that a philosopher may
+say _we_ as well as a monarch or a penny-a-liner. Yet I, at the present
+moment, incline to fall back upon my record of baptism, and to confront
+the white sheet, whose blankness I trust to overcome, in the character
+of an agent one and indivisible.
+
+Nor let it be supposed that these preliminary remarks undervalue the
+merits and dignity of those who write for ready money, whose meals and
+travels are at the expense of mysterious corporations, the very cocktail
+which fringes their daily experience being thrown in as a brightener of
+their wits and fancies. Thus would I, too, have written, had anybody
+ordered me to do so. I can hurry up my hot cakes like another, when
+there is any one to pay for them. But, leisure being accorded me, I
+shall stand with my tablets in the marketplace, hoping in the end to
+receive my penny, upon a footing of equality with those who have borne
+the burden and heat of the day.
+
+With the rights of translation, however, already arranged for in the
+Russian, Sclavonian, Hindustanee, and Fijian dialects, I reserve to
+myself the right to convert my pronoun, and to write a chapter in _we_
+whenever the individual _I_ shall seem to be insufficient. With these
+little points agreed upon beforehand, to prevent mistakes,--since a book
+always represents a bargain,--I will enter, without further delay, upon
+what I intend as a very brief but cogent chronicle of a third visit to
+Europe, the first two having attained no personal record.
+
+
+
+
+THE VOYAGE.
+
+The steamer voyage is now become a fact so trite and familiar as to call
+for no special illustration at these or any other hands. Yet voyages and
+lives resemble each other in many particulars, and differ in as many
+others. Ours proves almost unprecedented for smoothness, as well as for
+safety. We start on the fatal Wednesday, as twice before, expecting the
+fatal pang. Our last vicarious purchase on shore was a box of that
+energetic mustard, so useful as a counter-irritant in cases of internal
+commotion. The bitter partings are over, the dear ones heartily
+commended to Heaven, we see, as in a dream, the figure of command
+mounted upon the paddle-box. We cling to a camp stool near the red
+smoke-stack, and cruelly murmur to the two rosy neophytes who are our
+companions, "In five minutes you will be more unhappy than you ever were
+or ever dreamed of being." They reply with sweet, unconscious looks of
+wonder, that ignorance of danger which the recruit carries into his
+first battle, or which carries him into it. But five minutes pass, and
+twelve times five, and the moment for going below does not come. In the
+expected shape, in fact, it does not arrive at all. We do not resolve
+upon locomotion, nor venture into the dining saloon; but leaning back
+upon a borrowed _chaise longue_, we receive hurried and fragmentary
+instalments of victuals, and discuss with an improvised acquaintance the
+aspects of foreign and domestic travel. The plunge into the state-room
+at bedtime, and the crawl into the narrow berth, are not without their
+direr features, which the sea-smells and confined air aggravate. We hear
+bad accounts of A, B, and C, but our neophytes patrol the deck to the
+last moment, and rise from their dive, on the second morning, fresher
+than ever.
+
+Our steamer is an old one, but a favorite, and as steady as a
+Massachusetts matron of forty. Our captain is a kindly old sea-dog, who
+understands his business, and does not mind much else. To the innocent
+flatteries of the neophytes he opposes a resolute front. They will
+forget him, he says, as soon as they touch land. They protest that they
+will not, and assure him that he shall breakfast, dine, and sup with
+them in Boston, six months hence, and that he shall always remain their
+sole, single, and ideal captain; at all of which he laughs as grimly as
+Jove is said to do at lovers' perjuries.
+
+Our company is a small one, after the debarkation at Halifax, where
+sixty-five passengers leave us,--among whom are some of the most
+strenuous _euchreists_. The remaining thirty-six are composed partly of
+our own country people,--of whom praise or blame would be impertinent in
+this connection,--partly of the Anglo-Saxon of the day, in the
+pre-puritan variety. Of the latter, as of the former, we will waive all
+discriminating mention, having porrigated to them the dexter of
+good-will, with no hint of aboriginal tomahawks to be exhumed hereafter.
+Some traits, however, of the _Anglais de voyage_, as seen on his return
+from an American trip, may be vaguely given, without personality or fear
+of offence.
+
+The higher in grade the culture of the European traveller in America,
+the more reverently does he speak of what he has seen and learned. To
+the gentle-hearted, childhood and its defects are no less sacred than
+age and its decrepitude; withal, much dearer, because full of hope and
+of promise. The French barber sneezes out "Paris" at every step taken on
+the new land. That is the utmost his ratiocination can do; he can
+perceive that Boston, Washington, Chicago, are not Paris. The French
+exquisite flirts, flatters the individual, and depreciates the
+commonwealth. The English bagman hazards the glibbest sentences as to
+the falsity of the whole American foundation. Not much behind him lags
+the fox-hunting squire. The folly and uselessness of our late war supply
+the theme of diatribes as eloquent as twenty-_five_ letters can make
+them. Obliging _apercus_ of the degradation and misery in store for us
+are vouchsafed at every opportunity. But it is when primogeniture is
+touched upon, or the neutrality of England in the late war criticised,
+that the bellowing of the sacred bulls becomes a brazen thunder. After
+listening to their voluminous complaints of the shortcomings of western
+civilization, we are tempted to go back to a set of questions asked and
+answered many centuries ago.
+
+"What went ye out into the wilderness for to see? A man clothed in soft
+raiment? Behold, they that live delicately dwell in kings' houses. But
+what went ye out for to see? A prophet? Yea, I say unto you, And more
+than a prophet." For the prophet only foretells what is to be, but the
+prophetic nation is working out and fulfilling the prophet's future.
+
+Peace, however, peace between us and them. Let the bagman return to his
+business, the squire to his five-barred gate. We wish them nothing worse
+than to stay at home, once they have got there. Not thus do the Goldwin
+Smiths, the Liulph Stanleys, take the altitude of things under a new
+horizon. They have those tools and appliances of scientific thought
+which build just theories and strait conclusions. The imperfection and
+the value of human phenomena are too well understood by them to allow
+them to place all of the values in the old world, and all of the
+imperfections in the new. And, _apropos_ of this, we have an antidote to
+all the poison of gratuitous malignity in the shape of M. Auguste
+Laugel's thorough and appreciative treatise entitled The United States
+during the War. From depths of misconception which we cannot fathom we
+turn to his pages, and see the truths of our record and of our
+conviction set forth with a simplicity and elegance which should give
+his work a permanent value. To Americans it must be dear as a righteous
+judgment; to Europeans as a vindication of their power of judging.
+
+It must not, however, be supposed that our whole _traversee_ is a
+squabble, open or suppressed, between nationalities which should contend
+only in good will. The dreamy sea-days bring, on the contrary, much
+social chat and comfort. Two of the Britons exercise hospitality of tea,
+of fresh butter, of drinks cunningly compounded. One of these glows at
+night like a smelting furnace, and goes about humming in privileged
+ears, "The great brew is about to begin." For this same great brew he
+ties a white apron before his stout person, breaks ten eggs into a bowl,
+inflicting flagellation on the same, empties as many bottles of ale in a
+tin pan, and flies off to the galley, whence he returns with a smoking,
+frothing mixture, which is dispensed in tumblers, and much appreciated
+by the recipients. In good fellowship these two Britons are not
+deficient, and the restriction of the alphabet, dimly alluded to above,
+does not lie at their door.
+
+After rocking, and dreaming, and tumbling; after drowsy attempts to get
+hold of other people's ideas and to disentangle your own; after a week's
+wonder over the hot suppers of such as dine copiously at four P. M., and
+the morning cocktails of those who drink whiskey in all its varieties
+before we separate for the night; after repeated experiments, which end
+by suiting our gait and diet to an ever-mobile existence, in which our
+prejudices are the only stable points, our personal restraints the only
+fixed facts,--we fairly reach the other side. The earliest terrene
+object which we behold is a light-house some sixty miles out at sea,
+whose occupants, we hope, are not resolutely bent upon social enjoyment.
+Here the sending up of blue lights and rockets gives us a cheerful sense
+of some one besides ourselves. Queenstown, our next point, is made at
+two A. M., and left after weary waiting for the pilot, but still before
+convenient hours for being up. Some hours later we heave the lead, and
+enjoy the sight of as much _terra firma_ as can be fished up on the
+greased end of the same. Our last day on board is marred by a heavy and
+penetrating fog. We are in the Channel, but can see neither shore. In
+the early morning we arrive at Liverpool, and, after one more of those
+good breakfasts, and a mild encounter with the custom-house officers, we
+part from our late home, its mingled associations and associates to be
+recalled hereafter with various shades of regard and regret. The good
+captain, having been without sleep for two nights, does not come to take
+leave of us--a neglect which almost moves the neophytes to tears. The
+two veterans console them, however; and now all parties are in the
+little lighter which carries the steamer's passengers and luggage to the
+dock. Here, three shillings' worth of cab and horse convey us and ours,
+a respectable show of trunks, to the hotel of our choice--the
+Washington by name. We commend this cheapness of conveyance, a novel
+feature in American experience. At the hotel we find a comfortable
+parlor, and, for the first time in many days, part from our wrappings.
+After losing ourselves among the Egyptian china of our toilet set,
+wondering at the width of beds and warmth of carpets, we descend to the
+coffee-room, order dinner, and feel that we have again taken possession
+of ourselves.
+
+
+
+
+LIVERPOOL.
+
+
+A good deal of our time here is spent in the prosaic but vital
+occupation of getting something to eat. If Nature abhors a vacuum, she
+does so especially when, after twelve days of a fluctuating and
+predatory existence, the well-shaken traveller at last finds a stable
+foundation for self and victuals. The Washington being announced as
+organized on the American plan, we descend to the coffee-room with the
+same happy confidence which would characterize our first appearance at
+the buffet of the Tremont House or Fifth Avenue Hotel. But here no
+waiter takes possession of you and your wants, hastening to administer
+both to the mutual advantage of guest and landlord. You sit long
+unnoticed; you attract attention only by a desperate effort. Having at
+length secured the medium through which a dinner may be ordered, the
+minister (he wears a black dress coat and white trimmings) disappears
+with an air of "Will you have it now, or wait till you can get it?"
+which our subsequent experience entirely justifies. We learn later that
+a meal ordered half an hour beforehand will be punctually served.
+
+And here, except in cases of absolute starvation, we shall dismiss the
+meal question altogether, and devote ourselves to nobler themes. We
+ransack the smoky and commercial city in search of objects of interest.
+The weather being incessantly showery, we lay the foundation of our
+English liberty in the purchase of two umbrellas, capable each of
+protecting two heads. Of clothes we must henceforward be regardless. In
+the streets, barefooted beggary strikes us, running along in the wet,
+whining and coaxing. We visit the boasted St. George's Hall, where,
+among other statues, is one of the distinguished Stephenson, of railroad
+memory. Here the court is in session for the assizes. The wigs and gowns
+astound the neophytes. The ushers in green and orange livery shriek
+"Silence!" through every sentence of judge or counsel. No one can hear
+what is going on. Probably all is known beforehand. At the hotel, the
+Greek committee wait upon the veteran, with asseverations and
+hiccoughings of to us incomprehensible emotions. We resist the theatre,
+with the programme of "Lost in London," expecting soon to experience the
+sensation without artistic intervention. We sleep, missing the cradle of
+the deep, and on the morrow, by means of an uncanny little ferry-boat,
+reach the Birkenhead station, and are booked for Chester.
+
+
+
+
+CHESTER--LICHFIELD.
+
+
+The Grosvenor Inn receives us, not at all in the fashion of the hostelry
+of twenty years ago. A new and spacious building forming a quadrangle
+around a small open garden, the style highly architectural and somewhat
+inconvenient; waiters got up after fashion plates; chambermaids with
+apologetic caps, not smaller than a dime nor larger than a dinner plate;
+a handsome sitting-room, difficult to warm; airy sleeping-rooms; a
+coffee-room in which our hunger and cold seek food and shelter; a
+housekeeper in a striped silk gown,--these are the first features with
+which we become familiar at the Grosvenor. The veteran falling ill
+detains us there for the better part of two days; and we employ the
+interim of his and our necessities in exploring the curious old town,
+with its many relics of times long distant. The neophytes here see their
+first cathedral, and are in raptures with nothing so much as with its
+dilapidation. We happen in during the afternoon hour of cathedral
+service, and the sexton, finding that we do not ask for seats, fastens
+upon us with the zeal of a starved leech upon a fresh patient, and leads
+us as weary a dance as Puck led the Athenian clowns. This chase after
+antiquity proves to have something unsubstantial about it. The object is
+really long dead and done with. These ancient buildings are only its
+external skeleton, the empty shell of the tortoise. No effort of
+imagination can show us how people felt when these dark passages and
+deserted enclosures were full of the arterial warmth and current of
+human life. The monumental tablets tell an impossible tale. The immortal
+spirit of things, which is past, present, and future, dwells not in
+these relics, but lives in the descent of noble thoughts, in the
+perpetuity of moral effort which makes man human. We make these
+reflections shivering, while the neophytes explore nave and transept,
+gallery and crypt. A long tale does the old sexton tell, to which they
+listen with ever-wondering expectation. Meantime the cold cathedral
+service has ended. Canon, precentor, and choir have departed, with the
+very slender lay attendance. In a commodious apartment, by a bright
+fire, we recover our frozen joints a little. Here stands a full-length
+portrait of his most gracious etc., etc. The sexton, preparing for a
+huge jest, says to us, "Ladies, this represents the last king of
+America." The most curious thing we see in the cathedral is the room in
+which the ecclesiastical court held its sittings. The judges' seat and
+the high-backed benches still form a quadrangular enclosure within a
+room of the same shape. Across one corner of this enclosure is mounted a
+chair, on which the prisoner, accused of the intangible offence of
+heresy or witchcraft, was perforce seated. I seem to see there a face
+and figure not unlike my own, the brow seamed with cabalistic wrinkles.
+Add a little queerness to the travelling dress, a pinch or two to the
+black bonnet, and how easy were it to make a witch out of the sibyl of
+these present leaves! The march from one of these types to the other is
+one of those retrograde steps whose contrast only attests the world's
+progress. The sibylline was an excellent career for a queer and
+unexplained old woman. To make her a sorceress was an ingenious device
+for getting rid of a much-decried element of the social variety. Poor
+Kepler's years of solitary glory and poverty were made more wretched by
+the danger which constantly threatened his aged mother, who was in
+imminent danger of burning, on account of her supposed occult
+intelligences with the powers of darkness.
+
+After a long and chilly wandering, we dismiss our voluble guide with a
+guerdon which certainly sends him home to keep a silver wedding with his
+ancient wife. The next day, the veteran's illness detained us within the
+ancient city, and we contemplated at some leisure its quaint old houses,
+which in Boston would not stand five days. They have been much propped
+and cherished, and the new architecture of the town does its best to
+continue the traditions of the old. The Guide to Chester, in which we
+regretfully invest a shilling, presents a list of objects of interest
+which a week would not more than exhaust. One of these--the Roodeye--is
+an extensive meadow with a silly legend, and is now utilized as a
+race-course. We see the winning post, the graduated seats, the track.
+For the rest,--
+
+    "The Spanish fleet thou canst not see, because
+     It is not yet in sight."
+
+We visit the outside of a tiny church of ancient renown,--St.
+Olave's,--but, dreading the eternal sexton with the eternal story, we do
+not attempt to effect an entrance. The much-famed Roman bath we find in
+connection with a shop at which newspapers are sold. We descend a narrow
+staircase, and view much rubbish in a small space. For description, see
+Chester Guide. One of our party gets into the bath, and comes out none
+the cleaner. Spleen apart, however, the ruin is probably authentic, with
+its deep spring and worn arches. Near the Grosvenor Hotel is a curious
+arcade, built in a part of the old wall--for Chester was a fortified
+place. A portion of the old castle still stands, but we fail to visit
+its interior. The third morning sees us depart, having been quite
+comfortably entertained at the Grosvenor, even to the indulgence of
+sweetmeats with our tea, which American extravagance we propose speedily
+to abjure. Our national sins, however, still cling to us.
+
+Although the servants are "put in the bill," the cringing civility with
+which they follow us to the coach leads me to suspect that the nimble
+sixpence might find its way to their acceptance without too severe a
+gymnastic. _En route_, now, in a comfortable compartment, with hot water
+to our feet, according to the European custom. Our way to Lichfield lies
+through an agricultural region, and the fine English mutton appear to be
+forward. Small lambs cuddle near magnificent fat mothers. The wide
+domains lie open to the view. Everything attests the concentration of
+landed property in the hands of the few. We stop at Lichfield, attracted
+by the famous cathedral. The Swan Inn receives, but cannot make us
+comfortable, a violent wind sweeping through walls and windows. Having
+eaten and drunk, we implore our way to the cathedral, St. Chadde, which
+we find beautiful without, and magnificently restored within. Many
+monuments, ancient and modern, adorn it, with epitaphs of Latin in every
+stage of plagiarism. A costly monument to some hero of the Sutlej war
+challenges attention, with its tame and polished modern sphinxes. Tombs
+of ancient abbots we also find, and one recumbent carving of a starved
+and shrunken figure, whose leanness attests some ascetic period not
+famous in sculpture. The pulpit is adorned with shining brass and
+stones, principally cornelians and agates. The organ discoursed a sonata
+of Beethoven for the practice of the organist, but secondarily for our
+delectation. A box with an inscription invites us to contribute our mite
+to the restoration of the cathedral, which may easily cost as much as
+the original structure. Carving, gilding, inlaid work, stained glass--no
+one circumstance of ecclesiastical gewgawry is spared or omitted; and
+trusting that some to us unknown centre of sanctification exists, to
+make the result of the whole something other than idol worship, we
+comply with the gratifying suggestion of our wealth and generosity.
+After satisfying ourselves with the cathedral, we look round wonderingly
+for the recipient of some further fee. He appears in the shape of a
+one-eyed man who invites us to ascend the tower. Guided by a small boy,
+Neophyte No. 1 executes this ascent, and of course reports a wonderful
+prospect, which we are content to take on hearsay. Leaving the
+cathedral, we seek the house in which Dr. Johnson is said to have been
+born. It is, strange to say, much like other houses, the lower story
+having been turned into a furnishing shop, where we buy a pincushion
+tidy for remembrance. In an open space, in front of the house, sits a
+statue of the renowned and redoubted doctor, supported by a pedestal
+with biographical bas-reliefs. Below one of these is inscribed, "He
+hears Sacheverell." The design represents a small child in a father's
+arms, presented before a wiggy divine, who can, of course, be none other
+than the one in question. While these simple undertakings are planned
+and executed, the veteran and elder neophyte engage a one-horse vehicle,
+and madly fly to visit an insane asylum. We shiver till dinner in the
+chilly parlor of the inn, and inter ourselves at an early hour in the
+recesses of a huge feather-bed, where the precious jewel, sleep, is
+easily found. And the next morning sees us _en route_ for London.
+
+At one of the stations between Lichfield and London, we encounter a
+group whose chief figure is that of a pretty little lady, blithe as a
+golden butterfly, apparelled for the chase. Her dress consists of a
+narrow-skirted habit, of moderate length, beneath which we perceive a
+pair of stout boots, of a description not strictly feminine. A black
+plush paletot corresponds with her black skirt. A shining stove-pipe
+crowns her yellow tresses. As she emerges from the railway carriage, a
+young man of elegant aspect approaches her. He wears white hunting
+trousers, high black boots, a black plush coat, and carries a hunting
+whip. The similarity of color in the costumes leads us to suppose that
+the wearers belong to some hunting association. He is at least Sir
+Charles, she, Lady Arabella. He accosts her with evident pleasure, and
+is allowed a shake of the hand. An elderly relative in the background, a
+servant in top boots, who touches his hat as if it could cure the
+plague,--these complete the picture.
+
+At the same station we descry another huntsman in white breeches,
+scarlet cap, and overcoat. We learn that there are two _meets_ to-day in
+this region, but our interests are with the black and white party.
+Farewell, Sir Charles and Lady Arabella. Joyous be your gallop, light
+your leap over five-barred gates. The sly fox Cupid may be chasing you,
+while you chase poor Renard. _Prosit_.
+
+
+
+
+LONDON.
+
+
+"Charing Cross Hotel? 'Ere you are, sir;" and a small four-wheeled cab,
+with a diminutive horse and beer-tinted driver, has us up at the door of
+the same. In front, within the precincts of the hotel court, stands the
+ancient cross, or that which replaces it, and around radiate cook-shops
+and book-shops, jewellers and victuallers and milliners. The human river
+of the Strand fluxes and refluxes before this central spot, and
+Trafalgar Square, and Waterloo Place, and Westminster Abbey, and the
+Houses of Parliament are near. Cabs spring up like daisies and primroses
+beneath the footsteps of spring. At the hotel they make a gratifying
+fuss about us. They seize upon all of us but our persons; the lift,
+(_Americane_--elevator) does that, and noiselessly lodges us on the
+second floor, where we occupy a decent sitting-room, with bedrooms _en
+suite_. A fire of soft coal soon glows in the grate. A smart chambermaid
+takes our orders. We get out our address-book, rub up our recollections,
+enclose and send our cards, then run out and take a dip in the Strand,
+and expand to the full consciousness that we are in the mighty city
+which cannot fall because there is no hollow deep enough to hold it.
+
+We have a quiet day and a half at the hotel before we receive the echo
+of our cards. This interval we improve by visits to the houses of
+Parliament and Westminster Abbey, where we pay our full price, and visit
+the royal chapels with their many tombs. At the recumbent figures of
+Mary Stuart and Elizabeth we pause to think of the dramatic ghosts which
+will not allow them to rest in their graves. Poetry is resurrection, and
+for us who have seen Rachel and Ristori, Mary and Elizabeth are still
+living and speaking lessons of human passion and misfortune. These
+marbles hold their crumbling bones, but we have seen them in far
+America, doing a night's royalty before a democratic audience, and
+demanding to be largely paid for the same.
+
+The frescoes and statues in the long corridors of the Houses of
+Parliament deserve a more minute study than we are able to give them.
+The former show considerable progress in the pictorial art during the
+seventeen years which divide our present from our past observations.
+They represent noted events in English history, the last sleep of
+Argyle, the execution of Montrose, and so on. Among them we see the
+departure of the May Flower, but not the battle of Bunker Hill. The
+statues perpetuate the memories of public men, including a great variety
+both as to opinion and as to service. The solidity of all these
+adornments and arrangements well deserves the praise with which English
+authorities have been wont to comment upon them. A little sombre and
+sober in their tone, they are expressive of the taste and feeling of the
+nation. Parliament is now in session, and various interesting measures
+and reforms are under contemplation. Among these are the extension of
+the elective franchise, the abolition of flogging in the army, and the
+change of the whole long-transmitted system by which commissions in the
+latter are conferred or purchased. The last is perhaps a more democratic
+measure than is dreamed of. Throw open the military and church benefices
+to the competition of the most able and deserving, and the younger sons
+of houses esteemed noble will stand no better chance than others. They
+will then simply earn their bread where they can get it. Then, down
+comes primogeniture, then the union of state and church, then the
+prestige of royalty. This last we think to be greatly on the wane. The
+English prefer an hereditary to an elective symbol of supreme power. The
+permitted descent in the female line prevents the inconvenient issues to
+which the failure of an heir male might give rise. The Georges rose to
+great respectability in the third person, and sank to a disreputable
+level in the fourth. The present queen is an excellently behaved woman,
+and has adhered strictly to her public and private duties. Her long and
+strict widowhood is a little carped at by people in general, the
+personal sentiment having seemed to encroach upon the public career and
+office. But the Prince of Wales will be held to strict and sensible
+behavior, and, failing of it, will be severely dealt with. The English
+people will endure no second season of Carlton House, no letting down of
+manly reserve and womanly character by the spectacle of royal favorites,
+bankrupt at the fireside, but current in the world. All this John Bull
+will not put up with again. Nor will any Christendom, save that Frankish
+and monkeyish one which has yet to learn that true freedom of thought is
+not to be had without purity of conscience, and which, in its desire to
+be polite, holds the door wider open to bad manners than to good ones.
+
+Rash words! What noble, thoughtful Frenchmen have not we known, and the
+world with us! Shall boastful Secesh and blustering Yankee, or the
+sordid, shining shoddy fool stand for the American? Yet these are the
+figures with which Europe is most familiar. So let us fling no smallest
+pebble at the nation of Des Cartes, Montesquieu, Pascal, and De
+Tocqueville. It is not in one, but in all countries that extremes meet.
+And in this connection a word.
+
+The less we know about a thing, the easier to write about it. To give
+quite an assured and fluent account of a country, we should lose no time
+on our first arrival. The first impression is the strongest. Familiarity
+constantly wears off the edge of observation. The face of the new region
+astonishes us once, and once only. We soon grow used to it, and forget
+to describe it. The first day of our arrival in Liverpool or in London
+gave us volumes to write, which have proved as evanescent as the
+pictures of a swift panorama, vanishing to return no more. For now we
+are seated in London as though we had always lived there. We may sooner
+astonish it with our western accent, unconsidered costume, and wild
+coiffure, than it can rivet our attention with its splendors and its
+queernesses, its squares, fountains, equipages, cabmen, well-dressed and
+well-mannered circles. This for the features, for the surface. But for
+the depth and spirit of things, the longer we explore, the less sanguine
+do we feel of being able to exhaust them. We sink our deepest shaft, and
+write upon it, "Thus far our abilities and opportunities; far more
+remains than we can ever bring to light."
+
+And, _apropos_ of this terrible familiarity with things once discerned,
+let me say that when we shall have been two days in heaven, we shall not
+know it any longer, which is one reason why we must always be getting
+there, but never arrive. Pope's old-fashioned line, "always to be
+blest," expresses profoundly this philosophical necessity, although he
+saw it in a simply didactic light, and stated it accordingly. The line
+none the less takes its place in the stately train of the ideal
+philosophy, to which those have best contributed who have been least
+aware of the fact of their having done so. "Lord, when saw I thee naked
+and an hungered," etc., etc. On some smallest, obscurest occasion
+probably, when, the recognized form and the ignored spirit presenting
+themselves together, thy hospitable bosom received the one, and left the
+other to take care of itself.
+
+Our neophytes take this great Babel with the charming _at-homeness_ to
+which our paragraph alludes. They devour London as if it were the
+perpetual bread and butter which their father's house keeps always cut
+and spread for them; cab hire, great dinners, distinguished company, the
+lofty friend's equipage and livery, lent for precious occasions,--all
+this seems as much a matter of course as Lindley Murray's rules, or the
+Creed and the Commandments. Joachim? Of course they will hear Joachim,
+and the Opera, if it be good enough, and Mr. Dickens. Lady ----, Duke of
+So and so. Very well in their way. Presented at court? They wouldn't
+mind, provided it were not too tedious. Mr. Carlyle? Herbert Spencer?
+Yes, they have heard tell of them.
+
+Happy season of youth, which can find nothing more reverend than its
+possibilities, more glorious than its unwasted powers! In spite of all
+the new views and theories, I say, let children be born, and let women
+nurse them and bring them up, and let us have young people to take our
+work where we leave it, laughing at our limitations, and excelling us
+with noble strides; to pause some day, and remember our lessons, and
+weep over our pains, not the less, O God of the future, surpassing us!
+So let children continue to be born, and let no one attempt to
+reconstruct society at the expense of one hair of the head of these
+little ones, ourselves in hope as well as in memory.
+
+
+
+
+ST. PAUL'S--THE JAPANESE.
+
+
+The first feature of novelty in visiting St. Paul's Cathedral is the
+facility for going thither afforded by the city railways,--one of which
+swiftly deposits us in Cannon Street, whence, with the Cathedral in full
+sight, we beg our way to the entrance, so far as information goes,--one
+only of its several doors being open to the public at all times. The
+second is the crypt occupied and solemnized by the ponderous funereal
+pomps of the late Duke of Wellington. In conjunction with these must be
+mentioned the Nelson monument. These two men have been the great
+deliverers of England in modern times, and there is, no doubt, a certain
+heartiness in the gratitude that attends their memory. The duke's
+mausoleum is of solid porphyry, highly polished, in a quadrangular
+enclosure, at each of whose four corners flames a gas-jet, fixed on a
+porphyry shaft. Behind this a large space is filled by the huge funereal
+car which bore the hero to this place of rest. It is of cast iron,
+furnished by the cannon taken in his victories. In it are harnessed
+effigies of the six horses that dragged it, in the veritable trappings
+worn on the occasion. The heavy black draperies of the car are edged
+with a colored border, representing the orders worn by the duke. And
+here the care of England will, no doubt, preserve them, with the nodding
+hearse-plumes, and all the monuments of that holiday of woe, to moulder
+as long as such things can possibly hold together. For there is a point
+at which the most illustrious antiquity degenerates into dirt. And in
+England the past and present will yet have some awkward controversies to
+settle; for the small island cannot always have room for both, and to
+cramp and crowd the one for the heraldic display of the other will not
+be good housekeeping, according to the theories of to-day. So, when the
+fox-hunting squire tells us that his chief public aim and occupation
+will be to keep his county conservative, we think that this should mean
+to cheat the honest and laborious peasantry out of their eye teeth;
+though how they should be ignorant enough to be outwitted by him, is a
+question which makes us pause as over an unexplored abyss of
+knownothingism.
+
+St. Paul's is clearly organized for the extortion of shillings and
+sixpences. So much for seeing the bell, clock, and whispering gallery;
+so much for the crypt. You are pressed, too, at every turn, to purchase
+guide-books, each more authentic than the last. There, as elsewhere, we
+go about spilling our small change at every step, and wondering where it
+will all end. We remember the debtors' prisons which still abound in
+England, and endeavor to view the younger neophyte in the sober livery
+of Little Dorrit.
+
+The only occasion of public amusement that we improve, after the one
+happy hearing of Joachim, is an evening performance of the Japanese
+jugglers, which remains fresh and vivid in our recollections, with all
+its barbaric smoothness and perfection.
+
+The first spectacle which we behold is that of a chattering and
+shrieking monkey of a man, who, squatting on his haunches, visibly
+fills a tea-cup with water, inverts it upon a pile of papers without
+spilling a drop, and pulls out layer after layer of those papers, all
+perfectly dry, which he waves at us with a childish joy. By and by, he
+restores the cup to its original position, and then empties its contents
+into another vessel before our eyes. Another, a top-spinning savage,
+continually whirls his top into that state which the boys call "sleep,"
+and spins it, thus impelled, along the sharp edge of a steel sword, up
+to the point and back again, and along the border of a paper fan, with
+other deeds which it were tedious to enumerate. While these feats go on,
+two funny little Japanese children, oddly bundled up according to the
+patterns of the two sexes, toddle about and chatter with the elders,
+probably for the purpose of illustrating the features of family life in
+Japan. A young creature, said to be the wife of six unpronounceable
+syllables, strums on a monotonous stringed instrument, and screeches,
+sometimes striking an octave, but successfully dodging every other
+interval. Both in speech and in song the tones of these people betray an
+utter want of command over the inflections of the voice. Every elevation
+is a scream, every depression, _con rispetto_, a grunt. And when, in
+addition to the song and strumming, the little ones lustily beat a large
+wooden tea-box with wooden weapons, we begin to waver a little about the
+old proverb, _De gustibus non disputandum est_. The beautiful butterfly
+trick, however, consoles our eyes for what our ears have suffered. The
+conjurer twists first one, then two, butterflies out of a bit of white
+paper, and, by means of a fan, causes them to fly and poise as if they
+were coquetting with July breezes. When, at last, he presents a basket
+of flowers, the illusion is perfect. They settle, fly again, and hover
+round, in true coleopteric fashion.
+
+But the acrobatic exhibition is that which beggars all that our
+overworked sensibilities have endured at the hands of rope-dancer or
+equestrian. Blondin himself, Hanlon in the flying trapeze, are less
+perfect and less terrible. Acrobat No. 1 appears in an athlete's costume
+of white linen. He binds a stout silken tie around his head--a
+precaution whose object is later understood. He then gets into a small
+metal triangle with a running cord attached, and is swung up to the
+neighborhood of the high, arched ceiling, where various cross-pieces,
+slight in appearance, are attached. To one of these he directs his
+venturous flight, and letting his triangle depart, he takes his station
+with his legs firmly closed upon the cross-piece, his head hanging down,
+his hands free. Acrobat No. 2 now comes upon the scene. Mounting in a
+second triangle, he is swung to a certain height at a distance of some
+twenty or more feet from the first performer. A bamboo pole is here
+handed him, of which he manages to convey the upper end within the grasp
+of the latter. And now, swinging loose from his triangle, he hangs at
+the lower end of the bamboo, his steadfast colleague holding fast the
+upper end. And this mere straight line, with only the natural jointings
+of the cane, becomes to him a domain, a palace of ease. Now he clings to
+it apparently with one finger, throwing out the other hand and both
+feet. Now he clings by one foot, his head being down, and his hands
+occupied with a fan. There is, in fact, no name for the singularities
+with which he amazes us for at least a quarter of an hour. No. 1 always
+holds on like grim death. No. 2 seems at times to hold on by nothing.
+All the while one of their number chatters volubly in the Japanese
+dialect, directing attention to the achievements of the two pendent
+heroes. Our thoughts recurred forcibly to a dialogue long familiar in
+our own country:--
+
+"Wat's dat darkening up de hole?" asks Cuffee in the she bear's den to
+Cuffee without, who is forcibly detaining the returned she bear by one
+extremity.
+
+"If de tail slips through my fingers, you'll find out," is the curt
+reply, and end of the story.
+
+But the pole did not slip through, and, finally, the second triangle was
+swung towards acrobat No. 2, who relinquished his hold of the bamboo,
+and intwining his legs about it, pleasantly made his descent with his
+head downwards, afterwards setting himself to rights with one shake.
+Acrobat No. 1 now condescends to come down from his high position, also
+with his head down, and a cool and consummate demeanor. But he walks off
+from the stage as if his late inverted view of it had given him
+something to think of. And in all this, not one jerk, one hasty snatch,
+one fall and recovery. All goes with the rounded smoothness of
+machinery. These gymnasts have perfected the mechanism of the body, but
+they have given it nothing to do that is worth doing.
+
+
+
+
+SOCIETY.
+
+
+We bite at the tempting bait of London society a little eagerly. In our
+case, as veterans, it is like returning to a delicious element from
+which we have long been weaned. The cheerfulness with which English
+people respond to the modest presentment of a card _well-motived_, the
+cordiality with which they welcome an old friend, once truly a friend,
+may well offset the reserve with which they respond to advances made at
+random, and the resolute self-defence of the British _Lion_ in
+particular against all vague and vagabond enthusiasms. Carlyle's wrath
+at the Americans who homaged and tormented him prompted a grandiose
+vengeance. He called them a nation of hyperbores. Not for this do we now
+vigorously let him alone, but because his spleeny literary utterances
+these many years attest the precise moment in which bright Apollo left
+him. The most brilliant genius should beware of the infirmity of the
+fireside and admiring few, whose friendship applauds his poorest
+sayings, and, at the utmost, shrugs its shoulders where praise is out of
+the question.
+
+Our remembrance of the London of twenty-four years ago is, indeed
+hyperdelightful, and of that description which one does not ask to have
+repeated, so perfect is it in the first instance. A second visit was
+less social and more secluded in its opportunities. But now--for what
+reason it matters not; would it were that of our superior merit--we find
+the old delightful account reopened, the friendly visits frequent, and
+the luxurious invitations to dinner occupy every evening of our short
+week in London, crowding out theatres and opera,--the latter now just in
+the bud. To these dissipations a new one has been added, and the
+afternoon tea is now a recognized institution. Less formal and expensive
+than a New York afternoon reception, it answers the same purpose of a
+final object and rest for the day's visiting. In some instances, it
+continues through the season; in others, invitations are given for a
+single occasion only. You go, if invited, in spruce morning dress, with
+as much or as little display of train and bonnet as may suit with your
+views. You find a cheerful and broken-up assemblage--people conversing
+in twos, or, at most, in threes. And here is the Very Reverend the Dean.
+And here is the Catholic Archbishop, renowned for the rank and number of
+his proselytes. And here is Sir Charles--not he of the hunting-whip and
+breeches, but one renowned in science, and making a practical as well as
+a theoretical approximation to the antiquity of man. And here is Sir
+Samuel, who has finally discovered those parent lakes of the Nile which
+have been among the lost arts of geography for so many centuries. In
+this society, no man sees or shows a full-length portrait. A word is
+given, a phrase exchanged, and "_tout est dit_." What it all may amount
+to must be made out in another book than mine.
+
+Well, having been more or less introduced, you take a cup of tea, with
+the option of bread and butter or a fragment of sponge cake. Having
+finished this, you vanish; you have shown yourself, reported yourself;
+more was not expected of you.
+
+A graver and more important institution is the London dinner, commencing
+at half past seven, with good evening clothes--a white neckcloth and
+black vest for gentlemen; for _nous autres_, evening dress, not
+resplendent. The dinners we attend have perhaps the edge of state a
+little taken off, being given at short notice; but we observe female
+attire to be less showy than in our recollections of twenty-four years
+previous, and our one evening dress, devised to answer for dinner,
+evening party, and ball, proves a little over, rather than under, the
+golden mean of average appearance. As one dinner is like all, the
+briefest sketch of a single possible occasion may suffice. If you have
+been at afternoon tea before dinner, your toilet has been perforce a
+very hurried one. If it is your first appearance, the _annonce_ of a
+French hair-dresser in the upper floor of your hotel may have inspired
+you with the insane idea of submitting your precious brain-case to his
+manipulations. Having you once in his dreadful seat, he imposes upon you
+at his pleasure. You must accept his hair-string, his pins, his rats, at
+a price at which angola cats were dear. You are palpitating with haste,
+he with the conceit of his character and profession. Fain would he add
+swindle to swindle, and perfidy to perfidy. "Don't you want a little
+crayon to darken the hair?" and hide the ravages of age; "it is true it
+colors a little, since it is made on purpose." You desire it not. "A
+cream? a pomade? a hair-wash?" None of all this; only in Heaven's name
+to have done with him! He capers behind you, puffing your sober head
+with curls, as if he had the breath of AEolus, according to Flaxman's
+illustration. Finally he dismisses you at large and unwarranted cost;
+but in your imagination he capers at your back for a week to come.
+
+This prelude, which gives to
+
+                "_hairy_ nothing
+    A local habitation and a name,"
+
+leaves little time for further adornment. A hired cab takes your
+splendors to the door of the inviting mansion, and leaves them there.
+When you depart, you request the servant of the house which feeds you to
+call another cab, which he does with the air of rendering a familiar
+service.
+
+I have no intention of giving a detailed portrait of the entertainment
+that follows. Its few characteristic features can be briefly given.
+Introductions are not general; and even in case the occasion should have
+been invoked and invited for you, the greater part of your fellow-guests
+may not directly make your acquaintance. Servants are graver than
+senators with us. Dishes follow each other in bewildering and rather
+oppressive variety. You could be very happy with any one of them alone,
+but with a dozen you fear even to touch and taste. Conversation is not
+loud nor general, scarcely audible across the table. As in marriage,
+your partner is your fate. One would be very glad to present one brick
+so that another could be laid on top of it, or even to attempt an angle
+and a corner adjustment. But this conversation is not architectonic. It
+aims at nothing more than the requisite small change. If by chance the
+society be assembled at an informal house, and composed of artists and
+authors, we shall hear jests and laughter, but the themes of these will
+scarcely go beyond the most familiar matters. Having told thus much we
+have told all, except that ice is not served, as with us, upon the
+table, in picturesque variety of form and color, but is usually bestowed
+in spoonfuls, one of either kind to each person, the quality being
+excellent, and the quantity, after all else that has been offered, quite
+sufficient. It is here one of the most expensive articles of
+_luxe_--costing thrice its Yankee prices. The ladies leave the table a
+little before the gentlemen; but these arrive with no symptoms of
+inordinate drinking. The latter, as is well known, is long gone out of
+fashion, and with it, we imagine, the description of wit and anecdote,
+whose special enjoyment used to be reserved for the time "after the
+ladies had left the table." This is all that can be told of the dinner,
+which is the _ne plus ultra_ of English social enjoyments; for balls
+everywhere are stale affairs, save to the dancing neophytes, and the
+enjoyment to be had at them is either official or gymnastic. At a
+"select" _soiree_ following a state dinner, we hear Mr. Ap Thomas, the
+renowned harpist, whose execution is indeed brilliant and remarkable.
+The harp, however, is an instrument that owes its prestige partly to its
+beauty of form, partly to the romance of its traditions, from King David
+to the Welsh bards. In tone and temper it remains greatly inferior to
+the piano-forte, the finger governing the strings far better with than
+without the intervention of the keys and hammers.
+
+But while we thankfully accept the offered opportunities of meeting
+those whom we desire to see, we are forced, as hygienists and
+economists, to enter our protest against the English dinner--this last
+joint in the back-bone of luxury. After hearty luncheon and social tea,
+it would seem to be a mere superfluity, not needed, a danger if partaken
+of, a mockery if neglected. So let New England cherish while she can the
+early dinner; for with the extended areas of business and society,
+dinner grows ever later, and the man and his family wider apart. By the
+time that tea and coffee are got through with, it may well be half past
+ten o'clock, and by eleven, at latest, unless there should be music or
+some special after-entertainment, you take leave.
+
+Hoping to revisit more fully this ancestral isle before the tocsin of
+depart for home, we will now, with a little more of our sketchiness,
+take leave of it, which we should do with heartier regret but for the
+prospect of a not distant return.
+
+In philosophy, England at the present day does not seem to go beyond
+Mill on the one hand, and Stewart on the other. The word "science" is
+still used, as it was ten years ago with us, to express the rules and
+observances of physical and mathematical study. Science, as the mother
+of the rules of thought, generating logic, building metaphysics, and
+devising the rules of coherence by which human cogitation is at once
+promoted and measured,--this conception of science I did not recognize
+in those with whom I spoke, unless I except Rev. H. Martineau, with whom
+I had only general conversation, but whose intellectual position is at
+once without the walls of form, and within the sanctuary of freedom. I
+was referred to Jowett and his friends as the authorities under this
+head, but this was not the moment in which to find them. In religion,
+Miss Cobbe leads the van, her partial method assuming as an original
+conception what the Germans have done, and much better done, before her.
+Theodore Parker is, I gather, her great man; and in her case, as in his,
+largeness of nature, force and geniality of temperament, take the place
+of scientific construction and responsible labor. Mr. Martineau's
+position is well known, and is for us New Englanders beyond controversy.
+The broad church is best known to us by Kingsley and Maurice. To those
+who still stand within the limits of an absolute authority in spiritual
+matters, its achievements may appear worthy of surprise and of
+gratulation. To those who have passed that barrier they present no
+intellectual feature worth remarking.
+
+I well remember to-day my childish astonishment when I first learned
+that I and my fellows were outside the earth's crust, not within it. In
+connection with this came also the fact of a mysterious force binding us
+to the surface of the planet, so that, in its voyages and revolutions,
+it can lose nothing of its own.
+
+Something akin to this may be the discovery of believers that they and
+those whom they follow are, so far as concerns actual opportunity of
+knowledge, on the outside of the world of ideal truth. Eye hath not
+seen, nor ear heard, nor heart conceived, any absolute form of its
+manifestation. A divine, mysterious force binds us to our place on its
+smiling borders. Of what lies beyond we construe as we can--Moses
+according to his ability, Christ and Paul according to theirs. Unseen
+and unmanifested it must ever remain; for though men say that God has
+done so and so, God has never said so. Of this we become sure: religion
+spiritualizes, inspires, and consoles us. The strait gate and narrow
+path are blessed for all who find them, and are the same for all who
+seek them. But this oneness of morals is learned experimentally; it
+cannot be taught dogmatically.
+
+Proposing to return to this theme, and to see more of the broad church
+before I decide upon its position, I take leave of it and of its domain
+together. Farewell, England! farewell, London! For three months to come
+thou wilt contain the regalia of all wits, of all capabilities. Fain
+would we have lingered beside the hospitable tables, and around the
+ancient monuments, considering also the steadfast and slowly-developing
+institutions. But the chief veteran is in haste for Greece, and on the
+very Sunday on which we should have heard Martineau in the forenoon, and
+Dean Stanley in the afternoon, with delightful social recreation in the
+evening, we break loose from our moorings, reach Folkstone, and embark
+for its French antithesis, _Boulogne sur mer_.
+
+
+
+
+THE CHANNEL.
+
+
+If the devil is not so black as he is painted, it must be because he has
+an occasional day of good humor. Some such wondrous interval is hinted
+at by people who profess to have seen the Channel sea smooth and calm.
+We remember it piled with mountains of anguish--one's poor head
+swimming, one's heart sinking, while an organ more important than either
+in this connection underwent a sort of turning inside out which seemed
+to wrench the very strings of life. But on this broken Sabbath our
+wonderful luck still pursues us. It is in favor of the neophytes that
+this new dispensation has been granted. The monsters of the deep respect
+their innocence, and cannot visit on them the vulgar offences of their
+progenitors. They bind the waves with a garland of roses and lilies,
+whose freshness proves a spell of peace. We, the elders, embark,
+expecting the usual speedy prostration; but, placing ourselves against
+the mast, we determine, like Ulysses, to maintain the integrity of our
+position. And it so happens that we do. While a few sensitive mortals
+about us execute the irregular symphony of despair, we rest in a calm
+and upright silence. Never was the Channel so quiet! We were not
+uproarious, certainly, but contemplative. A wretch tucked us up with a
+tarpaulin, for which he afterwards demanded a trifle. If civility is
+sold for its weight in silver anywhere, it is on English soil and in
+English dependencies. We, the veterans, took our quiet ferriage in mute
+amazement; the neophytes took it as a thing of course.
+
+Arrived, we rush to the _buffet_ of the railroad station, where every
+one speaks French-English. Here a very limited dinner costs us five
+francs a head. We accept the imposition with melancholy thoughtfulness.
+Then comes the whistle of the locomotive. "_En voiture, messieurs!_" And
+away, with a shriek, and a groan, and a rattle,--to borrow Mr. Dickens's
+refrain, now that he has done with it,--_en route_ for Paris.
+
+
+
+
+PARIS AND THENCE.
+
+
+In Paris the fate of Greece still pursues us. Two days the rigid veteran
+will grant; no more--the rest promised when the Eastern business shall
+have been settled. But those two days suffice to undo our immortal souls
+so far as shop windows can do this. The shining sins and vanities of the
+world are so insidiously set forth in this Jesuits' college of Satan,
+that you catch the contagion of folly and extravagance as you pace the
+streets, or saunter through the brilliant arcades. Your purveyor makes a
+Sybarite of you, through the inevitable instrumentality of breakfast and
+dinner. Your clothier, from boots to bonnet, seduces you into putting
+the agreeable before the useful. For if you purchase the latter, you
+will be moved to buy by the former, and use becomes an after-thought to
+your itching desire and disturbed conscience. Paris is a sweating
+furnace in which human beings would turn life everlasting into gold,
+provided it were a negotiable value. You, who escape its allurements
+solvent, with a franc or two in your pocket, and your resources for a
+year to come not mortgaged, should after your own manner cause _Te
+Deum_ to be sung or celebrated. Strongly impressed at the time, moved
+towards every acquisitive villany, not excluding shop-lifting nor the
+picking of pockets, I now regard with a sort of indignation those silken
+snares, those diamond, jet, and crystal allurements, which so nearly
+brought my self-restraint, and with it my self-respect, to ruin.
+Everything in Paris said to me, "Shine, dye your hair, rouge your
+cheeks, beggar your purse with real diamonds, or your pride with false
+ones. But shine, and, if necessary, beg or steal." Nothing said, "Be
+sober, be vigilant, because your adversary, like a roaring lion," etc.,
+etc. What a deliverer was therefore the stern Crete-bound veteran, who
+cut the Gordian knot of enchantment with, "Pack and begone." And having
+ended that inevitable protest against his barbarity with which women
+requite the offices of true friendship, I now turn my wrath against
+false, fair Paris, and cry, "Avoid thee, _scelestissima_! Away from me,
+_nequissima_! I will none of thee; not a franc, not an obolus. Avoid
+thee! _Nolo ornari!_"
+
+Touching our journey from Paris to Marseilles, I will only give the
+scarce-needed advice that those who have this route to make should
+inflict upon themselves a little extra fatigue, and stop only at Lyons,
+if at all, rather than risk the damp rooms and musty accommodations of
+the smaller places which lie upon the route, offering to the traveller
+few objects of interest, or none. For it often happens in travelling
+that a choice only of inconveniences is presented to us, and in our
+opinion a prolonged day's journey in a luxurious car is far less
+grievous to be borne than a succession of stoppages, unpackings, and
+plungings into unknown inns and unaired beds. To this opinion, however,
+our Greece-bound veteran suffers not himself to be converted, and,
+accordingly, we, leaving Paris on the Wednesday at ten A. M., do not
+reach Marseilles until four o'clock of the Friday afternoon following.
+
+The features of our first day's journey are those of a country whose
+landed possessions are subdivided into the smallest portions cultivable.
+Plains and hill-sides are alike covered with the stripes which denote
+the limits of property. Fruit trees in blossom abound every where, but
+the villages, built of rough stone and lime, are distant from each
+other. As we go southward, the vine becomes more apparent, and before we
+reach Lyons we see much of that contested gift of God. The trains that
+pass us are often loaded with barrels whose precious contents cannot be
+bought pure for any money, on the other side of the Atlantic, or even of
+the Straits of Dover. To this the procession of the jolly god has come
+at last. He leers at us through the two red eyes of the locomotive; its
+stout cylinder represents his _embonpoint_. Instead of frantic
+Bacchantes, the rattling cars dance after him, and "_Ohe evohe!_"
+degenerates into the shrill whew, whew of the engine. At the _buffets_
+and hotels _en route_ his mysteries are celebrated. These must be sought
+in the labyrinthine state of mind of those who have drunken frequently
+and freely. They utter words unintelligible to the sober and uninspired,
+sentences of prophetic madness which the prose of modern physiology
+condenses into those two words--gout and delirium tremens. Yet these two
+dire diseases are rare among the temperate French. They export the
+producing medium _au profit de l'etranger_.
+
+We stop the first night at Macon, and sleep in an imposing, chilly room,
+without carpets, under down coverlets. The second day's journey brings
+us to Lyons an hour before noon. We engage a _fiacre_, drive around the
+town, whose growth and improvement in the interval of sixteen years do
+not fail to strike us. Fine public squares adorn it, themselves
+embellished with bronze statues, among which we observe an equestrian
+figure of the first and only Napoleon. The shops are as tormenting as
+those of Paris, the Cafe Casati, where we dine, as elegant. Re-embarking
+at four P. M., we reach Valence in about four hours.
+
+The worst of it is, that, arriving at these quaint little places after
+dark, you see none of their features, and taste only of their
+discomforts. At Valence our inn was so dreary, that, having bestowed the
+neophytes in sound slumber, the veteran and I sallied forth in quest of
+any pastime whatever, without being at all fastidious as to its source
+and character. Passing along the quiet streets, we observe what would
+seem to be a theatre, on the other side of the way. Entering, we find a
+youthful guardian, who tells us that there is up stairs a "_conference
+de philosophie_." We enter, and find a very respectable assemblage,
+listening attentively to an indistinct orator, who rhapsodizes upon the
+poets of modern France, with quotations and personal anecdotes. What he
+says has little originality, but is delivered with good taste and
+feeling. He speaks without notes; for, indeed, such a _causerie_ spins
+itself, like a sailor's yarn, though out of finer materials.
+
+Returning to our hostelry, we sleep with open window in a musty room,
+and catch cold. The next day's journey still conducts us through a
+vine-growing region, in a more and more advanced condition. The constant
+presence of the _morus multicaulis_ also makes us aware of the presence
+of the silk-worm--so far, only in the egg-condition; for that prime
+minister of vanity is not hatched yet. We learn that the disease which
+has for some years devastated the worm is on the decline. The world with
+us, meanwhile has become somewhat weaned from the absolute necessity of
+the article, and the friendly sheep and alpaca have made great progress
+in the aesthetics of the toilet. As we approach Marseilles, we cross a
+dreary flat of wide extent, covered with stones and saltish grass, and
+said to produce the finest cattle in France. The olive, too, makes his
+stiff bow to us as we pass, well remembering his dusty green. The olive
+trees seem very small, and are, indeed, of comparatively recent growth;
+all the larger ones having been killed by a frost, rare in these
+latitudes, whose epoch we are inclined to state as posterior to our last
+presence in these parts. Our informant places it at twenty years ago.
+After three days of piecemeal travelling, the arrival at Marseilles
+seems quite a relief.
+
+
+
+
+MARSEILLES.
+
+
+At Marseilles we find a quasi tropical aspect--long streets, handsome
+and well-shaded, tempting shops, luxurious hotels, a motley company,
+and, above all, a friend, one of our own countrymen, divided between the
+glitter of the new life and the homesick weaning of the old. Half, he
+assumes the cicerone, and guides our ignorance about. Half, he sits to
+learn, and we expound to him what has befallen at home, so far as we are
+conscious of it. We take half a day for resting, the next day for
+sight-seeing. On the third, we must sail, for finding that Holy Week is
+still to be, we determine to make our reluctant sacrifice to the
+Mediterranean, and to trust our precious comfort and delicate
+equilibrium to that blue imposture, that sunniest of humbugs.
+
+On the second day, we climb the steep ascent that leads to the chapel of
+La Bonne Mere de la Garde. This hot and panting ascent is not made by us
+without many pauses for recovered breath and energy. At every convenient
+stopping-place in the steep ascent are stationed elderly women presiding
+over small booths, who urgently invite us to purchase candles to give to
+the Madonna, medals, rosaries, and photographs, to all of whom we oppose
+a steadfast resistance. We have twice in our lives brought home from
+Europe boat-loads of trash, and we think that, as Paul says, the time
+past of our lives may suffice us. Finally, with a degree of perspiration
+more than salutary, we reach the top, and enjoy first the view of the
+Mediterranean, including a bird's-eye prospect of the town, which looks
+so parched and arid as to make the remembrance of London in the rain
+soothing and pleasant. A palace is pointed out which was built in the
+expectation of a night's sojourn of the emperor, but to which, they tell
+us, he never came. Our point of view is the top of one of the towers of
+the church. Going inside, we look down upon the aisles and altars from a
+lofty gallery. The silver robes of the Madonna glisten, reflecting the
+many wax-lights that devotees have kindled around her. The first sight
+of these material expressions of devotion is imposing, the second
+instructive, the third, commonplace and wearisome. We are at the last
+clause, and gaze at these things with the eyes of people who have seen
+enough of them.
+
+The remainder of the disposable day we employ in a drive to the Prado,
+the fashionable region for the display of equipage and toilet. This is
+not, however, the fashionable day, and we meet only a few grumpy-looking
+dowagers in all stages of fatitude. The road is planted with double rows
+of lindens, and is skirted by country residences and villas to let. We
+stop and alight at the Musee, a spacious and handsome building, erected
+and owned by a noble of great wealth, long since dead, who committed
+celibacy, and left no personal heir. It is now the property of the city
+of Marseilles. The hall is fine. Among the spacious salons, the largest
+is used as a gallery of pictures, mostly by artists of this
+neighborhood, and of very humble merit. In another we find a very good
+collection of Egyptian antiquities, while in yet another the old state
+furniture is retained, the rich crimson hangings, long divan of gobelin,
+and chairs covered with fine worsted needle-work. Beyond is a pretty
+Chinese cabinet, with a full-length _squatue_ of Buddh, gayly gilded and
+painted. Above stairs, the state bed and hangings are shown, the latter
+matching a handsome landscape chintz, with which the walls are covered.
+This museum has in it a good deal of instructive and entertaining
+matter, and is kept in first-rate order. Returning, we drive around the
+outer skirts of the town, and see something of the summer bathing
+hotels, the great storehouses, and the streets frequented by the working
+and seafaring portion of the community.
+
+In the evening we walk through the streets, which are brilliant with
+gas, and visit the cafes, where ices, coffee, and lemonade are enjoyed.
+We finally seat ourselves in a casino, a sort of mixed cafe and theatre,
+where the most motley groups of people are coming, going, and sitting.
+At one end is a small stage, with a curtain, which falls at the end of
+each separate performance. Here songs and dances succeed each other,
+only half heeded by the public, who drink, smoke, and chatter without
+stint. After a hornpipe, a dreadful woman in white, with a blue peplum,
+hoarsely shouts a song without music, accompanied by drums and barbaric
+cymbals. She makes at last a vile courtesy, matching the insufficiency
+of her dress below by its utter absence above the waist, and we take
+flight. The next morning witnesses our early departure from Marseilles.
+
+
+
+
+ROME.
+
+
+With feelings much mingled, I approach, for the third time, the city of
+Rome. I pause to collect the experience of sixteen years, the period
+intervening between my second visit and the present. I left Rome, after
+those days, with entire determination, but with infinite reluctance.
+America seemed the place of exile, Rome the home of sympathy and
+comfort. To console myself for the termination of my travels, I
+undertook a mental pilgrimage, which unfolded to me something of the
+spirit of that older world, of which I had found the form so congenial.
+To the course of private experience were added great public lessons.
+Among these I may name the sublime failure of John Brown, the sorrow and
+success of the late war. And now I must confess that, after so many
+intense and vivid pages of life, this visit to Rome, once a theme of
+fervent and solemn desire, becomes a mere page of embellishment in a
+serious and instructive volume. So, while my countrymen and women, and
+the Roman world in general, hang intent upon the pages of the
+picture-book, let me resume my graver argument, and ask and answer such
+questions of the present as may seem useful and not ungenial.
+
+The Roman problem has for the American thinker two clauses: first, that
+of state and society; secondly, that of his personal relation to the
+same. Arriving here, and becoming in some degree acquainted with things
+as they are, he asks, first, What is the theory of this society, and how
+long will it continue? secondly, What do my countrymen who consent to
+pass their lives here gain? what do they give up? I cannot answer either
+of these questions exhaustively. The first would lead me far into social
+theorizing; the second into some ungracious criticism. So a word, a
+friendly one must stand for good intentions where wisdom is at fault.
+
+The theory of this society in policy and religion is that of a symbolism
+whose remote significance has long been lost sight of and forgotten.
+Here the rulers, whose derived power should represent the _consensus_ of
+the people, affect to be greater than those who constitute them, and the
+petty statue, raised by the great artist for the convenience and
+instruction of the crowd, spurns at the solid basis of the heaven-born
+planet, without which it could not stand. Rank here is not a mere
+convenience and classification for the encouragement of virtue and
+promotion of order. Rank here takes the place of virtue, and repression,
+its tool, takes the place of order. A paralysis of thought characterizes
+the whole community, for thought deprived of its legitimate results is
+like the human race debarred from its productive functions--it becomes
+effete, and soon extinct.
+
+Abject poverty and rudeness characterize the lower class (_basso ceto_),
+bad taste and want of education the middle, utter arrogance and
+superficiality the upper class. The distinctions between one set of
+human beings and another are held to be absolute, and the inferiority of
+opportunity, carefully preserved and exaggerated, is regarded as
+intrinsic, not accidental. Vain is it to plead the democratic allowances
+of the Catholic church. The equality of man before God is here purely
+abstract and disembodied. The name of God, on the contrary, is invoked
+to authorize the most flagrant inequalization that ignorance can prepare
+and institutions uphold. The finest churches, the fairest galleries, you
+will say, are open to the poorest as to the richest. This is true. But
+the man's mind is the castle and edifice of his life. Look at these
+rough and ragged people, unwashed, uncombed, untaught. See how little
+sensible they are of the decencies and amenities of life. Search their
+faces for an intelligent smile, a glance that recognizes beauty or
+fitness in any of the stately circumstances that surround them. They are
+kept like human cattle, and have been so kept for centuries. And their
+dominants suppose themselves to be of one sort, and these of another.
+But give us absolutism, and take away education, even in rich and roomy
+America, and what shall we have? The cruel and arrogant slaveholder, the
+vulgar and miserable poor white, the wronged and degraded negro. The
+three classes of men exist in all constituted society. Absolutism allows
+them to exist only in this false form.
+
+This race is not a poor, but a robust and kindly one. Inclining more to
+artistic illustration than to abstract thought, its gifts, in the
+hierarchy of the nations, are eminent and precious. Like the modern
+Greek, the modern Celt, and the modern negro, the Italian peasant asks a
+century or two of education towards modern ideas. And all that can be
+said of his want of comprehension only makes it the more evident that
+the sooner we begin, the better.
+
+It should not need, to Americans or Englishmen, to set out any formal
+argument against absolutism. Among them it has long since been tried and
+judged. Enough of its advocacy only remains to present that opposition
+which is the necessary basis of action. And yet a word to my countrymen
+and countrywomen, who, lingering on the edge of the vase, are lured by
+its sweets, and fall into its imprisonment. It is a false, false
+superiority to which you are striving to join yourself. A prince of
+puppets is not a prince, but a puppet; a superfluous duke is no dux; a
+titular count does not count. Dresses, jewels, and equipages of
+tasteless extravagance; the sickly smile of disdain for simple people;
+the clinging together, by turns eager and haughty, of a clique that
+becomes daily smaller in intention, and whose true decline consists in
+its numerical increase,--do not dream that these lift you in any time
+way--in any true sense. For Italians to believe that it does, is
+natural; for Englishmen to believe it, is discreditable; for Americans,
+disgraceful.
+
+Leaving philosophy for the moment, I must renew my sketchy pictures of
+the scenes I pass through, lest treacherous memory should relinquish
+their best traits unpreserved. Arrived in Rome, at a very prosaic and
+commonplace station, I had some difficulty in recognizing the front of
+Villa Negroni, an old papal residence belonging to the Massimi family,
+in whose wide walls the relatives I now visit had formerly built their
+nest. A cosy and pleasant one it was, with the view of the distant
+hills, a large _entourage_ of gardens, a fine orange grove, and the
+neighborhood of some interesting ruins and churches. With all the
+cordiality of the old time these relatives now met me. My labors of
+baggage and conveyance were ended. One leads me to the carriage, where
+another waits to receive me. Time has been indulgent, we think, to both
+of us, for each finds the other little changed.
+
+And now we begin in earnest to tread the fairy land of dreams. Here are
+the Quattro Fontane, there is the Quirinal, yonder the dome of domes. We
+thread the streets in which I used to hunt for small jewelry and
+pictures at a bargain, enacting the part of the prodigal son, and
+providing a dinner of husks for the sake of a feast of gewgaws. A
+certain salutary tingling of shame visits my cheeks at the remembrance
+of the same. I find the personage of those days poor and trivial. But
+here is the Forum of Trajan, and soon we drive within a palatial
+doorway, and our guides lead us up a stately marble staircase--a long
+ascent; but we pause finally, and a great door opens, and they say,
+Welcome! We are now at home.
+
+Through a long hall we go, and through a sweep of apartments unmatchable
+in Fifth Avenue, at least in architectural dignity, seconded by rich and
+measured taste--green parlor, crimson parlor, drab parlor, the lady's
+room, the signore's room, the children's room. And in the guest-chamber
+I confronted my small and dusty self in the glass--small, not especially
+in my human proportions. But the whole of my modest house in B. Place
+would easily, as to solid contents, lodge in the largest of those lofty
+rooms. The Place itself would equally lodge in the palace. I regard my
+re-found friends with wonder, and expect to see them execute some large
+and stately manoeuvre, indicating their possession of all this space.
+
+And now, dinner served in irreproachable style, and waited on by two
+young men whose air and deportment would amply justify their appearance
+at Papanti's Hall on any state occasion. We soon grow used to their
+polite services; but at first Mario and Giuseppe somewhat intimidate us.
+
+And after dinner, talk of old times and old friends, question of this
+region and the other, the cold limbo as to weather, whence we come. Long
+and familiar is our interchange of facts, and sleep comes too soon, yet
+is welcome.
+
+
+
+
+ST. PETER'S.
+
+
+The first day in Rome sees us pursuing the phantom of the St. Peter
+ceremonies, for all of which, tickets have been secured for us. Solid
+fact as the performance of the _functions_ remains, for us it assumes a
+forcible unreality, through the impeding intervention of black dresses
+and veils, with what should be women under them. But as these creatures
+push like battering-rams, and caper like he-goats, we shall prefer to
+adjourn the question of their humanity, and to give it the benefit of a
+doubt. We must except, however, our countrywomen from dear Boston, who
+were not seen otherwise than decently and in order. Into the
+well-remembered _palco_ we now drag the trembling neophyte, dished up
+in black in a manner altogether astonishing to herself. And we push her
+youthful head this way and that. "See, there are the cardinals; there is
+the pope; there, in white-capped row, sit the pilgrims. Now, the pope's
+mitre being removed, he proceeds with great state to wash the pilgrims'
+feet." But she, like sister Anne in the Blue Beard controversy, might
+reply, "I see only a flock of black dresses, heaped helter-skelter, the
+one above the other." Some bits of the picture she does get, certainly,
+which may thus be catalogued: "Pope's nose, black dress, ditto
+skull-cap, black dress, a touch of cardinal's back, black dress--and
+now? Bla--ck dre--ss, for the rest of the time. But what is this
+commotion?" For now the he-goats begin to jump in the most extraordinary
+way, racing out of the tribune as eagerly as they had pressed into it.
+Their haste is to see the _tavola_, or pilgrims' table, up stairs, where
+the pope and cardinals are to wait upon the twelve elect, whose
+foot-washing we have just tried to see. Silence, decency, decorum--all
+are forgotten. One in diamonds calls to a friend in the crowd outside,
+"Hollo, Hollo! Come along with us!" and at the top of her voice. If "the
+devil take the hindmost" be the moving cause of this gymnastic, I would
+humbly suggest that, on these occasions, the devil certainly seems to be
+in the foremost. With a little suppressed grumbling, we tumble out of
+the tribune, and descend to the body of the church, where the double
+line of Swiss guards detains us so long as to render our tickets for the
+_cupola_, where the pilgrims' feast takes place, nearly useless. This
+detention seems to be entirely arbitrary; for when, after endless
+entreaty, we are allowed to reach the door, an easy ingress is allowed
+us. And here, bit by bit, the neophyte puzzles out the significance of
+the scene before her--a table set with massive golden ornaments (silver
+gilt at best), the twelve white caps behind; the great church
+dignitaries handing plates of fish, vegetables, and fruit towards the
+table; the pope hidden behind some black dress or other, and a chanting
+of prayers or texts, we know not what. The whole is much like the stage
+banquet in Macbeth, the part of Banquo's ghost being played by the
+spirit of the Christian religion.
+
+And now away, away! to the door of the Sistine Chapel, where the
+_Miserere_ will be sung at six of the clock, it now being one of the
+same. So, in profane haste, we reach that door, already occupied by a
+small mob of women of the politer sort, and others. Here one maintains
+one's position till two o'clock, when the door opens, and, in shocking
+disorder, the mob enter. Those who keep the door exclaim, "Do not push
+so, ladies; there is room for all." But the savageness of the
+Anglo-Saxon race has full scope to-day, not being on its good behavior,
+as at home. So the abler-bodied jam and cram the less athletic without
+stint. After falling harmlessly on my face, I breathe freely, and obtain
+an end seat on the long benches reserved for the unreserved ladies.
+
+And here passed three weary hours before the office began, and another
+hour after that before the musical _bonne bouche_, coveted by these
+people, and little appreciated by many of them, was offered to their
+tired acceptance. The first interval was mostly employed in the
+resuscitating process of _chawing_ upon such victuals as had not proved
+contraband for such an occasion. And here were exchanged some little
+amenities which revived our sinking hopes of the race. Biscuits,
+sandwiches, and chocolate pastilles were shared. "Muffin from the Hotel
+de Russie" was offered by a face not unknown. Munching thereon with
+thankfulness, we interrogate, and find with joy a Boston woman. O
+comfort! be my friend; and when the next black rush doth come, if
+fisticuffs should become general and dangerous, be so good as to belabor
+the woman who belabors me.
+
+The office begins at five. It consists mostly of linked sameness long
+drawn out. The chapel is by this time well filled with ceremonial
+amateurs in every sort and quality. Men of all nationalities, in
+gentlemen's dress, fill the seats and throng the aisle. Priests,
+_militaires_, and even Sisters of Charity, vary the monotony of the
+strict coat and pantaloon. Upon an upright triangle, as is well known,
+are spiked the fifteen burning candles, of which all, save one, must be
+quenched before we can enjoy our dear-bought _Miserere_. Much of our
+attendant zeal is concentrated upon the progress visible in their
+decline. The effect of the chanting is as square and monotonous as would
+be the laying down of so many musical paving-stones. We tried to peep at
+the Latin text of a book of prayers in the hand of a priest on our left;
+but the pitiless Swiss guard caused him and his Breviary to move on, and
+this resource was lost. About half way through the office, a pause came
+over matters, very unwelcome to our hurry. A door on the left of the
+altar opened, and the pope entered, preceded by his guard. He walked to
+his throne on the right of the altar, and the chanting was resumed. Some
+time before this, however, the _treni_ or lamentations were sung. These
+were chanted in a high voice, neither fresh nor exact, and did not make
+on me the impression of sixteen years ago. The extinguishing of the
+candles was a slow agony, the intervals appearing endless. Finally, all
+the lights were out. The one burning taper which represented Christ was
+removed out of sight, the pope sank upon his knees before the altar, and
+the verses of the _Miserere_ were sung. Twilight and fixed attention
+prevailed through the chapel, whose vaulted roof lends a certain magic
+of its own to the weird chant. Yet, with the remembrance of sixteen
+years since, and with present judgment, I am inclined to consider the
+supremacy of the _Miserere_ a musical superstition. I know not what
+critical convictions its literal study would develop, but, as I heard
+it, much of it seemed out of tune, and deformed by other than musical
+discords. The _soprani_, without exception, were husky, and strained
+their voices to meet the highest effects. The vaulted roof, indeed,
+gives a lovely scope to such melody as there is. The dim, majestic
+frescos, which you still feel, though you see them no longer,--the
+brilliancy and variety of the company, its temporary stillness,--all
+these circumstances in this _ne plus ultra_ of the Roman aesthetic
+combine to impress you. But the kneeling pontiff and his cardinals did
+not appear to me invested with any true priesthood. I could feel no
+religious sympathy with their movements, which seemed a show, and part
+of a show--nothing more. And when the verses were all sung, and the
+shuffling of feet at the end got through with, I staid not to see the
+procession into the Pauline Chapel, nor the adoration of the relics, nor
+the mopping of St. Peter's altar. I had seen enough of such sights, and,
+quietly wrapping the twilight about my discontent, I thankfully went
+where kindred voices and a kindred faith allowed me to claim the shelter
+of home.
+
+
+
+
+SUPPER OF THE PILGRIMS.
+
+
+Faster go these shows than one can describe them. On Good Friday evening
+we attempted only to see the supper of the female pilgrims at the
+Trinita dei Pellegrini. This again I undertook for the neophytes' sake,
+having myself once witnessed the august ceremony. Here, as everywhere at
+this time, we found a crowd of black dresses, with and without veils,
+which, on this occasion, are optional. Another mob of women, small but
+energetic; another rush to see what, under other circumstances, we
+should hold to be but a sorry sight. The pilgrims are waited upon by an
+association of ladies, who wear a sort of feminine overall in scarlet
+cotton, nearly concealing a dress, usually black, of ordinary wear. They
+are also distinguished by a pictorial badge, representing, I think, the
+Easter Lamb, in some connection. Some of these ladies are of princely
+family, others of rank merely civic. Princess Massimo, of first-rate
+pretensions, keeps the inner entrance to the rites, and accords it only
+to a limited number in turn. We tumble down the dividing stairs in the
+usual indecorous manner, and walk through two rooms, in each of which
+the pilgrims sit with their feet in tubs of water, the attendant ladies
+being employed either in scrubbing them clean, or in wiping them dry.
+All were working women from the country, their faces mostly empty of
+thought and rude with toil. Some of the heads were not without
+character, and would easily have made, with their folded head-dresses, a
+_genre_ picture. In general, they and their attire were as rough and
+uninteresting as women and their belongings can be. A number of them
+carried infants, whose appearance also invited the cleansing
+ministration, which did not include them. In either room an ecclesiastic
+recited prayers in Latin, and a pretty young lady at intervals rattled a
+box, the signal for the participants to make the sign of the cross,
+which they did in a business-like manner. From this _lavanda_ we passed
+to other rooms, in which the supper tables were in process of
+preparation. The materials for the meal were divided into portions. To
+each one was allotted a plate of salad and sardines, one of _bacala_, or
+fried salt fish, two small loaves of bread, and a little pitcher of
+wine, together with figs and oranges. The red-gowned ministrants
+bestirred themselves in dividing and arranging these portions, with much
+apparent good nature. Many of them wore diamond earrings, and one young
+lady, whom we did not see at work, was adorned as to the neck with a
+rich collar of jewelled lockets, an article of the latest fashion. All
+of these ladies are supposed to be princesses, but several of them
+talked house-gossip in homely Italian. To us the time seemed long, but
+at length arrived the _minestra_ in a huge kettle. This universal
+Italian dish is a watery soup, containing a paste akin to macaroni. And
+now the pilgrims, having had all the washing they could endure, came in
+to take possession of the goods prepared for them. Those of the same
+family tried to sit together, but did not always manage to do so. For
+every babe a double portion is allowed, and the coin (ten cents)
+received at departure is also doubled. We had feared lest the pilgrims
+might have found the presence of numbers a source of embarrassment. But
+it did not prove so. They attacked their victuals with the most
+practical and evident enjoyment. The babies were fed with _minestra_,
+fish, salad, and wine. Of these one was two weeks old, and its mother
+had walked four days to get to Rome. Each pilgrim carried either a
+bottle or a tin canteen, into which the superior waiting-women decanted
+the wine allowed, that they might carry it home with them. A Latin grace
+was rehearsed before they fell to. Cardinals and _monsignori_ were seen,
+here and there, talking with friends among the spectators. Observing
+that pilgrims eat much like other people, we left them still at table,
+and came away, to find the Prince Massimo in pink cotton, at the bottom
+of the staircase, and a stupid Swiss, with ill-managed bayonet, guarding
+the outer entrance. He, a raw recruit, carried his weapon as carelessly
+as a lady waves a bouquet. Close to the eye of the neophyte he thrusts
+it, through inattention. A scream from me makes her aware of the danger,
+but affects him not. Under the weight of my objurgation he falters not,
+but makes a vehement pass at a harmless dog, which runs by unhurt. And
+my reflections upon his sheer brutishness were the closing ones of the
+day.
+
+
+
+
+EASTER.
+
+
+St. Peter's on Easter called us with the magical summons of the silver
+trumpets, blown at the elevation of the host, and remembered by me
+through these sixteen years. To the tribunes, however, I did not betake
+myself, but, armed with a camp stool, wandered about the church, getting
+now a _coup d'oeil_, now a whiff of harmony. The neophytes had our
+tickets, and beheld the ceremonies, which, once seen, are of little
+interest to those to whom they are not matters of religion. The pope and
+cardinals officiate at high mass, with the music of the Sistine singers.
+The pope drinks of the consecrated cup through a golden tube, the cup
+itself having previously been tasted of by one commissioned for the
+purpose. This feature clearly indicates the recognized possibility of
+poison. It is probably not observed by most of those present, who have,
+after all, but a glimpse of what passes. The effect of the trumpets is
+certainly magical. The public has no knowledge of their whereabouts, and
+the sound seems to fall from some higher region. Having enjoyed this
+aesthetic moment, one hurries out into the piazza in front of the church,
+where a great assemblage waits to receive the papal benediction. Here
+seats and balconies can be hired, and a wretched boy screeches, "_Ecco
+luoghi_," for half an hour, as if he had a watchman's rattle in his
+head. At last the blessed father in his palanquin is borne to that upper
+window of the church, over which the white canopy rests: his mitres are
+all arranged before him. The triple crown, glittering with jewels, is on
+his head. On either side of him flutter the peacock fans. Cannons clear
+the way for his utterance, and holding up two fingers, he recites the
+apostolic benediction in a voice of remarkable distinctness and power.
+It is received by good Catholics on their knees. Another cannon shot
+closes the performance, and at the same moment two or three papers,
+containing indulgences, fall from the pontiff's hand. Then the crowd
+disperses, and you yourself, having witnessed "the most impressive
+ceremony in the world," become chiefly occupied with the getting home,
+the crowd of carriages being very great, and the bridge of St. Angelo
+reserved for the passage of the _legni privilegiati_. And on the way,
+query as to this impressiveness. If one could suppose that the pope had
+any special blessing to bestow, or that he thought he had, one would
+certainly be desirous and grateful to share in it. If one could consider
+him as consecrated by anything better than a superstition for anything
+better than the priestly maintenance of an absolute rule, one might look
+in his kindly old face with a feeling stronger than that of personal
+good-will or indifference. But I, standing to see and hear him, was in
+the position of Macbeth.
+
+    "I had most need of blessing, but Amen
+     Stuck in my throat."
+
+And I concluded that common sense, common justice, and civil and
+religious liberty,--the noblest gifts of the past and promises of the
+future,--had been quite long enough
+
+    "Butchered to make a Roman holiday."
+
+As for the evening illumination, it was just as I remember it on two
+former occasions, separated from this and from each other by long
+intervals. A magical and unique spectacle it certainly is, with the
+well-known change from the paper lanterns to the flaring _lampions_.
+Costly is it of human labor, and perilous to human life. And when I
+remembered that those employed in it receive the sacrament beforehand,
+in order that imminent death may not find them out of a state of grace,
+I thought that its beauty did not so much signify.
+
+We have a dome, too, in Washington. The Genius of Liberty poises on its
+top; the pediment below it is adorned with the emblems of honest thrift
+and civic prosperity. May that dome perish ere it be lit at the risk of
+human life, and lit, like this, to make the social darkness around it
+more evident by its momentary aureole.
+
+
+
+
+WORKS OF ART.
+
+
+Enough of shows. Galleries and studios are better. Rome is rich in both,
+and with a sort of studious contentment, one embraces one's Murray,
+picks out the palace that unfolds its art treasures to-day, and travels
+up the stairs, and along the marble corridors, to wonderful suites of
+apartments, in which the pasteboard programmes lie about waiting for
+you, while the still drama of the pictures acts itself upon the
+thronged wall, yourself their small public, and they giving their
+color-eloquence, whether any one gives heed or not.
+
+They are precious, the Colonna, Doria, Sciarra, Borghese, and we have
+seen them. We have picked out our old favorites, and have carried the
+neophytes before them, saying, "I saw this, dear, before you were born."
+But this past, whose reflex fold inwraps us, does not exist for the
+neophytes, who look at it as out of a moment's puzzle, and then conclude
+to begin their own business on their own responsibility, without any
+reference to these outstanding credits of ours.
+
+Of the pictures it is little useful to speak. Your description enables
+no one to see them, and the narration of the feelings they excite in you
+is as likely to be tedious as interesting to those who cultivate
+feelings of their own. Copies and engravings have done here what you
+cannot do, and the best subjects are familiar to art students and lovers
+in all countries. A little sigh of pleasure may be allowed you at this,
+your third sight of the Francias, the Raphaels, Titian's Bella, Claude's
+landscapes, and the scientific Leonardo's heavily-labored heads and
+groups. But do not therefore put the trumpet to your lips, and blow that
+sigh across the ocean, to claim the attention of ears that invite the
+lesson for the day. The lesson for this day is not written on canvas,
+and though it may be read everywhere in the world, you will scarcely
+find its clearest type in Rome.
+
+And here, perhaps, I may as well carry further the philosophizing which
+I began a week ago with regard to the objects and resources of Roman
+life, and their compatibility with the thoughts and pursuits most dear
+and valuable to Americans.
+
+Art is, of course, the only solid object which an American can bring
+forward to justify a prolonged residence in Rome. Art, health, and
+official duty, are among the valid reasons which bring our countrymen
+abroad. Two of these admit of no argument. The sick have a right, other
+things permitting, to go where they can be bettered; a duty perhaps, to
+go where the sum of their waning years and wasting activities admits of
+multiplication. Those who live abroad as ministers and consuls have a
+twofold opportunity of benefiting their country. If honest and able,
+they may benefit her by their presence in foreign lands; if unworthy and
+incompetent, by their absence from home. But our artists are those whose
+expatriation gives us most to think about. They take leave of us either
+in the first bloom or in the full maturity of their powers. The ease of
+living in Southern Europe, the abundance of models and of works of art,
+the picturesque charms of nature and of scenery, detain them forever
+from us, and, save for an abstract sentiment, which itself weakens with
+every year, the sacred tie of country is severed. Its sensibilities play
+no part in these lives devoted to painting and modelling.
+
+Now, an eminent gift for art is an exceptional circumstance. He who has
+it weds his profession, leaves father and mother, and goes where his
+slowly-unfolding destiny seems to call him. Against such a course we
+have no word to say. It presents itself as a necessary conclusion to
+earnest and noble men, who love not their native country less, but their
+votive country more. Of the first and its customs they would still
+say,--
+
+    "I cannot but remember such things were
+     That were most precious to me."
+
+Yet of this career, so often coveted by those to whom its attainment
+does not open, I cannot speak in terms of supreme recognition. The
+office of art is always as precious as its true ministers are rare. But
+the relative importance of sculptural and pictorial art is not to-day
+what it was in days of less thought, of smaller culture. Every one who
+likes the Bible to-day, likes it best without illustrations. Were Christ
+here to speak anew, he would speak without parables. In ruder times,
+heavenly fancies could only be illustrated on the one hand, received on
+the other, through the mediation of a personal embodiment. Only through
+human sympathy was the assent to divine truth obtained. The necessity
+which added a feminine personality to the worship of Christ, and
+completed the divided Godhead by making it female as well as male, was a
+philosophical one, but not recognized as such. The device of the Virgin
+was its practical result, counterbalancing the partiality of the
+one-sided personal _culte_ of the Savior. Modern religious thought gets
+far beyond this, makes in spiritual things no distinction of male and
+female, and does not apply sex to the Divine, save in the most vague and
+poetic sense. The inner convictions of heart and conscience may now be
+spoken in plain prose, or sung in ringing verse. The _vates_, prophet
+or reformer, may proclaim his system and publish his belief; and his
+audience will best apprehend it in its simplest and most direct form.
+The wide spaces of the new continent allow room for the most precious
+practical experimentation; and speculative and theoretical liberty keep
+pace with liberty of action. The only absolute restraint, the best one,
+is a moral one. "Thou shalt not" applies only to what is intrinsically
+inhuman and profane. And now, there is no need to puzzle simple souls
+with a marble gospel. Faith needs not to digest whole side-walls of
+saints and madonnas, who once stood for something, no one now knows
+what. The Italian school was to art what the Greek school was to
+literature--an original creation and beginning. But life has surpassed
+Plato and Aristotle. We are forced to piece their short experiences, and
+to say to both, "You are matchless, but insufficient." And so, though
+Raphael's art remains immortal and unsurpassed, we are forced to say of
+his thought, "It is too small." No one can settle, govern, or moralize a
+country by it. It will not even suffice to reform Italy. The golden
+transfigurations hang quiet on the walls, and let pope and cardinal do
+their worst. We want a world peopled with faithful and intelligent men
+and women. The Prometheus of the present day is needed rather to animate
+statues than to make them.
+
+
+
+
+PIAZZA NAVONA--THE TOMBOLA.
+
+
+When, O, when does the bee make his honey? Not while he is sipping from
+flower to flower, levying his dainty tribute as lightly as
+love--enriching the world with what the flower does not miss, and
+cannot.
+
+This question suggests itself in the course of these busy days in Rome,
+where pleasures are offered oftener than sensibilities can ripen, and
+the edge of appetite is blunted with sweets, instead of rusting with
+disuse. In these scarce three weeks how much have we seen, how little
+recorded and described! So sweet has been the fable, that the intended
+moral has passed like an act in a dream--a thing of illusion and
+intention, not of fact. Impotent am I, indeed, to describe the riches of
+this Roman world,--its treasures, its pleasures, its flatteries, its
+lessons. Of so much that one receives, one can give again but the
+smallest shred,--a leaf of each flower, a scrap of each garment, a
+proverb for a sermon, a stave for a song. So be it; so, perhaps, is it
+best.
+
+Last Sunday I attended a Tombola at Piazza Navona--not a state lottery,
+but a private enterprise brought to issue in the most public manner. I
+know the Piazza of old. Sixteen years since I made many a pilgrimage
+thither, in search of Roman trash. I was not then past the poor
+amusement of spending money for the sake of spending it. The foolish
+things I brought home moved the laughter of my little Roman public. I
+appeared in public with some forlorn brooch or dilapidated earring; the
+giddy laughed outright, and the polite gazed quietly. My rooms were the
+refuge of all broken-down vases and halting candelabra. I lived on the
+third floor of a modest lodging, and all the wrecks of art that neither
+first, second, nor fourth would buy, found their way into my parlor, and
+staid there at my expense. I recall some of these adornments to-day. Two
+heroes, in painted wood, stood in my dark little entry. A gouty Cupid in
+bas-relief encumbered my mantel-piece. Two forlorn figures in black and
+white glass recalled the auction whose unlucky prize they had been. And
+Horace Wallace, coming to talk of art and poetry, on my red sofa,
+sometimes saluted me with a paroxysm of merriment, provoked by the sight
+of my last purchase. Those days are not now. Of their accumulations I
+retain but a fragment or two. Of their delights remain a tender memory,
+a childish wonder at my own childishness. To-day, in heathen Rome, I can
+find better amusements than those shards and rags were ever able to
+represent.
+
+Going now to Piazza Navona with a sober and reasonable companion, I
+scarcely recognize it. At the Braschi Palace, which borders it, we
+pause, and enter to observe the square hall and the fine staircase of
+polished marble. This palace is now offered in a lottery, at five francs
+the ticket; and all orders in Rome, no doubt, participate in the venture
+it presents. The immense piazza is so filled and thronged with people
+that its distinctive features are quite lost. Its numerous balconies are
+crowded with that doubtful community comprehended in the title of the
+"better class." From many of its windows hang the red cotton draperies,
+edged with gilt lace, which supply so much of the color in Roman
+_festas_. Soldiers are everywhere mingled with the crowd, so skilfully
+as to present no contrast with them, but so effectually that any popular
+disorder would be instantly suppressed. The dragoons, mounted and
+bearing sabres, are seen here and there in the streets leading to the
+piazza. These constitute the police of Rome; and where with us a civil
+man with a badge interposes himself and says, "No entrance here, sir,"
+in Rome an arbitrary, ignorant beast, mounted upon a lesser brute, waves
+his sabre at you, shrieks unintelligible threats and orders, and has the
+pleasure of bringing your common sense to a fault, and of making all
+understanding of what is or is not to be done impossible. Their greatest
+glory, however, culminates on public _festas_, when there are foreigners
+as well as Romans to be intimidated. At the Tombola they are only an _en
+cas_.
+
+Well, the office of the Tombola is solemnized upon a raised stage,
+whereon stand divers officials, two seedy trumpeters, and a small boy in
+fancy costume, whose duty soon becomes apparent. Before him rests a
+rotatory machine, composed of two disks of glass, bound together by a
+band of brass: this urn of fate revolves upon a pivot, and is provided
+with an opening, through which the papers bearing the numbers are put
+in, to be drawn out, one by one, after certain revolutions of the
+machine. Not quite so fast, however, with your drawing. The numbers are
+not all in yet. A grave man, in a black coat, holds up each number to
+the public view, calls it in his loudest tones, and then hands it to
+another, who folds and slips it into the receptacle. When all of the
+numbers have been verified and deposited, the opening is closed up, the
+trumpeters sound a bar or two, the wheel revolves, the fancy boy paws
+the air with his right hand, puts the hand into the opening, and draws
+forth a number, which the second black coat presents to the first, who
+unfolds it, and announces it to the multitude. At the same moment, a
+huge card, some two feet square in dimensions, is placed in a frame, and
+upon this we read the number just drawn out. The number is also shown
+upon several large wooden frames in other parts of the square. Upon
+these it remains, so that the whole count of the drawing may be apparent
+to the eager public. This course of action is repeated until a stir in
+one part of the piazza announces a candidate for one of the smaller
+prizes. A white flag, repeated at all the counting frames, arrests the
+public attention. The candidate brings forward his ticket and is
+examined. Finally, a _quaterna_ is announced, formed by the agreement of
+four numbers on a ticket with four in the order of the drawing. The
+crowd applaud, the trumpets sound again, and the drawing proceeds.
+Unhappily, at one moment the persons on duty forget to close the valve
+through which the numbers are taken out. The omission is not perceived
+until several rotations have shaken out many of the precious papers. A
+roar of indignation is heard from the populace; the wheel is arrested,
+the numbers eagerly sought, counted, and replaced, under the jealous
+scrutiny of the public eye. Meanwhile, one of two copious brass bands,
+provided with five ophicleides each, and cornets, etc., to match,
+discoursed tarantellas and polkas. And we see the _quinquina_ (formed by
+five numbers) drawn, and then the first Tombola, and the second. And lo!
+there are four tombolas: but we await them not. But in all this crowd,
+busy with emotion and reeking with tobacco and Roman filth in all its
+varieties, who shall interest us like the _limonaro_ with his basket of
+fruit, his bottles of water, his lemon squeezer, and his eager thrifty
+countenance? A father of family, surely, he loves no plays as thou dost,
+Anthony. Pale, in shirt sleeves, he keeps the sharpest lookout for a
+customer, and in voice whose measure is not to be given, hammers out his
+endless sentence, "_Chi vuol bere? Ecco, il limonaro._" To the most
+doubtful order he responds, carrying his glasses into the thickest of
+the throng, and thundering, "_Chi ha comandato questo limone?_" For half
+a _bajoco_ he gives a quarter of a lemon, wrung out in a glass of tepid
+water, which his customers absorb with relish. Sometimes he varies this
+procedure by the sale of an _orzata_, produced by pouring a few drops of
+a milky fluid into a glass of water. On our way from the piazza we
+encounter other _limonari_,--dark, sleepy, Italian, not trenchant nor
+incisive in their offers. But our man, a blond, yet remains a picture to
+us, with his business zeal and economy of time. A thread of good blood
+he possibly has. We adopt and pity him as a misplaced Yankee.
+
+
+
+
+SUNDAYS IN ROME.
+
+
+Our first Sunday in Rome was Easter, in St. Peter's, of which we have
+elsewhere given a sufficient description. Our second was divided between
+the Tombola just described, in the afternoon, and the quiet of the
+American Chapel in the morning. We found this an upper chamber, quietly
+and appropriately furnished, with a pleasant and well-dressed attendance
+of friends and fellow country-people. The prayers of the Episcopal
+service were simply read, with no extra formality or aping of more
+traditional forms. It was pleasant to find ourselves called upon once
+more to pray for the President of the United States, although in our own
+country he is considered as past praying for. Still, we remembered the
+old adage, "while there is life there is hope," and were able, with a
+good conscience, to beseech that he might be plenteously endowed with
+heavenly grace, although the reception of such a gift might seriously
+compromise him with his own party. The sermon, like others we have heard
+of late, shows a certain progress and liberalization even in the holding
+of the absolute tenets which constitute what has been hitherto held as
+orthodoxy. In our youth, the Episcopal church, like the orthodox
+dissenters, preached atonement, atonement, atonement, wrath of God,
+birth in sin,--position of sentimental reprobation towards the one fact,
+of unavailing repentance concerning the other. The doctrine of atonement
+in those days was as literal in the Protestant church as in the
+Catholic, while the possibility of profiting by it was hedged about and
+encumbered by frightful perils and intangible difficulties. But to-day,
+while these doctrines are not repudiated by the denominations which then
+held them, they are comparatively set out of sight. The charity and
+diligence of Paul are preached, and even the sublime theistic simplicity
+of Jesus is not altogether contraband; though he, alas! is as little
+understood in doctrine as followed in example. For he has hitherto been
+like a beautiful figure set to point out a certain way, and people at
+large have been so entranced with worshipping the figure, that they have
+neglected to follow the direction it indicates.
+
+Well, our American sermon was dry, but sensible and conscientious. It
+did not congratulate those who had accepted the mysterious atonement,
+nor threaten those who had neglected to do so. But it exhorted all men
+towards a reasonable, religious, and diligent life, and thus afforded
+the commonplace man a basis for effort, and a possible gradual
+amelioration of his moral condition. One little old-fashioned phrase,
+however, the preacher let slip. He cast a slight slur upon the moral, as
+distinguished from the religious man. Now, modern ethics do not
+recognize this distinction. For it, true morals are religion. He who
+exemplifies the standard does it more honor than he who praises, and
+pursues it not. And he who prays and plunders is less a saint than he
+who does neither. We passed this, however, and went away in peace.
+
+Our third Sunday morning was passed in _S. Andrea delta Valle_, a large
+and sumptuous church, where we had been promised a fine _messa-cantata_,
+i.e., a mass performed principally in music. Mustafa, of the pope's
+choir, was there, with some ten other vocalists, who put into their
+_Kyrie_, _Miserere_, and so on, as much operatic emphasis and cadence as
+the bars could hold. The organ was harsh, loud, and overpowering, the
+music utterly uninteresting. Mustafa's renowned voice, which has
+suffered by time and use, has something nasal and _criard_ in it, with
+all its power. He still takes and holds A and B with firmness and
+persistence, but his middle notes are unequal and husky. Although the
+sopranos of to-day are merely falsetto tenors, and their unsexed voices
+a fiction, they yet acquire in process of time a tone of old-woman
+quality, which contrasts strangely with their usually robust appearance.
+On this occasion we did not conjecture whose might be the music to which
+we listened. It had a mongrel paternity, and hailed from no noble race
+of compositions. Having, however, our comfortable chairs, and being out
+of the murderous direct reverberation of the organ, we sat and saw as
+outsiders the flux and reflux of life which passed through the church.
+It was obviously, this morning, a place of fashionable resort; and many
+were the good dresses and comfortable family groups that first appeared,
+and then were absorbed among its crowded chairs and their occupants. The
+well-dressed people were mostly, I thought, of _medio ceto_,--middling
+class,--which in Rome is a term of strict reprobation, and answers to
+what we used to call Bowery in New York. Their devotion had mostly a
+business-like aspect. They hired their chair, brought it, sat down, made
+their crosses and courtesies, accompanied the priest with their books,
+went down on their knees at the elevation of the host, had benediction,
+and went. Mass was taking place at various side altars, and people were
+coming and going, as their devotions were past or future. Dirty and
+shabby figures mingled with the others; a group of little children from
+the street, holding each other by the hand; a crippled old woman,
+hobbling on two crutches, who, wonderfully, did not beg, of us at least;
+an elderly dwarf, of composed aspect, some thirty-eight inches high, who
+took a chair, but could not get into it, so squatted down beside it, and
+stared at us. A loud bell was rung, and one in yellow satin bore an
+object under yellow satin across the church. This was the sacrament,
+going to one of the altars for the beginning of the mass. Having mused
+sufficiently on the music and on the crowd, we desired to hear a Puritan
+sermon, and, there being none to be had, we went away.
+
+Away to the Farnesina Palace, lovely with Raphael's frescos of Galatea
+and the story of Psyche, with Michael Angelo's grim charcoal head
+looming in the distance. The Psyche series has suffered much by
+restorations; and though the gracious outline and designs remain, the
+coloring, one thinks, is far other than that of the master. The Galatea
+has faded less, and has been less restored. The lovely Sodoma fresco up
+stairs--the family of Darius--was undergoing repairs, and could not be
+seen. The palace belongs to the ex-king of Naples. It was formerly
+visible at all times, but may now be seen only on Sunday. He himself now
+lives in Rome, and perhaps chooses to tread its banquet halls deserted,
+which possibly accounts for the present restriction. In the afternoon we
+were bidden to see the embalmed remains of an ancient pontiff,--Pius
+V.,--who should be happy to make himself useful to Catholic institutions
+at a period so remote from the intentions of Nature. The old body is
+shown in a glass case, upon an altar of Santa Maria Maggiore. He lies on
+his side, his darkened face adorned by a new white beard composed of
+lamb's wool. His hands are concealed by muslin gloves; his garments are
+white, and he wears a brilliant mitre. And the devout crowd the church
+to touch and kiss the glass case in which he resides. There is,
+moreover, a procession of the crucifix, and vespers are sung in pleasing
+style by a tolerable choir; and many _pauls_ and _bajocs_ are dropped
+hither and thither in pious receptacles by the pious in heart. So, I
+repeat it, the mummied pope, sainted also, is of use.
+
+
+
+
+CATACOMBS.
+
+
+Of all that befell us in the catacombs we may not tell. We betook
+ourselves to the neighborhood of St. Calixtus one afternoon. A noted
+ecclesiastic of the Romish church soon joined our party, with various of
+our countrymen and countrywomen. He wore a white woollen gown and a
+black hat. Before descending, he ranged us in a circle, and harangued us
+much as follows:--
+
+"You will ask me the meaning of the word 'catacomb,' and I shall tell
+you that it is derived from two Greek words--_cata_, hidden, and
+_cumba_, tomb. You have doubtless heard that the whole city of Rome is
+undermined with catacombs; but this is not true. The American
+Encyclopaedia says this. I have read the article. But intramural burials
+were not allowed in Rome; therefore the catacombs commence outside the
+walls. They are, moreover, limited to an irregular extent of some three
+miles. Why is this? It is because they were possible only in the tufa
+formation. Why only in the tufa? Because it cuts easily and crumbles
+easily, hardening afterwards. And as the burials of the Christians were
+necessarily concealed, it was important for them to deal with a material
+easily worked and easily disposed of. The solid contents of the
+catacombs of Rome could be included within a square mile; their series,
+if arranged at full length, would not measure less than five hundred
+miles. In some places there are no less than seven strata of tombs, one
+below the other." All of this, with more repetitions than I can possibly
+signify, was delivered under the cogent stimulus of a roasting afternoon
+sun of the full Roman power. Being quite calcined as to the head and
+shoulders, we somewhat thankfully undertook the descent. The extreme
+contrast, however, between the outer heat and the inner chill and damp,
+proved an unwelcome alternative to most of us. Had we been allowed a
+somewhat brisk motion, we should have dreaded less its effects. But
+Father ---- fought his ground inch by inch, and continued to carry on a
+stringent controversy with imaginary antagonists. We will not endeavor
+to transcribe the catechism, at once tedious and amusing, with which he
+held captive a dozen of Yankees prepared to sell their lives dearly, but
+uncertain how to deal with his mode of warfare. He kept us long in the
+crypt of the pontiffs, where are found two fragments of marble tablets
+bearing names in mingled Latin and Greek character. One inscription
+records, "_Anteros episcopus_." The other is of another
+name--"_episcopus et martyr_." The father now led us into a narrow
+crypt, where his stout form wedged us all as closely as possible
+together. He showed us on the walls two time-worn frescos, one of
+which--Jonah and the whale--represented the resurrection, while the
+other depicted that farewell banquet at Emmaus in which Peter received
+the thrice-repeated charge, "Feed my sheep." To this symbolical
+expression the father added one later and more puzzling. The fish which
+appeared in one of the dishes represented, he told us, the anagram of
+Christ in the Greek language--_icthus_, the fish, _Jesus Christos
+theos_--I forget the rest. The fish was the only hint of the presence of
+Christ on this occasion, and its significance could be apprehended only
+with this explanation. These pictures, he insisted, sufficiently showed
+us that the early Christians had religious images--a point of great
+authority and significance in the Catholic church, for us how easily
+disposed of! The pictures and the symbolism of the primitive church are
+both alike features of its time. In periods when culture is rare and
+limited, the picture and the parable have their indispensable office.
+The one preserves and presents to the eye much that would otherwise be
+overlooked and forgotten; the other presents to the mind that which
+could not otherwise be apprehended. The painted Christs, Madonnas, and
+so on, were in their time a gospel to the common people. Even in
+Raphael's period, even in the Italy of to-day, how few of the populace
+at large are able to save their souls by reading the New Testament! The
+paintings undoubtedly answered a useful purpose, as all men must
+acknowledge; but the Catholic system, carried out in its completeness,
+would give a melancholy perpetuity to the class of people who cannot
+read otherwise than in pictures. Even where it teaches to read, it
+withholds the power of interpretation. Protestantism means direct and
+general instruction. It gives to the symbolism of the Bible its plainest
+and most practical interpretation, without building upon it a labyrinth
+of types whose threading asks the study of a lifetime.
+
+The fear and danger of early times had, no doubt, much to do with the
+growth of symbolism, both in pictures and in language. The intercourse
+of the early Christians was limited and insecure. It was guarded by
+watchwords. Its bodily presence took refuge in pits and caves. Its
+thought buried itself in similitudes and allusions. But now, when
+Christianity has become the paramount demand of the world, this
+obscurity is no longer needed nor legitimate.
+
+The parables of Christ may be supposed to have had a double object. The
+most usually recognized is that of popular instruction, in the form best
+suited to the comprehension of his hearers. Many of his sayings,
+however, point to another meaning; viz., the discrimination between
+those who were fitted to receive his doctrine, and those who were not.
+How many, among the multitudes who heard him, can we suppose to have
+been anxious about the moral lessons intended by his illustrious fables?
+Few indeed; and those few alone would be able to understand his
+teaching, and, in turn, to teach according to his method. So he
+represents the kingdom of heaven which he preached as a net thrown into
+the sea. His sermons were such castings of the net; he made his
+disciples fishers of men. The Christian church, like the Jewish, rapidly
+degenerated into a tissue of legends and observances--at first
+representative of morality, soon cumbrous, finally inimical to it.
+
+All this time, however, we are standing wedged by Father ---- in a narrow
+compass, and, while the thought of one undertakes this long, swift
+retrospect, the temper of the others becomes irritated--not without
+reason. So we insist upon breaking out of the small quadrangle, and are
+led into the crypt in which were found the remains of St. Cecilia. Here
+tradition again holds a long parley with the representatives of modern
+thought. St. Cecilia, a noble Roman lady, was beheaded, but survived the
+stroke of the executioner three days, which she occupied in describing
+and explaining the doctrine of the trinity. (This, therefore, is the
+doctrine of those who have lost their head.) For this purpose she
+employed two fingers of the right hand and one of the left. All of this
+passes without controversy. Her body was found lying on its face, in an
+attitude perpetuated by the well-known statue in the church in
+Trastevere. But in this crypt are the relics of an altar, erected over
+the remains of another saint. The early Christian altars, our guide
+says, were always erected above the burial-place of some saint. Hence,
+no Catholic church is allowed to dispense with the presence of
+consecrated bones. Other graves, moreover, cluster around that which is
+supposed to have consecrated this altar: sums of money were paid for the
+privilege of interment in this proximity. This clearly shows the early
+Christians to have supposed that the saint himself had the power to
+benefit them, and the right of intercession. This we concede as quite
+possible; but does this go to show, O father, that the saint _had_ any
+such power? Let us go back after this fashion in other things. Fingers
+were made before knives and forks, skins were worn before tissues, and
+nakedness is of earlier authority than either. A predatory existence has
+older precedent than agriculture or commerce. Let us go backward like a
+crab, if you will, but let us be consistent.
+
+In another crypt we are shown two marble sarcophagi, well carved, in
+each of which lies a mouldering human figure once embalmed, and now
+black, without features, and with only a dim outline of form. Elsewhere
+we are shown a large marble slab handsomely engraved, with the record of
+a Christian martyr on one side, and with an inscription concerning the
+Emperor Hadrian on the other, presenting the economic expedient of a
+second-hand tombstone. We passed also through various dark galleries,
+and down one staircase. Some chambers of the catacomb had a
+_luminarium_, or light from the top; many of them were entirely dark.
+Father ----'s style of explanation threatening to prolong itself till
+midnight, impatience became general, and one of our party ventured a
+remonstrance, which was made and met something after the following
+fashion:--
+
+_Mr. F._ Hem--hem! Sir, I am old and infirm, and--
+
+_Father ----._ O, sir, ask any questions you like. The more you ask, the
+better I can explain myself. (Repeated over some three times.)
+
+_Mr. F._ But, sir, I do not wish to ask any questions. I only wish--
+
+_Father ----._ Don't make any excuses, sir. I shall be very glad to have
+you ask any questions. I am very ready to answer and explain everything.
+(Several repetitions.)
+
+After a number of efforts, the senior member of the party at length
+obtained the floor, and succeeded in expressing himself to the effect
+that he feared to take death of cold in the catacomb, and would gladly
+be piloted out by the commonplace youth who followed Father ---- as
+attendant, without views of any kind, except as to a possible _buona
+mano_. This suggestion of the elder met with so hearty a response from
+the remainder of the party as to bring the present exploration to an
+end, and Father ---- and his public simultaneously dispersed to carriages
+and horses. In view of the whole expedition, I would advise people in
+general to read up on the subject of the catacombs, but not to visit
+them in company with one intent on developing theories of any kind. The
+underground chill is unwholesome in warm weather, and a conversion made
+in these dark galleries and windings would be much akin to baptism at
+the sword's point. Meet, therefore, the theorist above ground, and on
+equal terms; and for the subterraneous proceeding, elect the society of
+swift and prosaic silence.
+
+
+
+
+VIA APPIA AND THE COLUMBARIA.
+
+
+Since my last visit to Rome, more progress has been made under ground
+than above it. Rome is the true antipodes of America. Our business is to
+build--her business is to excavate. The tombs on Via Appia are among the
+interesting objects which the spade and mattock, during the last
+seventeen years, have brought to view. I remember well the beginning of
+this work, and the marble tombs and sarcophagi which it brought to
+light. I also remember, in those unconscientious days, a marble head, in
+exceedingly flat relief, which was desired by me, and stolen for me by
+the faithful servant of a friend. At the commencement of the diggings,
+we descended from our carriage, and easily walked to the end of the way
+then opened. Via Appia now affords a long drive, set with tombs on
+either side. Many of these are in brick, and of large dimensions. Most
+of the marbles have, however, been removed to the Museum of the Vatican.
+
+On this road, if I mistake not, are the two _columbaria_ discovered and
+excavated some seven years ago. They stand in a vineyard, which I saw in
+its spring bloom. The proprietor, a civil man, answers the little bell
+at the gate, and taking down a bunch of keys, unlocks for you the door
+of the small building erected over the vault. The original roof has
+fallen. All else looks as if it might have been used the day before for
+burial. The descent is by a steep, narrow stairway, of at least thirty
+steps, each of which is paved with a single lamina of coarse brick. The
+walls are honeycombed with small parallelogrammatic niches, in each of
+which was set a funeral vase or box. Over some of these places are such
+inscriptions as, "_Non tangite vestes mortales_," "_Vencrare deos
+manes_." There are many names, of which I have preserved but one,
+"_Castus Germanicus Caesaris_." This _columbarium_ belonged to the
+Flavian family. It has about it an indescribable gloom, like that of a
+family vault in our own time, but, it must be confessed, more aesthetic.
+One felt the bitter partings that death had made here, the tears, the
+unavailing desire to heap all the remaining goods of life upon the altar
+of departed friendship. Time healed these wounds then, no doubt, as he
+does to-day. The tears were dried, the goods enjoyed again; but, while
+Christianity has certainly lightened the dead weight of such sorrows,
+the anguish of the first blow remains what it was all those dim
+centuries ago. A glance into the _columbarium_ makes you feel this.
+
+The second _columbarium_ is much like the first, excepting that the
+stair is not so well preserved. On emerging, the proprietor invited us
+to visit an upper room in his own house, in which were a number of
+objects, taken, he averred, from the two _columbaria_. These were mostly
+vases, tear-bottles, and engraved gems. But I doubted their genuineness
+too much to make any purchases from among them. The trade in antiquities
+is too cheap and easy a thing in Italy to allow faith in unattested
+relics.
+
+Not very far beyond the _columbaria_ stand the catacombs of the ancient
+Hebrews, much resembling in general arrangement those of the Christians.
+We found in several places the image of the seven-branched candlestick
+impressed upon the tufa. In one of the rooms were some remains of
+fresco. At each of its corners was painted a date-palm with its fruit.
+In two other rooms the frescos were in good preservation. Some of the
+graves were sunk in the earth, the head and feet at right angles with
+the others. We were shown the graves of two masters of synagogues. The
+frescos are not unlike those in the Christian and pagan tombs, though as
+I remember them, the Christian paintings are the rudest of all, as
+respects artistic merit.
+
+The subjects were usually genii, peacocks, the cock, fruits, garlands,
+the latter sometimes painted from end to end of the wall. Some of the
+small tombs were still sealed with a marble slab. An entire skeleton was
+here shown us, and a number of sarcophagi. Of these, one was sunk into
+the ground, and several graves were grouped around it, much after the
+fashion of those in the Christian catacombs, from which Dr. Smith
+inferred so largely, both concerning the sanctity of the saint's body
+and the post-mortem power of the saint.
+
+We were taken also to see some interesting tombs in the Via Latina.
+These were recently brought to light from their long concealment in a
+tract of the Campagna, belonging to the Barberini family. Descending a
+flight of stone steps, the custode admitted us into two fine vaulted
+chambers, decorated each after its own manner. The ceiling of the first
+was adorned with miniature bas-reliefs in stucco. The small figures,
+beautifully modelled, were enclosed in alternate squares and octagons.
+The designs were exhibitions of genii, griffins, and of centaurs,
+bearing female figures on their backs. The sculptured sarcophagi found
+in this tomb were removed to the Lateran Museum.
+
+In the second tomb the walls and ceilings were adorned with miniature
+frescos, also enclosed in small compartments. Many of these represented
+landscapes, sometimes including a water view, with boats. These were
+rather faint in style, but very good. Peacocks, also, were frequent; and
+in one compartment was painted a glass dessert vase, with the fruit
+showing through its transparency. This design amazed us, both as to its
+subject and execution. Some panels in this tomb bore stucco reliefs on
+grounds of brilliant red and blue. In its centre was found hanging a
+fine bronze lamp, which is now at the Barberini Palace. A large
+sarcophagus of stone still remains here, nearly entire, with a pointed
+lid. On looking through a small break in one side of it, we perceived
+two skeletons, lying side by side, supposed, the custode told us, to
+have been husband and wife. These tombs certainly belong to a period
+other than that of the _columbaria_ before described. The presence of
+sarcophagi, and of these skeletons, attests the burial of the dead in
+accordance with the usage of modern society, while the great elegance
+and finish of the ornamentation point to a time of wealth and luxury. I
+have heard no conjecture as to the original proprietorship of these
+tombs. They contain no military or civil emblems, and probably belonged
+to wealthy contractors or merchants. That day, no doubt, had its shoddy,
+and of the tricks practised upon the government one may read some
+account in Titus Livy, who, to be sure, wrote of an earlier time, but
+not a more vicious one.
+
+Rome now boasts an archaeological society, not indeed of Romans, but
+composed of foreign residents, mostly of British origin. The well-known
+artist Shakspear Wood is one of its most energetic members. At his
+invitation I attended a lecture given by Mr. Charles Hemans, on the
+subject of the ancient churches and mosaics of the city. Complementary
+to this lecture was an expedition of the society to several of these
+churches, which I very gladly joined. Our first and principal object of
+interest was the old Church of San Clementi, a building dating from the
+eleventh or twelfth century. Here Mr. Hemans first led us to observe an
+ancient fresco in the apsis, which represents the twelve apostles in the
+guise of twelve lambs, a thirteenth lamb, in the middle of the row, and
+crowned with a nimbus, representing Christ. Here we saw also an ancient
+marble chair, a marble altar screen, and a pavement in the ribbon
+mosaic, of which archaeologues have so much to say. This mosaic is so
+named from the strips of colored stones which form its various patterns
+on the white marble of the pavement.
+
+The church itself, however, occupied us but briefly. Beneath the church
+has recently been discovered and excavated a very extensive basilica, of
+a date far more ancient. This crypt was now lighted for us. Its original
+proportions are marred by walls of masonry built between its long rows
+of columns, and essential to the support of the church above. These
+walls are adorned by curious paintings of saints, popes, martyrs, and
+miracles. Among them is a very rude crucifixion; also a picture of
+Christ giving benediction after the fashion of the Greek church, and of
+a pontiff in the same act. Upon these things Mr. Hemans made many
+interesting comments. From the crypt we descended yet farther into a
+house supposed to date back at least to the empire, if not to the
+republic. It is a small but heavily-built enclosure, of two chambers,
+and contains a curious bas-relief in marble, representing a pagan
+sacrifice. In the narrow descent that led to it Mr. Wood showed me in
+three consecutive strata the tufa of the time of the kingdom, travertine
+of the republic, and brick of the empire.
+
+The presence of the ancient basilica below the ancient church was
+suggested to one of the priests of the latter by the presence of a
+capital, rising just above the pavement of the church, and not accounted
+for by any circumstance in its architecture. This capital belonged to
+one of the columns of the basilica; but before so much could be
+ascertained, a long and laborious series of excavations had to be
+instituted. Father ----, the priest who first conjectured of the presence
+of this under building, has been indefatigable in following up the hint
+given by the capital, which he alone, in a succession of centuries, was
+clever enough to interpret. Most of the expense of this work has been
+borne by him.
+
+From San Clementi the worshipful society went to the church of Santi
+Quattro. The object of interest here was a small chapel filled with
+curious old frescos, one series of which represents the conversion of
+Constantine. We see first depicted a dream, in which Sts. Peter and Paul
+appear to Constantine, warning him to desist from the murder of innocent
+children, whose blood was supposed to be a cure for his leprosy. Not
+disobedient to the heavenly vision, Constantine relinquishes the
+blood-bath, and releases the children. He sends for St. Sylvester, the
+happy possessor of an authentic portrait of the two apostles. The fresco
+shows us Sylvester responding to this summons, and bringing in his hand
+the portrait, which the emperor immediately recognizes. Farther on we
+see Sylvester riding in papal triumph, the emperor leading his
+palfrey--a haughty device for those days. Another fresco records the
+finding of the true cross by St. Helena. Coming at one time upon the
+three crosses she applied each of them in succession to the body of a
+dying person, who was healed at once by the contact of the true one.
+
+The archaeological society also explores the interesting neighborhoods of
+Rome, the villas of emperors, statesmen, and poets. Thus life springs
+out from decay, and the crumbling relics of the past incite new
+activities in minds that cling, like the ivy, about relics and ruins.
+This society, ancient as are the facts about which it occupies itself,
+seemed to me one of the most modern features of Rome, especially as it
+travels by rail, and carries its luncheon with it. I was not fortunate
+enough to join its visits to the environs of the Eternal City, but I
+wish that on one of its excursions it would take with it the oldest
+nuisance of modern society, and forget to bring it back. There is room
+enough outside of Rome for that which, shut within its walls, crowds out
+every new impulse of life and progress. No harm to the old man; no
+violence to his representative immunity; only let him remember that the
+world has room for him, and that Rome has not.
+
+
+
+
+NAPLES--THE JOURNEY.
+
+
+From these brief, sombre notes of Rome, we slide at once to Naples and
+her brilliant surroundings. Here, taking the seven colors as the
+equivalents of the seven notes, we are at the upper end of the octave of
+color. Rome is painted in purple, gold, olive, and bistre--its shadows
+all in the latter pigment. Naples is clear red, white, and yellow.
+Orange tawny is its deepest shade. The sounds of Rome awaken memories
+of devotion. They call to prayer, although the forms now be empty, and
+the religious spirit resident elsewhere. The voice of Naples trills,
+shrieks, scolds, mingling laughter, wail, and entreaty, in a new and
+confused symphony. Little piano-fortes, played like a barrel organ, go
+about the streets, giving a pulse to the quick rhythm of life. The
+common people are pictures, the aristocracy caricatures. When you rise
+above low life, Italian taste is too splendid for good effects in
+costume. The most ill-married colors, the most ill-assorted ornaments,
+deform the pale olive faces, and contradict the dignity of the dark eyes
+and massive hair. This is somewhat the case in Rome, much more in
+Naples. The continual _crescendo_ of glare, as you go southward, points
+to the African crisis of orange and crimson, after which the negro
+nakedness presents an enforced pause, saying, "I can no more."
+
+This land is the antipodes of the Puritan country. There all is
+concentration, inward energy, interior. Here all is external glow and
+glitter. If there be any interior, it can only belong to one of these
+three--passion, superstition, avarice. Every one who deals with you
+speculates upon your credulity. "Will you give four times the value of a
+thing, or five, or only twice?" is the question which the seller's eyes
+put to the buyer, however the tongue of the one may respond to that of
+the other. And here is a sad deforming of the Scripture parable; and he
+who has five in value gets ten in money for it, he who has three gets
+six, while the one talent, honesty,--the fundamental gift of God to
+man,--is indeed ignominiously buried in a dirty napkin, and laid nobody
+knows where. And while New England energy is a hundred-armed giant that
+labors, Italian sloth is a hundred-handed lazzaro that begs. If this is
+the result of the loveliest climate, the most brilliant nature, give me
+our snow and ice, ay, the east wind and all.
+
+The journey from Rome to Naples at this season is hot, oppressive.
+Railway carriages, even as administered in Europe, make you acquainted
+with strange way-fellows. We chance upon a Neapolitan prince, with an
+English wife, returning to his own country and possessions after an
+absence of six years, the time elapsed since the inauguration of the new
+rule. He obviously regrets the changes over which the rest of the
+civilized world rejoices. In person, however, he and his partner are
+simple and courteous. Our car confines also a female nondescript
+carrying a dog, herself quite decently got up, but with an extraordinary
+smile, that is either lunatic or wicked, we cannot determine which. A
+certain steadiness and self-possession incline us to the latter theory,
+but we hold it subject to correction at a later day. She is obviously of
+Irish or low English extraction, and may be anything, from a discarded
+lady's maid to a reigning mistress. As we approach Naples, our princely
+friend begins to take notice. Here is Caserta, here its battle-field,
+where poor Francesco would certainly have had the victory, had not the
+French and Piedmontese interfered. "_Oh Richard, oh mon Roi!_" But we
+remember another saying: "And I tell you, if these had held their peace,
+the very stones would have cried out." Ay, those very stones, volcanic
+lava and tufa, worn by the chariot wheels of the wicked, from Tiberius
+to Napoleon and after, would have sobbed, "Let the feet of the messenger
+of peace, the beautiful feet, at last pass this way!" Arrived at the
+station, no warning can have taught you what to expect. It costs you
+forty cents to have your moderate effects transported from the cars to
+the omnibus of the hotel,--this not through any system, but because
+various people meddle with them, and shriek after you for recompense. At
+the Hotel de Rome, you are shown up many stairs into a dingy little
+room, a sort of spider's web. This will not do. You try the Hotel de
+Russie, opposite. Here you are forced to take an apartment much too fine
+for your means and intentions. The choice being this or none, you shut
+your eyes upon consequences, and blindly issue orders for tea and meats.
+To-morrow you will surely get a cheaper apartment. But to-morrow you do
+not.
+
+The hotel book looks discouraging. Names of your countrymen are in it,
+not of your friends. Better remain apart than run the risk of ungenial
+society, and enforced fellowship. But the dull waters soon break into
+the sparkle of special providences. A bright little Briton, with a mild
+husband, hospitably makes your acquaintance. She is from Ireland, and
+has not the "thorough-bred British stare." All the more of a lady do we
+deem and find her. To her pleasant company is soon added that of an
+American of the sincere kind. He accepts us without fear or condition,
+and while we remain under the same roof with him, we have no cause to
+complain for want of sympathy or of countenance.
+
+
+
+
+THE MUSEUM.
+
+
+In the Museum we spend two laborious days. The first we give to the
+world-renowned marbles, finding again with delight our favorites of
+twenty years' standing. Prominent among these are the Amore Delfino, and
+the Faun bearing the infant Bacchus.
+
+The Farnese Bull and the Farnese Hercules are admirable for their
+execution, but their subject has no special interest for us. We observe
+the Atlas, the Athletes, and the Venuses, one of whom is world-famous,
+but inexcusable. Here, too, is the quadriform relic of the Psyche, well
+known by copies, and the whole Balbo family on horseback. These marble
+knights once guarded the Forum of Pompeii. There is a certain melancholy
+in their present aspect, whether of fact or imagination we will not
+determine. One of the most interesting objects, from the vicissitudes
+through which it has passed, is the statue of Caligula, destroyed by the
+people with all other mementos of him after his death, the head having
+served, even in modern times, to steady the wheels of carriages in a
+ferry boat. The Naples Museum does not rival the Vatican in the merit of
+its nude marbles; but in draped statues it is far richer, as well as in
+statues of personal historical interest. The belief of the past has the
+most stately illustration in Rome, its life the most vivid record in
+Naples.
+
+Many new treasures have been added to the collection during these years
+of our absence. Among them are some exquisite small bronzes, and three
+statuettes in marble, of which the eyes are colored blue, and the hair
+of a reddish tint. One of them is very pretty. It represents the seated
+figure of a little boy, and almost reconciles us to the strictly
+inadmissible invasion of color into the abstract domain of sculpture.
+Each art has, indeed, its abstraction. Sculpture dispenses with color,
+painting with the materiality of form. The one is to the other as
+philosophy to poetry.
+
+From the marbles we flit to the Pompeian bronzes and mosaics, rich in
+number and in interest. Two tablets in mosaic especially detain us, from
+their representation of theatrical subjects. One of these shows the
+manager surrounded by several of his actors, to whom he dispenses the
+various implements of their art. At his feet, in a basket, lie the comic
+and tragic masks. Of the personages around him, one is pulling on his
+garment, another is trying the double tubes of a wind instrument. The
+second mosaic presents a group of three closely-draped figures. Actor is
+written on their faces, though we know not the scene they enact. The
+bronzes are numerous and admirable. Miniature art seems to have been
+held in great esteem among the Pompeians. Most of these figures are of
+small size, and suggest a florid and detailed style of adornment. Among
+other objects, we are shown the semicircular model of a Pompeian bath,
+on which are arranged the ornaments and water-fixtures just as they were
+found. One of these imitates a rampant lion standing on his hind legs,
+and delivering water from his mouth; another a serpent nearly upright.
+In the upper story of the Museum we see whole rooms floored with mosaic
+pavements removed entire from houses in Pompeii. The patterns are mostly
+in black and white, but of an endless variety. The contents of these
+rooms match well in interest with their pavements. Here, in glass cases,
+are carefully ranged and presented the tools and implements of Pompeian
+life; the loaves that never left the baker's shop, still fresh and puffy
+in outline, although calcined in substance; the jewels and silver
+vessels of the wealthy, the painter's colors, the workman's needles and
+thread: baths and braziers, armor in bronze and in iron, scarcely more
+barbaric than that of the middle ages; helmets, with clumsy metal
+network guarding the spaces for the eyes; spades, cooking utensils in
+great variety, fruits and provisions as various. Among the bronze
+utensils is a pretty and economical arrangement which furnishes at once
+hot water, a fire of coals to heat the room, with the convenience of
+performing at the same time the solemn rites of cookery. Hot water, both
+for bathing and drinking, seems to have been a great desideratum with
+the Pompeians. The stone cameos and engraved gems are shown in rows
+under glass cases. This Museum contains a well-known tazza, or flat cup,
+of onyx entire, elaborately carved in cameo on either side. It also
+possesses a vase of double glass, of which the outer or white layer has
+been cut, like a cameo, into the most delicate and elaborate designs.
+The latter is an object of unique interest and value, as is shown by
+the magnificence with which it has been mounted on a base of solid
+silver, the whole being placed under glass.
+
+The Cumaean collection is less rich in objects of interest than the
+Pompeian. Its treasures are mostly Etruscan. It possesses many vases,
+Etruscan and Greek, many rude Etruscan sculptures, with household
+articles of various descriptions. It occupies a separate set of rooms,
+and is the gift of the Prince of Carignano.
+
+Among the Pompeian remains we forgot to mention a mosaic tablet
+representing a cock-fight. One cock already bleeds and droops; above him
+the figure of his genius turns desponding away. The genius of the
+victorious cock, on the contrary, bears a crown and palm. The design is
+worthy of the Island of Cuba at the present day.
+
+The frescos brought and transferred from Pompeii are beautiful and
+interesting. One of them shows thirteen dancing figures, all of which
+are frequently copied. Many inscriptions in marble are also preserved,
+but to decipher them would ask much time. We were interested in a small
+painted model of a Pompeian dwelling, called the House of the Poet. It
+shows the quadriform arrangement of the dark chambers around the open
+courts, of which one is the _atrium_, one the _peristylium_. The
+window-panes of the house of Diomed are shown,--not of glass, but talc,
+and only translucent. Windows, however, were rare in Pompeii. Perhaps
+the most pathetic relic that we observe is the skull of the sentinel in
+his helmet, as it was found.
+
+We have here given only the most hurried and imperfect indication of the
+mines of wealth which this institution offers to the student of art and
+of history. A detailed account of its contents will be found in the
+valuable but prosaic Murray, and would here be superfluous. Its
+guardians, the custodi, are civil, and are not allowed to ask or receive
+any compensation from visitors. Several of them, nevertheless, manage to
+suggest that they would be glad to wait on you at your hotel, with
+books, objects of antiquity, and other small merchandise, which you
+hurriedly decline. You will be fortunate to get out of Naples in any
+state short of utter bankruptcy. How you are ever to get home to
+America, with temptations and expenses multiplying so frightfully upon
+you, sometimes threatens to become a serious question.
+
+
+
+
+NAPLES--EXCURSIONS.
+
+
+You have been two days in Naples, the hotel expenses and temptations of
+the street eating into your little capital. For value received your
+intellects have nothing to show. Your eyes and ears have been full, your
+brain passive and empty. You rouse yourself, and determine upon an
+investment. To learn something, you must spend something. These
+cherished napoleons must decrease, and you must, if possible, increase.
+
+The first attempt is scarcely a success. Having heard marvels of the
+conventual church of San Martino, formerly belonging to the Cistercian
+brotherhood, you consult the porter of the hotel, and engage, for seven
+francs, a carriage to transport you thither. The drive is one immense
+climb under the heat of the afternoon sun. When you have gained the
+difficult ascent, your driver coolly informs you that the church is
+always closed at four P. M., the present time being 5.30. "Why did you
+not tell me so?" is the natural but useless question. "Because I could
+not in that case have got seven francs from you," would be the real
+answer. The driver shrugs his shoulders, and expects a scolding, which
+you are too indignant to give.
+
+But you are not to be defeated in this way. A second expedition is
+planned and executed. To the gates of Pompeii you fly, partly by steam,
+and partly by horse-aid. You alight from your cloud of dust, demand a
+guide. "Yes; you can have the guide by paying also for the litter. This
+being Sunday, the entrance is free, and the government supplies no
+guide. You must have the _portantina_, or blunder about alone." The
+litter, with its pink gingham frill and cushion, looks hateful to you.
+You remember it twenty-three years ago with dislike. The sun of noon is
+hot upon you. The men are unpersuadable. Red and fierce as lava, you
+storm through the deserted streets of the ancient capital of seaside
+luxury. Like the lava, you soon cool, as to your temper--the rest of you
+continuing at 120 Fahrenheit. There are two of your party: one finds the
+litter convenient; the other also gives way, and you ride and tie, as
+the saying is, in very amicable style, and encourage the guide to tell
+you all he knows; but he, alas! has cropped but the very top of the
+clover. The fragments of history which he is able to give you, measure
+only his own ignorance and yours.
+
+"Here is the Forum in which the Balbo statues were found. At the upper
+end were the court and seat of justice,--for a figure was found there
+bearing a balance; underneath were the prisons." Ah, the broken columns!
+Stately did they stand around the mounted statues, that expected to ride
+into perpetual fame on their marble horses--now most famous because so
+long forgotten. "Wherever four streets met, madam, stood a fountain. The
+Exchange stood also in the Forum. Here is the street of abundance, in
+which was found a marble bust bearing a horn of plenty. Here is the
+Temple of Isis. By this secret staircase the priest ascended and stood
+unseen behind the goddess, making the sounds which she was supposed to
+utter. Here was the bakery; behold the ovens. This was found filled with
+newly baked loaves. [Yes; for I myself beheld them in the Museum at
+Naples.] Ah, madam! the baths, with hot water and cold, and vapor. In
+those niches running around the wall were placed the vases with
+unguents. Here is the House of the Poet; here that of the Faun. See the
+frescos. What forms! what colors! Here is a newly excavated house, large
+and richly appointed. Each of these marble columns surrounding the inner
+court contains a leaden water-pipe with a faucet, so that from all at
+once water might flow to cool the extreme heats of summer. Here still
+stand two fine dragons carved in white marble, which must formerly have
+supported a marble slab. See what a garden this house had! What a
+fish-pond! Climb this stair, madam, if you would see the theatre. This
+larger one was for day performances. Yonder was the stage. There are
+still the grooves for the scenes to slide in. There was the orchestra
+[mostly flutes and fiddles]. Here sat the nobles, here the citizens,
+here the plebeians. From this eminence you can look over into the
+smaller theatre close at hand, in which night performances were given."
+And the stately dames, with those jewels which you saw stored at the
+Museo, and dressed and undressed like the frescos we have seen to-day,
+sat on their cushioned benches, and wafted their perfumes far and wide.
+
+Here was the house of Diomed, rich and very extensive. The skeleton of
+Diomed (as is supposed) was found at the garden gate, with the key of
+the house and a purse of money. In one of the subterranean rooms is
+shown the impression of his wife's figure, merely a darker mark on a
+dark wall. Seventeen similar impressions were found. I think it is in
+this house that the walls of one of the rooms have an under-coating of
+lead to keep the moisture from the frescos, which are still brilliant.
+The _luxe_ of fountains was, as is known, great and universal in
+Pompeii, and the arrangement of its leaden conduits is ample and
+skilful. Besides the well-known frescos, with their airy figures and
+brilliant coloring, we are shown a bath, whose vaulted roof is adorned
+with stucco reliefs, arranged in small medallions, octagons alternating
+with squares.
+
+Presently we come to the street of tombs. Among these I best remember
+that which bears the inscription, "_Diomede, sibi suis_." At the upper
+end of this street we find a semicircular seat of stone, for the
+accommodation of the guard. Close by this was found the skeleton of the
+sentinel in armor which we saw in the Museum at Naples. In the prison
+were found the iron stocks, with at least one skeleton in them; others
+chained in divers ways. A feature new to me is that of various
+diminutive temples, with roofs roundly or sharply arched, devoted to the
+household gods. These usually stand upon an elevated projection, and
+might measure three feet in height and four in depth. The guide pointed
+out to us some small, square windows, which are simply open squares in
+the masonry, defended by iron gratings, deeply rusted. They are not
+numerous. Our guide suggests that there may have been a tax upon
+windows, accounting for their rare occurrence. One he shows us still
+nearly entire, a narrow slit, measuring, perhaps, eight inches by three,
+with a slab of talc in place of glass.
+
+And presently we come to a small museum, whose contents are much the
+same in kind with the household remains seen by us in the Museum at
+Naples. And farther on is a room in which we are shown the _quattro
+morti_--the four dead bodies whose impress on the hardened cinders which
+surrounded them has been so ingeniously utilized. It is known that the
+masses of cinder within which these bodies had slowly mouldered were
+filled with liquid plaster, and the forms of the bodies themselves,
+writhing in their last agonies, were thus obtained. One of these
+figures--that of a young woman--is full of pathetic expression. She
+lies nearly on her face, her hand near her eyes, as if weeping. Her
+back, entirely exposed, has the fresh and smooth outline of youth. The
+forms of two elder women and one man complete the sad gallery. Of these
+women one wears upon her finger a silver ring, the plaster having just
+fitted within it. This figure and that of the man are both swollen,
+probably from the decomposition that took place before the crust of
+ashes hardened around them into the rigid mould which to-day gives us
+their outlines.
+
+These four plaster ghosts were the last sights seen by us in Pompeii.
+For by this time we had walked and ridden three hours, and those three
+the most fervent of the day, beginning soon after noon. The heat was
+cruel and intense, but we had not given ourselves time to think of it.
+The umbrella and _portantina_ helped us as they could, but the feeling
+that the work had to be done now or never helped us most of all. Our
+vexation against our guides had long ago cooled into a quiet good will.
+Relinquishing the fiery journey, which might have been prolonged some
+hours further, we paid the rather heavy fee. The second carrier of the
+litter demanded a few extra pence, reminding us that at our first
+arrival he had brushed the dust from our dresses with a zeal which then
+appeared mysterious, but whose object was now clear. Parting from these,
+we passed into the little inn, quite bare and dirty, whose coolness
+seemed delicious. We here ordered an afternoon _dejeuner_, and ate,
+drank, and rested.
+
+
+
+
+THE CAPUCHIN.
+
+
+While we waited for our dinner, a Capuchin at another table enjoyed a
+moderate repast. Bologna sausage, cheese, fruit, and wine of two sorts
+contented him. His robust countenance beamed with health, his eyes were
+intelligent. This was one of the personalities of which the little shown
+makes one desirous to know more. His refreshment consumed and paid for,
+he began a rambling conversation with the _garcon_ who attended us, as
+well as with the proprietor of the _locanda_ in which we were. Capuchin
+and Garcon mutually deplored the poverty of the poor in Naples. Capuchin
+showed two blue silk handkerchiefs which he had been forced to purchase,
+for compassion, of a poor woman. Both obviously considered the new state
+of things as partly accountable for this poverty, which is, on the
+contrary, as old as the monastic orders. The Capuchin had been preaching
+Lenten sermons in Greece, and had been well received. Garcon rejoined
+that there were good Catholics in Greece, agreeing harmoniously with the
+man in brown. But at this juncture another face looks in at the door.
+"That is the man who plagues me to give him lucky numbers for play,"
+says the _frate_. Here I can keep out of the company no longer. "What
+does he play at--cards or dice?" I ask. "Neither, madam; that man ruins
+himself with playing at the lottery." Capuchin continues: "If I had the
+gift of fortunate numbers, I would not withhold them. I should wish to
+benefit my fellow-creatures in this way, if I were able to do so. But I
+have it not, this gift of prophecy." And if you had it, thought I, I am
+not so sure of the ultimate benefit of gambling to your
+fellow-creatures, even were they to win, instead of losing.
+
+The Capuchin and I, however, talk of other things--of monasteries, and
+rich libraries, closed to women. "So, father, you consider us the allies
+of the devil." "No, signora; the inhibition is mutual: we may not enter
+any nunnery." The _padrone_ of the inn here breaks in with the robust
+suggestion that these restrictions ought to be removed, and that monks
+and nuns should have liberty to visit each the establishments of the
+other. While this talk proceeds, I occasionally glance into the smoky
+depths of the kitchen opposite, where a mysterious figure, in whose
+cleanliness I desire to believe, wafts a frying-pan across a dull fire,
+which he stimulates by fanning with a turkey's wing. After each of his
+gymnastics, a dish is brought out, and set upon our table--first fish,
+then omelet, then cutlet; and we discover that the Capuchin and
+ourselves have a mutual friend at Fuligno, the good, intelligent,
+accomplished Count ----, in whose praises each of us is eloquent. We
+part, exchanging names and addresses. Our Pompeian guide urges us to
+return and make the ascent of Vesuvius under his care. But we depart
+untrammelled. Every one was satisfied with us except the cripple who
+rolled himself in the dust, and the weird, white-haired women with
+spindles, who followed us shrieking for a largess. We gave nothing, and
+they commented upon us with a gravity of moral reprobation quite fit to
+make one's hair stand on end, even with New England versus beggar behind
+one. But the train came, and mercifully took us away; and whether in not
+giving we did well or ill, is a point upon which theorists will not
+agree; so we may be pardoned for giving ourselves the benefit of a
+doubt.
+
+After Pompeii a little good fortune awaited us. As before said, we had
+encountered an American of the right sort,--kindly, sincere, and of
+adequate education. Joining forces with him, we no longer shivered
+before the hackman, nor shrank from the _valet de place_. We at once
+engaged the latter functionary, ordered the _remise_ of the hotel to
+wait for us, and started upon two days of eager but weary sight-seeing.
+Our first joint act was to scale again the height of San Martino, this
+time to enter the church and convent, and view their boasted riches. A
+pleasant court, with a well in the centre of it; a church whose chapels
+and altars were gorgeous with lapis lazuli, jasper, agate, and all
+precious marbles; a row of seats in wooden mosaic, executed by a monk of
+the Cistercian order, vowed to silence; cloisters as spacious and
+luxurious as can well be imagined; a great array of relics in golden
+boxes, shielded from dust and common sight by rich curtains of heavy
+silk and gold--this is all of the establishment that remains in our
+recollection. The present government has dismissed the saintly idlers of
+the monasteries, saying, perhaps, in the style of Henry VIII., "Go
+plough, you drones, go plough." But in what field and for what wages
+they henceforth labor is not known to me.
+
+Hence to the Grotto of Siana, half a mile long, and some eight feet
+wide. The chill of this long, damp passage, in contrast with the high
+temperature from which we entered it, so alarmed us that we turned back
+at half the distance, and gave up seeing the den or cave that lay
+beyond. At Pozzuoli we view Caligula's Bridge, of which but a few large
+stones remain: the guide points out the place at which Paul and Peter
+landed. Here are the ruins of a fine amphitheatre. The underground
+arrangements still show us the pits in which the wild beasts and the
+gladiators were kept. Square openings at the top ventilated each of
+these, and a long, open space in the middle separated the cells of the
+beasts from those of the gladiators. On public occasions all of these
+openings were closed by heavy plates of metal, so as to present the
+solid surface desired for the combats.
+
+    "Arise, ye Goths, and glut your ire!"
+
+In this neighborhood we visited what is left of the temple of Jupiter
+Serapis. The salt water formerly covered its columns to such a height as
+to corrode them badly. The smell caused by the evaporation of the
+sea-water in the hot sun was so offensive that the government found it
+necessary to apply a thorough drain. These time and tide worn marbles
+were of the choicest kinds--African marble, _rosso antico_, and so on.
+Their former beauty little avails them now. We drive further to the
+cavern with the stratum of carbonic acid gas, and see the dog
+victimized, which cruel folly costs us two francs. And then we visit
+the sulphur vapor baths, whose fiery, volcanic breath frightens us.
+These are near the Lake of Agnano, an ancient volcanic crater. In its
+neighborhood are the royal game preserves, in which fratricidal V. E.
+hunts and slays the wild boar. Returning, we climb to Virgil's tomb, a
+small, empty enclosure, with a stone and inscription dating from 1840.
+
+    "Cecini pascua, rura, duces,"
+
+says the poet, through his commemorator. Item, this steep journey under
+a scorching sun did not pay very well. Yet, having ascended the fiery
+stair, and stood in the small, dark enclosure, and read the tolerable
+inscription, I felt that I had done what I could to honor the great
+Mantuan: so, with a good conscience, I returned through cool,
+ill-smelling Posilippo, to the hotel, dinner, and the afternoon
+meditation.
+
+
+
+
+BAJA.
+
+
+The excursion to Baja called us up early in the morning. With a tender
+hush, a mysterious remembrance of our weaker and still sleeping
+brethren, we stole through the hotel, swallowed coffee, and issued forth
+with carriage and _valet de place_ for a day's campaigning. As the
+functionary just mentioned had invented a hitherto unpatented language,
+supposed by him to present some points of advantage over the Queen's
+English, I will here, _en passant_, serve up a brief sample, for the
+study of those inclined to the practical pursuit of linguistics.
+
+"Zat is ze leg Agnano [lake of.] In vinter he is full of vile dog [wild
+duck]." Of Lake Avernus: "Zis was de helty [hell]." Of the ruins of the
+amphitheatre at Pozzuoli: "Ruin by de barbions [barbarians]. Zey brok
+him in piece and pushed him down. Zar is Caligole's [Caligula's] Bridge.
+Tis de Sibyl's Cave, where she gib de ragle [oracle]. Temple Diana,
+temple Neptune, ze god of ze sea and ze god of ze land." Here was a
+mythological _apercu_ thrown in. This individual rarely condescended to
+speak his native language--Italian. In ours, it required no little
+adjustment of the perceptive faculties to meet his views.
+
+Passing through Posilippo, we come first to a piece of ground which
+bears the form of an amphitheatre, although the whole structure, if it
+exist at all, is thickly overgrown with trees and shrubs. A rustic
+proprietor cultivates the vine here, but cannot pass the nights during
+July, August, and September, on account of the bad air. The wines, white
+and red, are nevertheless excellent. The right of excavation here vests
+in a Frenchman, who has purchased the same.
+
+Our next point of exploration is the Temple of Mercury, at Baja--a
+circular building, with fine columns partly overthrown. Here exists a
+perfect whispering gallery, for at a certain spot in the wall the
+slightest utterance is instantly heard at the point directly opposite.
+Here two forlorn women, with a tambourine and without costume, dance a
+joyless _tarantella_, which costs us a franc. They urge us, also, to buy
+sea-shells, and small fragments of mosaic, together with skeletons of
+the sea-horse, a queer little fish, some two inches long. After this, we
+are shown some _columbaria_, and a bath with stucco reliefs. Adjacent is
+the well preserved ruin of a large bathing establishment. Besides the
+baths, we here find places for reclining, where vapor baths were
+probably enjoyed.
+
+Now come Nero's prisons, gloomy, under-ground galleries, in which he
+kept his slaves. Torches here became necessary. These galleries,
+destitute of daylight, were quite extensive, frequently crossing each
+other at right angles. And then we visited the Piscina Mirabilis, an
+immense reservoir which formerly supplied the Roman fleet at Marina with
+fresh water. Its tall columns, still entire, are deeply corroded by
+water. This was a work of surprising extent and finish. Thereafter,
+mindful of Murder considered as a Fine Art, we gave some heed to the
+whereabouts of Agrippina's villa, and inquired concerning those
+matricidal attempts of her son, which were finally crowned with so
+entire a success. The villa of Hortensius, in this neighborhood, lies
+chiefly under water, the level of the ground having changed. Perhaps
+this villa was anciently built on ground reclaimed from the sea, as
+Horace says,--
+
+    "Marisque Baiis obstrepentis urges
+     Summovere litora. Parum locuples continente ripa."
+
+We next visited the Lake of Avernus, and Lake Fusano, the River Styx of
+Virgil and the Romans. Bordering upon this we found a whole hill-side
+honeycombed with _columbaria_. Then came the long sulphurous gallery
+leading to the hot spring in which eggs are boiled for your instruction.
+Each of these visitations has its fee, so that the pilgrimage, even if
+made on foot, would be a costly one. Cuma next claimed us. A long, dark
+gallery leads to the cave of the Cumaean Sibyl, described by Virgil. But
+the presence of water here makes it necessary for visitors to sit upon
+the shoulders of two or three shaggy and uncleanly-looking sprites. We
+stoutly decline this adventure, and are afterwards sorry. From this
+neighborhood was taken the Cumaean collection, which figures at the
+_Museo Nazionale_, presented by the Prince of Carignano. Somewhere in
+the course of this crowded and heated day, a dinner was slidden in,
+which gave our labor a brief interval of rest and refreshment. It
+consisted mostly of dirt, in various forms, flavored with cheese,
+garlic, and a variety of savors equally choice. To facilitate its
+consumption, we drank a sour-sweet fluid, called white Capri. I found
+none of the Italian wines joyous. Despite their want of body, they give
+one's nerves a decided shake.
+
+Well, I have narrated all that took place on the day set apart for Baja.
+Its results may be prosaically summed up as heat, haste, and headache,
+with a confused vision of the past and a most fragmentary sense of the
+present.
+
+
+
+
+CAPRI.
+
+
+I have a fresh chapter of torment for a new Dante, if such an one could
+be induced to apply to me. I will not expatiate, nor exhale any
+Francesca episodes, any "_Lasciate ogni spiranza!_" I will be succinct
+and business-like, furnishing the outlines from which some more
+leisurely artist, better paid and employed, shall do his hell-painting.
+
+We leave enchanting Naples,--tear ourselves from our hotel, whose very
+impositions grow dear to us; the precious window, too, which shows the
+bay and Capri, and close at hand the boats, the fish-market, and the
+chairs on which the populace sit at eventide to eat oysters and drink
+mineral water. A small boat takes us to a very small steamer, on whose
+deck we pay ten francs each to a stout young man, in appearance much
+like a southern poor Buckra, who departs in another small boat as soon
+as he has plundered us. The voyage to Capri is cool and reasonably
+smooth. A pleasant chance companion, bound to the same port, beguiles
+the time for us. We exchange our intellectual small wares with a certain
+good will, which remains the best part of the bargain. When quite near
+the island, the small steamer pauses, and lowers a boat in which we
+descend to view the famous Blue Grotto. At the entrance, we are warned
+to stoop as low as possible. We do so, and still the entrance seems
+dangerous. With some scratching and pushing, however, the boat goes
+through, and the lovers of blue feast their eyes with the tender color.
+The water is ultramarine, and the roof sapphire. The place seems a toy
+of nature--a forced detention of a single ray of the spectrum. Dyes
+change with the fashion; the blue of our youth does not color our
+daughter's silks and ribbons. The purples of ten years ago cannot be met
+with to-day. But this blue is constant, and therefore perfect.
+
+Our enjoyment of it, however, is marred by an old beast in human form
+who rushes at us, and insists upon being paid two francs for diving. He
+promises us that he will show us wondrous things--that he will fill the
+azure cave with silver sparkles. Wearied with his screeching, and a
+little deluded by his promises, we weakly offer him a franc and a half;
+whereupon he throws off some superfluous clothing, and softly glides
+into the deep, without so much as a single sparkle. He certainly
+presents an odd appearance; his weird legs look as if twisted out of
+silver; his back is dark upon the water. But the refreshing bath he
+takes is so little worth thirty sous to us that we feel tempted to
+harpoon him as he dodges about, sure that, if pierced, he can shed
+nothing more solid than humbug. On our return to the steamer we pay two
+francs each for this melancholy expedition, and presently make the
+little harbor of Capri.
+
+And here the promised Hell begins. The way to it, remember, is always
+pleasant. No sooner does our boat touch the land than a nest of human
+rattlesnakes begins to coil and hiss about us, each trying to carry us
+off, each pouring into our ears discordant, rapid jargon. "My donkey,
+siora." "And mine." "And mine." "How much will you give?" "Will you go
+up to Tiberio?" But all this with more repetition and less music than a
+chorus of Handel's or an aria of Sebastian Bach. "My donkey," flourish;
+"My do-n-onkey," high soprano variation; "My donkey," good grumbling
+contralto. "How much?" "How much?" "How much?" "How much?" shriek all in
+chorus. And you, the unhappy star in this hell opera, begin with
+uncertain utterance--"Let me see, good people. One at a time. What is
+just I will pay"--the _motivo_ also repeated; chorus renewed--"Money;"
+"Three francs;" "Four francs;" "Five francs;" "A _bottiglia_;" "A _buona
+mano_." A _buona mano_? Good hand--would one could administer it in the
+right way, in the right place! By this time each of you occupies the
+warm saddle of a donkey, and at one P. M., less twenty, the thermometer
+at 90 Fahrenheit or more, and being warned to reach the steamer by three
+P. M., at latest, the punishment of all your past, and most of your
+future sins begins.
+
+_Facile descensus Averni._ Yes; but the _ascensus_? To climb so high
+after Tiberio, who went so low! For this is the ruined palace of
+Tiberius Caesar himself, which you go to seek and see, if possible. He
+still plagues the world, as he would have wished to do. Your expedition
+in search of his stony vestiges is a long network of torment, spun by
+you, the donkey, and the donkey-driver, undisguised Apollo standing by
+to weld the golden chains by which you suffer. As often as you seem to
+approach the object, a new _detour_ leads you at a zigzag from the
+straight direction. But this is little. At every turn in the road a
+beggar, in some variety, addresses you. Now a deformed wretch shows you
+his twisted limbs, and shrieks, "_co cosa, siora_." Now, a
+wholesome-looking mother, with a small child, asks a contribution to the
+wants of "_questa creatura_" Now, a grandam, with blackened face and
+bleached hair, hobbles after you. Children oppress you with flowers,
+women with oranges,--all in view of the largest _quid_ for the smallest
+_quo_. You grow afraid to look in a pretty face or return a civil nod,
+lest the eternal signal of beggary should make itself manifest. And such
+women and children!--every one a picture. Such intense eyes, such
+sun-ripened complexions! I take note of them, handsome devils that they
+are, all foreordained as a part of my fiery probation. For all this time
+I am making a steep ascent. Sometimes the donkey takes me up a flight of
+stone steps, clutching at each with an uncertain quiver, but stimulated
+by the nasal "n--a--a--a," which follows him from the woman who by turns
+coaxes and threatens him. Now we clamber along a narrow ledge, whose
+height causes my dizzy head to swim; there is nothing but special
+providence between me and perdition. A little girl, six years of age,
+pulls my donkey by the head; a dignified matron behind me holds the
+whip. The little girl leads carelessly, and I quake and grow hot and
+cold with terror; but it is of no use. The matron will not take the
+rein; her office is to flog, and she will do nought else. And the
+sun?--the sun works his miracles upon us until we wish ourselves as well
+off as the Niobides, who, at least, look cool. Finally, after an hour of
+jolting, roasting, quivering, and general exasperation, we reach the
+top. Here we are passively lifted from our donkeys; we mechanically
+follow our guide through a white-washed wine-shop into a small outer
+space, with a low wall around it, over which we are invited to look down
+some hundreds of feet into the sea. This is called the Leap of Tiberio:
+from this height, says the barefooted old vagabond who guides us, he
+pitched his victims into the deep. The descent here is as straight as
+the wall of a house. Farther on, we find some very fragmentary ruins, in
+the usual Roman style. Among them is a good mosaic pavement, with some
+vaults and broken columns. A sloping way is shown us, carefully paved,
+and with a groove on either side. Into this, say they, fitted the wheels
+of a certain chariot, in which guests were invited to seat themselves.
+The chariot, guided by two cords, then started to go down to the sea.
+But at a certain moment the vehicle was arrested by a sudden shock.
+Those within it were precipitated into the water, after which the cords
+comfortably drew the chariot back.
+
+I have never heard any of the evidence upon which is based the modern
+rehabilitation of Tiberius and Nero. I have, however, found in the
+stately Tacitus, and even in gossipy Suetonius, a shudder of horror
+accompanying the narration of their deeds. The world has seen cruelty in
+all ages, and sees it still; but I cannot believe that the average
+standard of humanity can justly be lowered so far as to make the acts of
+Tiberius simply rigorous, those of Nero a little arbitrary. Mr. Carlyle,
+in dealing with the French revolution, reprobates the hysterical style
+of reviewing painful events; but in the history of Rome under the Caesars
+we hear too plainly the sobs and shrieks of the victims to be satisfied
+with the modern philosophizing which would deprive them of our
+compassion. Man is naturally cruel; superstition makes him more so. A
+genuine religion alone softens his ferocious instincts, and places the
+centre of action and obligation elsewhere than in his own pleasure or
+personal advantage. Man is also compassionate; but without the
+systematic formation of morals, his weak compassion will not compensate
+the ardor of his self-assertion, which may involve all crimes. Luxury
+exaggerates cruelty, because it intensifies the action of the selfish
+interests, and loosens the rein of restraint--its objects and the
+objects of morals being incompatible. The most cruel characters have
+been those presenting this admixture of luxury and ferocity. The silken
+noose gives finer and more atrocious death than the iron sword.
+
+I think that the (unless vilified) wretch Tiberius built this palace in
+fear, and dwelt in it in torment. In its fastnesses he felt himself safe
+from the knife of the assassin. In the leisure of its isolation he could
+meditate murders with aesthetic deliberation, and hurl his bolts of death
+upon the world below, remorseless and unattainable as Jove himself.
+
+Here is an episode of philosophizing in the hell I promised you. But
+hell itself would not be complete without the button-bore--the man or
+woman who holds you by a theory, and detains you amid life's intensity
+to attend the slow circlings of an elaborative brain.
+
+I have now finished Tiberio. The donkeys brought us down with more
+danger, more heat, more fear and clatter. Only beggary diminishes, a
+little discouraged, in our rear. It seems to have been given out that we
+have no small change, as is indeed the fact; so the young and old only
+grumble after us enough to keep their hand in. In compensation for this,
+however, a new trouble is added, viz., the danger of losing the small
+steamboat, which threatens to leave at three P. M., a period by this
+time scarce half an hour distant. Yet a bit of bread we must have at the
+hotel. It is the former palace of Queen Joanna; but we do not know it at
+the moment, and nothing leads us to suspect it. Here two good-natured
+English faces make us for the moment at home. A cup of tea,--the English
+and American restorative for all fatigues,--a wholesome slice of bread
+and butter, a moderate charge, and ten minutes of cool seclusion, make
+the Hotel di Tiberio pleasant in our recollection. And then we remount,
+and, the little steamer beginning to manoeuvre, our haste and anxiety
+become extreme; so we take no more heed of steep or narrow, but the
+donkeys and we make one headlong business of it down to the beach, where
+we have still to make a secondary embarkation before reaching the
+steamer. Here, as we had foreseen, the final crush attends us. The
+guide and each of the donkey girls and women insist upon separate
+payment. With grim satisfaction I fling a five-franc note for the whole.
+It is too much, but the whole island cannot or will not give change for
+it. And then ensues much shrieking, expostulation, and gesticulation, in
+the midst of which I plunge into the boat, make my bargain with Charon,
+and am for the time out of hell. As I looked back, methought I saw
+Stefano the guide and the women having it out pretty well with reference
+to the undivided fee. Stefano leaped wildly into the sea after me, and
+extorted five more _soldi_ from my confusion. Finally, I exhort all good
+Christians to beware of Capri, and on no account to throw away a trip
+thither, but to undertake the same as a penance, for the mortification
+of the flesh and the good of the immortal soul. The island is to-day in
+as heathen a condition as Tiberius himself could wish; only from a
+golden, it has descended to the perpetual invoking of a copper rain.
+That the Beggar's Opera should have been written out of the kingdom of
+Naples is a matter of reasonable astonishment to the logically inferring
+mind. I could improvise it myself on the spur of the moment, making a
+heroine out of the black-eyed woman who drove my animal--black-haired
+also, and with a scarlet cotton handkerchief bound around her head in
+careless picturesqueness. Gold ear-rings and necklace had she who
+screamed and begged so for a penny more than her due. And when I cried
+aloud in fear, she replied, "_Non abbia timor--donkey molt' avezzo_;"
+which diverted my mind, and caused me to laugh. As we went up and as we
+went down, she encountered all her friends and gossips in holiday
+attire; for yesterday was _Festa_, and to-day, consequently, is _festa_
+also--a saint's day leaving many small arrearages to settle, in the
+shape of headache, fight, and so on, so that one does not comfortably
+get to work again until the third day. This fact of the antecedent
+_festa_ accounted for the unusual amount of good clothes displayed
+throughout the island. Our eyes certainly profited by it, and possibly
+our purses; for we just remember that one or two groups in velvet
+jackets and gold necklaces did not beg.
+
+But all of this is a superfluous after-digression, as I am really, in my
+narrative, already on board of the little steamer, with the charitable
+waves between me and the brigand Caprians. A pleasant sail--not so
+smooth but that it made the Italian passengers ill--brought us to
+Sorrento. Here our trunk was hoisted on the head of a stout fellow, all
+the small fry of the harbor squabbling for our minor luggage. We climbed
+a long, steep flight of stone steps, walked through a shady orange
+garden, and came out upon a cool terrace fronting the sea, with the
+Rispoli Hotel behind it. Here we were to stay; our bargain was soon
+made, with the divine prospect thrown in. Our room was on the ground
+floor, behind a shallow arcade paved with majolica. Shaking off the dust
+of travel, and ranging our few effects in the rather narrow quarters, we
+at once took possession of the prospect, and regulated ourselves
+accordingly.
+
+
+
+
+SORRENTO.
+
+
+Ugh! after the roasting, hurried day at Capri, how delicious was the
+first morning's rest at Sorrento! The coral merchant came and went. We
+did not allow him to trouble us. They offered us the hotel asses; we did
+not engage them. The blue sea, the purple mountains, the green, rustling
+orange groves,--these were enough for us, pieced with the writing of
+these ragged notes, and a little dipping into our Horace, who, it must
+be confessed, goes lamely without a dictionary. A day of lights and
+shadows, of sunshine and silence, of pains caressed, and fatigues whose
+healing was sweeter than fresh repose. And we dreamed of novels that we
+could write beneath this romance-forging sun, and how the commonplace
+men and women about us should take grandiose shapes of good and ill, and
+figure as ideals, no longer as atoms. We would forsake our scholastic
+anatomy, and make studies of real life, with color and action. For this,
+as we know, we should need at least six months of freedom, which perhaps
+the remnant of our mortal lives does not offer. Meantime we sit and
+dream. Each sees the content of the landscape reflected in the other's
+eyes. We sit just within our room, the little writing-table half within,
+half without the window, that reaches to the ground. The soft breeze
+flutters our pages to and fro. We scold it caressingly, as one reproves
+the overplay of a gracious child. With the exception of an occasional
+straggling visitor, the whole terrace is ours. Now and then we forsake
+the writing-table, rush to the railing that borders the terrace, and
+take a good look up and down, to assure ourselves that what we see is
+real, and founded on terra firma. Here our wearied nerves shall bathe in
+seas of heavenly rest. As to our suffering finances, too,--if one word
+is not too often profaned for us to profane it, we will quote Horace's
+
+    "mox reficit rates quassas,"
+
+not
+
+    "indociles pauperiem pati"
+
+Here our rapture will cost nothing. We will feed our eyes. The sea and
+sky shall wear sapphires and diamonds for us. Our shabbiness will be the
+aesthetic complement to their splendors. Do you not remember the figures
+in brown or olive green that always lurk in the corners of pictures in
+whose centre the Madonna, or some saint, is glorified? They also serve,
+who only stand and wait in the shadow. So will we do now. We will lie
+forgotten in the corner of this splendid picture, while our time and our
+remaining credit equalize themselves a little. The days in Naples
+considerably outran our estimate; the days here must make up for it. And
+we want nothing; and all is delightful.
+
+It is true, we do not carry out those good intentions quite literally.
+Who ever does? But we adhere to our proposed outline of rigid economy
+with only an occasional break. We soon begin to take note of small
+temptations that lie about the streets. Here we see the little
+neck-ribbons that are so cheap and pretty. A handful of them twisted
+around the neck of Economy give her something of a choke. Further on in
+our days and walks, a sound of saws in motion arrests our attention;
+while a sign and tempting show-case urge us at least to _look_ at the
+far-famed Sorrento woodwork. We enter; we set the tenth clause of the
+Decalogue at nought, coveting wildly. Brackets, tea, glove, and cash
+boxes are displayed there for our overthrow; watch-cases, on a new
+principle, all either brave with mosaic, or smooth and shining in the
+simple beauty of the olive wood. Something of all this we snatched and
+fled. We took far too little for our wishes, rather too much for our
+means. Silk stockings we did resist by that simplest and best of
+measures--not entering the shops in which they were pressingly
+advertised. The very passing of those shops gave us, however, vague
+dreams of swimming about in silken movements; how grateful in a world of
+heat! But the line has to be drawn somewhere, and we draw it here.
+
+A donkey excursion pleasantly varies our experience in Sorrento. Do you
+know how much a donkey ride means in Sorrento? It does not mean a
+perpetual jolt, and horrible inter-asinicidal contest between the ass
+who carries the stick and the ass who carries you. The donkeys of
+Sorrento are fat and well-liking: smooth and gray are the pair that come
+for us, comfortable as to the saddle and the bridle. And our
+donkey-driver is a handsome youth, with a bold, frank countenance, and
+the ripest olive and vermilion complexion. His walk is graceful and
+robust; he knows every one he meets, and has his bit of fun with sundry
+of the groups who pass us. These consist of men and women bearing on
+their heads large flat baskets filled with cocoons, or in their hands
+bundles of the same; girls leading mules, or carrying household burdens;
+soldiers, beggars, Neapolitan princes, the syndic of Sorrento, and other
+varieties of the species vaguely called human. He takes us up a steep
+and rough ascent to the telegraph station. There are many bad bits in
+the road; he is but one, and the donkeys are two; but he has such a
+clever way, at critical moments, of holding on to the head of the second
+donkey in conjunction with the tail of the first, that he gets the two
+cowardly riders through many difficulties and more fears. Once on level
+ground, the donkeys amble along delightfully. So pleasant is the whole
+in remembrance, that, sitting here, at an interval of many miles in
+distance, and ten days in time, we feel a sincere twinge in remembering
+that we gave him only a franc for himself, paying by agreement two
+francs for either donkey. Forgive us, beauteous and generous Gaetano,
+and do not curse us in _aggio_ and _saggio_, the open-mouthed _patois_
+of your country.
+
+
+
+
+FLORENCE.
+
+
+A week is little for the grandeurs of Florence, much for the discomforts
+of its summer weather. The last week of May, which we passed there,
+mistook itself for June, and governed itself accordingly. We went out as
+early as human weakness, unsubdued by special discipline, permitted. We
+struggled with church, gallery, painting, sculpture, and antiquities.
+We breathlessly read sensible books, guides, and catalogues, in the
+little intervals of our sight-seeing. We dropped at night, worn and
+greedy for slumber; and the day died, and made no sign.
+
+A hot week, but a happy one. To be overcome in a good cause is glorious,
+and our failure, we trust, was quantitative, not qualitative. Good
+friends helped us, took away all little troubles and responsibilities;
+took us about in carriages of dignity and ease, and landed us before
+royal, imperial works of art. With all their aid and cherishing,
+Florence was too many for us. So, of her garment of splendors, we were
+able only to catch at and hold fast a shred here and there, and whether
+these fragments are worth weaving into a chapter at all, will better
+appear when we shall have made the experiment of so combining them.
+
+Our first view of her was by night; when, wearied with a day's shaking,
+a hot and a long one, we tumbled out of railroad car into arms of
+philanthropic friend, who received us and our bundles, selected our
+luggage, conquered our porter and hackman, pointed to various
+interesting quadrangles of lamps, and said, "This is Florence." But we
+had seen such things before, and gave little heed--our thought machinery
+being quite run down for lack of fuel. The aspect which we first truly
+perceived, and still remember, was that of a clean and friendly
+interior, a tea-table set, a good lamp bright with American _petrolio_
+(O shade of Downer!), and, behind an alcove, the dim, inviting
+perspective of a comfortable bed, which seemed to say, "Come hither,
+weary ones. I have waited long enough, and so have you."
+
+
+
+PALAZZO PITTI.
+
+
+The second aspect of Florence was the Pitti Palace, brown and massive;
+and the bridges numerously spanning the bright river; and the gay, busy
+streets, shady in lengths and sunny only in patches; the picturesque
+_melange_ of business and of leisure, artisans, country people, English
+travellers and dressed-up Americans; the jeweller's bridge, displaying
+ropes of pearls and flashes of diamonds, with endless knottings and
+perplexities of gold and mosaic; alabaster shops, reading-rooms,
+book-stores, fashions, cabinets of antiquities--all leading to a welcome
+retirement within the walls of the Palazzo Pitti.
+
+Well content was the Medici to live in it, ill content to exchange it,
+even for the promised threshold of Paradise. A good little sermon here
+suggests itself, of which the text was preached long ago, "For where
+your treasure is, there will your heart be also." And Medici's
+investments had been large in Pitti, and trifling in Paradise; hence the
+difficulty of realizing in the latter. Within the Pitti Palace are
+things that astonish the world, and have a right to do so, as have all
+the original results of art. The paintings are all--so to speak--set on
+doors that open into new avenues of thought and speculation for mankind.
+The ideal world, of which the real is but a poor assertion, has, in
+these glimpses, its truest portraiture. Their use and dignity have also
+limits which the luxury and enthusiasm of mankind transgress. But
+indispensable were they in the world's humanization and civilization:
+that is enough to say of them.
+
+O, unseen in twenty-three years, and never to be seen again with the
+keen relish of youth. What have I kept of you? What good seed from your
+abundant harvest has ripened in my stony corner of New England? Your
+forms have filled and beautified the blank pages of life, for every life
+has its actual blanks, which the ideal must fill up, or which else
+remain bare and profitless forever. And you are here, my Seggiola, and
+you, my Andreas and Peruginos and Raphael; and Guercino's woman in red
+still tenderly clasps the knees of the dead Savior. But O! they have
+restored this picture, and daubed the faded red with savage vermilion.
+
+Scarcely less ungrateful than the restoration of a beautiful picture is
+the attempt to restore, after the busy intervals of travelling, the
+precious impressions made by works and wonders of art. The incessant
+labor of sight-seeing in Florence left little time for writing up on the
+spot, and that little was necessarily given to recording the then recent
+recollections of Naples and Rome. It was in Venice that I first tried to
+overtake the subject of Florence. It is in Trieste that I sit down and
+despair of doing the poorest justice to either. My meagre notes must
+help me out; but, in setting them down, I forgot how rapidly and
+entirely the material, of which they gave the outline, would disappear.
+I thought that I held it, so far as mind possession goes, forever. At
+the feast of the gods we think our joys eternal.
+
+On reference to the notes, then, I find that the best Andreas and Fra
+Bartolomeos are to be found here, and quite a number of them in the
+Pitti. Some of the first Raphaels also are here, and some Titians. The
+Seggiola looked to me a little dim under her glass. The Fates of Michael
+Angelo were strong and sincere. Two of the Andreas are the largest I
+remember, and very finely composed. Each represents some modification of
+the Madonna and Saints, subjects of which we grow very weary. Yet one
+perceives the necessity of these pictures at the time in which they were
+painted. The aesthetic platform of the time would have them, and accepted
+little else. A much smaller picture shows us the heads of Andrea and his
+beautiful wife, the _Lucia_, made famous by Browning. The two heads look
+a little dim now, both with age, and one with sorrow. Raphael's
+pictures, seen here in copious connection with those of his
+predecessors, appear as the undoubted culmination of the Florentine
+school, grandly drawn, and conceived with the subtlest grace and spirit.
+The Florentine school, as compared with others, has a great weight of
+aesthetic reason behind it. It reminds me of some rare writing in which
+what is given you represents much besides itself. The best Peruginos
+share this merit, so do, in a different manner, the works of Beato
+Angelico, whose wonderful faces deserve their gold background. How to
+overtake these supreme merits in the regions of prose and of verse, one
+scarcely knows. By combining bold and immediate conception with untiring
+energy, unflinching criticism, and a nicety that stops before no
+painfulness, one might do it. Life runs like a centiped; one dreams of
+being an artist, and dies.
+
+Here it may not be amiss for me to recur to the form of my diary, whose
+inartistic jottings will best give the order of my days and movements.
+
+Wednesday, May 29.--Walked to Santa Croce, hearing that a mass was to be
+celebrated there for the Florentine victims of '48. When I arrived, the
+mass was nearly over; the attendance had been very numerous, and we
+found many people still there. Near the high altar were wreaths and
+floral trophies. I should be glad to know whether the priests who
+celebrated this mass did so with a good will. The ideas of '48 are the
+deadly enemies of the absolute and unbounded assumptions of the Roman
+papacy and priesthood. I hear that many of the priests desire a more
+liberal construction of their office. Would to God it might be so. It is
+most mournful that those who stand, in the public eye, for the religion
+of the country, should be pledged to a course utterly out of equilibrium
+with the religious ideas of the age. Thus religious forms contradict the
+spirit and essence of religion, and the established fountain-heads of
+improvement shut the door against social and moral amelioration.
+
+In Santa Croce we hastily visited the monument erected to Alfieri by the
+Countess of Albany, and the tombs of Machiavelli, Galileo, and Raphael
+Morghen. The last has a mural background of florid marble, of a light
+red color, with a recumbent figure in white marble, and an elaborate
+medallion of the same material, representing the Madonna, infant and
+saints. I fully hoped and intended to revisit this venerable and
+interesting church, but was never able to do so. It has lately received,
+as all the world knows, a fine front in pure white marble, adorned by
+bas-reliefs executed by the popular sculptor Fedi. In the square before
+the church stands the new statue of Dante, which I found graceful, but
+not grandiose, nor indeed characteristic. The face bears no trace of the
+great poem; the awe and dignity of super-human visions do not appear in
+its lines. He, making hell and heaven present to our thoughts, did a far
+deeper and more difficult work than those accomplished who made their
+material semblance present to our eyes.
+
+The remainder of this morning we devoted to the gallery of the Uffizi,
+the artistic _pendant_ of the Pitti. We hastily make its circuit with a
+friend who points out to us the portraits of Alfieri and the Countess of
+Albany, his lady and companion. The head of Alfieri is bold and
+striking, the hair red, the temperament showing more of the northern
+energy than of the southern passion. The sobriety of his works and
+laborious character of his composition also evince this. The countess,
+painted from mature life, shows no very marked characteristic. Hers is
+the face of an intelligent woman, but her especial charm does not appear
+in this portrait.
+
+The Uffizi collection appears to have been at once increased and
+rearranged during the three and twenty years of our absence. We find the
+Niobides grouped in an order different from that in which we remember
+them. The portrait gallery of modern artists is for us a new feature,
+and one which, alas! we have not time to study, seeing that the great
+_chefs-d'oeuvres_ imperiously challenge our attention, and that our
+time is very short for them. We spend a dreamy hour in the Tribune,
+whose very circumscription is a relief. Here we are not afraid of
+missing anything. This _etui_ of gems is so perfectly arranged and
+inventoried that the absence of any one of them would at once be
+perceived. Here stands the Venus, in incomparable nudity. Here the Slave
+still sharpens his instrument--the classic Boxers hold each other in
+close struggle. Raphael, Correggio, Michael Angelo, Carlo Dolce, are all
+here in concentration. You can look from one to the other, and read the
+pictorial language of their dissents and arguments. A splendid Paul
+Veronese, in half figures, merits well its place here. It represents a
+Madonna and attendant female saint: the hair and costumes are of the
+richest Venetian type; and though the crinkles of the one and the
+stripes of the other scarcely suggest the fashions of Palestine, they
+make in themselves a very gorgeous presentment. In the other rooms we
+remember some of the finest Raphaels, a magnificent Perugino, Sodoma's
+beautiful St. Sebastian, a famous Salutation of Mary and Elizabeth, by
+Albertinelli, a very tipsy and impudent Silenus by Rubens, with other
+pictures of his which I cannot characterize. The Vandykes were all hung
+too high to be well seen. They did not seem nearly so fine as the
+Vandykes in the Brignoli Palace in Genoa. Here are some of Beato
+Angelico's finest works, among others his famous triptych, from whose
+bordering of miniature angels so many copies are constantly made. Here
+is also a well-known Leonardo da Vinci, as well as Raphael's portraits
+of Leo Tenth, attended by a cardinal and another dignitary. A narrow
+gallery is occupied by numerous marble alto relievos by Luca della
+Robbia and Donatello; here is also a marble bas-relief of the Madonna
+and Child, the work of the great Michael.
+
+By knocking at a side door you gain admittance into a small chamber,
+whose glass cases contain works of art in gold, crystal, and precious
+stones. Here is a famous cup, upon whose cover a golden Hercules
+encounters the many heads of the Hydra, brilliant with varied enamels,
+the work of Benvenuto Cellini. Miniature busts in agate and jasper,
+small columns of the same materials,--these are some of the features
+which my treacherous memory records. It has, however, let slip most of
+what is precious and characteristic in this collection. The Uffizi
+demands at least a week's study for even the slightest sketch of its
+contents. We had but a week for all Florence, and tasted of the great
+treasure only on this day, and a subsequent one still more hurried. In
+remembrance, therefore, we can only salute it with a free confession of
+our insufficiency.
+
+Thursday.--A _dies non_ for the galleries. It was a Festa, and they were
+all closed. So was the Bargello. The Boboli gardens were not open till
+noon, at which time the heat made them scarcely occupable. We visited
+the Church of San Michele, which was formerly a Loggia, or building with
+open sides and arches, like others still existing in various parts of
+the city. The filling up of these open arches changed it into a church.
+They tell us that it is to be reconverted into a Loggia, to answer the
+present necessities of the over-crowded city. Here we found a curious
+tabernacle, carved in marble--a square enclosure, with much detail of
+execution, and, on the whole, a Gothic effect. Tombs, monuments, and old
+mosaic pavement this temple also contains; but I cannot recall its
+details.
+
+The afternoon of this day we employed partly in a visit to the two tombs
+beside which American feet will be sure to pause. Here, in this
+sculptured sarcophagus, sleeps the dust of E. B. B. Here, beneath this
+granite cross, lie the remains of Theodore Parker. At the first, I
+seemed to hear the stifled sobs that mourned a private sorrow too great
+to take account of the public loss. For what she gave the world, rich
+and precious as it was, was less than that inner, unalienable jewel
+which she could not give but in giving herself. And he who had both, the
+singer and her song, now goes through the world interrogating the ranks
+of womanhood for her peer. Seek it not! She was unique. She died and
+left no fellow.
+
+A soberer _cortege_, probably, followed Theodore to his final
+resting-place. The grief of poets is ecstatic, and cannot be thought of
+without dramatic light and shade, imagined, if not known of. A
+sorrowing, patient woman, faithful through all reverses, stood beside
+the grave of the great preacher, the mighty disputant. She remembered
+that it had always been peace between her and this church militant. From
+every raid, every foray, into the disputed grounds of theory and
+opinion, she kept open for him a return to the orthodoxy of domestic
+life. The basis of his days was a calm, well-ordered household, whose
+doors were opened or shut in accordance with his desire of the moment.
+Would he receive his whole congregation, or a meeting of the clergy, or
+a company more mixed and fashionable? The simple, well-appointed rooms
+were always in order; the lights were always clear; the carpets swept;
+the books and engravings in nice order. The staid New England
+women-servants brought in the refreshments, excellent of their kind, and
+carefully selected for their suitableness to the occasion. The wife sat
+or moved unobtrusively among her guests; but she loved Theodore's
+friends, and made his visitors welcome. If Theodore had war without, and
+it became his business to have it, he had ever peace within. And this it
+was pleasant and exemplary to remember, standing beside his grave.
+
+How often have I, in thought, linked these two graves together, striving
+to find a middle term or point of meeting for them both! The distant
+image of the spot was sacred and dear to me. The person of the one, the
+character of the other, were fixed among my affections. For let me say
+here that though I have criticised Parker's theology, adopting neither
+his methods nor his conclusions, of Parker himself I have never ceased
+to think as of a person with a grand and earnest scope, of large powers
+and generous nature. He was tender in large and in little, a sympathist
+in practice as well as a philanthropist in theory. My heart still warms
+and expands at the remembrance of what he was in the pulpit and at the
+fireside. Nor was he the less a stern moralist because he considered the
+ordinary theories of sin as unjust and insufficient. No one would better
+console you for a sin deplored, no one could more forcibly deprecate a
+sin contemplated. He painted his time more wicked than it was, and saw
+it so. A modern Dante, all in the force of prose, E. B. B. lies here
+like the sweet Beatrice, who was at hand when the cruel task of
+criticism was over, to build before the corrected vision of the great
+pilgrim the silvery shrines and turrets of the New Jerusalem. So will we
+leave them--a lesser Dante, a greater Beatrice, and one who has borne
+record of herself.
+
+
+
+
+VENICE.
+
+
+Venice, which I seek to hold fast, is already a thing of yesterday.
+"Haste is of the devil," truly says the Koran, whose prophet yet knew
+its value. But the strokes of the pen need deliberation as much as those
+of the sword need swiftness. Strength goes with Time, and skill against
+him.
+
+Little of either had I after a night in the cars between Florence and
+Venice,--hot, dusty Florence, and cool, glassy Venice,--a night of
+starts and stops, morsels of sleep set in large frames of uneasy waking.
+The steep ascent of the Apennines is only partially descried through the
+darkness. It begins at Pistoia, and when it ends, Pistoia lies
+vertically under you, at the bottom of what seems in the darkness an
+abyss, in which its lights shine brightly. Tunnels there are in plenty
+on this road, and one of these threatens us with suffocation. For the
+engine was unduly replenished with coal at Pistoia in view of the hard
+task before it, and the undigested food vented itself in unwholesome
+gases, which the constraints of the tunnel drove in upon us, filling the
+lungs with mephitic stuff which caused them to ache for more than an
+hour afterwards. This part of the journey was made pleasant to us by the
+presence of a Venetian lady, handsome, intelligent, and cordial. At
+Bologna we lost her, making also a long stop. The hour was three in the
+morning; the place, a bare railroad depot. The hour passed there would
+not have been patiently endured by an American public. But Italians
+endure every possible inconvenience from the railway management, which
+is clearly conducted on _pessimistic_ principles. On reaching the cars
+again, another pleasant companion shortened the time with easy
+conversation. Not but that we dozed a little after the weary night; and
+the priest in the opposite compartment fell asleep over his morning
+prayers. But my new companion and I made our way through a shoal of
+general remarks to the _terra firma_ of a mutual acquaintance, in whose
+praises both of us grew warm. And at length we began to see marshes, and
+waters, and a fortress. "That is Venice," said the captain; and I
+replied with sincere surprise, "Is it possible?" For Venice, as
+approached by the railroad, makes no impression, presents no _coup
+d'oeil_. And this marks a precaution for which the devisers of
+railroads in this country may deserve praise. Being pure men of
+business, and not sentimentalists, they do not wish to find themselves
+mixed up with any emotions consequent upon the encounter of the sublime
+and beautiful. They cannot become responsible for any enthusiasm. And
+so, in their entrances and exits, they sedulously avoid the picturesque,
+and lead the traveller into no temptation towards stopping and lingering
+by the way. Of two possible routes, they, on principle, choose the more
+prosaic; so that the railroad traveller nowhere gets less beauty for his
+money than in this same Italy, the flower-garden of the world.
+
+The arrival even in Venice becomes, therefore, vulgar and commonplace in
+their management. And soon one gets one's luggage out of the clutches of
+guardians and porters, and cheaply, in an omnibus gondola, one swashes
+through a great deal of middling water, landing finally at Hotel
+Barbesi, where breakfast and the appliances of repose are obtained.
+
+We did not prudently devote this first day to sleep, as we ought to have
+done. The energy of travel was still in us, and we aroused ourselves,
+and went forth. The _valet de place_, with high cheek-bones, a fresh
+color, and vivacious eyes, led us on foot to the Place and Cathedral of
+St. Mark, the Ducal Palace, the Bridge of Sighs, and prisons of the
+condemned. We visited the great council-halls, superb with fretted
+gilding, and endless paintings by Tintoretto and Bellini. We saw the
+Lion's Mouth, into which anonymous accusations were dropped; the room of
+the Ten; the staircase all in white and gold, sacred to the feet of
+Doge and Dogaressa alone. As magnificent as is the palace, so miserable
+are the prisons, destitute of light, and almost of air--a series of
+small, close parallelograms, with a small hole for a window, opening
+only into a dark corridor, containing each a stony elevation, on which,
+perhaps, a pallet of straw was placed. Heaven forbid that the blackest
+criminal of our day should confront the justice of God with so poor a
+report to make of the mercy of man! In the dreaminess of our fatigue, we
+next visited a bead factory, and inspected some of its delicate
+operations. And then came the _table d'hote_, and with it a little whiff
+of toilet and hotel breeding, sufficiently irksome and distasteful. In
+the evening there was to be a Fresco, or procession of gondolas on the
+great canal, with lanterns and music, in honor of Prince Plomplon, who
+was at Danieli's hotel. Uncertain whether to engage a gondola or not, I
+sat in the garden balcony of Barbesi's, immediately over the canal. I
+saw the gondolas of high society flit by, gay with flags and colored
+lanterns, the gondoliers in full livery. Their attitude in rowing is
+singular. They stand slanting forward, so that one almost expects to see
+them fall on their faces. In the gondola, however, one becomes aware of
+the skill and nicety with which they impel and guide their weird-looking
+vehicles.
+
+The Fresco was to be at nine o'clock; but by an hour earlier the
+gondolas were frequent. And soon a bark, with lanterns and a placard
+announcing an association of artists, stopped beneath our balcony, while
+its occupants, with vigorous lungs, shouted a chorus or two in the
+Venetian dialect. The effect was good; but when one of the singers asked
+for a "_piccola bottiglia_" and proceeded, hat in hand, to collect from
+each of us a small contribution, we felt that such an act was rather
+compromising for the artists. In truth, these men were artisans, not
+artists; but the Italian language has but one word for the two meanings,
+contriving to distinguish them in other ways.
+
+The stream of gondolas continued to thicken on the canal, and at nine
+o'clock, or thereabouts, a floating theatre made its appearance--a large
+platform, brilliantly lighted, and bearing upon it a numerous orchestra
+and chorus. The _chef d'orchestre_ was clearly visible as he passed,
+energetically dividing the melody and uniting the performers. This
+lovely music floated up and down the quiet waters, many lesser lights
+clustering around the greater ones. Comparison seems to be the great
+trick of descriptive writing; but I, for my part, cannot tell what the
+Fresco was like. It was like nothing that I have ever seen.
+
+And I saw it in the intervals of a leaden stupor; for, after the
+sleepless night and active day, the quiet of Barbesi's balcony was too
+much for me. Fain would I have hired a gondola, have gone forth to
+follow the musical crusade, albeit that to homage a Napoleon be small
+business for an American. But by a new sort of centaurship, my chair and
+I were that evening one, and the idea of dividing the two presented
+itself only in the light of an impossibility. Roused by the
+exclamations of those about me, I awoke from time to time, and
+mechanically took note of what I have here described, returning to sleep
+again, until a final wrench, like the partition of soul and body, sent
+me with its impetus to the end of all days--bed.
+
+The fatigue of this day made itself severely felt in the waking of the
+next morning. Shaking off a deadly stupor and dizziness, I arose and
+armed for the day's warfare. My first victim was the American consul,
+who, at the sight of a formidable letter of introduction, surrendered at
+discretion. Annexing the consul, I bore him in triumph to my gondola,
+but not until I had induced him to find me a lodging, which he did
+speedily; for of Barbesi and many francs _per diem_ I had already
+enough, and preferred charities nearer home to that of enriching him. I
+do, moreover, detest hotel life, and the black-coated varlets that
+settle, like so many flies, upon your smallest movement. I have more
+than once intrenched myself in my room, determining to starve there
+rather than summon in the imps of the bell. With the consul's aid, which
+was, I must say, freely given, I secured to myself the disposal of a
+snug bedroom and parlor, with a balcony leading into a music-haunted
+garden, full of shiny foliage, mostly lemon and myrtle trees, having
+also a convenient access to the grand canal. After this, we proceeded to
+the Church of the Frari, rich with the two monuments of Titian and
+Canova. Both are architectural as well as sculptural. That of Canova is
+a repetition of his own model, executed in the well-known Vienna
+monument, with the addition, I thought, of a winged lion and one or two
+figures not included in the other. The monument of Titian stands
+opposite to that already described. The upper portion of it presents a
+handsome facade enclosed in three arches, each of which contains a
+bas-relief of one of his great pictures. The middle one presents the
+Assumption, in sculpture; that on the right the Entombment of Christ;
+that on the left the St. Peter Martyr--the picture itself being in the
+sacristy of the Church of Santi Giovanni e Paolo. The Frari also
+contains a curious and elaborate monument to a doge whose name I forget.
+Above sits the doge in his ducal chair; below, four black slaves clad in
+white marble, their black knees showing through their white trousers,
+support the upper part of the monument upon their heads. Two bronze
+Deaths, between the doge and the slaves, bear each a scroll in white
+marble, with long inscriptions, which we did not read. The choir was
+adorned with the usual row of seats, richly carved in black walnut. From
+this rich and interesting temple we passed to the Academia delle belle
+Arti.
+
+This institution contains many precious and beautiful works of art. The
+Venetian school is, however, to the Florentine much as Rossini's
+Barbiere to Dante's Divina Commedia. Here all is color, vitality,
+energy. The superabundance of life and of temperament does not allow the
+severer deliberations of thoughtful art. The finest picture of this
+school, the Assumption of Titian, is the intense embodiment of the
+present, an ideal moment that presupposes no antecedent and no
+successor. It is as startling as a sudden vision. But it is a vision of
+life, not of paradise. The Madonna is a grand, simple, human woman,
+whose attitude is more rapt than her expression. She stands in the
+middle of the picture, upon a mass of clouds, which two pendent cherubs
+deliciously loop up. Above, the Eternal Father, wonderfully
+foreshortened, looks down upon her. Beneath, the apostles are gazing at
+the astonishing revelation. All is in the strongest drawing, the most
+vigorous coloring. Yet the pale-eyed Raphaels have more of the inward
+heaven in them. For this is a dream of sunset, not of transfiguration.
+So great a work of art is, however, a boon beyond absolute criticism.
+Like a precious personality, its value settles the account of its being,
+however widely it may depart from the standard recognized in other
+things.
+
+In the same hall is the last work of Titian, a Pieta, or figure of the
+dead Christ upon his mother's knees. This picture is so badly placed
+that its effects can only be inferred, absolute glare and darkness
+putting out its light and shade. Far from the joyous allegro of Titian's
+characteristic style, the coloring presents a greenish pallor, rather
+negative and monotonous. The composition of the picture is artistic,
+tonic, and harmonious; its expression high and pathetic. The ebbing tide
+of the great master's vitality left this pearl on the shore of time.
+
+The Presentation of the Virgin in the Temple, by Titian, is another of
+the famous pictures in this collection. The Virgin is represented as a
+maiden of ten years, ascending the steps of the temple at Jerusalem.
+The figure and the steps are both of them seen in profile. Her pale-blue
+dress is relieved by an oblong glory which surrounds her from head to
+foot. More famous is a large Paul Veronese, representing Christ at
+supper in the house of the Pharisee. The richness of the Venetian
+costumes, the vigor and vitality of the figures, give this picture its
+great charm. It is no nearer to Christ and Jerusalem "than I to
+Hercules." A large painting by a French artist, in this hall, replaces
+the great Paul Veronese taken to Paris by Napoleon I.,--the Cena,--and,
+to my mind, replaces it very poorly. The huge paintings of Tintoretto
+are among the things that amaze one in Venice. How one hand, guided by
+one brain, could, in any average human life, have covered such enormous
+spaces of canvas, is a problem and a puzzle. The paintings themselves
+are full of vigor, color, and variety. But one naturally values them
+less on account of their great number. Of course, in the style of
+Raphael or Perugino, a single life could not have produced half of them.
+The Venetian school is sketchy, and its figures often have more toilet
+than anatomy.
+
+I am almost ashamed to speak of these pictures at all, since I speak of
+them so inadequately. Yet, gentle reader, all is not criticism that
+criticises, all is not enthusiasm that admires. Copious treatises are
+written on these subjects by people who know as little of them as is
+possible for a person of average education. Americans have especially to
+learn that a general tolerable intelligence does not give a man special
+knowledge in matters of art. Among the herd of trans-Atlantic travellers
+who yearly throng these galleries, they know most who pretend least to
+know.
+
+A brief interval of rest and dinner enabled us to visit the Armenian
+Convent at San Lazzaro. For this excursion two rowers were requisite.
+Starting at five P. M., we reached the convent in half an hour. It
+stands upon an island which its walls and enclosures fill. The porter
+opens to us. We have a letter of introduction from Ex-Consul Howills to
+Padre Giacomo, and bring also a presentation copy of the late consul's
+work on Venice. The padre receives us with courteous gravity. We make
+acquaintance with his monkey before we make acquaintance with him. The
+monkey leaps on the neophyte's hat, tears off a waxen berry, and eats
+it. His master thoughtfully leads us through the dreamy rooms and
+passages of the convent. Here is the room that Byron occupied; here is
+his name, written in Armenian in his own hand. Here also is Prince
+Plonplon's name, written by him in the book of illustrious visitors.
+After showing it, the padre offers another book, for commonplace
+visitors, in which he invites me to enter my name: I humbly comply. We
+visit the chapel, which is handsome, and the pleasant garden. The
+printing establishment interests us most. These Armenian fathers are
+great polyglots, and print books in a variety of languages. Padre
+Giacomo, who speaks good English, shows us an Armenian translation of
+Napoleon's Life of Julius Caesar, which we are surprised and rather
+sorry to see. We afterwards hear it suggested that the expense of this
+work has probably been borne by the French emperor himself, with a view
+to the Eastern question. Among the antiquities of the convent we find a
+fine Armenian manuscript of the fourth century; among its modern
+curiosities, a book of prayers in thirty languages. In the refectory is
+a pulpit, from which one monk reads aloud, while the others dine.
+Connected with this convent is a college for the education of Armenian
+youths, either for the priesthood or for active life. Another
+institution, in Venice proper, receives from this those scholars who
+decide upon an ecclesiastical profession. Padre Giacomo had already
+bought Consul Howill's book for the convent library. He led us, lastly,
+into a small room, in which are kept the publications of the convent, to
+be sold for its benefit. Here we made a few purchases, and took leave,
+trusting to see Padre Giacomo again.
+
+One of my earliest acts in Venice, after the first preliminaries of
+living, was to get from a circulating library the first volume of Mr.
+Ruskin's Stones of Venice. I have never been a reader of Mr. Ruskin, and
+my position towards him is that of an outside unbeliever. I shun his
+partisans and disbelieve his theories. The title of this book, however,
+seemed to promise a key to the architectural mysteries of the mirror
+city, and I, taking him at his word, reached out eagerly after the same.
+But Mr. Ruskin's key opens a great many preliminary doors before
+admitting you to the point desired, and my one busy week was far too
+short to follow the intricacies of his persuasions. I could easily see
+that the book, right or wrong, would add to the pleasure and interest of
+investigating the city. Mr. Ruskin is an author who gives to his readers
+a great deal of thought and of study. His very positive mode of
+statement has this advantage; it sums up one side of the matter so
+exhaustively as to make comparatively easy the construction of the
+opposite argument, and the final decision between the two. Yet, while
+the writer's zeal and genius lead us to follow his reasonings with
+interest, and often with pleasure, his judgment scarcely possesses that
+weight and impartiality which would lead us to acquiesce in his
+decisions. Those who fully yield to his individual charm adopt and
+follow his opinions to all extremes. This already shows his power. But
+they scarcely become as wise as do those who resist, and having fully
+heard him, continue to observe and to think for themselves. And as, in
+Coleridge's well-known lines, anxiety is expressed as to the human
+agency that can cleanse the River Rhine when that river has cleansed the
+city of Cologne, we must confess that our expectations always desire the
+man who shall criticise Mr. Ruskin, when he has criticised to his full
+extent. For there is one person whom he cannot criticise, and that is
+himself. To do this would involve a deliberation of thought, an
+exactness of style, to which even Mr. Ruskin cannot pretend.
+
+With his help, however, I did observe the two granite columns in the
+Piazzetta, to whose shafts he gives fifteen feet of circumference, and
+to their octagonal bases fifty-six, a discrepancy exceeding the
+difference which the eye would measure. But he certainly ought to know.
+And I found also the columns brought from St. Jean d'Acre, which are, as
+he does not mention, square, and of a dark marble, with Oriental
+capitals and adornments. And I sought out, in the church of SS. Giov. e
+Paolo, two dogal monuments, of which he praises one and criticises the
+other with stress. The one praised is that of Doge Mocenigo; the other,
+that of Doge Vendramin. I did not find in either a significance to
+warrant the extensive notice he gives them. Having learned, with great
+satisfaction, that the artist of the monument which "dislikes" him was
+afterwards exiled from Venice for forgery, he proceeds to speak of "this
+forger's work," allowing no benefit of doubt. And this was my account
+with Mr. Ruskin, so far as the Stones of Venice are concerned; for time
+so shortened, and objects so multiplied, that I was constrained
+thereafter to dispense with his complicated instruments of vision, and
+to look at things simply with my own eyes.
+
+We made various visits to the Cathedral of San Marco, whose mosaic
+saints, on gold backgrounds, greet you in the portico with delight. The
+church is very rich in objects of art and in antiquities. It has columns
+from Palestine, dogal monuments, tessellated pavements, in endless
+variety. But the mosaics in the sacristy were for me its richest
+treasure. They comprise the conscientious labors mentioned by George
+Sand, in her Maitres Mosaistes. The easy arch of the ceiling allows one
+to admire them without the painful straining usually entailed by the
+study of fresco or other ceiling adornment. In a small chapel we were
+shown a large baptismal font brought from Palestine, and the very stone
+on which John Baptist's head was cut off!
+
+We went in, one Sunday, hoping to see the famous _palle d'oro_, an
+altar-covering in massive gold, exhibited only on rare Festas, of which
+this day was one. But while we wedged ourselves in among the crowd, one
+of our party descried a boy with the pustules of small pox still fresh
+upon his face. We fled in precipitation, marvelling at the sanitary
+negligence which allows such exposures to take place at the public risk.
+
+We visited the Church of the Scalzi (Barefooted Friars), and found it
+very rich in African and other marbles. It boasts some splendid columns
+of _nero antico_. One of the side chapels has four doors executed in
+Oriental alabaster, together with simulated hangings in _rosso antico_,
+the fringe being carved in _giallo_. Another was adorned with oval slabs
+of jasper, very beautiful in color and in polish. The ceiling, painted
+in fresco by Tiepolo, was full of light and airy grace.
+
+From this, we went to the Church of the Gesuiti, in high repute for the
+richness of its adornments. We found it a basilica, its sides divided by
+square piers, and the whole interior, piers and walls, covered with a
+damasked pattern wrought in verd antique upon a ground of white marble.
+The capitals of the piers were heavily gilded. The baldecchino of the
+high altar was dome-shaped, and covered on the outside with a scolloped
+pattern in verd antique, each scollop having a slender bordering of
+white marble. The baldecchino is supported by four twisted columns
+formed of small rounded pieces of verd antique closely joined together.
+The pulpit has a heavy marble drapery, with simulated fringe, all in the
+pattern already mentioned. The whole is more luxurious than beautiful.
+Its art bears no proportion to its expense. To those who think of the
+Jesuits in general as I do, it will hardly stand as a monument of
+saintly service and simplicity. Near the high altar rest the ashes of
+the last Doge of Venice. The spot is designated by a simple slab,
+forming part of the pavement. On it is written, "_AEternitate suoe
+Manini cineres_."
+
+We visited two very good collections of antiquities, in one of which we
+found the door of the Bucentaur, and its banner of crimson silk, with
+gilded designs. Here were portraits of doges, curious arms, majolicas,
+and old Venetian glass, much finer than that of the present day. Here
+also are collected many relics of Canova, the most interesting of which
+are the small designs for his great works. Over the door of this museum
+stands a pathetic inscription to the effect that Michel Correr,
+"_vedendo cadere la patria_" had collected here many things of patriotic
+and historical interest.
+
+But these prosaic recounts are only the record of actual steps. The
+charm, the delight of Venice they do not and cannot express. My
+recollections of the city invest her with a solemn and stately
+personality. I did not see her bowed beneath the Austrian yoke,
+betrayed, but not sold, refusing to be cajoled and comforted. That
+cloud was removed. The shops were busy and prosperous, the streets
+thronged with people, the canals gay with gondolas, bearing also barges
+and large and small boats of very various patterns. The Piazza was
+filled at night with social groups of people, less childish, methought,
+than other Italians, and with a more visible purpose in them. Still, the
+contrast of the past and present, no longer shameful and agonizing, was
+full of melancholy. Venice can never be what she has been. The present
+world has no room for a repetition of her former career. But she can be
+a prosperous and happy Christian commonwealth, with her offices and
+dignities vested in her own sons, with education and political rights
+secured to all her children. And this is better, in the present day,
+than to be the tyrant of one half of the world, the fear and admiration
+of the other. For Peace, now, with open hands, bestows the blessings
+which War formerly compelled with iron grasp and frowning brow. The true
+compulsion now is to compel the world to have need of you, by the
+excellence of your service. Industry has a deeper mine of wealth than
+piracy or plunder can ever open. A man's success is in strict proportion
+to his use; and the servant of all is the master of all. So the new
+Venice for which I look is to be no more like the old Venice than the
+new Jerusalem will be like the city of David. Moral grandeur must make
+her great. Justice must make her people happy. And so beautiful and
+delightful is she, that I cannot help echoing the Psalmist's
+exclamation, "Pray for the peace of Jerusalem! They shall prosper who
+love thee!"
+
+A wash of waters, a play of lights, a breeze that cools like the
+perfumed water of the Narguile, a constant interchange of accents
+musically softened from the soft Italian itself, which seems hard in
+comparison with them; rows of palaces that have swallowed their own
+story; churches modelled upon the water like wax-flowers upon a mirror;
+balconies with hangings of yellow-brown and white; dark canals, that
+suggest easy murders and throwing over of victims; music on the water;
+robust voices, of well-defined character; columns and arches, over which
+Mr. Ruskin raves, and which for him are significant of religion or
+irreligion; resolute-looking men and women; a world of history and
+legend which he who has to live in to-day can scarcely afford time to
+decipher,--this is Venice as I have seen her, and would see her again.
+Rejoice, O sister cities, that she is free. Visit her with your golden
+rain, O travellers; with your golden sympathy, O poets! Enrich her,
+commerce! Protect her, Christian faith of nations, for she is
+free--free!
+
+To me she is already a recollection. For after the days of which I have
+so briefly told, a far summons carried me to an elder land, a more
+mournful mystery. Looking, but not loving my last, I packed the
+wearisome trunk, paid for the nights and dinners, owing little else at
+my lodging. A certain nightingale, who, at eight precisely every
+morning, broke in upon my slumbers with delicious singing, did not
+figure in the bill. But remembering his priceless song, I almost regret
+my objections to certain items set down in the account against me. And I
+had a last row in the gondola, and a last ice in the Piazzetta, and,
+last of all, a midnight embarkation on board the Austrian steamer for
+Trieste. Farewell, Sebastiano, my trusty gondolier. I shall not hear you
+cry, "Oh, juine" (giovine) again. I see the line of the Piazzetta,
+defined by the lamps. Brightly may they burn; glad be the hearts that
+beat near them. And now they are all out of sight, and the one outside
+light is disappearing, too. Farewell, wonderful Venice. Thou wert
+painfully gotten together, no doubt, like other dwelling-places of man.
+Thou camest of toiling and moiling, planning, digging, and
+stone-breaking. But thou lookest to have risen from the waters like a
+dream. And this wholeness of effect makes thee a great work of art, not
+henceforth to be plundered by the powerful ones of the earth, but to be
+cherished by the lovers of beauty, studied by the lovers of art.
+
+I will return upon my steps to mention one feature in the new Venice, a
+small and obscure one, whose significance greatly interested me. Having
+heard of a Protestant Italian congregation in the neighborhood of one of
+the great Catholic temples, I turned my steps one evening towards one of
+its meetings, and found, in a large upper chamber, a numerous assemblage
+of Italians of various grades, chiefly people of the poorer class, who
+listened with attention to a fervent address from a young clergyman of
+their own nation. The discourse had much of the spirit of religion,
+little of its technic, and was thereby, I thought, the better adapted
+to the feeling of the congregation. A sprinkling of well-dressed men was
+observable. A prayer followed the discourse, in which the auditors
+joined with a hearty amen. This little kernel of Protestantism, dropped
+in a field so new, gave me the assurance of the presence of one of the
+most important elements in the progress and prosperity of any state, to
+wit, that of religious liberty.
+
+It is quite true that the sects under whose protection the Protestant
+Venetian church has sprung up--the Scotch and Swiss Presbyterians--can
+in no sense be considered as exponents of liberal ideas in religion.
+Calvinism, _per se_, is as absolute as Catholicism, and as cruel. The
+Calvinistic hell is but an adjourned Inquisition, in which
+controversialists have as great satisfaction in tormenting the souls of
+their opponents as Torquemada had in tormenting their bodies. Yet
+Calvinism itself is a rough and barbaric symbolization of great truths
+which the discipline of Catholicism tended ever more and more to
+distance from the efficient lives of men. The principle of individual
+responsibility, the impossibility of moral action without religious
+liberty, the inward character of religious acts and experiences, in
+contradistinction to the precepts and practice of a religion which had
+become all form, all observance. These ideas, gathered together by a
+vigorous mind, and made efficient by the constitution of a sect or
+party, were capable of regenerating modern Europe, and did so. For it
+will be found that all of its Protestant piety ran within the bounds of
+this somewhat narrow channel. But even here, the liberalizing
+influences of time are irresistible, and although the cruel and
+insufficient doctrines are still subscribed to by zealous millions, the
+practice and culture of the church itself become more and more liberal.
+The zeal for propagandism, which characterizes the less tolerant portion
+of the Protestant sects, makes their ministration on new ground
+efficient and valuable. The material hell, from which, in good faith,
+they seek to deliver those who hear them, symbolizes the infinite danger
+and loss to man of a life passed without the impulses and restraints of
+religion. A more philosophic statement would be far less tangible to the
+minds alike of teacher and disciple. Their intervention in communities
+characterized by a low grade of religious culture is therefore useful,
+perhaps indispensable. And while I value and prize my own religious
+connections beyond aught else, I am thankful to the American missions
+that support Waldense preaching in Italy. They at least teach that a man
+is to think for himself, pray for himself; and their worship, even when
+rudest and most uncultured, is more an instruction of the multitude than
+a propitiation of the infinite love which is always ready to do for us
+more and better than we can ask.
+
+So, little Protestant congregation in Venice, my heart bids you God
+speed! But may the love of God be preached to you rather than the
+torment of fear, and may the simplicity and beauty of the Christian
+doctrine and example preserve you alike from the passional and the
+metaphysical dangers of the day.
+
+
+
+
+GREECE AND THE VOYAGE THITHER.
+
+"in a transition state."
+
+
+We have left Venice. We have passed an intolerable night on board the
+Austrian steamer, whose state-rooms are without air, its cabin without
+quiet, and its deck without shelter. So inconvenient a transport, in
+these days of steamboat luxury, makes one laugh and wonder. Trieste, our
+stopping-place, is the strangest mongrel, a perfect cur of a city
+(cur-i-o-sity). It is neither Italian, Greek, nor German, but all three
+of these, and many more. The hotel servants speak German and Italian,
+the shop-keepers also. Paper money passes without fight or _agio_ upon
+the prices demanded. It seems to be par, with gold and silver at a
+premium. Much Oriental-looking merchandise is seen in the shop windows.
+The situation is fine, the port first rate.
+
+Our consul here, Mr. Alex. Thayer, is the author of the Life of
+Beethoven, already favorably known to the world as far as the first
+volume. The second, not yet completed, is looked for with interest. Mr.
+Thayer's kind attentions made our short stay in Trieste pleasant, and
+our transit to the Austrian Lloyd's steamer easy, and within thirty-six
+hours after our arrival we found ourselves embarked on board the latter,
+_en route_ for Syra, where we should find another Austrian Lloyd waiting
+to convey us to the Piraeus, the well-known port of Athens.
+
+Our voyage began with a stormy day. Incessant rain soaked the deck. A
+charming little upper cabin, cushioned and windowed like a luxurious
+carriage, gave us shelter, combined with fresh air--the cordial of those
+who "_coelum et animum mutant, quia trans mare current_." Here I
+pillowed myself in inevitable idleness, now become, alas! too familiar,
+and amused myself with the energetic _caquet_ of my companions.
+
+An elderly Greek gentleman, Count Lunzi of Zante, with a pleasing
+daughter; a young Austrian, accompanied by a pretty sister; an elderly
+Neapolitan bachelor,--these were our fellow-passengers in the first
+cabin. In the second cabin were eleven friars, and an intelligent
+Venetian apothecary, with whom I subsequently made acquaintance. The
+captain, a middle-aged Dalmatian, came and went. He wore over his
+uniform a capote of India rubber cloth, which he laid aside when he came
+into our deck-parlor for a brief sitting and a whiff of tobacco. The
+gentlemen all smoked without apology. The little Greek lady soon became
+violently seasick, and the Austrian maiden followed. The neophyte and
+the Austrian brother felt no pang, but the neophyte's mother was dizzy
+and uncomfortable. Count Lunzi and the Neapolitan kept up a perpetual
+conversation in French, having many mutual acquaintances, whose absence
+they found it worth while to improve. I blessed their loquacity, which
+beguiled for me the weary, helpless hours. We went down to dinner; at
+tea-time we were _non compos mensis_. The state-rooms below being
+intensely hot and close in consequence of the rain, we all staid up
+stairs as long as possible, and our final retreat was made in the order
+of our symptoms.
+
+The following morning brought us the sun. The rain was at an end, and
+the sea grew less turbulent. The day was Sunday, and the unmistakable
+accents of theological controversy saluted my ears as I ascended the
+companion-way, and took my place in the deck-parlor. Count Lunzi, a
+liberal, and a student of German criticism, was vigorously belaboring
+three of the friars, who replied to him whenever they were able to get a
+word in, which was not often. His arguments supported the action of the
+Italian government in disbanding all monastic fraternities throughout
+its dominions, giving to each member a small pension, and inviting all
+to live by exercising the duties of their profession as secular priests.
+Our friars had concluded to expatriate, rather than secularize,
+themselves, and were now _en route_ for Kaiafa, a place concerning which
+I could only learn that it was in Syria. They were impugned, according
+to the ancient superstition, as the causes of our bad embarkation and
+rough voyage. They were young and vigorous men, and the old count not
+unreasonably urged them to abandon a career now recognized as useless
+and obsolete, and to earn their bread by some availing labor. The circle
+of the controversy widened. More friars came up from below. The ship's
+surgeon joined himself to them, the Venetian siding with the count. The
+Neapolitan stood by to see fair play, and a good part of the day of rest
+was occupied by this symphony of discord.
+
+I confess that, although the friars' opinions were abhorrent to mine, I
+yet wished that they might have been let alone. Even Puritan Milton
+does not set a Calvinistic angel to argue with Adam and Eve concerning
+the justice of their expulsion from Paradise. The journey itself was
+pain enough, without the reprobation. As the friars had been turned out
+of their comfortable nests, and were poor and disconsolate, I myself
+would sooner have given them an obolus unjustified by theory than a
+diatribe justified by logic. But the old count was sincere and able, and
+at least presented to them views greatly in advance of their bigotry and
+superstition. While this conversation went on, we passed Lissa, where
+the Italian fleet was repulsed by the Austrians, during the war of
+Italian unity. Our fellow-passenger of the nation second named quietly
+exults over this event. He does well. Austrian victories have been rare
+of late. Of the day following my diary says,--
+
+June 17.--In sight of the Acroceraunian mountains and shore of Albania.
+Vessel laboring with head wind, I with Guizot's Meditations, which also
+have some head wind in them. They seem to me inconclusive in statement,
+and insufficient in thought, presenting, nevertheless, some facts and
+considerations of interest. At a little before two P. M., we pass Fano,
+the island in which Calypso could not console herself; and no wonder. At
+two we enter the channel of Corfu, but do not reach the shore itself
+until five o'clock. A boat conveys us to the shore, where, with our
+Austrian friends, we engage a carriage, and drive to view the environs.
+
+This is my first experience of Greece. The streets are narrow and
+irregular, the men mostly in European costume, with here and there a
+_fustanella_. Our drive took us to a picturesque eminence, commanding a
+lovely prospect. It led us through a sort of Elysian field, planted with
+shade trees, where the populace on gala days go to sip coffee, and meet
+their friends and neighbors. Returning to the town, we pass several
+large hotels and cafes, at one of which we order ices. I puzzle myself
+in vain with the Greek signs over the shop windows. Our leave of absence
+having expired, we hasten back to the steamer, but find its departure
+delayed by the labor of embarking a Turkish dignitary, Achmed Pacha,
+who, with a numerous suite, male and female, is to take passage with us
+for the Dardanelles.
+
+A steamer, bearing the Crescent flag at her mast-head, was anchored
+alongside of our own. Our hitherto quiet quarters were become a little
+Babel of strange tongues and costumes. Any costume artist would have
+gone mad with delight over the variety of coats and colors which our new
+visitors displayed. Those wonderful jackets and capotes, which are the
+romance of stage and fancy-ball attire, here appeared as the common
+prose of every-day dress. Every man wore a fez. I remember a handsome
+youth, whose crimson head-gear contrasted with a white sheepskin jacket
+with wide, hanging sleeves--the sleeves not worn on the arms, but at the
+back; the close vest, loose, short skirt, and leggings were also
+white--the whole very effective. He was only one figure of a brilliant
+panorama, but treacherous memory does not give me the features of the
+others.
+
+Our vessel, meanwhile, was engaged in swallowing the contents of the
+Turkish steamer with the same deliberation with which an anaconda
+swallows a bullock. The Turks and Albanians might scream and chatter,
+and declaim the whole Koran at their pleasure, the great crane went
+steadily on--hoisting bale after bale, and lowering the same into our
+hold. This household stuff consisted principally of rugs and bedding,
+with trunks, boxes, and kitchen furniture, and some mysterious bundles
+whose contents could not be conjectured.
+
+The sight of this unwholesome-looking luggage suggested to some of us
+possible communication of cholera, or eastern plague. The neophyte and I
+sat hand in hand, looking ruefully on, and wondering how soon we should
+break out. But when the dry goods were disposed of, the transfer of the
+human merchandise from one vessel to the other seized our attention, and
+put our fears out of sight.
+
+Our first view of the pacha's _harem_ showed us a dozen or more women
+crouching on the deck of the Turkish steamer, their heads and faces
+bundled up with white muslin veils, which concealed hair, forehead,
+mouth, and chin, leaving exposed to view only the triangle of the eyes
+and nose. Several children were there, who at first sight all appeared
+equally dirty and ill-dressed. We were afterwards able to distinguish
+differences between them.
+
+The women and children came on board in a body, and took up a position
+on the starboard side of the deck. With them came an old man-servant,
+in a long garment of whitish woollen cloth, who defined their boundaries
+by piling up certain bales of property. In the space thus marked off,
+mattresses were at once laid down and spread with coverlets; for these
+women were to pass night as well as day on deck. Five ladies of the
+pacha's family at once intrenched themselves in one of the small cabins
+below, where, with five children, they continued for the remainder of
+the voyage, without exercise or ventilation. Too sacred to be seen by
+human eyes, these ladies made us aware of their presence by the sound of
+their incessant chattering, by the odor of their tobacco, and by the
+screaming of one of their little ones, an infant of eight months.
+
+When these things had been accomplished, our captain sent word to the
+pacha that he was ready to depart. The great man's easy-chair--by no
+means a splendid one--was then carried on board, and the great man
+himself, accompanied by his son-in-law and his dragoman, came among us.
+He was a short, stout person, some fifty years of age, and wore a dark
+military coat, with a gold stripe on the shoulder, and lilac trousers.
+His dragoman was a Greek. He and his suite smoked vigorously, and stared
+somewhat, as, with the neophyte on one side and the little Austrian lady
+on the other, I walked up and down the deck. The women and the old
+servant all slept _a la belle etoile_. The pacha and his officers had
+state-rooms in the saloon; the other men were in the third cabin. I
+forgot to say that at Corfu we left Count Lunzi and his amiable
+daughter, whose gracious manners and good English did credit to Mrs.
+Hills's excellent tuition, which the young lady had enjoyed for some
+years at her well-known school in Athens.
+
+When we came on deck the next morning, we found some of the Turkish
+women still recumbent, others seated upon their mattresses. Two of the
+children, a girl of ten years and a boy of twelve, went about under
+orders, and carried dishes and water-vessels between the cabin and the
+deck. We afterwards learned that these were Albanian slaves. The girl
+was named Haspir, the boy Ali. The first had large dark eyes and a
+melancholy expression of countenance; the boy also had Oriental eyes,
+whose mischievous twinkle was tempered by the gravity of his situation.
+The old servant, whom they called Baba, ate his breakfast in a corner.
+He had a miscellaneous looking dish of fish, bread, and olives. The
+women fed chiefly, as far as I could judge, on cucumbers and radishes,
+which they held and munched. Water was given from a brazen pitcher, of a
+pattern decidedly Oriental. Coffee was served to the invisible family in
+the small cabin. I did not see the women on deck partake of it. But from
+this time the scope of my observations was limited. A canvas partition,
+made fast to the mast overhead, now intervened, to preserve this portion
+of the _harem_ from the pollution of external regards. Henceforth, we
+had glimpses of its members only when a lurch of the steamer swayed the
+canvas wall far out of equilibrium. The _far niente_ seemed to be their
+fate, without alternative. Nor book nor needle had they. The children
+came outside, and peeped at us. Baba, grim guardian of the household,
+sat or squatted among his bales, oftenest quite unoccupied, but
+sometimes smoking, or chattering with the children. I took my modest
+drawing-book, and, with unsteady hand, began to sketch him in pen and
+ink. He soon divined my occupation, and kept as still as a mouse until
+by a sign I released him, when he begged, in the same language, to see
+what I had drawn. I next tried to get a _croquis_ of a pretty little
+girl who played about, wearing a pink wadded sack over a gown and
+trousers of common flowered calico, buff and brown. She was disposed to
+wriggle out of sight; but Baba threatened her, and she was still.
+
+Presently, the slave-boy, Ali, came up from the select cabin below,
+bearing in his arms an ill-conditioned little creature, two years of
+age, who had come on board in a cashmere pelisse lined with fur, a pink
+wadded under-jacket, and a pair of trousers of dirty common calico. He
+had now discarded the fur-pelisse. On his round little head he wore a
+cap of pink cashmere, soiled and defaced, with a large gold coin
+attached to it. A natural weakness drew me towards the little wretch,
+whom I tried to caress. Ali patted him tenderly, and said, "Pacha." This
+was indeed the youngest member, save one, of the pacha's family--the
+true baby being the infant secluded down stairs, whose frequent cries
+appealed in vain for change of air and of scene. The two-year-old had
+already the title of bey.
+
+"Can a baby a bey be?" I asked, provoking the disgust which a pun is
+sure to awaken in those who have not made it.
+
+We met the pacha at meals, interchanging mute salutations. He had a
+pleasant, helpless sort of smile, and ate according to the orthodox
+standard of nicety. On deck some attendant constantly brought him a pipe
+composed of a large knob of amber, which served as a mouth piece, and a
+reed some eight inches in length, bearing a lighted cigar.
+
+As we sat much in our round house, it was inevitable that I should at
+last establish communication with him through the mediation of a young
+Greek passenger, who spoke both Turkish and French.
+
+It was from the pacha that I learned that Haspir and Ali were slaves.
+The little girl whom I had sketched was his daughter. I inquired about a
+girl somewhat younger, who played with this one. The pacha signified
+that he had given the mother of his daughter to one of his men, and that
+the second little girl was born of this connection. The two younger
+children already spoken of were born of another mother, probably each of
+a different one.
+
+"O Christian marriage!" I thought, as I looked on this miscellaneous and
+inorganic family, "let us not complain of thy burdens."
+
+With us the birth of a child is the strongest bond of union between its
+parents; with the Oriental it is the signal for separation. No society
+will ever permanently increase whose structure rests on an architecture
+so feeble. The Turkish empire might spread by conquest and thrive by
+plunder. But at home it can never compete with nations in which family
+life has individuality of centre and equality of obligation. With Greeks
+and Albanians to work for them, and pay them tribute, the Turks are able
+to attain a certain wealth. It is the wealth, however, which
+impoverishes mankind, exhausting the sources of industry and of
+enterprise. Let the Turk live upon what he can earn, and we shall hear
+little of him.
+
+The women sometimes struggled out from their canvas enclosure, and went
+below on various errands. On these occasions they were enveloped in a
+straight striped covering, white and red, much like a summer
+counterpane. This was thrown over the head, held together between the
+teeth, and reached to the feet. It left in view their muslin
+head-dresses, and calico trousers, gathered at the ankle, nothing more.
+A few were barefoot--one or two only wore stockings. Most of them were
+shod with _brodequins_, of a size usually worn by men.
+
+At a late hour in the afternoon, Ali brought to their enclosure a round
+metal dish of stewed meat, cut in small pieces for the convenience of
+those whose customs are present proof that fingers were made before
+knives and forks. A great dish of rice simultaneously made its
+appearance. Baba chattered very much, Ali made himself busy, and a
+little internal commotion became perceptible behind the canvas wall.
+
+My opportunity of observing Turkish manners was as brief as it was
+limited. Having taken the Moslems on board on Monday, well towards
+evening, the Wednesday following saw, at ten A. M., my exit from the
+steamer. For we were now in the harbor of Syra. When I came on deck,
+soon after five A. M., the pacha sent me coffee in a little cup with a
+silver stand. It was prepared after the Turkish manner, and was fragrant
+and delicious. While we were at breakfast, Mr. Saponzaki, American
+consul at Syra, came on board in search of me, followed soon by an old
+friend, Mr. Evangelides. With real regret I took leave of the friendly
+captain and pleasant companions of the voyage. I shook hands with the
+pacha, not unmindful of the miseries of Crete. Baba also gave me a
+parting salutation. He was a nice observer of womanly actions, and his
+farewell gesture seemed to say, "Although barefaced, you are
+respectable;" which, if he really meant it, was a great deal for him to
+allow. Our luggage was now transferred on board the smaller steamer,
+which was to sail at six P. M. for the Piraeus, and the neophyte and
+myself soon found ourselves under the shelter of Mr. Evangelides' roof,
+where his Greek wife made us cordially welcome.
+
+
+
+
+SYRA.
+
+
+Mr. Evangelides was one of a number of youths brought to the United
+States, after the war of Greek independence, for aid and education. The
+latter was the chief endowment with which his adopted country returned
+him to his native land. The value of this gift he was soon to realize,
+though not without previous hardships and privations. After a year or
+two of trial, he commenced a school in Syra. This school was soon
+filled with pupils, and many intelligent and successful Greeks of the
+present day are among his old scholars. Besides methods of education, he
+brought from America a novel idea--that of the value of real estate.
+Looking about Syra, and becoming convinced of its inevitable growth, he
+invested the surplus of his earnings in tracts of land in the immediate
+neighborhood of the then small town, to the utter mystification of his
+neighbors. That one should invest in jewels, arms, a house, or a
+vineyard, would have seemed to them natural enough; but what any man
+should want of mere land scarcely fit for tillage, was beyond their
+comprehension. The expected growth was not slow in coming. Mr.
+Evangelides soon began to realize handsomely, as we should say, from his
+investment, and is now esteemed a man of wealth. His neighbors
+thereafter named him "the Greek Yankee;" and I must say that he seems to
+hold equally to the two belongings, in spite of the Scripture caution.
+
+Under the escort of my old friend, I went out to see the town, and to
+make acquaintance with the most eminent of the inhabitants, the custom
+of the country making the duty of the first call incumbent upon the
+person newly arrived.
+
+Unfurling a large umbrella, and trembling with the fear of sun-stroke, I
+proceeded to climb the steep and narrow streets of the town. We first
+incommode with our presence the governor of the Cyclades, a patriotic
+Greek, who speaks good English and good sense. We talk of Cretan
+affairs; he is not sanguine as to the efficient intervention of the
+European powers.
+
+We next call upon the archbishop, at whose house we are received by a
+black servant in Frank dress, speaking good French. Presently the
+prelate appeared--a tall, gentlemanly person in a rich costume, one
+feature of which was a medallion, brilliant with precious stones of
+various colors. His reverence had made his studies in Germany, and spoke
+the language of that country quite fluently. Tholuck had been his
+especial professor, but he had also known Bauer; and he took some pains
+to assure me that the latter was not an irreligious man, in spite of the
+hardihood of his criticism. He deplored the absence of a state religion
+in America. I told him that the progress of religion in our country
+seemed to establish the fact that society attains the best religious
+culture through the greatest religious liberty. He replied that the
+members should all be united under one head. "Yes," said I, "but the
+Head is invisible;" and he repeated after me, "Indeed, the Head is
+invisible." I will here remark that nothing could have been more
+refreshing to the New England mind than this immediate introduction to
+the theological opinions of the East.
+
+Other refreshment, however, was in store for me--the sweetmeats and
+water which form the somewhat symbolical staple of Greek hospitality. Of
+these I partook in the orthodox manner. One dish only is brought in, but
+many spoons, one of which each guest dips into the _gliko_ (sweet), and,
+having partaken, drops the spoon into the glass of fresh water which
+always follows. Turkish coffee was afterwards served in small cups
+without spoons. And now, not knowing what sermons or other duties my
+presence might impede, I took leave, much gratified by the interview.
+
+We passed from hence to the house of the Austrian consul, Dr. Hahn, a
+writer of scientific travels, and a student of antiquities. He had not
+long before visited the Island of Santorin, whose recently-awakened
+volcano interests the world of science. He told me of a house newly
+excavated in this region, containing tools and implements as old, at
+least, as those of the Lacustrine period, and, in his opinion, somewhat
+older. This house had been deeply buried in ashes by an ancient
+eruption, so violent as to have eviscerated the volcano of that time,
+which subsequently collapsed. The depth of ashes he stated as
+considerably greater than that found in any part of the Pompeian
+excavation, being at least thirty yards. Hewn stones were found here,
+but no metal implements, nor traces of any. Caucasian skulls were also
+found, and pottery of a finer description than that belonging to the
+Lacustrine period. He gave me a model of a small pitcher discovered
+among the ruins, of which the nose was shaped like the beak of a bird,
+with a further imitation of the eye on either side. Another small vessel
+was ornamented by the model of a human breast, to denote plenty. He had
+also plaster casts of skulls, arm and jaw bones, and flint saws, upon
+which he descanted with great vivacity.
+
+Dr. Hahn's courteous and charming manners caused me to remember him as
+one of the many Austrians whose amiable qualities make us doubly regret
+the _onus_ which the untimely policy of their government throws upon
+them.
+
+These visits at end, Mr. Evangelides took me home to dinner, where the
+best Greek dishes were enhanced by Samian wine. We had scarcely dined
+when the archbishop, followed by an attendant priest, came to return our
+visit. The Greeks present all kissed his hand, and _gliko_ and coffee
+were speedily offered. We resumed our conversation of the morning, and
+the celibacy of the clerical hierarchy came next in order in our
+discussion. The father was in something of a strait between the
+Christian dignification of marriage and its ascetic depreciation. The
+arrival of other visitors forced us to part, with this interesting point
+still unsettled. We next visited the wife of the American
+vice-consul--Mr. Saponzaki--a handsome person, who received us with
+great cordiality. After a brief sojourn, we walked down to the landing,
+visiting the foundery, where they were making brass cannon, and the
+_Acadi_, the smart little steamer given by the Greeks of London to the
+Cretan cause. She ran our blockade in the late war, but is now engaged
+in a more honest service, for she runs the Turkish blockade, and carries
+the means of subsistence to the Cretans. Here we met Mr. DeKay, a
+youthful Philcandiote of our own country. He had already made himself
+familiar with the state of things in Candia, and, like the
+blockade-runner, was serving in his second war, with the difference that
+his former record showed him to have been always on the side of
+Christian loyalty.
+
+Finally, amid thanks and farewells, a small boat took us alongside of
+the Austrian steamer, which carried us comfortably, and by magnificent
+moonlight, to the Piraeus.
+
+
+
+
+PIRAEUS--ATHENS.
+
+
+We were still soundly asleep when the cameriere knocked at the door of
+our cabin, crying, "Signora, here we are at the Piraeus." The hour was
+four of the morning, but we were now come to the regions in which men
+use the two ends of the day, and throw away the middle. We, therefore,
+seized the end offered to us, and as briefly as possible made our way on
+deck, where we found a commissionaire from the Hotel des Etrangers, at
+Athens. We had expected to meet here the chief of our party, who had
+gone before us to Athens. The commissionaire, however, brought us a
+note, telling of an accident whose fatigues did not allow him to wait
+upon us in person. We were soon in the small boat, and soon after in the
+carriage, intent upon reaching Athens. Pireo, as they call the classic
+port, is quite a bustling place, the harbor gay with shipping and flags
+of all nations. The drive to the Capitol occupies three quarters of an
+hour. The half-way point of the distance is marked by two rival _khans_,
+at one of which the driver of a public vehicle always stops to water his
+horses and light his cigar. Here a plate of _lokumia_, a sweetmeat
+something like fig-paste, and glasses of fresh water, were brought out
+and offered to us. Soon we came in sight of the Acropolis, not without
+an indescribable puzzle at beholding, in commonplace existence, one of
+those dreams whose mystical beauty we never expect to realize, and fear
+to dissipate. Now we drive through many streets and squares, and
+finally stop at a hotel in front of one of the prettiest of the latter,
+from whose door our chief issues to welcome us. With him is the elder
+neophyte, who has so far shared his wanderings, and latterly the near
+danger of shipwreck. Under her guidance we walk out, after breakfast, to
+look at the shops in Hermes Street, but the glaring sun soon drives us
+back to our quarters. We take the midday nap, dine, and at sunset drive
+to the Acropolis. On our way thither, we pass the remaining columns of
+the Temple of Jupiter Olympius, a Roman-Greek structure, the work of
+Adrian. These columns, sixteen in number, stand on a level area of some
+extent. One of them, overthrown by an earthquake, lies in ruins, its
+separate segments suggesting the image of gigantic vertebrae. The spine
+is indeed a column, but it has the advantage of being flexible, and the
+method and principle of its unity are not imitable by human architects.
+At the Acropolis a wooden gate opens for our admission, and a man in
+half-military costume follows our steps.
+
+We visit first the Propylea, or five gates, then the Parthenon. Our
+guide points out the beauty of its Doric columns, the perfection of
+their execution--the two uniting faces of each of their pieces being
+polished, so as to allow of their entire union. Here stood the great
+statue of Minerva Medica; here, the table for sacrifice. Here are the
+ways on which the ponderous doors opened and shut. And Pericles caused
+it to be built; and this, his marble utterance, is now a lame sentence,
+with half its sense left out. In this corner is the high Venetian
+tower, a solid relic, modern beside that which it guards. And worse than
+any wrong _denouement_ of a novel is the intelligence here given you
+that the Parthenon stood entire not two hundred years ago, and that the
+explosion of a powder magazine, connected with this Venetian
+fortification, shattered its matchless beauty.
+
+Here is the Temple of Victory. Within are the bas-reliefs of the
+Victories arriving in the hurry of their glorious errands. Something so
+they tumbled in upon us when Sherman conquered the Carolinas, and
+Sheridan the valley of the Shenandoah, when Lee surrendered, and the
+glad president went to Richmond. One of these Victories is untying her
+sandal, in token of her permanent abiding. Yet all of them have trooped
+away long since, scared by the hideous havoc of barbarians. And the
+bas-reliefs, their marble shadows, have all been battered and mutilated
+into the saddest mockery of their original tradition. The statue of
+Wingless Victory that stood in the little temple, has long been absent
+and unaccounted for. But the only Victory that the Parthenon now can
+seize or desire is this very Wingless Victory, the triumph of a power
+that retreats not--the power of Truth.
+
+I give heed to all that is told me in a dreamy and desolate manner. It
+is true, no doubt--this was, and this, and this; but what I see is none
+the less emptiness--the broken eggshell of a civilization which Time has
+hatched and devoured. And this incapacity to reconstruct the past goes
+with me through most of my days in Athens. The city is so modern, and
+its circle so small! The trumpeters who shriek around the Theseum in the
+morning, the _cafe_ keeper who taxes you for a chair beneath the shadow
+of the Olympian columns, the _custode_ who hangs about to see that you
+do not break the broken marbles further, or carry off their piteous
+fragments, all of these are significant of modern Greece; but the ruins
+have nothing to do with it.
+
+Poor as these relics are in comparison with what one would wish them to
+be, they are still priceless. This Greek marble is the noblest in
+descent; it needs no eulogy. These forms have given the model for a
+hundred familiar and commonplace works, which caught a little gleam of
+their glory, squaring to shapeliness some town-house of the west, or
+southern bank or church. So well do we know them in the prose of modern
+design, that we are startled at seeing them transfigured in the poetry
+of their own conception. Poor old age! poor columns!
+
+And poor Greece, plundered by Roman, Christian, and Mussulman. Hers were
+the lovely statues that grace the halls of the Vatican--at least the
+loveliest of them. And Rome shows to this day two colossal groups, of
+which one bears the inscription, "_Opus Praxitelae_," the other that of
+"_Opus Phidiae_." And Naples has a Greek treasure or two, one thinks,
+besides her wealth of sculptural gems, of which the best are of Greek
+workmanship. And in England those bas-reliefs which are the treasure of
+art students and the wonder of the world, were pulled from the pediment
+of the Parthenon, like the pearly teeth from a fair mouth, the mournful
+gaps remaining open in the sight of the unforgiving world. "Thou art old
+and decrepit," said England. "I am still in strength and in vigor. All
+else has gone, as well thy dower as thy earnings. Thou hast but these
+left. I want them; so give them me."
+
+Royal Munich also had his share. The relict of Lola Montes did to the
+temple at Egina what Lord Elgin did to the Parthenon, inflicting worse
+damage upon its architecture. At the time, the unsettled state of the
+country, and the desire to preserve things so costly and beautiful, may
+be accepted as excuses for such acts. But when Greece shall have a
+museum fit to preserve the marbles now huddled in the Theseum, or left
+exposed on the highways, then she may demand back the Elgin and Bavarian
+marbles. She will then deserve to receive them again. Nor could she,
+methinks, do better than devote to this noble purpose some of the
+superfluous extent of Otho's monstrous palace, whose emptiness afflicts
+the visitor with sad waste of room and of good material. Making all
+allowance for the removal of the Penates of its late occupants, it is
+still obvious that these two luxurious wrens occupied but a small
+portion of this eagle's nest. A fine gallery could as easily be spared
+from its endless apartments as are the public galleries from the
+Vatican.
+
+Nor should this new kingling and his Russian bride be encouraged to
+people such an extent of masonry with smart aid-de-camps, lying
+diplomats, and plundering stewards and _dames d'honneur_. For pity's
+sake, let the poor kingdom have a modest representative, who shall
+follow the spirit of modern reform, and administer the people's revenues
+with clean hands. A sculpture gallery, therefore, in the palace by all
+means, open to the public, as are the galleries of Italian palaces. And
+these marbles in the Theseum and elsewhere--fie upon them! Not only are
+they so crowded that one cannot see them, but so dirty that one cannot
+discern their features. "Are they marble?" one asks, for a thick coating
+of the sand and dust in which they were embodied for ages still envelops
+them, and can only be removed by careful artistic intervention.
+
+A little money, please, king and Parliament, for these unhappy ones. The
+gift would repay itself in the end, for a respectable collection of
+authentic Greek remains on the very soil in which they were found would
+bring here many of the wide-ranging students of art and antiquity. A
+little money, please, for good investment is good economy. Moreover,
+despite the velvet flatteries and smiling treasons of diplomacy, the
+present government of Greece is, as every government should be, on good
+behavior before the people. Wonderfully clever, enterprising, and
+liberal have the French people made the author of the Life of Julius
+Caesar. Wonderfully reformative did the radicals of twenty years since
+make the pope. And the Greek nation, taken in the large, may prove to
+have some common sense to impart to its symbolical head, of whom we can
+only hope that the something rotten in the state of Denmark may not have
+been taken from it to corrupt the state of Greece.
+
+
+
+
+EXPEDITIONS--NAUPLIA.
+
+
+A few days of midsummer passed in Athens make welcome any summons that
+calls one out of it. Majestic as the past is, one likes to have its grim
+skeleton a little cushioned over by the aesthetic of the present, and, at
+the present season, this is not to be had, even in its poorest and
+cheapest forms. The heat, moreover, though tempered by healthful
+breezes, is yet of a kind and degree to tell heavily upon a northern
+constitution. To take exercise of any kind, between ten A. M. and six P.
+M., is uncomfortable and far from safe. How delightful, therefore, to
+pack one's little budget, and start upon a cruise!
+
+For the government, we must confess, is very hospitable to us. Our chief
+veteran goes about to distribute clothing to the Cretan refugees, who,
+in advanced stages of nakedness, congregate in Egina, Syra, Argos, and
+other places, as well as in Athens. And he asks the government, and the
+government lends its steamer, the Parados, for the philanthropic voyage.
+So we drive down to the Pireo and embark, and are on our way. A pleasant
+little Athenian lady accompanies us, together with her father, a Cretan
+by birth, and a man who has been much in the service of the government.
+Our travelling library for this occasion is reduced to a copy of
+Machiavelli's Principe, a volume of Muir's Greece, and a Greek
+phrase-book on Ollendorff's principle. We have also some worsted work;
+but one of us, the writer of these notes, has added to these another
+occupation, another interest.
+
+Take note that the beds of the hotel at Athens are defended by
+mosquito-nets, which show, here and there, the marks of age. Take note
+that we close these nettings the first night a little carelessly,
+remembering Cuba, and expecting nothing worse. Take note that we neither
+wear gloves at night, nor bandage our arms and wrists, and then take
+note of what follows.
+
+A fiery stinging of needle points in every accessible part of your body.
+Each new bite is like a new star of torment in the milky way of your
+corporeal repose. These creatures warn not, like the honest American
+mosquito, rattlesnake, or bore, of their intended descent upon you. In
+comparison with their silent impudence, the familiar humming of our
+Yankee torments becomes an apologetic murmur, significant of, "We are
+very sorry indeed, but we cannot well do otherwise." This is the
+language of the dun--the Greek insect has the quiet of the thief.
+
+So much for the action; now for the result. You awake uncomfortably,
+and, provoked here and there, begin to retort upon your skin a little.
+Never was more salient illustration of the doctrine of the forgiveness
+of injuries. Let by-gones be by-gones; suffer the bites to rest. Ah! the
+warning comes too late. The fatal process has begun. At every touch you
+get worse, but cannot stop. You now realize what a good gift your
+Anglo-Saxon skin was, and so clean, and so comfortable! and it cost you
+so little! But just because it was so good, these foreign vermin
+insisted on sharing it with you. And you exemplify in little the fate of
+Italy and of Greece, which have been feasted on for ages, and cursed by
+the absolute mosquito for not continuing in perpetuity to yield their
+life-blood without remonstrance. This for the moral aspect of the case.
+The material aspect is that of intolerable pain and itching,
+accompanying a distinct suppuration of every spot punctured by the
+insect. For some days and nights the principal occupation of the writer
+of these notes was to tear the unhappy hands and arms that aid in their
+production. A remedy is casually mentioned--vinegar. Bandages dipped in
+this fluid, and closely wrapped around the suffering members, give
+instant relief, but have to be frequently renewed, the fever of the skin
+rapidly drying them. The sufferings of Job were now understood, and his
+eminent but impossible virtue appreciated. Even he, however, had
+recourse to a potsherd. Never were my human sympathies so called out
+towards the afflicted Scotch nation! Well, let this subject rest.
+Recovery is now an established fact. From the height of experience we
+can look down upon future sufferers and say, "This, too, shall pass
+away."
+
+But now, to return to the deck of the Parados. Scenery, worsted work,
+the Principe, and a little conversation caused the time to pass very
+agreeably. We took also the Ollendorff book, and made a short trial of
+its lumbering machinery. And we had _dejeuner_ on board, and dinner. And
+Georgi, the cameriere, had the features of Edwin Booth--the strong eyes,
+the less forcible mouth, something even of the general expression. At
+about 7.30 P. M., we made the harbor of Nauplia, otherwise called
+Napoli de Romania. The harbor being shallow, the steamer anchored at
+some distance from the land, whither its boats conveyed us. On the quay
+stood a crowd of people, waiting to see us. They had discerned the
+steamer afar, and had flocked together from mere curiosity. Something in
+the landing made me think of that portion of the quay at Naples which
+lies before the Hotel de Russie. Much of the present town was built by
+the Turks. The streets are narrow and irregular, and many of the houses
+have balconies. One of these streets is nearly blocked by a crowd. We
+inquire, and learn that the head of a brigand has just been brought in.
+For the brigands, long tolerated in some regions by usage and indolence,
+have now set foot in a region in which they will not be endured. The
+Peloponnesus will not have them, and the peasants, who elsewhere aid the
+brigands, here aid the _gens d'armes_. Upon the head of their leader,
+Kitzos, a large price has been set. But the head which causes the
+commotion of this evening is not that of Kitzos. Getting through the
+crowd at length, we come upon a pretty square, surrounded by houses, and
+planted with pepper-trees.
+
+Here is the house of the prefect, at whose door we knock, imploring
+shelter. Our Cretan friend, M. Antoniades, is well known to the prefect;
+hence the daring of this summons. The prefecture receives us. The
+prefect--a vivacious little man, with blue eyes and light hair--capers
+about in great excitement. He has to do with the war against the
+brigands, and joy at the bringing in of the head before mentioned nearly
+causes him to lose his own. His large _salon_ is thronged with
+visitors, who come partly to talk over these matters, partly to see the
+strangers. We, the ladies, meanwhile take refuge on a roomy balcony,
+where we have chairs, and where _gliko_ and cold water are offered to
+us. I make my usual piteous request for vinegar, and renew my bandages,
+while the others enjoy cool air and starlight. The prefect goes off to
+supper at nine, having first signified to us that his wife is occupied
+with a baby two days old, and cannot wait upon us; that his house is at
+our disposal, and that he will send out among his neighbors and obtain
+all that we may require. One of his visitors--M. Zampacopolus, a major
+of cavalry--promises to wait upon us at five in the morning, to conduct
+us up the steep ascent of the fortress Palamides. By ten o'clock the
+mattresses are brought. They are spread in a row on the floor, and we
+weary women, four in number, lie down and sleep as only weary people
+can.
+
+The summons that arouses us at five the next morning does not awaken
+enthusiasm. We struggle up, however, and get each a minimum of the
+limited basin and towel privilege. Descending, we find Major
+Zampacopolus in full uniform, and are admonished by him for being so
+late. He came for us at four o'clock; but the chief veteran would not
+suffer us to be disturbed. The sun had already risen, and the ascent
+looked most formidable. Invoking the courage of our ancestors, we
+unfolded the umbrellas and began. We had six hundred steps to climb, and
+steep ones at that. The labor caused such perspiration that at any turn
+commanding the breeze we were forced to shield ourselves, the sudden
+evaporation being attended with great danger. The ascent is everywhere
+guarded by loopholes for musketry, and could not be carried by any party
+of human assailants. There is, however, another route of access to the
+fortress, which may be pursued on horseback. It was by this latter path
+that the Greeks ascended during the war of independence. They took the
+fortress from the Turks, but were admitted within the gates by
+treachery. After weary efforts and pauses, we reach the plane of the
+main structure, which consists of a number of independent bastions in
+strong positions, commanding each other and the pass. It was built by
+the Venetians, and vouches for their skill and thoroughness in military
+architecture. The officers receive us, and accommodate us in an airy
+bedroom, whose draughts of air we avoid, being _en nage_ with
+perspiration. We cool by degrees, and enjoy the balcony. A pot of basil
+is offered us for fragrance, at which we smell with little pleasure. We
+are then told the legend of the discovery of the true cross beneath a
+growth of this plant, which circumstance consecrates it among Eastern
+traditions forever. In the mean time a functionary enters, and furtively
+carries away a small box. Not very long afterwards its contents are
+returned in the shape of a cup of delicious coffee for each of us, with
+a piece of the ration bread of the garrison. "This bread," said the
+major, "is made with the hands, as we know, for it is made by the
+soldiers; but the bread you commonly eat in Greece is made with the
+feet." Here was indeed a heightening of present enjoyment by a somewhat
+unwelcome disparagement of unavoidable past and future experiences. We
+now proceeded to visit the bastions in detail. Each of them has its own
+name. One is called Miltiades. The most formidable one is called Satan.
+The view from the highest parapet is very grand. We go about, wondering
+at the grim walls and the manifold openings for musketry. They show us
+an enormous cistern for rain water. The place contains several of these,
+and is thus capable of standing a very long siege. We pass an enclosure
+in which are detained "the military prisoners," whoever they may be. As
+a _bonne bouche_ we are promised a sight of the criminals condemned to
+death. These are kept in the strongest recess of the fortress. They lead
+us to it, and bid us look down into a court below, in which we perceive
+twenty-five or more unfortunates refreshing themselves in the open air.
+At the door and grated window of the prison behind them appear the faces
+of others. Stationed on a narrow bridge above stand the military guard,
+whose muskets command the court. These men have all been convicted of
+crimes of violence against the person. Sentence has been passed upon
+them, and its execution follows the convenience and pleasure of the
+officers of the law. At short intervals a little group of them is led
+out to endure the last penalty. "Do not pity them, madam," said the
+major; "they have all done deeds worthy of death." But how not to pity
+them, when they and we are made of the same fragile human stuff, that
+corrupts so easily to crime, and is always redeemable, if society would
+only afford the costly process of redemption. A sad listlessness hung
+over the melancholy group. Some of them were busied in preparing
+breakfast--coffee, probably. Most of them sat or stood quite idly, with
+the terrible guns bristling above them. They looked up in our women's
+faces as if they sought there something, some compassionate glance that
+might recall mother or sweetheart--if such people have them. One old
+brigand lifted his voice, and petitioned the officers that his single
+daily hour of fresh air might be extended to two hours, pleading the
+pain he suffered in his eyes. This was granted. Our guides directed our
+attention to a man of elastic figure and marked face--tall, athletic,
+and blond. All that they could tell us was, that there seemed to be
+something remarkable about this man, as, indeed, his appearance
+indicated. In his face, more than in those of the others, we observed
+the blank that Hope leaves when her light is extinguished. All days, all
+things, were alike to him now; the dark, close prison behind, before him
+only the day when one in command shall say, "This is thy last!" If the
+priest shall then have any hidden comfort to bestow upon him! Shade of
+Jesus, we will hope so!
+
+These men, however, go to death with bold defiance, singing and
+laughing. A rude sympathy and admiration from the multitude gives them
+the last thrill of pleasure. As I looked at them, I was struck by a
+feeling of their helplessness. What is there in the world so helpless
+as a disarmed criminal? No inner armor has he to beat back the rude
+visiting of society; no secure soul-citadel, where scorn and anger
+cannot reach him. He has thrown away the jewel of his manhood; human law
+crushes its empty case. But the final Possessor and Creditor is unseen.
+
+In our wanderings we catch glimpses of a pretty little garden, disposed
+in terraces, and planted with flowers, vegetables, and vines. This
+garden recalls to memory a gentle-hearted commandant who planted it,
+loving flowers, and therefore not hating men. It is a little gone to
+decay since he left it, but its presence here is a welcome and useful
+boon. After visiting its beds and borders, we take leave of the
+hospitable officers, and by rapid and easy descent return to the
+prefecture, where the breakfast-table is set, and where a large tea-pot
+and heaped dish of rice attest the hospitable efforts of our host.
+
+I have only forgotten to say that on one of the ramparts of the fortress
+they showed us two old Venetian cannon, both of which served in the last
+revolution; and further, that, in returning, passing through the old
+gate of the town, we saw sculptured in stone the winged lion of St.
+Mark, the valorous device of Venice.
+
+
+
+
+ARGOS.
+
+
+We found the prefect at the very maximum of excitement. Another telegram
+concerning the brigands, and yet another. Kitzos is closely beleaguered
+by peasants and gens-d'armes; he cannot get away. Another head will be
+brought in, and the country will be free of its scourge. With much
+jumping up and declaiming, our entertainer shared the morning meal with
+us. We feed the discontented servant, whose views of life appeared to be
+dismal, kissed the sweet-eyed children of the family, and, as a party,
+leaped into two carriages, leaving the prefect intent upon welcoming
+with grim hospitality the prospective heads of bandits, which did not
+hinder him from shaking hands with us, cordially inviting us to return
+to the shelter of his roof. But shelter was not for us under any roof,
+save the ambulating cover of the carriage. We were now _en route_ for
+Argos. Our drivers were clothed alike, in well-worn bags of blue
+homespun, peaked babouches without stockings, and handkerchiefs bound
+about the head. The thermometer was ranging in the upper regions. Dust
+and overwhelming heat assail us. Stopping to water the well-flogged
+horses, we take refuge for a few minutes in a shady garden, planted with
+flowers, vines, and merciful trees with flat, not pointed, foliage. We
+sit around a tiny fountain, at whose small spouts the smaller bees
+refresh themselves on the wing. This sojourn is brief; our next halt is
+on the burning, dusty high-road, where the chief veteran says, "Tiryns,"
+and leads a very forlorn hope across thorny fields and stony ditches to
+a Cyclopean ruin--a side and angle of old wall, built after the manner
+so denominated, and so solidly that it outlasts at least three thousand
+years. We stand and consider this grim old remnant as long and as
+attentively as the fear of sun-stroke will permit. The veteran,
+however, leads us farther in pursuit of a cave in which, during the war
+of Greek independence, he was wont to seek shelter from sun and rain.
+This cave is probably one of the galleries of the ancient fortress; for
+that the ruin was a fortress, they say who know. It is perhaps twenty
+yards in length, and three in its greatest height; for it has a pointed
+roof, laboriously formed by the fitting and approximation of the two
+sides, no arch being then invented. The stones that form this roof are
+very large, rather broken than hewn, and are laid together with great
+care. Some of them are of very hard material. From these most venerable
+relics we creep back, under the deadly fire of the sun, to the carriage.
+The remainder of our drive leads across the plain of Argos, the "courser
+feeding," as Homer denominates it. We come in sight of its lofty
+Acropolis long before we reach the town, through whose narrow streets we
+drive, and after a brief pause at the prefecture, find rest and shelter
+in a private house.
+
+The proprietors of this house ranked among the best people of the
+place--_oi megaloi_, as the multitude naively denominate them. They
+received us in a large _salon_ without carpets, darkened by green
+blinds, and furnished with a mahogany centre table and chairs, all of a
+European pattern, with a cushioned divan occupying one corner of the
+room, according to the favorite fashion of these parts. The lady of the
+house wore a dress of ordinary figured jacconet, open at the neck, and a
+red fez, around which her own hair was bound in a braid. Her husband
+appeared in full Palicari dress, with an irrepproachable fustanella,
+and handsome jacket and leggings. They welcomed us with great
+cordiality, and bestirred themselves to minister to our necessities.
+Gliko and water were immediately brought us, together with the vinegar
+for my fevered hands. We next begged for mattresses, which were brought
+and spread on the floor of a bedroom adjoining. The four feminines, as
+usual, dropped down in a row. In the drawing-room mattresses were
+arranged for the gentlemen. We rested from 12.30 until 2 P. M., the hour
+appointed for the distribution of clothing to the destitute Cretans, of
+whom there is a large settlement at Argos. For I may as well mention
+here that our pursuit of pleasures and antiquities in the terms of this
+expedition was entirely secondary to the plans of our veteran for
+clothing the nakedness of these poor exiles. In his energetic company we
+now walked to a large building with court enclosed--a former convent, in
+whose corridors our eager customers, restrained by one or two officials,
+were in waiting. We were ushered into a well-sized room, in which lay
+heaps of cotton under-clothing, and of calico dresses, most of them in
+the shape of sacks and skirts. These were the contents of one or two
+boxes recently arrived from Boston. Some of them were recognized as
+having connection with a hive of busy bees who used to gather weekly in
+our own New England parlor. And what stress there was! and what
+hurrying! And how the little maidens took off their feathery bonnets and
+dainty gloves, wielding the heavy implements of cutting, and eagerly
+adjusting the arms and legs, the gores and gathers! With patient pride
+the mother trotted off to the bakery, that a few buns might sustain
+these strenuous little cutters and sewers, whose tongues, however active
+over the charitable work, talked, we may be sure, no empty nonsense nor
+unkind gossip. For charity begins indeed at home, in the heart, and,
+descending to the fingers, rules also the rebellious member whose
+mischief is often done before it is meditated. At the sight of these
+well-made garments a little swelling of the heart seized us, with the
+love and pride of remembrance so dear. But sooner than we could turn
+from it to set about our business, the Cretans were in presence.
+
+Here they come, called in order from a list, with names nine syllables
+long, mostly ending in _poulos_, a term signifying descent, like the
+Russian "witzch." Here they come, the shapely maiden, the sturdy matron,
+the gray-haired grandmother, with little ones of all small sizes and
+ages. Many of the women carried infants at the breast; many were
+expectant of maternity. Not a few of them were followed by groups of
+boys and girls. Most of them were ill-clothed; many of them appeared
+extremely destitute of attire. A strong, marked race of people, with
+powerful eyes, fine black hair, healthy complexions, and symmetrical
+figures. They bear traces of suffering. Some of the infants have pined;
+but most of them promise to do well. Each mother cherishes and shows her
+little beggar in the approved way. The children are usually robust,
+although showing in their appearance the very limited resources of
+their parents. Some of the women have tolerable gowns; to these we give
+only under-clothing. Others have but the rag of a gown--a few stripes of
+stuff over their coarse chemises. These we make haste to cover with the
+beneficent growth of New England factories. They are admitted in groups
+of three or four at a time. As many of us fly to the heaps of clothing,
+and hastily measure them by the length and breadth of the individual. A
+papa, or priest, keeps order among them. He wears his black hair uncut,
+a narrow robe much patched, and holds in his hand a rosary of beads,
+which he fingers mechanically. We work at this distribution for a couple
+of hours, and return to the house to take some necessary refreshment. We
+find a dinner-table set for us in one of the sleeping-rooms, and are
+cordially invited to partake of fish cooked in oil, bread, acrid cheese,
+cucumbers, olives, and cherries, together with wine which our Greek
+companions praised as highly stomachic, but which to us seemed at once
+bitter, sour, and insipid--a wine without either sugar or sparkle, dull
+as a drug, sufficient of itself to overthrow the whole Bacchic
+dispensation. Having enjoyed the repast, we returned to the Cretan
+settlement, and continued the distribution of the clothing until all
+were provided. The dresses did not quite hold out, but sufficed to
+supply the most needy, and, in fact, the greater number. Of the
+under-clothes we carried back a portion, having given to every one. To
+an old papa (priest) who came, looking ill and disconsolate, I sent two
+shirts and a good dark woollen jacket. Among all of these, only one
+discontented old lady demurred at the gift bestowed. She wanted a gown,
+but there was none; so that she was forced to content herself, much
+against her will, with some under-clothing. The garments supplied, of
+which many were sent by the Boston Sewing Circle, under the
+superintendence of Miss Abby W. May, proved to be very suitable in
+pattern and in quality. The good taste of their assortment gave them an
+air of superiority over the usual dress of the poor in this and other
+countries of the old world. The proportion of children's clothing was
+insufficient; but who could have foreseen that the Cretans would have
+had such large families of such little children? Finally, we rejoiced in
+the philanthropic energy of our countrywomen, and in the good appearance
+of our domestic manufactures. As we descended the steps, we met with
+some of the children, already arrayed in their little clean shirts, and
+strutting about with the inspiration of fresh clothing, long unfelt by
+them.
+
+We now went on foot to visit a fine amphitheatre in the neighborhood of
+the town, called by the ignorant "the tomb of Helen." The seats are hewn
+out of the solid rock, and occupy the whole ascent of a lofty hill-side.
+From the ground to the middle row they were faced with fine white
+marble. The remainder consisted simply of the stone itself, without
+covering. The division first mentioned is in better condition than the
+second, the marble incasement having protected the softer stone against
+the action of the elements. In front are some remains which probably
+represent the stage and its background. The extent embraced is
+unusually large; and as we sat in the chief seats and looked towards
+the proscenium, we wondered a little as to what manner of entertainment
+could be given to an assembly so vast. The ancient masks were indeed
+necessary to enable the distant portion of the audience to have any idea
+of the expression of countenance intended to be conveyed. But I should
+suppose that games of strength and agility, races, combats of wild
+beasts, would have been best suited to such an arena. To us it was
+sufficiently melancholy in its desertion and desecration--grass and
+thorny shrubs growing profusely between its defaced stones, the heavy
+twilight forming the background, while the stars that enlivened the
+evening were real ones, not their human symbols. As we descended,
+however, from our half hour of contemplation, we received notice of the
+incursion of busy western life even into this charmed domain. In a field
+hard by, a threshing machine was winnowing the Argive grain,--a thing of
+wonder to the inhabitants, probably an object of suspicion,--the
+property of a rich land-owner. Beggars are rare in Greece; but the Argos
+children followed us both to and from the amphitheatre with mendicant
+solicitations. They went thither under the plea of showing us the way,
+and pursued our return under that of being paid for the same. We
+endeavored to satisfy two or three of them; but, the whole troop
+following and tormenting, one of our companions appealed in Greek to the
+parents, as we passed their thatched dwellings. These called off the
+little hounds with threats of the bastinado. We reached the hospitable
+roof of our entertainers, first taking a lemonade at a little booth in
+the dark street. The mattresses were spread, the sick hands bathed, and
+we lay down to rest as we could, an early start being before us. A
+variety of insects preyed upon us, and made not very unwelcome the
+dawning of the early hour that saw us roused and dressed.
+
+But here I have forgotten to make mention of a fact which had much to do
+with our immediate movements at this time. The evening of our sojourn in
+Argos saw an excitement much like that which blocked the street in
+Nauplia. The occasion was the same--the bringing home of a brigand's
+head; but this the very head and front of all the brigands, Kitzos
+himself, upon whose head had been set a prize of several thousand
+drachmas. Our veteran with difficulty obtained a view of the same, and
+reported accordingly. The robber chief, the original of Edmond About's
+"Hadji Stauros," had been shot while sighting at his gun. He had fallen
+with one eye shut and one open, and in this form of feature his
+dissevered head remained. The soldier who was its fortunate captor
+carried it concealed in a bag, with its long elf-locks lying loose about
+it. He showed it with some unwillingness, fearing to have the prize
+wrested from him. It was, however, taken on board of our steamer, and
+carried to Athens, there to be identified and buried.
+
+All this imported to us that Mycenae, which we desired to visit, had for
+some time been considered unsafe on account of the presence of this very
+Kitzos and his band. But at this moment the band were closely besieged
+in the mountains. They wanted their Head, and so did Kitzos. We, in
+consequence, were fully able to visit the treasure of Atreus and the
+ruins of Mycenae without fear or risk from those acephalous enemies.
+Taking leave therefore of our friendly entertainers with many thanks,
+"polloi, polloi," we sprang again into the dusty carriages, and the
+sunburnt youths in blue bagging drove us out upon the wide plain to a
+spot where we were desired to dismount and make our way over a thorny
+and flinty hill-side to the spot in question. Such walking, in all of
+Greece with which I became acquainted, is difficult and painful. It is
+scarcely possible to avoid treading on the closely-growing bushes of
+nettles. To come in contact with these is like putting one's foot on a
+cushion of needles whose sharp points should be uppermost. Where you
+shun these, the small, pointed stones present difficulty as great.
+Creeping up from the plain, crying out for assistance and sympathy,
+beneath a sun already burning, we came to the entrance of the cave to
+which they give the name of the tomb of Agamemnon. This is an opening in
+the hill-side. Its door has long been wanting, but the formidable
+door-posts still remain. Two heavily-built stone sides support a single,
+horizontal stone, twenty-seven feet in length, by perhaps eight in
+breadth, and about the same in thickness. The door obviously swung open
+from the bottom; the traces in the stone-work make this clear. The cave
+itself is hollowed out from the height and depth of the hill. It is
+lined with large stones, carefully fitted to each other, and is in the
+shape of a rounded cone, whose gradual diminution to the top is very
+symmetrical. Here a small aperture, partly covered by a stone, admits
+the light. The perfection of the work in its kind is singular. From this
+outer chamber, an opening admits you to an inner cave, without light, in
+which they suppose the treasure to have been kept. This is much smaller
+than the first chamber, and, like it, is heavily lined with squared
+stone. A fire of dry brush enables us to distinguish so much; but our
+observations are somewhat hurried, for the chill of these interterranean
+passages, acting upon the perspiration that bathes our limbs, suggests
+terrible fears of an untimely end to be attained in some inflammatory
+and painful way.
+
+The outer structure, of which I have endeavored to give some idea, is,
+however, indescribable, and the manner of its building scarcely
+comprehensible in these days. It suggests a time whose art must be as
+far removed from ours as its nature, and whose solid and simple
+construction takes little heed of the passage of time.
+
+From the treasure of Atreus to the old citadel and gate of Mycenae, we
+pass, by a few painful steps, through thorns, stones, and dust. Here we
+sit and meditate, as well as we are able. Mycenae was in ruins in Homer's
+time. This gate and citadel go back at least to the time of Agamemnon.
+In one of the tragedies of Sophocles, Electra and Orestes meet before
+the gate of Mycenae, which we naturally suppose to have been this one.
+Its heavy stone masonry is surmounted by a curious sculpture, a
+bas-relief, representing two lions aspiring to a column that stands
+between them. The column is one of the ancient symbols of Apollo, and
+is met with in some of the coins of the period. Agamemnon, Cassandra,
+Clytemnestra,--this trio of ghosts will serve to fill up for us the
+ancient gateway. Of the city nothing remains save the walls of the
+citadel, the space within being now piled up and grassed over by the
+action of time. At the present day, this citadel would be of little
+avail, being itself commanded by an adjacent hill, from which artillery
+would soon knock it into pieces. The walls just mentioned are solidly
+built of squared stone, laid together without mortar. The briefness of
+our time hurried us away before we had taken in half the significance of
+the spot. But so it was, and we turned with regret from a mere survey of
+objects that deserve much study.
+
+We were now to find our way back to Nauplia, but our fasting condition
+compelled us to pause for a moment at a little khan, whose energetic
+mistress bestirred herself, with small materials, to make us
+comfortable. The morning shadow threw her window in the dark. We
+gathered around it, escaping for the moment the scorching heat of the
+sun. Near us a traveller on a donkey rested himself and his patient
+beast. The little woman had blue eyes and chestnut hair, bound with a
+handkerchief. She offered us cold fish, fried in oil, from her frying
+pan. Each of us took a fish by the tail, and devoured it as we could.
+Cucumbers were next handed to us. Of these we ate with salt, which the
+mistress strewed with her fingers on the wooden window-sill, together
+with a little pepper. Wine and water she dipped out for us, the one
+from a barrel, the other from an earthen jar. We had brought with us two
+large loaves of bread from Argos, which greatly assisted our pedestrian
+meal. The mistress rinsed the glasses with her own hands, not over
+clean. When we had eaten, she poured water over our hands, offering us a
+piece of soap and a towel. As we laughed, she laughed--we at her want of
+accommodation, she probably rejoicing in its sufficiency. We now
+returned to our carriages, and drove back to Nauplia, and through
+Nauplia down to the quay, where our boats were waiting for us. The
+remainder of the day we passed on board the steamer, reaching Porus at
+sunset, and going on shore to visit its fine arsenal, and narrow, dirty
+streets. In the arsenal, with other heroes, hangs the portrait of
+Bouboulina, the famous woman who did such good naval service in the war
+of Greek independence. She commanded a ship, and her patriotic efforts
+were acknowledged by conferring on her the style and title of admiral.
+
+From the roof of the arsenal we enjoyed a beautiful view of the harbor.
+The town, as seen at a little distance, has rather an inviting aspect.
+On a nearer view, it offers little to detain the traveller. We passed
+along the quay, looking at the groups of men, occupied with coffee or
+the narghile, and soon regained our boat and steamer. The Greeks, we are
+told, give Porus a nickname which signifies "Pig-city," just as our
+Cincinnati is sometimes called "Porkopolis." But the pigs in Porus are
+human.
+
+
+
+
+EGINA.
+
+
+We passed this night on board of the steamer, first supping luxuriously
+on deck, by the light of various lanterns fastened to the masts and
+bulwarks of the ship. The next morning saw us early awake and on foot to
+visit the Temple of Egina. The steamer came to anchor near the shore,
+and its boats soon conveyed us to land. We found on the shore two
+donkeys with pack-saddles, upon which two of us adventured to ascend the
+long and weary eminence. The temple is one of the most beautiful remains
+that we have seen. Its columns are of the noblest Doric structure. A
+number of them are still standing. His majesty of Munich and Montes
+robbed this temple, at some convenient moment of political confusion. He
+had a statue or so, perhaps several, and pulled down the architrave to
+obtain the bas-reliefs. Can we wonder that the Greeks do not punish
+brigandage after such royal precedents in its favor. A fine lion in
+marble, twenty feet in length, was taken from this temple, either by
+this or a similar marauding. The lion was sawn in three pieces, that it
+might be more conveniently conveyed by boat. But, being left over night,
+the peasants, in their rage, came and destroyed with their hammers what
+they were not able to protect. Here no diplomatic interference was
+possible, and the fact accomplished had to be accepted.
+
+This temple stands upon one of those breezy eminences so often selected
+by the Greeks for their places of worship and defence. It commands a
+wide view of the sea and surrounding islands. On the opposite island of
+Salamis they show you Xerxes' Seat, the spot from which he contemplated
+the land he intended to enslave. Here the inexorable veteran conceded to
+us a pleasant half hour, enabling us to survey the fine columns from
+various points of view, and to enjoy fully the beauty of their
+surroundings. Too soon, however, came the summons to descend. I again
+mounted the ass, but found my sideward and unsupported seat only
+maintainable by a gymnastic of the severest order. I yielded, therefore,
+this uneasy accommodation to one who might bestride the beast at his
+ease, being quite of the opinion of the Irishman, who, having been
+regaled with a ride in a bottomless sedan chair, said that, if it was
+not for the name of it, it was not much better than walking. In the same
+way I concluded that to be so badly carried by the ass was almost as bad
+as to carry him myself. We were soon on board and afloat again, and a
+few hours of sea travel, cherished for their coolness, brought us back
+to busy Piraeus, and thence to torrid Athens, where the great heats now
+begin. We had meditated a change of hotel at the time of our leaving
+Athens, and had contemplated a fine apartment at lower charges in an
+establishment opposite to our own. But our hitherto landlord was too
+much for us. He was down at Piraeus to receive us. The veteran yielded to
+his dangerous smile, and after a brief parley, implying a slight
+enlargement in accommodations, we found ourselves bagged, and carried
+back to the Hotel des Etrangers. Here the servants cordially welcomed
+us, and made us much at home. I regretted a certain beautiful view of
+the Acropolis commanded by the hotel opposite, but my view was outvoted;
+and we gave ourselves up again to the imprisonment of our small rooms,
+and to the darkness which is a necessary attendant upon summer life in
+Athens. And the gallant vision of the Parados, with its prow turned to
+the sea, and of lofty climbings, and monument-seeking wanderings, faded
+from all but these notes, in which so much of it as may live is
+faithfully preserved.
+
+
+
+
+DAYS IN ATHENS.
+
+    "As idle as a painted ship
+     Upon a painted ocean."
+
+
+O, there were many of them, each hotter and stiller than the other. All
+night we steamed and sleepily suffered beneath the mosquito-net. In the
+morning we arose betimes. We smiled to each other at breakfast, sighed
+at dinner, were dumb at tea-time. The whole long day held its flaming
+sword at our door. Sun-stroke and fever threatened us, should we cross
+the threshold. Visits were tame, and carriages expensive. For many days
+we sat still, doing little. This is what people call "being thrown upon
+one's own resources." But to those accustomed to active and energetic
+life it is rather a being thrown off from all that usually renders the
+passage of time pleasurable and useful. Even those dull days had,
+however, their distinctions. And, like a picture of our Indian summer,
+hazy, dreamy, and indistinct, so will I try to give a color picture of
+that unheroic time, in which we grew ungrateful for classic
+surroundings, forgetful of great names and histories, and sat and
+sewed, and said, "How long?"
+
+First, the little newsboys in the street who shriek, "_Pende lepta!_"
+calling the price of the paper for the paper itself. This music one may
+hear at any hour of the day when there is news from Crete, or when a
+steamer has arrived from England for the Cretan service, or when
+anything takes place that can motive the publishing of an extra. The
+veteran catches one day one of these curious little insects. He is
+barefoot, his hair is wild, his eyes are wilder. His extra is a single
+column, scarcely ten inches long; and over this he dares to make as much
+noise as if it were an issue of the New York Herald, or the Tribune
+itself, with white-haired Greeley at its back.
+
+Next, the funerals, starting always with music, and bearing flat disks
+of gilded metal, something in the style of the Roman eagles. At one time
+a mortality prevailed among children, and the little coffins were
+carried through the street, with mournful sounds of wind instruments. We
+saw several military funerals. In these the deceased is carried by hand
+in a crimson velvet coffin, bound with silver lace. A glass cover shows
+him at full length. The velvet cover that corresponds with the coffin
+itself is carried before in an upright position. The hearse, drawn by
+four or five horses, follows. Priests walk along, and chant prayers in
+the intervals of the music, which on these occasions is supplied by a
+full band. A body of soldiers also makes part of the pageant. Friends
+and relatives walk after, carrying the large cambric parasols so much
+in vogue here. As the cemetery is at some distance from the town, the
+hearse probably serves later for the transport of the body. But I from
+my window always saw it following in empty state. The friends all go to
+the church, where the prayers and orations occupy from one to two hours.
+The deceased is usually in full dress, and the countenance is often
+painted in white and red. The gilded symbols which are carried, and the
+wild tones of the wind instruments, give to those processions a somewhat
+barbaric aspect, as compared with the sober mourning of countries more
+familiar to ourselves. But there is nothing grim in the Greek funeral;
+it seems rather a cheerful and friendly attendance, and compares
+favorably with the _luxe_ of English burials, their ingenious ugliness
+and tasteless exaggeration of all that is gloomy and uncongenial to
+life.
+
+Next, the out-of-door life and music. The first is, of course, limited
+by the severe heat of the day. Eight A. M. is a fashionable hour for
+being abroad. You will then find the market thronged. You will encounter
+seated groups, who take their coffee or smoke their cigar. Many
+carriages drive past, conveying people in easy circumstances to Faleran,
+a small harbor three miles distant from Athens, where the luxury of
+sea-bathing is enjoyed. At nine A. M. the best of the military bands
+begins to play before the palace. I have their _repertoire_ pretty well
+in mind, having listened to its repetition for three weeks past. They
+play most of the airs from the Barbiere di Seviglia, the overture to
+Othello, and sundry marches and polkas. With the early morning period
+begins the crying of fruit in the streets. These cries proceed from men
+who drive before them donkeys laden with rude baskets, in which you see
+potatoes, tomatoes, small squashes, apricots, and other fruits. They
+stop at various doors in our neighborhood, and serve their customers.
+The maid-servants come out. From one of those doors issues with his
+nurse a little child, who is set upon the donkey's back, and allowed to
+stay there while the dealer supplies the houses in the vicinity. This
+little one wears a white cambric weed on his hat to prevent sun-stroke,
+after the manner of greater people.
+
+From ten A. M. to five P. M., the streets are quiet. After the latter
+hour the carriages begin again to roll, though the fashionable drive
+scarcely begins earlier than six o'clock. One drives to Faleran, to the
+Piraeus, or, if it be Sunday, to the Polygonon, where the band plays, and
+whither the regent, mounted on a well-bred steed, is sure to betake
+himself. This Polygonon is simply a several-sided pavilion, at a
+distance of a mile and a half from the palace. A crowd of people flock
+to it on Sunday afternoons, either in carriages or on foot, and all in
+their best clothes. At a little distance stands a small cafe, where
+lemonade and lokumia may be enjoyed, but no ince. The view of the
+Acropolis from this spot is a very pleasant one. But to return to our
+Athenian streets. Carriages are very dear in the afternoon, being in
+request for drives to the bath, which is taken either at Faleran or at
+Pireo. A visit to either place refreshes after the long, hot day. When
+you return in the evening, you see the streets and squares about the
+cafes thronged with people sitting at little tables and enjoying ices or
+coffee. The narghile, or water-pipe, is much in use here. At these
+tables one often sees it. The sacred herb basil, also, whose legend we
+have elsewhere recounted, appears upon these tables, growing in earthen
+pots. You will somewhere encounter the military band, which nightly
+performs in some stated place. But the cafe opposite our hotel has a
+band every evening, and our discussions of Greek politics and of Cretan
+prospects are frequently interrupted by strains from Norma, Trovatore,
+Traviata, and other late abortions of the muse. From this phrase let me,
+however, even in passing, deliver Norma. This statement carefully
+enumerates the external resources of Athens during waking hours.
+
+Within doors, besides our grave studies, we have visits. Many Greeks and
+Cretans wait upon the veteran, together with American consuls, and
+Cretan women bringing silks, laces, and stockings of their own
+manufacture, or petitioning for little special helps over and above the
+forty lepta per diem allowed to each of them by the committee. Some
+mysterious consultations are there, bent on merciful conspiracies and
+Heaven-approved stratagems. Omer Pacha and his army have surrounded the
+unhappy Island of Candia, and are tightening their folds like a huge
+serpent. The severity of the blockade is starving to death the women and
+children who are shut up in the towns, or hidden in caves and recesses
+of the mountains. England meanwhile feasts the sultan, and pledges the
+bloody toast of non-interference. How comfortable is the water-proof by
+which my Lords Derby and Stanley ward off the approach of any fact that
+might induce compassion or compel indignation! Sympathy at every
+entrance quite shut out, and at every appeal for mercy a fat English
+laugh, echoed by the House, which may make the angels weep. Smart Argyle
+keeps heart of grace against this squad of the heartless. He even takes
+the trouble to get facts from Greece from sources less poisoned with
+prejudice than the Times' correspondent.[A] And I am fain to believe
+that a Scotch Presbyterian may easily have more heart, brains, and
+religion than one who combines church and state with the betting-book,
+and, among all races, honors least the human race.
+
+      [A] It is only fair to state here that the Times'
+          correspondent, minus his Mishellenism, is a most genial,
+          accomplished, and hospitable person.
+
+Our war upon the Turks is a war of biscuit and of cotton cloth. We run
+every permissible risk to feed the hungry and clothe the naked, both of
+these terms being of literal application. Our agent lands his
+insufficient cargo, and before his errand is known, the moan and wail of
+the suffering ones break out from hill-side and cavern. _Psomi!_
+_psomi!_ for God's sake, bread! And here comes the sad procession. The
+merciful man is ashamed to look at the women; their rags do not cover
+them. Hunted are they and starved like beasts. But the sultan feasts in
+England well. O, brave and merciful hearts of men and women, be lifted
+up to help them. And O, noble people, poor and hard-working,
+unsophisticated by theories which make the Turk's dominion a necessary
+nuisance, and his religion a form of Christianity, do you come forward,
+and make common cause with Christ's poor and oppressed, whose faces are
+ground, whose chains are riveted, in his name.
+
+Last evening the veteran received his Cretan mail. The biscuits arrived
+safely. The letters which acknowledge them begin with, "Glory to the
+triune God!" They then invoke blessings on the American people, and
+fervently thank the veteran, who has been at once the provoker of their
+zeal and the distributor of their bounty. Such thanks are painful; they
+make us feel the agonized suffering to which our small largess gives a
+momentary relief. The Arkadi, our blockade-runner, after landing her
+cargo, took on board more than three hundred women and children, fleeing
+from the last extremities of want and misery. This morning appears at
+the door of our hotel a little group of these unfortunates--a mother
+with four small children, the youngest a little nursing babe. Bread we
+give them, and a line to the committee. We ask the woman if she would
+not go back to Crete. "O God! no," she replies: "the Turks would murder
+us."
+
+Before the letters came, last evening, we heard continual cries of
+"Pende lepta," betokening the issue of an extra. The servant buys one
+and brings it. The news from Crete is, that Mechmet Pacha has been in a
+measure surrounded by the Cretans. Our veteran shakes his head, and
+fears that it is otherwise. A little later come in some of our Cretan
+friends, together with one or two new faces. They are hopeful and in
+some excitement. In the midst of this arrives the Cretan budget, as
+before mentioned. Eagerly indeed are the letters devoured. But the
+veteran remains thoughtful, and not sanguine. And when we are alone, I
+find that he will go at once to France and England, jog the easy
+conscience of diplomacy, and appeal to the sense and sympathy of the
+people. I utter a hearty "God speed!" We had intended visiting
+Constantinople; but that is now given up, and scarcely regretted, so
+urgent is the need of doing all that can be done for Crete.
+
+
+
+
+EXCURSIONS.
+
+
+To return to matters purely personal. I must not set down the heat and
+monotony of long days in Athens without stating also the _per contras_
+of freshness and enjoyment which have been paid in by various small
+undertakings and excursions. First among these I will mention a morning
+meeting under the columns of Jupiter Olympius. A small party of us, by
+appointment, started at five A. M., and reached the columns, some ten
+minutes later. They stand quite flatly on a large plain, lifting their
+Corinthian capitals high in the blue empyrean. But this we have already
+described elsewhere. On this occasion we take seats in the comforting
+shadow, around a little table, and call for coffee, lemonade, and
+lokumias. The early morning is very beautiful. A company of soldiers
+goes through its drill quite near us. Presently its officers also
+retreat under the shadows, take chairs and a table, and call for what
+pleases them best. The regimental band plays an air or two, perhaps in
+compliment to the neophytes, who are of our company. We enjoy the unique
+scene and combination--the picturesque costumes, the beauties and
+associations of the spot. So rampant does this effort make us, that we
+determine to have a meeting in the Acropolis in the afternoon of this
+very day, of cloudless promise, like its fellows.
+
+We disperse and return home before the severe heat of the morning sets
+in; and this is well, for between the shade of the pepper-tree walk and
+the shade of the columns there is a long tract of sunny expanse. At this
+hour it is quite endurable; an hour later it becomes overpowering. We
+pass the day after the usual fashion. At six o'clock in the afternoon we
+do meet in the Acropolis, and hold poetic session in a sheltered corner
+of the Parthenon. She who was there invited to read her own and other
+verses felt an especial joy and honor in so doing. And we had
+recitations besides, and singing, and Bengal lights, which the fairest
+of moons put to shame. And we went home afterwards with great
+reluctance.
+
+We had three windy days in Athens, really of a cool and boisterous
+quality. We took advantage of one of them to visit Eleusis, where stood
+the great Temple of Ceres, famous as the scene of initiation into the
+Eleusinian mysteries, which formed an epoch in the youth of every Greek.
+The road to it leads through Daphne, the spot on which Apollo is
+supposed to have chased the classic nymph. The rose laurels (oleanders)
+still bloom on its somewhat barren soil. The way leads also by the sea,
+commanding a refreshing outlook on the same. A modern Albanian village
+covers the greater part of the space formerly occupied by the temple. As
+the day is Sunday, we find the inhabitants walking about in picturesque
+costumes, the men in embroidered jackets or goatskin capotes, the
+shoulder of the garment expanding into a wide, short sleeve; the women
+in narrow skirts, wearing long, narrow redingotes without sleeves, in a
+coarse white woollen material, with two rows of black embroidery down
+the back, between which falls their long, braided hair, tied at the end
+with a black ribbon. Some of them wore at the waist large girdle-clasps,
+composed of two disks of silvered copper, not unlike a belt ornament
+worn by ladies in our own country. We asked leave to enter one of the
+small thatched cottages. It consisted of a single room. The walls were
+neatly whitewashed. An earthen pot was boiling upon a fire of sticks. I
+saw no furniture except a low wooden chest, on which was seated an old
+woman, the grandmother of the family. Several young women occupied the
+hut with her; all had small children with them. They stood about, all
+but one, who sat on the floor in a corner, soothing a sick and crying
+child. Of the ruins of the temple a small angle only is exposed. It
+includes some square yards of marble pavement, fragments of pillars, and
+one very large and fine Corinthian capital. It shows, besides this, some
+remnants of masonry indicating a number of small chambers. Near it is a
+wall, piled up of large pieces of the finest Greek marble, roughly
+broken with a hammer--the wreck, obviously, of former walls or columns.
+The magnitude of the temple is marked by some stones lying quite at the
+other end of the village street: the space between these and those first
+mentioned would indicate a building of enormous extent. Much of its
+ruined material probably underlies the little village, and will scarcely
+be brought to light in these times. A small cabin adjacent is dignified
+with the title of museum. To this we were admitted by a custode, an old
+soldier, who has it in charge. The collection consists of a mass of
+small fragments, some of which formerly belonged to statues, some to
+architectural sculptures. We saw little to move the cupidity of the
+visitor, but tried to bargain for one relic less ugly than the rest; in
+vain, however. A Frenchman, not long ago, took from these ruins many
+valuable objects, marbles, and even jewelry; since which time the
+government has strictly forbidden these Elgin thefts. The custode's
+domestic arrangements amused me more than did his museum. There was one
+very poor little tin, in which he boiled his coffee; another, smaller
+and more miserable, held oil and a wick. He had gunpowder in a gourd.
+His bed was small and much dilapidated. A fragment of mat thrown upon a
+heap of stones was his only seat. Few beggars in America are, probably,
+so ill provided with the appliances of life.
+
+One of the women of the cabin I had visited followed me to the museum,
+and naturally held out her hand for "pende lepta." Yet beggary is very
+rare in Greece, and this petitioner asked in rather a shamefaced
+manner, pointing to the little baby on her arm. And this is all that
+there is to narrate of the expedition to Eleusis.
+
+Of a more stately character was the expedition to Kephissia. We started
+at seven in the morning. There were two carriage-loads of our party;
+for, in addition to the veteran's six-syllabled secretary, we were
+accompanied by an amiable Greek family, whose guests we became for the
+day. In the villages that surround Athens there are no hotels or
+lodging-houses of any description. The traveller perforce implores
+hospitality, and usually receives it. On this occasion our friends had
+asked and obtained the key of a large and sumptuous house at Kephissia,
+whose owners are absent. They had also secured the company of three
+_gens d'armes_, who galloped along the dusty road beside us. The drive
+at this early hour was cool and most refreshing. The only drawback to
+its comfort was the dust, which the foremost carriage could not avoid
+sending back to that which followed. We reached first the village of
+Maroussi, a pretty, shady little place, in whose cafe we saw a group of
+peasants playing at cards. The usual appliances, coffee and tobacco,
+were also visible. Here we stopped to water the horses. A handsome
+marble fountain, beneath a shady clump of trees, bears the names of the
+family who caused it to be erected for the public good. Shade and water
+are, indeed, the two luxuries of regions such as these. A little farther
+on, we came to Kephissia, and stopped at the door of the palatial
+residence that was to give us shelter for the day. We entered a hall
+paved with white marble, and ascended a marble staircase. We now found
+ourselves in a spacious set of apartments, well kept, and furnished
+according to the Greek theory of summer furniture. Roomy divans extended
+with the walls of each _salon_, of which there were three, opening one
+into the other. Tables and chairs there were; and, had the proprietors
+resided there, handsome Turkish mats would, no doubt, have variegated
+the bare floors. The chief _salon_ opened upon a balcony commanding an
+extensive view. The fresh wind blew to quite a gale, greatly raising our
+languid energies. On the walls of this apartment hung two
+portraits--those of the former master and mistress of the house. She was
+sumptuous in dark blue velvet, with a collar of Valenciennes lace and a
+fastening bow of blue plaid ribbon. Her fingers were adorned with rings.
+Her husband appeared in his best broadcloth, wearing on his head a red
+fez with a white under edge. He had begun life in a humble station, and
+had raised himself to great opulence by his own exertions. Something of
+the consciousness of this was expressed in his countenance, which was a
+good-natured one. He and his wife did not long enjoy the fortune so
+justly earned. They died almost before the house at Kephissia was
+finished, bequeathing its magnificence to two young nephews, also rich,
+but resident in Italy.
+
+The freedom of our day here made amends for the many days of hot
+imprisonment passed in the hotel at Athens. Breakfast was necessary on
+first arriving. We then surveyed the bedrooms and made arrangements for
+our midday nap. We found comfortable bedsteads of bright metal. The
+servants brought clean mattresses, and unrolled them for us. Water and
+towels we enjoyed in abundance. We then walked out to view the environs.
+And first our steps brought us to an enormous plane tree, under whose
+far-reaching shade the gossips of the village hold their daily meetings.
+The boughs of this tree, with the cleared space under them, formed a
+sort of rustic _salon_, cool and delightful even in the heat of the day.
+The unfailing cafe was near at hand; its chairs and tables were
+scattered about these rustic purlieus, and its servants waited for
+orders. Here our companions encountered various acquaintances from the
+city, who have come hither to pass the season of the great heats. They
+wore white veils on their straw hats, as is much the custom here, and
+had altogether the enfranchised air which city men are wont to assume in
+country retirement. Mail and public conveyance they had none. One of our
+party brought them letters, and took the answers back to Athens. We now
+went in search of the source of the Kephisus, called Kefalari. We found
+a deep spring of the purest water, very cool for these parts, and
+constantly welling up. So clear was this pool that one saw without
+impediment the smallest objects at the bottom of the water. There were
+waving trees beside it. We sat down, and drank, and rested. Our walk
+next brought us to a wine factory, and, as we entered to look at it, the
+sound of a grand piano, skilfully touched, arrested us. Our friends
+guessed the unseen artist, and knocked at her door for admittance.
+Entering, we found two ladies, mother and daughter, of whom the elder
+was the mistress of the musical instrument. The daughter, very young,
+but already married, bears the historical name of Colocotroni, her
+husband being the grandson of the old revolutionary chieftain of that
+name. These ladies own extensive possessions in this vicinity, and the
+establishment in which we were belonged to them. They have a large villa
+at some distance; but fear of the brigands induces them to be satisfied
+with the shelter of two or three rooms, divided off from the rest of the
+factory, in which they live in comfortable simplicity. The table was
+laid for their _dejeuner_ in a little arbor made of pine tree branches.
+Dinner they took at twilight, without shelter. They entertained us with
+the invariable _gliko_ and water, and, at our request, the elder lady
+gave us a specimen of her skill in dealing with the piano-forte. Madame
+Colocotroni speaks both French and English, and the books and pamphlets
+in her drawing-room had quite a cosmopolitan air of culture.
+
+After these doings, we returned to the great house, and sheltered
+ourselves in its shady rooms. Here reading, worsted work, and
+conversation beguiled the time until dinner was announced. The
+gentlemen, meanwhile, had retired to smoke and discuss political
+questions. The dinner was much too well-appointed for a country picnic.
+Our munificent entertainers had sent out their own valets and _chef de
+cuisine_. And so we had potage, and entrees, and dessert, with Kephissia
+wine, both white and red, of which I found the former much like a
+Sauterne wine, and very mild and pure in quality. One of the guests was
+an Asiatic Greek from Broussa. His politics were of the backward
+sort--those of the Greek Greeks were radical and progressive. The dinner
+arena developed therefore some amicable differences of opinion. He from
+Broussa gave me a few characteristic particulars of his life. When he
+was but a year old, his father chartered a ship, put much of his
+property on board of her, and sent therewith his children to be educated
+in Europe. After many years of absence, M. L. returned to Broussa, to
+seek some traces of his family. Such as remained of them had been
+compelled by the pressure of circumstances to adopt the Turkish
+language, and to profess Mohammedanism. Their Christian prayers they
+always continued to recite in private, but were fain by every outward
+expedient to escape the ill treatment which Christians receive in a
+country in which Turkish authority is dominant. He told me--what I hear
+strongly corroborated by other testimony--that the Turks had often cut
+out the tongues of Greek women, in order that they should not be able to
+teach their children either their own language or their own religion.
+Under these circumstances the gradual absorption of the race in those
+regions seems almost inevitable.
+
+An after-dinner nap and a ramble completed our experience of Kephissia.
+At sunset we started homeward, the carriages all open, the _gens
+d'armes_ galloping, the dust playing a thousand solid antics, and
+writing hieroglyphics of movement all over our garments and faces. We
+found the little village of Maroussi cool with the evening shadows, and
+the women and children with their pitchers gathered around the marble
+fountain. We ourselves came back to Athens in a cooled and consoled
+condition, and said at parting, commanding the little Greek we knew,
+_Poly kala-evkaristo_.
+
+
+
+
+HYMETTUS.
+
+
+It happened that the next day was fixed upon for a visit to Hymettus,
+whose water is celebrated, as well as its honey. A certain monkless
+monastery on the side of the mountain receives travellers within its
+shady courts, and allows them to feed, rest, and amuse themselves
+according to their own pleasure. We started on this classic journey soon
+after five A. M., carrying with us a basket containing cold chicken,
+bread, and fruit. We filled one carriage; a party of friends accompanied
+us in another. The road to Hymettus is hilly and difficult; and our own
+troubles in travelling it were augmented by those of our friends in the
+foremost carriages, whose horses, at an early period in the ascent,
+began to back and balk. As these horses, who go so ill, insist upon
+going first, and refuse to stir the moment we take the lead, it comes to
+pass that in some steep ascents they press back upon us, to our
+discomfort and danger.
+
+An anxious hour brings us to the convent, which stands at no great
+elevation on the side of the mountain. The sun is already burning, and
+we are glad to take refuge in the shady inner court of the convent,
+where we are to pass the day. Our friends of the other carriage have
+brought with them Hatty, a child two years of age, and Marigo, a little
+servant of thirteen. The latter has somewhat the complexion of a
+potato-skin, with vivacious eyes, and dark hair, bound, after the Greek
+fashion, with a handkerchief. A young brother follows on a slow donkey,
+which he belabors to his heart's content.
+
+The court just spoken of is a small enclosure, surrounded on all sides
+by whitewashed walls, of which one includes a small chapel, with its
+tapers and painted images. In one corner a doorway leads into a den
+which must once have served as a kitchen. It is roughly built of stone,
+with no chimney, its roof presenting various apertures for the issue of
+smoke. Here a fire of sticks is hastily kindled on a layer of stones,
+and the coffee, boiled at home, is made hot for us. A wooden table is
+allowed us from the convent, which we decorate with a white cloth and
+green leaves. Rolls, butter, hard-boiled eggs, and fruits, together with
+the coffee, constitute a very presentable breakfast. We have around us
+the shade of vines and of lemon trees. Our repast is gay. When it is
+ended, we amuse ourselves with books, work, and conversation of a scope
+suited to the weather. An Athenian Plato could discourse philosophy in
+the present state of the thermometer. We need it more than ever he did,
+but we cannot attain it.
+
+While we sit cheerful and quiescent, dodging the sharp sunlight, which
+slyly carries one position after another, sounds of laughter from the
+outer court reach our ears. This is a feast day, and in this outer court
+a company of Athenian artisans, of the Snug and Bottom order, are
+keeping it after their fashion. Following their voices, we come to a
+shady terrace, where some eight or ten men are seated on the ground
+around a wooden table, one foot in height, while two or three of their
+comrades are employed in cutting up a lamb newly roasted, spitted on a
+long, slender pole.
+
+The cooking apparatus consisted of two or three stones, on which the
+fire of sticks was kindled, and of two forked stakes, planted upright,
+across which the spit and roast were laid. While the two before
+mentioned were hacking the paschal lamb with rude anatomy, a third was
+occupied with the salad, consisting of cucumbers sliced, with green
+herbs, oil, and vinegar. Olives, bread, and wine completed the repast.
+As we stood surveying them, one of their number approached us, bearing
+in one hand a plate containing choice morsels of the roasted meat. This
+he offered to each of us in turn, with great courtesy. In the other hand
+he carried a rather dirty fragment of cotton cloth, which he also
+presented to each in turn, as a towel. We took the meat with our
+fingers, and ate it standing, in true Passover fashion. The doubtful
+accommodation of the table napkin also we were glad to accept. Having
+fed each of us, he presently returned with a glass and bottle of wine,
+which he poured out and offered, saying, "_Eleuthera, eleuthera_" which
+signifies "free, free." The wine, however, was a little out of rule for
+us, and was therefore declined.
+
+This man wore neither coat nor shoes, but his manners were full dress.
+His comrades, meanwhile, had fallen to attacking their provisions with a
+hearty good will. When the wine was poured out, a toast was proposed,
+and "_Eleutheria tis Cretis_" ("the liberty of Crete") rang from every
+lip. "Amen, amen," answered we, and the _entente cordiale_ was at once
+established. Having eaten and drunk, they began to sing in a monotonous
+strain, keeping time by clapping their hands. Retiring to our court, we
+still heard this cadence from theirs. Their song, though little musical,
+had no brutal intonations. It breathed a rather refined good nature and
+hilarity. When we again visited our neighbors, they were dancing. All,
+save two of them, formed a line, joining hands, the leader and the one
+next him holding together by a pocket handkerchief. They sang all the
+while, stepping rather slowly. The leader, at intervals, made as though
+he would sit upon the ground, and then suddenly sprang high, with an
+_oich!_ something like the shout in a Highland fling. In another figure,
+they all lay upon their backs, springing up again quite abruptly, and
+continuing their round.
+
+These doings, together with talking, writing, and needle-work, brought
+on the hour at which, in these climates, sleep becomes necessary. In
+Greece, if you have risen early in the morning, by noon, or soon after,
+you are sensible of a sudden ebb of energy. The marrow seems to forsake
+your bones, the volition your muscles. You may not feel common
+sleepiness, but your skeleton demands instant release from its upright
+effort. You ask to become a heap, instead of a pile, and on the offer of
+the first accommodation, you fall like the disjointed column of Jupiter
+Olympius, more fortunate only in the easier renewal of your
+architecture. Such a fall, at this moment, the stiffest of us coveted.
+
+Meanwhile, an ancient hag, from the inner recesses of the building, had
+waited upon us, with copious chattering of her pleasure in seeing us,
+and of the drawback which the brigands had offered to her little
+business of serving the strangers who used to visit the convent before
+Kitzos and others made them afraid. For, the convent no longer
+containing monks, those who occupy it are glad to accommodate visitors
+from Athens and elsewhere. And the hag brought some heavy mats and
+quilts, and spread them on the floor of a little whitewashed out-house.
+And on these the little two-year-old child and others of the party lay
+down and slept. But "_e megale kyrie_"--meaning here the elder
+lady,--said the hag, "cannot sleep on the floor. I have a good bed up
+stairs; she shall lie there."
+
+So up stairs mounted the _megale kyrie_, and found a quiet room, and a
+bed spread with clean sheets in one corner. A rude chintz lounge, a
+wooden chest, and an eight-inch mirror completed the furniture of this
+apartment. Here, in the bed-corner, the Olympian column of _e megale_
+fell, and barbarian sleep, sleep of the _middle ages_, at once seized
+upon it and kept it prostrate. After a brief interval of Gothic
+darkness, the column rose again, and confronted the windows commanding a
+view of the court. On one of its wooden settles lay the young Greek
+secretary in wholesome slumber. Not far from him rested the Greek
+missionary, a graduate of Amherst, and a genial and energetic man. And
+presently the two-year-old, waking, desires to waken these also, and
+makes divers attempts against their peace, causing _e megale_ to descend
+for their protection. On her way, in an outer passage, she encounters a
+poor woman, lying on a heap of cedar boughs, and bewailing a bitter
+headache. Dinner-time next arrives. The wooden tables are once more set
+out with meat and fruit. We exert ourselves to give the feast a
+picturesque aspect, and are not altogether unsuccessful in so doing. The
+true feast, however, seems to consist in saying over to one's self,
+"This is Greece--this is Hymettus. I am I, and I am here." And now the
+greatest heat of the day being overpast, a ramble is proposed.
+
+The young people, escorted by the missionary, climb half the steep
+ascent of the mountain. _E megale_ and the secretary pause in the outer
+court, to whose festivities a new feature is now added. Our friends, the
+artisans, have feasted again, and little of the lamb remains save the
+bones. They are singing and dancing as before, but a strange figure from
+the mountain has joined them. He calls himself a shepherd, but looks
+much like a brigand. He wears a jacket, fustanella, and leggings, of the
+dirtiest possible white--a white which mocks at all washings, past and
+future. He has taken the leadership of the coryphees, and now executes a
+dance which is called the "Klepht." His sly movements express cunning,
+to which the twinkle of his sinister eyes responds. Now he pretends to
+be stabbed from behind; now he creeps cautiously upon a pretended foe.
+His dancing, which is very quiet, fatigues him extremely; but before
+making an end, he performs the feat of carrying a glass of wine on his
+head through various movements, not spilling a drop of it. The artisans
+are now intending to break up. They cork the bottles of wine and
+vinegar, empty and repack the dishes. We have brought them some fruit
+from our dessert. One of them makes a little speech to us, in behalf of
+all, thanking for our interest in the freedom of Crete and in the
+prosperity of their country. And "_Zeto! zeto!_" (live! live!) was the
+pleasant termination of the discourse, to which we were obliged to
+respond through the medium of a friendly interpretation.
+
+Finally the day began to wane, and we to pack and embark. The bell of
+the little church now made itself heard, and, looking in, we saw the
+priest engaged in going through his service, while a very homespun
+assistant stood at the reading-desk, wearing spectacles upon his nose,
+and making responses through it. A circlet of tapers was burning before
+the altar. One old woman or so, a peasant mother with her child,--these
+were the congregation. The idea of the Greek as of the Catholic mass is,
+that it effects a propitiation of the Divine Being; so the priest
+performs his office, often with little or no following. As to those who
+should attend, I believe that one pays one's money and has one's choice;
+there is nothing absolute about it. And now _e megale_ bestows a
+trifling largess upon the hag, who has also dined off the relics of our
+feast. The books and work are gathered, the carriages summoned. Item,
+our driver wore a Palicari dress, and took part, very lamely, in the
+dances we witnessed. Farewell, Hymettus! farewell, shady convent, clear
+and sparkling water! We kiss our hands to you, and cherish you in our
+remembrance.
+
+On our homeward way we soon passed the Athenian party, riding ten or
+twelve in a one-horse cart, carrying with them for an ensign the pole on
+which their lamb had been spitted. They saluted us, and we shouted back,
+"_Eleutheria tis Kritis!_" Amen, simple souls! your instincts are wiser
+than the reasons of diplomatists.
+
+
+
+
+ITEMS.
+
+
+My remaining chronicles of Athens will be brief and simple--gleanings at
+large from the field of memory, whose harvests grow more uncertain as
+the memorizer grows older. In youth the die is new and sharp, and the
+impression distinct and clean cut. This sharpness of outline wears with
+age; all things observed give us more the common material of human life,
+less its individual features. In this point of view it may well be that
+I shall often speak of things trivial, and omit matters of greater
+importance. Yet even these trifles, sketched in surroundings so
+grandiose, may serve to shadow out the features of something greater
+than themselves, always inwardly felt, even when not especially
+depicted. It is in this hope that I bind together my few and precious
+reminiscences of Grecian life, and present them, inadequate as they
+are, as almost better than anything else I have.
+
+
+
+
+THE PALACE.
+
+
+Armed with a permit, and accompanied by a Greek friend, we walked, one
+bitter hot afternoon, to see the royal palace built by King Otho, it is
+said, out of his own appanage, or private income. As an investment even
+for his own ultimate benefit, he would have done much better in
+expending the money on some of the improvements so much needed in his
+capital. The salary of the King of Greece amounts to two hundred and
+fifty thousand dollars; and this sum is sufficiently disproportionate to
+the slender monetary resources of the kingdom, without the additional
+testimony of this palatial monument of a monarch who wished to live like
+a rich man in a poor country. The palace is a very large one. It not
+only encloses a hollow square, but divides that square by an extension
+running across it. The internal arrangements and adornments are mostly
+in good taste, and one can imagine that when the king and queen held
+their state there, the state apartments may have made a brave show. The
+rooms now appear rather scantily furnished; the hangings are faded; and
+one can make one's own reflections upon the vanity and folly of
+ambitious expense, unperverted by the witchery of present luxury, which
+always argues, "Yes, the peasants have no beds, but see--this arm-chair
+is so comfortable!" Now, luxury was for the time absent on leave, and
+we thought much of the peasant, and little of the prince. For the
+peasant is a fact, and the prince but a symbol, and a symbol of that
+which to-day can be represented without him; viz., the unity of will and
+action essential to the existence of the state. This unity to-day is
+accomplished by the cooperation of the multitude, not by its exclusion.
+The symbol remains useful, but no longer sublime. No need, therefore, to
+exaggerate the difference between the common symbol and the common man.
+Fortify your unity in the will and understanding of the people, not in
+their fear and imagination. And let the king be moderate in his
+following, and illustrious in his character and office. So shall he be a
+leader as well as a banner--a fact as well as a symbol.
+
+While I thought these things, I admired Queen Amalia's blue, pink, and
+green rooms, the lustres of fine Bohemian glass, the suite of apartments
+for royal visitors, the ball-room and its marble columns, running
+through two stories in height, and altogether well-appointed. "The court
+balls were beautiful," said my companion, "and the hall is very
+brilliant when lighted and filled." "Is the queen regretted?" I asked.
+"Not much," was the moderate reply.
+
+The theatre interested me more, with its scenes still standing. In the
+same hall, at the other end, is a frame and enclosure for "tableaux
+vivants," of which the court were very fond. The prettiest girls in
+Athens came here, and _posed_ as Muses, Minervas, and what not. I have
+the photograph of one, with her white robe and lyre. And this brings to
+me the only good word I can say for Otho and Amalia, in the historic
+light in which I view them. They were not gross, nor cruel, nor
+sluttish. Their tastes and pleasures were of the refined, social order,
+and in so far their influence and example were softening and civilizing
+in tendency. The temporary prevalence of the German element has
+introduced a tendency towards German culture. And while the Greeks who
+seek commercial education very generally migrate to London or Liverpool,
+the men most accomplished in letters and philosophy have studied in
+Germany. All this may not have hindered the German patronage from
+becoming oppressive, nor the German rule from becoming intolerable to
+the people at large. But, with the examples of this and other ages
+before one, one thanks a monarch for not becoming either a beast or a
+butcher. Otho was neither. But neither was he, on the other hand, a
+Greek, nor a lover of Greeks. Nor could he and his queen present the
+people with a successor Greek in birth, if not in parentage. This
+absence of offspring, which is said to have sorely galled the queen, was
+really a weak point in their case before the people. To be ruled by a
+Greek is their natural and just desire.
+
+Europe, which has so little charity for their divergence from her
+absolute standard, must remember that it is not at their request that
+this expensive and uncongenial condition of a foreign prince has been
+annexed to their system of government. The superstitions of the old
+world have here planted a seed of mischief in the gardens of the new.
+England finds it most convenient to be governed by a German; France, by
+an Italian; Russia, by a Tartar line. What more natural than that they
+should muffle new-born Greece in their own antiquated fashions? The
+Greeks assassinated Capo d'Istrias for acts of tyranny from which they
+knew no other escape. For, indeed, the head of their state was very
+clumsily adjusted to its body by the same powers who left out of their
+construction several of its most important members. An arbitrary
+president was no head for a nation which had just conquered its own
+liberty. A foreign absolute prince was only the same thing, with another
+name and a larger salary. By their last resolution the Greeks have
+attained a constitutional government. If their present king cannot
+administer such a one properly, he will make room for some one who can.
+To his political duties, meanwhile, military ones will be added. Greece
+for the Greeks,--Candia, Thessaly, and Epirus delivered from the Moslem
+yoke,--this will be the watchword, to which he must reply or vanish.
+
+It is in the face of America that the new nations, Greece and Italy,
+must look for encouragement and recognition. The old diplomacy has no
+solution for their difficulties, no cure for their distresses. The
+experience of the present century has developed new political methods,
+new social combinations. In the domestic economy of France and England
+these new features are felt and acknowledged. But in the foreign policy
+of those nations the element of progress scarcely appears. In this,
+force still takes the place of reason; the right of conquest depends
+upon the power of him who undertakes it; and in the farthest regions
+visited by their flags, organized barbarism gets the better of
+disorganized barbarism. The English in India, the French in Algeria,
+were first brigands, then brokers. Of these two, we need not tell the
+civilized world that the broker plunders best.
+
+Greece is a poor democracy; America, a rich one. The second commands all
+the luxuries and commodities of life; the first, little more than its
+necessaries. Yet we, coming from our own state of things, can understand
+how the Greek values himself upon being a man, and upon having a part in
+the efficient action of the commonwealth. Greece is reproached with
+giving too ambitious an education to her sons and daughters. Her
+institutions form teachers, not maids and valets, mistresses and
+masters, not servants. But for this America will not reproach
+her--America, whose shop-girls take music lessons, whose poorest menials
+attend lectures, concerts, and balls. A democratic people does not
+acquiesce either in priestly or in diplomatic precedence. Let people
+perform their uses, earn their bread, enjoy their own, and respect their
+neighbors; these are the maxims of good life in a democratic country.
+"Love God, love thy neighbor," is better than "fear God, honor the
+king." As to the sycophancy of snobs, the corruption of office, the
+contingent insufficiency alike of electors and elected,--these are the
+accidents of all human governments, to be arrested only by the constant
+watchfulness of the wiser spirits, the true pilots of the state.
+
+By the time that I had excogitated all this, my feet had visited many
+square yards of palace, comprising bed-room, banqueting-room, chief
+lady's room, chapel, and so on. I had seen the queen's garden, and the
+_palmas qui meruit ferat_, and which she has left for her successor. I
+had seen, too, the fine view from the upper windows, sweeping from the
+Acropolis to the sea. I had exchanged various remarks with my Athenian
+companion. New furniture was expected with the Russian princess, but
+scarcely new enthusiasm. The little king had stopped the movement in
+Thessaly, which would have diverted the Turkish force now concentrated
+upon Crete, giving that laboring island a chance of rising above the
+bloody waters that drown her. Little love did the little king earn by
+this course. One might say that he is on probation, and will, in the
+end, get his deserts, and no more. And here my friend has slipped some
+suitable coin into the hand of the smiling major-domo, who showed us
+over the royal house. Farewell, palace: the day of kings is over.
+Peoples have now their turn, and God wills it.
+
+
+
+
+THE CATHEDRAL.
+
+
+In close juxtaposition with the state is the church. In America we have
+religious liberty. This does not mean that a man has morally the right
+to have no religion, but that the very nature of religion requires that
+he should hold his own convictions above the ordinances of others. The
+Greeks have religious liberty, whose idea is rather this, that people
+may believe much as they please, provided they adhere outwardly to the
+national church. The reason assigned for this is, that any change in the
+form or discipline of this church would weaken the bond that unites the
+Greeks out of Greece proper with those within her limits. This outward
+compression and inward latitude is always a dangerous symptom. It points
+to practical irreligion, an ever widening distance between a man's
+inward convictions and his outward practice. Passing this by, however,
+let us have a few words on the familiar aspect and practical working of
+the Greek church as at present administered. Like other bodies politic
+and individual already known to us, it consists of a reconciled
+opposition, which, held within bounds, secures its efficiency. The same,
+passing those bounds, would cause its annihilation. Like other churches,
+it is at once aristocratic and democratic. It binds and looses. It is
+less intellectual than either Catholicism or Protestantism; perhaps less
+intolerant than either, so far as dogma goes. I still think it narrower
+than either in the scope of its sympathies, lower than either in its
+social and individual standard. Taken with the others, it makes up the
+desired three of human conditions; but before it can meet them
+harmoniously, it has a long way to go.
+
+Refusing images, but clinging to pictures; allowing the Scriptures to
+the common people, but discouraging their use of the same; with an
+unmarried hierarchy of some education, and a married secular clergy of
+none,--the Greek church seems to me to be too flatly in contradiction
+with itself and with the spirit of the age to maintain long a social
+supremacy, a moral efficiency. The department of the clergy last
+mentioned receive no other support than that of the contingent
+contributions of the people, paid in small sums, as the wages of
+services better withheld than rendered. Exorcisms, benedictions, prayers
+recited over graves, or secured as a cure for sick cattle,--these are
+some of the sacerdotal acts by which the lesser clergy live. Those who
+wish to keep these resources open must, of course, discourage the
+reading of the New Testament, whose great aim and tendency are to
+substitute a religion of life and doctrine for a religion of
+observances. Congregations reading this book for themselves, no matter
+how poor or ignorant in other matters, will ask something other of the
+priest than the exorcism of demons or the cure of cattle.
+
+Of the higher clergy, some have studied in Germany, and, reversing Mr.
+Emerson's sentence, must know, one thinks, better than they build.
+Orthodox their will may be, firm their adherence to the establishment,
+strict their administration of it. But they must be aware of the limits
+that it sets to religious progress. And so long as they cannot preach to
+their congregations the full sincerity and power of their inward
+convictions, their ministration loses in moral power,--the house is
+divided against itself.
+
+I visited the Cathedral of Athens but once. It is a spacious and
+handsome church, in what I should call a modern Eastern style. It was
+on Sunday, and mass was going on. The middle and right aisles were
+filled with men, the left aisle with women. I do not know whether I have
+mentioned elsewhere that in the Greek and Russian, as in the Quaker
+church, men and women stand separately--stand, for seats are neither
+provided nor allowed. I found a place among the women, commanding a view
+of the high altar. The archbishop, a venerable-looking man, in gold
+brocade and golden head-dress, went through various functions, which,
+though not identical with those of the Romish mass, seemed to amount to
+about the same thing. There were bowings, appearings and retirings, the
+swinging of censers, and the presentation of tapers fixed in silver
+candelabras, and tied in the middle with black ribbon, so as to form a
+sheaf. These candelabras the archbishop from time to time took, one
+under each arm, and made a step or two towards the congregation. The
+dresses of the assistant priests were very rich, and their heads
+altogether Oriental in aspect. One of them, with his gold-bronzed face
+and golden hair, looked like pictures of St. John. The vocal part of the
+performance consisted of a sort of chant, with responses intensely nasal
+and unmusical. This psalmody, which is little relished by Greeks of
+culture, is yet maintained, like the discipline, intact, lest the most
+trifling amelioration should weaken the tie of Christian brotherhood
+between the free Greek church and the church that is in bondage with her
+children. To one familiar with the pretexts of conservatism, this plea
+of union before improvement is not new nor availing. One laughs, and
+remembers the respectabilities who tried to paralyze the American
+intellect and conscience in order to save the Union, which, after all,
+was saved only by the measures they abhorred and denounced. I had soon
+enough of what I was able to hear and see of the Greek mass. As I stole
+softly away, I passed a sort of lesser altar, before which was burning a
+circular row of tapers. An old woman had similar tapers on a small
+table, for sale, I suppose. I was invited, by gesture, to consummate a
+pious act by the purchase of some of these, but declined, not without
+remembering that I was some time since elected a lay delegate from a
+certain Unitarian church to a certain Unitarian conference. This fact,
+if communicated, would not have heightened my standing in the
+approbation of the sisters who then surrounded me. "What, no candle?"
+said their indignant glances. I was silent, and fled.
+
+
+
+
+THE MISSIONARIES.
+
+
+In the presence of the contradictions alluded to above, the position of
+the Greek church and of American Protestant missionaries becomes one of
+mutual delicacy and difficulty. The church allows religious liberty, and
+assumes religious tolerance. Yet it naturally holds fast its own
+children within its own borders. The Protestants are pledged to labor
+for the world's Christianization. When they see its progress opposed by
+antiquated usage and insufficient method, they cannot acquiesce in these
+obstacles, nor teach others to revere them. Here we must say at once
+that no act is so irreligious as the resistance of progress. Thought and
+conscience are progressive. Christ's progressive labor carried further
+the Jewish faith and tenets which were religious before he came, but
+which became irreligious in resisting the further and finer conclusions
+to which he led. "I come not to destroy, but to fulfil." Progress does
+fulfil in the spirit, even though it destroy in the letter.
+Protestantism acknowledges this, and this acknowledgment constitutes its
+superiority over the Greek and Catholic churches. The sincere reader of
+the New Testament will be ever more and more disposed to make his
+religion a matter lying directly between himself and the Divine Being.
+His outward conformity to all just laws and good institutions will be,
+not the less, but the more, perfect because his scale of obligation is
+an individual one, the spring and motive of his actions a deeply inward
+one. Church and state gain in soundness and efficiency by every
+individual conscience that functions within their bounds. Religion of
+this sort leads away from human mediations, from confessions,
+benedictions, injunctions, and permissions of merely human authority. It
+confesses first to God, afterwards, if at all, to those whom its
+confessions can benefit. It brings its own thought to aid and illustrate
+the general thought. It cannot abdicate its own conclusions before any
+magnitude either of intellect or of age.
+
+The Protestant, therefore, would be much straitened within the Greek
+limits. He is forced to teach those who will listen to him that God is
+much nearer than the priest, and that their own simple and sincere
+understanding of Christian doctrine is at once more just and more
+precious than the fallacies and sophisms of an absolute theology. Such
+teaching will scarcely be more relished by the Greek than by the Romish
+clergy; yet the Protestant must teach this, or be silent.
+
+And this, after their fashion, the American missionaries do set forth
+and illustrate. Their merits and demerits I am not here to discuss. How
+much of polite culture, of sufficient philosophy, goes with their honest
+purpose, it is not at this time my business to know or to say. Neither
+is their special theology mine. They believe in a literal atonement,
+while I believe in the symbolism which makes a pure and blameless
+sufferer a victim offered in behalf of his enemies. They look for a
+miraculous, I for a moral regeneration. They make Christ divine of
+birth, I make him simply divine of life. Their dogmas would reconcile
+God to man, mine would only reconcile man to God. Finally, they revere
+as absolute and divine a book which I hold to be a human record of
+surpassing thoughts and actions, but with the short-comings, omissions,
+and errors of the human historiographer stamped upon them. With all this
+diversity of opinion between the church of their communion and that of
+mine, I still honor, beyond all difference, the Protestant cause for
+which they stand in Greece, and consider their representation a just and
+genuine one.
+
+In writing this I have had in mind the three dissenting missionaries,
+Messrs. Kalopothaki, Constantine, and Zacularius. The older mission of
+Dr. and Mrs. Hill is an educational one. I believe it to have borne the
+happiest fruits for Greece. Whenever I have met a scholar of Mrs. Hill,
+I have seen the traces of a firm, pure, and gentle hand--one to which
+the wisest and tenderest of us would willingly confide our daughters. In
+raising the whole scale of feminine education in Greece, she has applied
+the most potent and subtle agent for the elevation of its whole society.
+She herself is childless; but she need scarcely regret it, since whole
+generations are sure to rise up and call her blessed.
+
+Dr. Hill is at present chaplain to the English embassy, at whose chapel
+he preaches weekly. Mrs. Hill and himself seem to stand in very
+harmonious relations with Athenian society, as well as with the
+travelling and visiting world.
+
+The missionaries preach and practise with unremitting zeal. They also
+publish a weekly religious paper. Their wives labor faithfully in the
+aid and employment of the Cretan women and children, and, I doubt not,
+in other good works. But of these things I have now told the little that
+I know.
+
+
+
+
+THE PIAZZA.
+
+
+Venice has a Piazza, gorgeous with shops, lights, music, and, above all,
+the joyous life of the people. Athens also has a Piazza, bordered with
+hotels and cafes, with a square of trees and flowering shrubs in the
+middle. It lies broadly open to the sun all day long, and gives back his
+rays with a torrid refraction. When day declines, the evening breezes
+sweep it refreshingly. Accordingly, as soon as the shadows permit, the
+spaces in front of the cafes--or, in Greek, _caffeneions_--are crowded
+with chairs and tables, the chairs being filled by human beings, many of
+whom have ripened, so far as the head goes, into a fez--have unfolded,
+so far as the costume goes, into pali-kari petticoats and leggings.
+Between the two hotels is mortal antipathy. Ours--"Des Etrangers"--has
+taken the lead, and manages to keep it. The prices of the other are
+lower, the _cuisine_ much the same, the upper windows set to command a
+view of the Acropolis, which is in itself an unsurpassable picture.
+Where the magic resides which keeps our hotel full and the other empty,
+I know not, unless it be in the slippery Eastern smile of the
+landlord--an expression of countenance so singular that it inevitably
+leads you, from curiosity, to follow it further. In our case it led to
+no profound of wickedness. We were not cheated, nor plundered, nor got
+the better of in any way that I remember. Our food was good, our rooms
+proper, our charges just. Yet I felt, whenever I encountered the smile,
+that it angled for me, and caught me on a hook cunningly baited.
+
+I must say that our landlord was even generous. Besides our three meals
+_per diem_,--which grew to be very slender affairs, so far as we were
+concerned,--we often required lemonades and lokumia, besides sending of
+errands innumerable. For these indulgences no extra charge was made. In
+an Italian, French, or English hotel, each one of them would have had
+its penitentiary record. So the mystery of the smile must have had
+reference to matters deeply personal to its wearer, and never made known
+to me.
+
+The cafes seemed to maintain a thrifty existence. But one of them took
+especial pains to secure the services of a band of music. Hence, on the
+evenings when the public band did not play, emanated the usual
+capriccios from Norma, Trovatore, and the agonies of Traviata. Something
+better and worse than all this was given to us in the shape of certain
+ancient Greek or Turkish melodies, obviously composed in ignorance of
+all rules of thorough-bass, with a confusion of majors and minors most
+perplexing to the classic, but interesting to the historic sense. I
+rejoiced especially in one of these, which bore the same relation to
+good harmony that Eastern dress bears to good composition of color. It
+was obviously well liked by the public, as it was usually played more
+than once during the same evening.
+
+Before the shadows grew quite dark, a barouche or two, with ladies and
+livery, would drive across the Piazza, giving a whiff of fashion like
+the gleam of red costume that heightens a landscape. And the people sat,
+ate and drank, came and went, in sober gladness, not laughing
+open-mouthed--rather smiling with their eyes. From our narrow hotel
+balcony we used to look down and wonder whether we should ever be cool
+again. For though the evenings were not sultry, their length did not
+suffice to reduce the fever of the day. And the night within the
+mosquito-nettings was an agony of perspiration. I now sit in Venice, and
+am cool; but I would gladly suffer something to hear the weird music,
+and to see the cheerful Piazza again. Yet when I was there, for ten
+minutes of this sea-breeze over the lagoons I would have given--Heaven
+knows what. O Esau!
+
+
+
+
+DEPARTURE.
+
+
+Too soon, too soon for all of us, these rare and costly delights were
+ended. We had indeed suffered days of Fahrenheit at 100 deg. in the shade.
+We had made experience of states of body which are termed bilious, of
+states of mind more or less splenetic, lethargic, and irritable. We
+dreamed always of islands we were never to visit, of ruins which we
+shall know, according to the flesh, never. We pored over Muir and Miss
+Bremer, and feebly devised outbreaks towards the islands, towards the
+Cyclades, Santorini, but especially towards Corinth, whose acropolis
+rested steadily in our wishes, resting in our memory only as a wish.
+Towards Constantinople, too, our uncertain destinies had one moment
+pointed. But when the word of command came, it despatched us westward,
+and not eastward. By this time our life had become somewhat too
+literally a vapor, and our sublimated brains were with difficulty
+condensed to the act of packing. Perpetual thirst tormented us. And of
+this as of other Eastern temptations, I must say, "Resist it." Drinking
+does not relieve this symptom of hot climates. It, moreover, utterly
+destroys the tone of the stomach. A little tea is the safest
+refreshment; and even this should not be taken in copious draughts.
+Patience and self-control are essential to bodily health and comfort
+under these torrid skies. The little food one can take should be of the
+order usually characterized as "nutritious and easy of digestion." But
+so far as health goes, "Avoid Athens in midsummer" will be the safest
+direction, and will obviate the necessity of all others.
+
+In spite, however, of all symptoms and inconveniences, the mandate that
+said, "Pack and go," struck a chill to our collective heart. We visited
+all the dear spots, gave pledges of constancy to all the kind friends,
+tried with our weak sight to photograph the precious views upon our
+memory. Then, with a sort of agony, we hurried our possessions, new and
+old, into the usual narrow receptacles, saw all accounts discharged,
+feed the hotel servants, took the smile for the last time, and found
+ourselves dashing along the road to the Piraeus with feelings very unlike
+the jubilation in which we first passed that classic transit. It was all
+over now, like a first love, like a first authorship, like a honey-moon.
+It was over. We could not say that we had not had it. But O, the void of
+not having it now, of never expecting to have it again!
+
+Kind friends went with us to soften the journey. At the boat, Dr. and
+Mrs. Hill met and waited with us. I parted from the apostolic woman with
+sincere good-will and regret. Warned to be on board by six P. M., the
+boat did not start till half-past seven. We waved last adieus. We clung
+to the last glimpses of the Acropolis, of the mountains; but they soon
+passed out of sight. We savagely went below and to bed. The diary bears
+this little extract: "The AEgean was calm and blue. Thus, with great
+pleasure and interest, and with some drawbacks, ends my visit to Athens.
+A dream--a dream!"
+
+
+
+
+RETURN VOYAGE.
+
+
+To narrate the circumstances of our return voyage would seem much like
+descending from the poetic _denouement_ of a novel to all the prosaic
+steps by which the commonplace regains its inevitable ascendency after
+no matter what abdication in favor of the heroic. Yet, as travel is
+travel, whether outward or inward bound, and as our homeward cruise had
+features, I will try, with the help of the diary, to pick them out of
+the vanishing chaos of memory, premising only that I have no further
+_denouement_ to give.
+
+    "Story? Lord bless you, I have none to tell, sir."
+
+On referring, therefore, to Clayton's quarto, of the date of July 21,
+1867, I find the day to have been passed by us all in the hot harbor of
+Syra, on board the boat that brought us there. At seven A. M. we did
+indeed land in a small boat with Vice-Consul Saponsaki, and betake
+ourselves through several of the steep and sunny streets of the town. At
+one of the two hotels we staid long enough to order lemonades and drink
+them. The said hotel appeared, on a cursory survey, to be as dirty and
+disorderly as need be; but we soon escaped therefrom, and visited the
+theatre, the Casino, and the Austrian consul. The Casino is spacious and
+handsome, giving evidence at once of wealth and of taste in those who
+caused it to be built. Such an establishment would be a boon in Athens,
+where there is no good public reading-room of any kind. The theatre is
+reasonable. Here, in winter, a short opera season is enjoyed, and, in
+consequence, the music books of the young ladies teem with arrangements
+of Verdi and of Donizetti. We found the square near the quay lively with
+the early enjoyers of coffee and the narghile. Every precious inch of
+shade was, as usual, carefully appropriated; but the sun was rapidly
+narrowing the boundaries of the shadow district. Our chief errand
+resulted in the purchase of an ok of _lokumias_, which we virtuously
+resolved to carry to America, if possible. The little boat now returned
+us to the steamer, where breakfast and dinner quietly succeeded each
+other, little worthy of record occurring between. One interesting half
+hour reached us in the shape of a visit from Papa Parthenius, a young
+and active member of the Cretan Syn-eleusis. He came with tidings for
+our chief veteran,--tales of the Turks, and how they could get no water
+at Svakia; tidings also of brave young DeKay, and of his good service in
+behalf of the island. While these, in the dreadful secrecy of an unknown
+tongue, impart he did, I seized pen and ink, and ennobled my unworthy
+sketch-book with a _croquis_ of his finely-bronzed visage. His
+countenance was such as Miss Bremer would have called dark and
+energetic. He wore the dress of his calling, which was that of the
+secular priesthood. He soon detected my occupation, and said, in Greek,
+"I regret that the kyrie should make my portrait without my arms."
+
+We parted from him very cordially. Consul Campfield afterwards gave us a
+refreshing row about the harbor, bringing us within view of the two
+iron-clads newly purchased and brought out to run the Turkish blockade.
+One of these was famous in the annals of Secessia. Both served that more
+than doubtful cause. Then we went back to the vessel, and the rest of
+the day did not get beyond perspiration and patience.
+
+Towards evening a spirited breeze began to lash the waters of the harbor
+into hilly madness. White caps showed themselves, and we, who were to
+embark on board another vessel, for another voyage, took note of the
+same. The friendly Evangelides now came on board, and scolded us for not
+having sent him word of our arrival. We pleaded the extreme heat of the
+day, which had made dreadful the idea of visiting and of locomotion of
+any sort. He was clad from head to foot in white linen, and looked most
+comfortable. While he was yet with us, the summons of departure came. In
+our chief's plans, meanwhile, a change had taken place. Determining
+causes induced him to return to Athens, minus his female _impedimenta_:
+so the little boat that danced with us from the Lloyd's Syra to the
+Lloyd's Trieste steamer danced back with him, leaving three disconsolate
+ones, bereft of Greece, and unprotected of all and any. Nor did we make
+this second start without a _contretemps_. Having bidden the chief
+farewell, we proceeded at once to take account of our luggage; and lo!
+the shawl bundle was not. Now, every knowing traveller is aware that
+this article of travelling furniture contains much besides the shawl,
+which is but the envelope of all the odds and ends usually most
+essential to comfort. For the second in command, therefore, previously
+designated as _a megale_, there was but one course to pursue. To hire a
+boat, refuse to be cheated in its price, tumble down the ship's side,
+row to the Syra steamer, pick up the missing bundle, astonish the chief
+in a pensive reverie, "_sibi et suis_," on the cabin sofa, and return
+triumphant, was the work of ten minutes. But the sea ran high, the
+little boat danced like a cockle-shell, and the neophytes were afraid,
+and much relieved in mind when the ancient reappeared.
+
+The America (the Trieste steamer) did not weigh anchor before midnight.
+Soon after the adventure of the shawl bundle, the Syra steamer fired a
+gun, and slipped out to sea. We had seen the last of the chief for a
+fortnight at least, and our attention was now turned to the quarters we
+were to occupy for four days to come. These did not at first sight seem
+very promising. Our state-rooms were small, and bare of all furniture,
+except the bed and washing fixtures. Just outside of them, on the deck,
+was the tent under which the Turkish women horded. For we found, on
+coming on board, a Turkish pacha and suite, bound from Constantinople to
+Janina, to take the place of him whom we had, a month before,
+accompanied on his way from Janina to Constantinople, via Corfu, where
+we were to be quit of the present dignitary. But before I get to the
+Turks, I must mention that good Christian, the Austrian consul at Syra,
+who came on board before we left, and introduced to me a young man in an
+alarming condition of health, a Venetian by birth, and an officer in the
+Austrian navy. His illness had been induced by exposure incident to his
+profession in the hot harbor of Kanea.
+
+The first night we made acquaintance only with various screaming babies,
+the torment of young mothers who did not know how to take care of them,
+their nurses having been left at home. The night was sufficiently
+disturbed up to the period of departure, and these little ones vented
+their displeasure in tones which argued well for their lungs. The next
+morning showed us a rough sea, the vessel pitching and tossing, the
+ladies mostly sea sick--we ourselves well and about, but much incommoded
+by heat and want of room. A tall member of the pacha's suite came into
+our little round house, dressed principally in a short, quilted sack of
+bright red calico. He carried in his arms a teething baby, very dirty
+and ill-dressed, and tried to nurse and soothe it on his knee, the
+mother being totally incapacitated by seasickness. This man was tall and
+fair. I thought he might be an Albanian. I made some incautious remarks
+in French concerning his dress, which he obviously understood, for he
+disappeared, and then reappeared dressed in a handsome European suit,
+with a bran-new fez on his head, but carrying no baby. Another of the
+suite, unmistakably a Turk, pestered the round-house. This individual
+wore white cotton drawers under a long calico night shirt of a faded
+lilac pattern, which was bound about his waist with a strip of yellow
+calico. The articles of this toilet were far from clean. Glasses and a
+fez completed it. The wearer we learned to be a fanatical Turk, who came
+among us in this disorderly dress to show his contempt for Christians in
+general. His motive was held to be, in his creed, a religious one. It
+further caused him to take his meals separately from us--a circumstance
+which we scarcely regretted. He was much amazed at the worsted work in
+the hands of one of the neophytes, and went so far as to take it up, and
+to ask a bystander who spoke his language whether the young girl spun
+the wools herself before she began her tapestry. He then asked the price
+of the wools, and on hearing the reply exclaimed, "What land on earth
+equals Turkey, where you can buy the finest wool for twelve piastres an
+ok!"
+
+Besides these not very appetizing figures, we had on board some
+Fanariote Greeks, of aristocratic pretensions and Turkish principles;
+some Hellenes of the true Greek stamp; a Dalmatian sea captain, his wife
+and daughters, who spoke Italian and looked German; an Armenian lady and
+young daughter from Constantinople, bound to Paris; several Greeks
+resident in Transylvania, speaking Greek and German with equal facility;
+two Armenian priests returning from an Eastern mission, and _en route_
+for Vienna; the Austro-Italian before spoken of; a Bohemian glass
+merchant; and an array of deck passengers as varied and motley as those
+already enumerated as belonging to the first cabin. With all of the
+latter we made acquaintance; but although we moved among them with
+cordiality and good-will, the equilibrium of sympathy was difficult to
+find. The Fanariotes were no Philhellenes, the Armenian ladies were
+frequenters of the sultan's palace; the Italian was thoroughly German in
+his inclinations, and spoke in utter dispraise of his own country when
+his feeble condition allowed him to speak. Of the Armenian priests, one
+was quite a man of the world, and somewhat reserved and suspicious. The
+other showed something of the infirmity of advanced age in the prolixity
+of his speech, as well as in its matter. In this Noah's ark _e megale_
+moved about, mindful of the bull in the china shop, and tried not to
+upset this one's mustard-pot and that one's vase of perfume. And as all
+were whole when she parted from them, she has reason to hope that her
+efforts were tolerably successful.
+
+In the human variety shop just described, I must not forget to speak of
+my sisters, the Turkish women, imprisoned in a small portion of the
+deck, protected by a curtain from all intrusion or inspection. As this
+sacred precinct lay along the outside partition of the ladies' cabin, I
+became aware of a remote window, through which a practicable breach
+might be made in their fortress. Thither, on the first day, I repaired,
+and paid my compliments. They were, I think, five in number, and lay
+along on mattresses, disconsolately enough. With the help of the
+stewardess, I inquired after their health, and learned that seasickness
+held them prostrate and helpless. Nothing ate they, nothing drank they.
+Two of them were young and pretty. Of these, one was the wife of the bey
+who accompanied the pacha. She had a delicate cast of features,
+melancholy dark eyes, and dark hair bound up with a lilac crape
+handkerchief. The other was the mother of the teething child spoken of
+above, and the wife of the tall parent who nursed it. By noon on the
+second day the sea had sunk to almost glassy smoothness. All of the
+patients were up and about; the children were freshly washed and
+dressed, and became coaxable. One of the Armenian ladies now volunteered
+to go with me to look in upon our Turkish friends. We found them up and
+stirring, making themselves ready to land at Corfu. And to my companion
+they told what good messes they had brought from Constantinople, and
+thrown into the blue AEgean; for the heat of the vessel spoiled their
+victuals much faster than they, being seasick, could keep them from
+spoiling. And they laughed over their past sufferings much after the
+fashion of other women. The pretty mother now appeared in a loose gown
+of yellow calico, holding up her baby. I made a hasty sketch of the pair
+as they showed themselves at the cabin window; but the flat, glaring
+light did not allow me to do even as well as usual, which is saying
+little. The oval face, smooth, black brows, and long, liquid eyes, were
+beautiful, and her smile was touchingly child-like and innocent. The
+bey's wife wore a lilac calico; another wore pale green. These dresses
+consisted of loose gowns, with under-trousers of the same material; they
+were utterly unneat and tasteless. I presently saw them put on their
+yashmacs, and draw over their calicoes a sort of cloak of black stuff,
+not unlike alpaca. They now looked very decently, and, being covered,
+were allowed to sit on deck until the time of the arrival in Corfu. The
+pretty one whom I sketched begged to look at my work. On seeing it she
+exclaimed, "Let no man ever behold this!" Nor could I blame her, for it
+maligned her sadly. Concerning the landing in Corfu, the meagre diary
+shows this passage:--
+
+"Went on shore at Corfu at 5.45 P. M., returning at 6.50. Expenses in
+all, ten francs, including boat, ices, and _valet de place_. The steamer
+was so hot that this short visit on shore was a great relief, Corfu
+being at this hour very breezy and shady. Every one says that the Ionian
+Islands are going to ruin since the departure of the English. This is
+from the want of capital and of enterprise. So it would seem as if
+people who have no enterprise of their own must be content to thrive
+secondarily upon that of other people. The whole type of Greek life,
+however, is opposed to the Occidental type. Its luxury is to be in
+health, and to be satisfied with little. We Westerns illustrate the
+multiplication of wants with that of resources, or _vice versa_. [The
+diary, prudently, does not attempt to decide the question of antecedence
+and consequence between these two.] The Greeks seem, so far, to
+illustrate the converse. Whether this opposition can endure in the
+present day, I cannot foresee. But this I can see--that Greece will not
+have more luxury without more poverty. The circle of wealth, enlarging,
+will more and more crowd those who are unfitted to attain it, and who
+must be content with the minimum even of food and raiment."
+
+So far the pitiful, sea-addled diary. It does not recount how mercifully
+the captain of our steamer found a _valet de place_ for us, and told him
+to take care of us, and bring us back at a given moment. Nor how our
+payment of ten francs for three persons, instead of Heaven knows what
+exorbitation, was owing to this circumstance. For it may not be known to
+the inexperienced that the boatmen of Corfu are wont to make a very
+moderate charge for setting people ashore on the island. This is done in
+order to disarm suspicion: _facile descensus Averni--sed revocare
+gradum_! But when you wish to return to your vessel, the need being
+pressing, and the time admitting of no delay, the same boatmen are wont
+to demand fifteen or twenty francs _per capita_, and the more you swear
+the more they laugh. Among the arrearages of justice adjourned to that
+supreme chancery term, the Day of Judgment, I fear there must be many of
+English et al. _vs._ boatmen. But under the captain's happy
+administration, I made bold, when the boatman insisted on being paid for
+the return trip in mid-sea, to refuse a single copper. Now, the gift of
+unknown tongues sometimes resides in the person who hears them. And I
+received it as a decided advantage that I understood no phrase of the
+boatmen's low muttering and grumbling. So they were forced to carry us
+to the gangway of the steamer, where the captain stood to receive us.
+And I paid the men and the valet under the captain's supervision, and
+when the former demanded a _bottiglia_, the captain cried out, in
+energetic tones, "Get off of my ship at once, you scoundrels; you have
+been well paid already;" the which indeed befell.
+
+Neither does the diary recount how the drivers of public carriages
+followed us up and down the streets, insisting upon our engaging them,
+first at their price, and then at ours, for a trip which we had neither
+time nor mind to make, desisting after half an hour's annoyance; nor how
+a money changer, given a napoleon, contrived to make up one of its
+francs by slipping in two miserable Turkish _paras_, not worth half a
+franc; nor how the whistle of the steamer made our return very anxious
+and hurried, the passengers accusing us of having delayed the departure,
+while the captain confided to us that he had assumed this air of extreme
+hurry, in order to stimulate the disembarkation of the Turks, whose
+theory of taking one's own time was somewhat loosely applied in the
+present instance. Well, this is all I know of Corfu. It is little
+enough, and yet, perhaps, too much.
+
+
+
+
+FARTHER.
+
+
+Corfu was the last of Greece to us. A tightening at our heartstrings
+told us so. We consented to depart, but conquered the agony of making
+farewell verses, dear at any price, in the then state of the
+thermometer. Our feelings, such as they were, were mutely exchanged with
+the bronze statue of that late governor, who brought the water into the
+town. Unless he should prove as frisky as the Commendatore in Don
+Giovanni, they will never be divulged.
+
+We now set our faces, in conjunction with the tide of conquest,
+westward. We all suffered heat, ennui, and baby-yell. The Italian
+invalid languished in his hot state-room, or in our cabin, his weak
+condition increasing the dangerous discomfort of perspiration--a grave
+matter when a chill would be death. Worsted work progressed, the hungry
+sketch-book got a nibble or two, and the mild good-wills of the voyage
+ripened, never, we fear, to bear future harvests of profit and
+intercourse. Not the less were we beholden to them for the time. And we
+will even praise thee here, Armenian Anna, with thy young graces, thy
+Eastern beauty, thy charming English, and thoroughly genial behavior.
+Mother and daughter had _distinction_, in the French sense of the word.
+From the former I had many _apercus_ of Eastern life. She was married at
+the early age of fourteen, and wore on that occasion the traditional
+veiling of threads of gold, bound on her brow and falling to her feet.
+"How glad I was to remove it," she said, "it was so heavy!" "What did
+you do with it?" I asked. "I divided it into several portions, and
+endowed with them the marriage of poorer girls, who could not afford it
+for themselves." But madame informed me that this cumbrous ornament has
+now passed out of fashion, the tulle veil and orange flowers of French
+usage having generally taken its place. This lady was supposed by most
+people to be the elder sister of her pretty daughter. In her soberer
+beauty one seemed to see the dancing eyes and pouting cheeks of the
+other carried only a little farther on. And both were among the chief
+comforts of the voyage.
+
+Of the two Armenian priests, the younger held himself aloof, as if he
+understood full well the inconveniences of sympathy--a dry, steely,
+well-balanced man, without enthusiasm, but fine in temperament, well
+bred, and with at least the culture of a man of the present world. But
+Pere Michel, the elder, was more willing to impart his mental gifts and
+experiences to such as would hear them. And he was a man of another age,
+with obsolete opinions, which he produced like the unconscious bearer of
+uncurrent coin.
+
+Here is a little specimen of his talk, the subject being that of dreams
+and revelations: "What is to happen, that God alone can know. But that
+which is already happening, or which has happened at a distance, this
+the _demonio_ may know and reveal. And he will reveal it to you in a
+dream, or in a vision, or by a presentiment."
+
+"But what does the _demonio_ get, Pere Michel, for the trouble of
+revealing it to us?"
+
+"The satisfaction of making men superstitious?"
+
+_Non c'e male, Pere Michel._ And what, thought I, is the chief advantage
+of being pope, cardinal, arch-priest, confessor? The satisfaction of
+making men superstitious. At another time I remarked upon the fact that
+the monasteries in Greece are usually situated at some height on a
+mountain side. "They are of the order of St. Basil," said the old man;
+"he always loved the retirement of the mountains, and his followers
+imitate him in this." Pere Michel had a pleasant smile, with just enough
+of second childhood to be guileless, not foolish. And I may here say
+that the Armenian priesthood appear to me to have quite an individuality
+of their own, corresponding to no order of the Romish priesthood with
+which I am acquainted.
+
+The excessive heat of the cabins and after deck one day induced me to
+head a valorous invasion of the forward deck, followed by as many of the
+sisterhood as I was able to recruit. The steamer being a very long one,
+we had to make quite a journey before we entered that almost interdicted
+region, crossing a long bridge, and passing the captain's sacred office.
+We carried books and work; our _fauteuils_ followed us. And here we
+found cool breezes and delicious shade. The sailors and deck passengers
+lay in heaps about the boards, taking their noonday nap in a very
+primitive manner. We profited by this discovery so far as to repeat the
+invasion daily while the voyage lasted.
+
+But it came to end sooner than one might suppose from this long
+description. We had left Syra on Sunday night; on Thursday afternoon we
+landed in Trieste. Farewell, Turco-Italians, Austro-Italians, Sieben
+Gebirgers, Transylvanians, Dalmatians, ladies, babies, priests, and all.
+When shall we meet again? Scarcely before that great and final analysis
+which promises to distinguish, once for all, the sheep from the goats.
+And even for that supreme consummation and its results, all of you may
+command my best wishes.
+
+
+
+
+FRAGMENTS.
+
+
+Up to the point last reached, my jottings down had been made with
+tolerable regularity. Living is so much more rapid than writing, that an
+impossible babe, who should begin his diary at his birth, would be sure
+to have large arrears between that period and the day of his death,
+however indefatigable he might be in his recording. A man cannot live
+his life and write it too; hence the work that men who live much leave
+to their biographers. So, of the space that here intervened between
+Trieste and Paris, I lived the maximum and wrote the minimum; that is,
+the little death's-head and cross-bone mementos with which the diary is
+forced to record the spot at which each day fell and lay, together with
+the current expenses of its interment. In some places even these are
+wanting, and the stricken soul, looking over the diary, cries out, "O,
+my leanness!" or words to that effect. Yet the poor document referred to
+shall help us what it can, beginning with the return from cheap, cosy
+Trieste to that polished jewel of the Adriatic, which now shines doubly
+in its new setting of liberty.
+
+We went, as we came, in the Lloyd steamer, declining, however, to engage
+a state-room, mindful of the exceeding closeness of that in which we
+suffered on our outward voyage. The embarkation was made, like that from
+Venice, at the mysterious hour of midnight; and we, coming on board at
+half past ten, secured such sofa and easy-chair privileges as moved the
+wrath of a high-talking German party who came at the last moment, and
+shouted for a quarter of an hour the assertion that his Damen were fully
+equal, if not superior, to any other Damen on board the steamer, and
+that if the other Damen had places, his surely ought much more to have
+them. The cameriere merely shrugged his shoulders, and we failed to be
+convinced that our first duty would be to vacate our limited
+accommodations, and stand at large for the benefit of these or any other
+virgins of the tardy and oily description. The blatant champion thereon
+took himself and his Damen up stairs. We reserved to ourselves the good
+intention of sharing our advantages with them at a later period, when
+the passage of the present acerbity should make intercourse possible.
+The cabin soon became insufferably hot and close. After various
+ineffectual attempts at repose, in a cramped position on the sofa, with
+a shawl bundle for a pillow, I went on deck, where I at least found
+fresh air and darkness, the blazing lamp in the cabin being enough, of
+itself, to banish sleep. Every available spot here was occupied by
+groups or single figures, whose _tout ensemble_, what with the darkness
+and their draping, constituted a very respectable gallery of figures,
+much resembling the conspirators in Ernani, or Mme. Tussaud's Chamber of
+Horrors, in the absence of the illuminating medium. I unconsciously
+seated myself on one sleeping figure, which kicked and cried, O! With
+difficulty I found a narrow vacancy on one of the side benches, after
+occupation of which I wrapped my shawl about me, and gave up to the
+situation.
+
+    "For we were tired, my back and I."
+
+Seasick women sobbed and gasped around me, not having, as we, graduated
+in the great college of ocean passage. The night was very black.
+Presently a form nestled at my right. It was the elder neophyte,
+disgusted with the cabin, and willing to be anywhere else. The moon rose
+late, a de-crescent. The whole time was amphibious, neither sleeping nor
+waking, neither day nor night. Suddenly, a perceptible chill seized upon
+us; a little later the black sky grew gray, and the series of groups
+that filled the deck were all revealed, like hidden motives in the light
+of some new doctrine. The sunrise was showery, and attended by a
+rainbow. The people bestirred themselves, stretched their benumbed
+limbs, and shook their tumbled garments into shape. Black coffee could
+now be had for ten sous a cup, and _cafe au lait_ for twenty, with a
+crust of bread which defied gnawing. The diary says, "L. and I grew
+quite tearful as we saw beautiful Venice come out of the water, just as
+we had seen her disappear. At the health station we were fumigated with
+chloride of lime--an unpleasant and useless process. We arrived opposite
+the Piazzetta at half past seven A. M. The captain was kind in helping
+us to find our effects and to get off. The gondoliers asked five francs
+for bringing us to our lodgings, and got them. The Barbiers could not
+receive us at our former snug abode, but monsieur went round to show us
+some rooms in Palazzo Gambaro, which he offered for seven francs _per
+diem_. We were glad to take them. Went to Florian's cafe for breakfast,
+visited San Marco, and then proceeded to install ourselves in our new
+lodging. Ordered a dinner for six francs, which proved abundant. Took a
+long sleep,--from one to four P. M.,--having only dozed a little during
+the night. Our lodgings are very roomy and pleasant--two large rooms
+well furnished, and two smaller ones. We expect to enjoy many things
+here, and all the more because we now know something of what is to be
+seen."
+
+This expectation was fully realized during the week that followed,
+although the meagre entries of the diary give little assistance in
+recalling the strict outlines of the brilliant picture. It was now
+height of season in Venice. The grand canal was brilliant, every
+evening, with gondolas, and gondoliers in costumes. Now we admired full
+suits of white, with scarlet sashes, trimmed with gold fringe, now gray
+and blue, edged with silver. Now an ugly jockey costume, got up by some
+Anglo-maniac, insulted the Italian _beau-ideal_, and, indeed, every
+other. For the short coat and heavy clothes, suited at once to the
+saddle and the English climate, were utterly unsuited to the action of
+rowing, as well as to the full bloom of an Italian summer. I cannot help
+remarking upon this unsightly livery, because it was an eyesore, and
+because it was obviously considered by its proprietor as a brilliant
+success. In stylish gondolas, the rowers are two in number, and always
+dressed in livery. The fashionables, in height of millinery bliss, float
+up and down the grand canal, until it is time for the rendezvous on the
+Piazza. As you pass the palaces, you often see the gondola in waiting
+below, while in a balcony or arched window above, the fresh, smiling
+faces make their bright picture; and the domestic stands draped in the
+white opera-cloaks or bournooses. And I remember a hundred little
+nonsensical songs about this very passage in Venetian life.
+
+            "Prent'e la gondoletta,
+            Tutt'e serena il mar,
+            Ninetta, mia diletta,
+            Vieni solcar il mar
+    Il marinar, che gioja--che gioja il marinar!"
+
+Which I translate into English equivalency as follows:--
+
+    The two-in-hand is waiting,
+      The groom is in his boots;
+    The lover's fondly prating,
+      The lady's humor suits:
+        Susanna! Susanna!
+      What joy to flog the brutes!
+    What joy, what joy in driving!
+    What joy, what joy to drive!
+
+Like all other poetical visions, these, once seen, speedily become
+matters of course. Still, we found always a fairy element in the "_Gita
+in gondoletta_." Our gondolier had always a weird charm in our eyes. He
+seemed almost a feudal retainer, a servant for life or death. His shrewd
+glance showed that he was not easily to be astonished. He could tip over
+an obnoxious person in the dark, stab at a street corner, carry the most
+audacious of letters, and deliver the contraband answer under the very
+nose of high-snuffing authority. Nought of all this did we desire of
+him: in fact, nothing but safe conduct and moderate charges. Yet we
+admired his mysterious talents, and wondered in what unwritten novels he
+might have figured. For, indeed, the watery streets of Venice, no less
+than her gondoliers, suggest the idea of romantic and desperate
+adventure. What balconies from which to throw a rival, dead or alive!
+What silent, know-nothing waters to receive him! What clever assistants
+to aid and abet!
+
+But enough of the evening row, which ends at the Piazzetta. Here you
+dismiss your man-at-oars, naming the hour at which you shall require his
+presence, he being meanwhile at liberty to sleep in his gondola, or lo
+leave it in charge with a friend, and to follow you to the Piazza, where
+you will amuse yourself after your fashion, he after his. Here the
+banners are floating, the lights glancing, the band stormily performing.
+Florian's cafe is represented by a crowd of well-dressed people sitting
+in the open air, with the appliances of chair and table covered by their
+voluminous draperies. If you arrive late, you may wait some time before
+a table, fourteen inches by ten, is vouchsafed to you. Ices are very
+good, very cheap, and very small. Tea and bread and butter are
+excellent. While you wait and while you feast, a succession of venders
+endeavor to impose upon you every small article which the streets of
+Venice show for sale. Shoes, slippers, alabaster work, shell work, tin
+gondolas concealing inkstands, nets, bracelets, necklaces,--all these
+things are offered to you in succession, together with allumettes,
+cigars, journals, and caramels, or candied fruits strung upon straws.
+If you are mild in your discouragement of these venders, they will
+fasten upon you like other vermin, and refuse to depart until they shall
+have drawn the last drop of your change. I found a brisk charge
+necessary, with appeals to Florian's _garcon_, after whose interference,
+life on the Piazza became practicable.
+
+To the mere enjoyment of good victuals, with squabbles intervening, may
+be superadded the perception of fashionable life, as it goes on in these
+regions. When your eyes have taken the standard of light of the Piazza,
+you recognize in some of the groups about you persons whom you have
+seen, either in the balcony or in the gondola. Here are two young women
+whom I saw emerge from a narrow passage, this evening, rowed by a
+fine-looking servant, who stood bareheaded, and one other. They have
+diamond earrings, fashionable bonnets, and dresses dripping from a
+baptism of beads. One by one a group of young men, probably of the first
+water, forms about them. One of the ladies is handsome and quiet, the
+other plain and voluble. The latter becomes perforce the prominent
+figure in what goes on, which indeed amounts to nothing worth repeating.
+These were on my right. On my left soon appeared a lady of a certain
+age, with "world" written in large letters all over her countenance. She
+chaperons a daughter, got up with hair _a l'Anglaise_, whose pantomimic
+countenance suggests that she has been drilled by an English governess
+with _papa_, _prunes_, _prism_, or some equivalent gymnastic. When
+addressed, she looks down into her fan, and rolls her eyes as if she
+saw her face in it. And lady friends come up: "Ah, marchesa! ah, signora
+contessa!" and the young bloods, hat in hand. So here we are, really, on
+the borders of high life, without intending it. And the baroness
+introduces a female relative--_una sorella maritata_--who has been
+handsome, and whose smile seems accustomed to fold the cloak of her
+beauty around the poverty of her character. And there is coffee, and
+there come ices. The ladies sip and gossip, the beaux come and go,
+talking of intended _villeggiaturas_; for the greatest social
+illustration for an Italian is that of travel. A third group immediately
+in front of us shows a young lady in an advanced stage of ambition,
+attired in a conspicuous tone, accompanied by quieter female relatives
+and a young boy. She regards with envious eyes the two popular
+associations on my right and left. She is dying to be noticed, and does
+not know how to manage it. And while I take note of these and other
+vanities, beggars whine for pence, or insist upon carrying off our
+superfluous bread or cake, for which, indeed, we must pay; but they eat
+the bread before your eyes with such evident relish that you are
+satisfied.
+
+By and by this palls upon you. You have seen and heard enough. The
+society to which you belong is over the water. Here your heart finds no
+place; and from the crowd of strangers even your lodging and quiet bed
+seem a refuge. So you settle with Florian's _garcon_, close your account
+with all beggars for the night, wander to the Piazzetta, and cry,
+"Bastiano!" and he of the mysterious intelligence sooner or later
+responds. You give a penny to the crab,--the man who superfluously holds
+the boat while you get in,--and are at home after a brief dream of
+smooth motion under a starry sky. And in this way end all midsummer days
+in Venice. Not so smooth, however, is your climbing of three flights of
+stone stairs in the dark, with thumping and bumping. But you are up at
+last, and Gianetta--the shrewd maid--receives you with a candle-end.
+Frugal orders for breakfast, and to rest, with the cherubs of the
+mantel-piece watching over you.
+
+For over the said mantel-piece, two fair, fat babes, modelled in
+flat-relief, playfully contended for the mastery, their laughing faces
+near together, their swinging heels wide apart, as the festoon required.
+Elsewhere in the same relief were arabesques with birds and flowers.
+This bedroom of ours has been a room of state in its day. A passage-way
+and dressing-room have been taken from its stately proportions, and
+still it remains very spacious for our pretensions. Our _salon_ is
+larger still, and largely mirrored. Two of its windows give upon a leafy
+garden, whose tree-tops lie nearer to us than to their owners. Its
+furniture has been hastily thrown together, and is mostly composed of
+odds and ends. But one of its pieces moves our admiration. It is a
+toilet table, enclosing a complete set of utensils in the finest
+Venetian glass--basins, ewers, toilet bottles and glasses, and the
+little boxes for soap and powder, all cut after the finest pattern. This
+toilet was made for a royal personage, a queen of something, whose
+effects somehow seem to have been sold at auction in these parts.
+Another relic of her we discover in a bureau entirely incrusted with
+mother-of-pearl, an article that makes one's mouth water, if one has any
+mouth, which all men, like all horses, have not. The doors which divide
+our sitting from our sleeping room are at once objects of wonder and of
+fear to us. Their size is monstrous, and each of them hangs, or rather
+clings, by the upper hinge, the lower being dismounted. These doors are
+left all day at a conciliatory angle between closing and opening. We
+fear their falling on our heads whenever we approach them. We hear
+vaguely of some one who shall come to put them in order; but he never
+appears. Our own veteran, arriving at last, sets this right in as
+summary a manner as he has dealt with other nuisances. For the veteran,
+worn with travel, does arrive from Greece one morning, rowing up to our
+palace just as we have stepped from it to meet our gondola. He has a
+tale to tell like the wanderings of Ulysses. But between this event and
+those that precede it, the diary shows the following important entry:--
+
+Thursday, Aug. 1.--To Malamocco this A. M., with three rowers--our own,
+and two others, who received one florin between them. The row, both in
+going and returning, was delightful. Arrived at Malamocco, the men
+demanded one franc for breakfast, and disappeared within the shades of
+the Osteria. This is a small settlement at the very entrance of the
+lagoons. It was strongly fortified by the Austrians. The heat, however,
+did not permit us to inspect the fortifications. We saw little of
+interest, but visited the church and a peasant's house. One of the
+daughters was engaged in stringing beads for sale. The beads were in a
+tray, and she plunged into them a bunch of wire needles some six inches
+in length, each carrying its slender thread. The merchant, she said,
+came weekly to bring the beads, and to take away those ready strung for
+the market. "To earn a penny, signora," said the mother, a
+substantial-looking person, wearing large gold earrings. The houses here
+looked very comfortable for people of the plain sort. The men seemed to
+be mostly away, whether engaged in fishing, or following the sea to
+foreign parts. On our way back we stopped at San Clementi, an ancient
+church upon a little island, now undergoing repairs. Within the church
+we found a marble tabernacle with solid walls, built behind the high
+altar. It may have been forty feet in length by twenty in breadth, and
+twelve or more feet in height. A massive door of bronze gave entrance to
+this huge strong-box, which was formerly used as a prison for refractory
+priests. We found the interior divided into two compartments. The larger
+of these was fitted up as a chapel; the smaller had served as the cell
+of confinement. The altar was erected at the partition which separated
+the two, and a grating inserted behind the altar figure allowed the
+prisoner the benefit of the religious services carried on in the chapel.
+The dreariness of this little prison can scarcely be described. No light
+had it, unless that of a lamp was allowed. A church within a church,
+and within the inner church a place of torment! This arrangement seemed
+to violate even the Catholic immunity of sanctuary. Think of the
+unfortunate shut up within on a feast day, when faint sounds of outward
+jubilee might penetrate the marble walls, and heighten his pain by its
+contrast with the general joyous thrill of life. Think of the cheerless
+mass or vespers vouchsafed to him,--no friendly face, no brother voice,
+to sweeten worship. And if he continued recalcitrant, how convenient was
+this isolation for the final disposition to be made of him! _De
+profundis clamavit_, doubtless, and the church did not know that God
+could hear him.
+
+The diary does not record our second visit to the Armenian convent,
+which took place in these days. I do not even find in its irregular
+columns any mention of a franc which I am sure I paid to the porter, and
+which, I faintly hope, has been put to my credit elsewhere. Despite this
+absence of _pieces justificatives_, the visit still remains so freshly
+in my memory that I may venture to speak of it. The elder neophyte not
+having been with us before in Venice, the convent was new ground to her.
+We who had already seen it felt much more at home on the occasion of our
+second visit than of our first. For Padre Giacomo had answered our
+invasion by a friendly call; and did we not now know him to be a most
+genial and hospitable person? Had we not, moreover, made ourselves
+familiar with his religion, on our late voyage, by frequent converse
+with two priests of his profession? Did I not possess Father Michel's
+views concerning the _demonio_, as well as his version of the Book of
+Job? And of Pere Isaak did I not know the polished, uncommunicative side
+which covered his intimate convictions, whatever they may have been? The
+Armenian ladies, too,--had they not made me free of the guild? One of
+them had shown me her prayer-book. The other, being but fifteen years of
+age, had no prayer-book. So, with an assured step, we entered the sacred
+parlor, and demanded news of Padre Giacomo, and of his monkey. And the
+father came, smiling a little better than before, but with a sweet
+Oriental gravity. And he showed us again the library, and hall, and
+chapel, with the refectory, from whose cruel pulpit one brother is set
+to read while the others feast. We saw again the printing presses,
+worked by hand. And in the sacristy he commanded two of the younger
+brethren to bring the chiefest embroidered garments, reserved for high
+occasions, judging of us unjustly by our sex. And these satin and velvet
+wonders were, indeed, embossed with lambs, and birds, and flowers, in
+needlework of silver and gold, and of various colors, meet for the necks
+of them that divide the spoil. And we saw also a very fine mummy, as
+black, and dried, and wizened, as any old Pharaoh could be. A splendid
+bead covering lay over him, in open rows of blue and white, with
+hieroglyphic-looking men in black and yellow. This covering had been
+lately cleaned and repaired at the glass-works of Murano, as Padre
+Giacomo recounted with pride. He showed us in the old part of the work
+some curious double beads, which Venice itself, he said, was unable to
+imitate. The colors were as fresh and clear as if the mummy had clothed
+himself from the last fancy fair, with a description of afghan well
+suited to the Egyptian climate.
+
+Having done justice to this human preserve, the padre now regaled us
+with a preparation of rose leaves embalmed in sugar. He also bestowed
+upon us one of the convent publications, a tolerable copy of verses
+composed on the spot itself by the late Louis of Bavaria, celebrating
+its calm and retirement. I myself could have responded to the royal
+_suspiria_ with one distich.
+
+    "Here no people comes to beg thee,
+     Here no Lola comes to plague thee."
+
+As we passed from the building to the garden, the wicked monkey, chained
+and lying in wait, sprang at my hat, and, snatching my lilac veil, bore
+it off with a flying leap of animal grace and malice. Padre Giacomo
+anxiously apologized for his pet's misconduct, which was certainly
+surprising. But the monkey's education, as every one knows, is
+dependent, not upon precept, but upon example, and Padre Giacomo's
+example, to the monkey, was only a negative. We parted from our
+cloistered friend, sincerely desiring, if not hoping, to see him again.
+
+Of our last day in fairest Venice the diary gives this meagre account:--
+
+Sunday, August 4. Early to Piazza, where we encountered the Bishop of
+Rhode Island. At San Marco's, visited Luccati's beautiful mosaics in
+the sacristy. The three figures over the door are especially
+fine--Madonna in the middle, and a saint on either side. A colossal
+cross adorns the ceiling, and the wall on one side is occupied by
+figures of twelve prophets; on the other, by the twelve disciples. The
+cross almost seems to bloom with beautiful devices. Luccati was
+imprisoned, they say, in the Piombi.
+
+To the Italian Protestant service, held in a good hall in the
+neighborhood of the Church of San Giovanni e Paolo. The hall was densely
+crowded. I found no seat, and barely room to stand. The audience seemed
+a mixed one, so far as worldly position goes, but was entirely
+respectable in aspect and demeanor, the masculine element largely
+predominating. Signor Comba, a young man, is quite eloquent and taking.
+He delivers himself clearly, and with energy. He criticised at some
+length the unchristian doctrines of the Romish church--this is part of
+his work.
+
+The service ended, I passed into the Church of San Giovanni e Paolo, and
+enjoyed my visit unusually. The vivid light of the day and hour made
+many of the monuments appear new to me. The doges in this, as in other
+churches, are stowed away on shelves, like mummies. Found a monument to
+Doge Sterno, dated early in the fifteenth century, and beside it the
+effigy of a youth designated as Aloysius Trevisano, aet. 23, deeply
+regretted, and commemorated for his attainments in Greek, Latin, and
+philosophy. The figure is recumbent, the face of a high and refined
+character, with the unmistakable charm of youth impressed upon it. The
+date is also of the fifteen century. From the church to the sacristy, to
+take a last look at the two pictures, Titian's Death of St. Peter,
+martyr, and a fine Madonna of Gian Bellini. The Titian was glorious
+to-day. It has great life and action. The Dominican in the foreground,
+who has his arm raised as if appealing to heaven and earth against the
+barbarous act, seems to have communicated a touch of his passion to the
+two cherubs above, who bear the martyr palm. They are stormy little
+cherubs, and seem in haste to bring in sight the recompense of so much
+suffering.
+
+Of the Protestant preaching I will once more and finally say, that it is
+a genuine missionary work, and commend it to the good wishes and good
+offices of those whose benefactions do not fear to cross the ocean. May
+it permanently thrive and prosper.
+
+Of the pictures I can only say, that I doubly congratulate myself on
+having paid them my last homage before leaving Titian's lovely city.
+For, not long after, a cruel fire broke out in or near that sacristy,
+precious with carvings in wood and marble bas-reliefs; and all the
+treasures were destroyed, including the two pictures, only temporarily
+bestowed there, and many square yards of multitude by Tintoretto,
+bearing, as usual, his own portrait in a sly corner, representative, no
+doubt, of his wish to watch the effect of his masterpieces upon humanity
+at large. The Madonna by Bellini was a charming picture, but the St.
+Peter is a loss that concerns the world. The saint, one hopes, has been
+comfortable in Paradise these many years. But the artist? What Paradise
+would console him for the burning of one of his _chefs-d'oeuvre_? He
+would be like Rachel weeping for her children, which reminds me that
+ideal parentage is of no sex. The artist, the poet, the reformer, are
+father and mother, all in one.
+
+We left Venice, the diary tells me, on the 5th of August, with what
+regret we need not say. The same venerable authority records a grave
+disagreement with the custom-house officers, of whose ministrations we
+had received no previous warning. So, two very modest pieces of dress
+goods, delayed in the making, caused me to be branded as a
+_contrabandista_, with a fine, and record to my discredit. I confess to
+some indecorous manifestations of displeasure at these circumstances.
+The truth is, forewarned is forearmed. Venice is a free port, and the
+traveller who leaves her by railroad for the first time may not be aware
+of the strict account to which he will be held for every little
+indulgence in Venetian traffic. Now, to have the spoons presented to you
+in the house, and to be arrested as a thief when you would pass the
+door, is a grievous ending to a hospitable beginning. So it came to pass
+that I anathematized beautiful Venice as I departed, gathering up the
+broken fragments of my peace, past diamond cement. But here, in
+trunk-upsetting Boston, I bethink me, and confess. I was wrong, utterly
+wrong, O custom-house officers, when I frowned and stormed at you,
+contending inch by inch and phrase by phrase. You were neither unjust
+nor uncivil, although I was both. Only I still attest and obsecrate to
+the fact that I did not intend to smuggle, and entered your jealous
+domain with no sense of contraband about me. Yet to such wrath did your
+perquisitions bring me, that the angry thoughts slackened only at
+Verona, where the tombs of the Scaligers and the rounds of the
+amphitheatre compelled me to quiet small distempers with great thoughts.
+
+At railroad speed, however, we visited these rare monuments. Can Grande
+and his horse looked flat and heavy from their eminence. We admired the
+beautiful iron screen of one of the tombs, hammer-wrought, and flexible
+as a shirt of mail. And we remembered Dante, paid two francs to the
+guardian of the enclosure, and drove away. The afternoon's journey
+whirled us past some strange antique towns, with walls and battlements,
+and at night we were in Bolsena, Germanice _Bottsen_. And when we asked
+the hotel maid if she had ever been in Verona, she replied, "O, no; that
+is in Italy." And so we knew that we were not.
+
+
+
+
+FLYING FOOTSTEPS.
+
+
+The journey which we now commenced was too rapid to allow of more than
+the briefest record of its route. The breathlessness of haste, and the
+number of things to be seen and visited, left no time for writing up on
+the subjects suggested by the meagre notes of the diary. To the latter,
+therefore, I am forced to betake myself, piecing its fragmentary
+statements, where I can do so, from memory.
+
+Tuesday, August 6. Started with vetturino for Innspruck, via Brenner
+pass. A splendid day's journey. Stopped to dine at a pretty
+village,--name forgotten,--at whose principal inn a smart, bustling
+maid-servant in costume, very clean and civil, came to the carriage,
+helped us to alight, and carried our travelling bags up stairs to a
+parlor with a stout bed in it, upon which our chief threw himself and
+slept until the cutlets were ready. This old-fashioned zeal and civility
+were pleasant to contemplate once more, probably for the last time. For
+a railroad has been built over the Brenner pass, the which will go into
+operation next week. Then will these pleasant manners insensibly fade
+away, with the up-to-time curtness of modern travel. The porter who
+helps you to carry your hand luggage from the car to the depot will
+sternly demand his fee for that laborious service. All officials will
+grow as reticent of doing you the smallest pleasure as if civility were
+a contraband of war. And it does indeed become so, for the railroad
+develops the antagonisms of trade. Its flaming sword allows of no
+wanderings in wayside Paradises. Its steam trumpet shrieks in your ear
+the lesson that the straight line is the shortest distance between two
+points. It swallows you at one point and vomits you at another, with
+extreme risk of your life between. And it vulgarizes every place that it
+touches. The mixed stir and quiet of the little town become concentrated
+into fixed crises of excitement. For the postilion's horn and whip, and
+the pleasant rattling of the coming and going post-chaise, you will
+have, three or four times in the day, those shrill bars whose infernal
+symphony is mercifully allowed to proceed no farther; and a cross and
+steaming crowd; and a cool and supercilious few in the first or second
+class _wart-saal_; and then a dull and dead quiet in the little town, as
+if steam and stir came and went together, and left nothing behind them.
+
+The buxom maid-servant mourned over the impending ruin of the small
+tavern business, as she showed us the curious arrangements of the old
+house. It had formerly been a convent of nuns, and was very solidly put
+together. The back windows commanded a lovely view of the mountains. In
+the garden we found a pleasant open house, no doubt formerly a place for
+devout assemblages and meditations, but now chiefly devoted to the
+consumption of beer.
+
+After dinner we walked to the church near by, and looked at the curious
+iron crosses and small mural tablets which marked the final
+resting-place of the village worthies. Their petty offices and cherished
+distinctions were all preserved here. All of them had received the "holy
+death sacrament," and had started on the mysterious voyage in good hope.
+Through this whole extent of country, the crucifixes by the wayside were
+numerous. Resuming our journey, we reached Mittelwald, a picturesque
+hamlet, composed of a small church, a stream, a bridge, and a short
+string of houses. Here we defeated the future machinations of all
+officers of customs, by causing the two offending dress-patterns,
+already twice paid for, and treated at length in various printed and
+written documents, to be cut into breadths, which we hastily managed to
+sew up, reserving their fuller treatment for the purlieus of civilized
+life.
+
+Our two days' drive over the mountains was refreshing and most charming.
+Our vetturino was not less despondent than the maid-servant before
+alluded to. In our progress we were much in sight of the scarcely
+completed railroad, whose locomotive and working cars constantly
+appeared and disappeared before us, plunging into the numerous tunnels
+that defeat the designs of the mountain fortresses, and mocking our slow
+progress, as the money-getting train of success and sensation mocks the
+tedious steps of learning and the painful elaboration of art.
+
+"This is my last journey," said the vetturino; "the railway opens on
+Monday of next week."
+
+"What will you do thereafter?" I inquired.
+
+"Sell all out, and go to work as I can," he answered; adding, however,
+"In case you should intend going as far as Munich by carriage, I beg to
+be honored,"--of which the Yankee rendering would be, "I shouldn't mind
+putting you through."
+
+This, however, was hardly to be thought of, and at Innspruck we took
+leave of this honest and polite man, whose species must soon become
+extinct, whether he survive or no. Here recommenced for us the prosaic
+chapter of the railroad. Our route, however, for a good part of the way,
+lay within sight of the mountains. The depots at which we took fiery
+breath were in the style of Swiss chalets, quite ornamental in
+themselves, and further graced by vines and flowers. The travellers we
+encountered were not commonplacely cosmopolite. The young women were
+often in Tyrolese costume, wearing gilt tassels on their broad, black
+felt hats. We encountered parties of archers going to attend shooting
+matches, attired in picturesque uniforms of green and gold. At the
+depots, too, we encountered a new medium of enlivenment. We were now in
+a land of beer, and foaming glasses were offered to us in the cars, and
+at the railway buffets. Mild and cheerful we found this Bavarian
+beverage,--less verse-inspiring than wine,--and valuable as tending to
+reduce the number of poets who tease the world by putting all its
+lessons into rhymes, chimes, and jingles. Whatever we ourselves may have
+done, it is certain that our companions of both sexes embraced these
+frequent opportunities of refreshment, and that the color in their
+cheeks and the tone of their good-natured laughter were heightened by
+the same. One of these, a young maiden, told us how she had climbed the
+mountain during four hours of the day before, visiting the huts of the
+cowherds, who, during summer, pasture their cows high up on the green
+slopes. The existence of these people she described as hard and solitary
+in the extreme. The rich butter and cheese they make are all for the
+market. They themselves eat only what they cannot sell, according to the
+rule whereby small farmers live and thrive in all lands. The young girl
+wore in her hat a bunch of the blossom called _edelweiss_, which she had
+brought from her lofty wanderings. It is held in great esteem here, and
+is often offered for sale.
+
+In the afternoon we turned our back upon the mountains. A flat land lay
+before us, green and well tilled. And long before sunset we saw the
+spires of Munich, and the lifted arm of the great statue of Bavaria. Our
+arrival was prosperous, and through the streets of the handsome modern
+city we attained the quiet of an upper chamber in a hotel filled with
+Americans.
+
+
+
+
+MUNICH.
+
+
+Our two days in Munich were characterized by the most laborious
+sight-seeing. A week, even in our rapid scale of travelling, would not
+have been too much for this gorgeous city. We gave what we had, and
+cannot give a good account of it.
+
+My first visit was to the Pinakothek, which I had thoroughly explored
+some twenty-three years earlier, when the galleries of Italy and the
+Louvre were unknown to me. Coming now quite freshly from Venice, with
+Rome and Florence still recent in my experience, I found the Munich
+gallery less grandiose than my former remembrance had made it. The diary
+says, "The Rubenses are the best feature. I note also two fine heads by
+Rembrandt, and a first-rate Paris Bordone--a female head with golden
+hair and dark-red dress; four peasant pictures by Murillo, excellent in
+their kind, quite familiar through copies and engravings; some of the
+best Albert Duerers. The Italian pictures not all genuine. None of the
+Raphaels, I should say, would be accepted as such in Italy. The Fra
+Angelicos not good. Two good Andrea del Sartos; a Leonardo da Vinci,
+which seems to me a little caricatured; a room full of Vander Wertes,
+very smooth and finely finished; many Vandycks, scarcely first rate."
+
+The afternoon of this day we devoted to the Glyptothek, or gallery of
+sculpture. Here our first objects of interest were the AEginetan marbles,
+whose vacant places we had so recently seen on the breezy height of the
+temple from which they were taken.
+
+We found these rough, and attesting a period of art far more remote than
+that of the Elgin marbles. They are arranged in the order in which they
+stood before the pediment of the temple, a standing figure of Minerva in
+the middle, the other figures tapering off on either side, and ending
+with two seated warriors, the feet of either turned towards the outer
+angle of his side of the pediment. All seemed to have belonged to a
+dispensation of ugliness; they reminded us of some of the Etruscan
+sculptures.
+
+This gallery possesses a famous torso called the Ilioneus, concerning
+which Mrs. Jamieson rhapsodizes somewhat in her Munich book. The
+Barberini Faun, too, is among its treasures. As my readers may not be
+acquainted with the artistic antecedents of this statue, I will subjoin
+for their benefit the following narration, which I abridge from the
+"Ricordi" of the Marquis Massimo d' Azeglio, recently published.
+
+At the time of the French domination in Italy, the Roman nobles were
+subjected to the levying of heavy contributions. The inconvenience of
+these requisitions often taxed the resources of the wealthiest families,
+and led to the sale of furniture, jewels, and the multifarious
+denomination of articles classed together as _objets d'art_. Among
+others, the Barberini family, in their palace at the Quattro Fontane,
+exposed for sale various antiquitties, and especially the torso of a
+male figure, of Greek execution and in Pentelican marble, a relic of the
+palmy days of Hellenic art.
+
+A certain sculptor, Cavalier Pacetti, purchased this last fragment, sold
+at auction for the sum of seven or eight hundred dollars. The arms and
+legs were wholly wanting--the narrator is uncertain as to the head.
+Pacetti had made this purchase with the view of restoring the mutilated
+statue to entireness. He proceeded to model for himself the parts that
+were wanting, and in time produced the sleeping figure known as the
+Barberini Faun.
+
+This work was esteemed a great success. Besides the value of its long
+and uncertain labor must be mentioned the difficulty of matching the
+original marble. To effect this the artist was obliged to purchase and
+destroy another Greek statue, of less merit, whose marble supplied the
+material for the restoration.
+
+In the mean time the Napoleonic era had passed away; the pope had
+returned to Rome. Foreigners from all parts now flocked to the Eternal
+City, and to one of these Pacetti sold his work for many thousands of
+dollars. Before it could be packed and delivered, however, a
+governmental veto annulled the sale, directing the artist to restore the
+statue to the Barberini family, under the plea of its being subject to a
+_fidei commissa_, and offering him the sum of money expended by him in
+the first purchase, together with such further compensation for his
+labor and materials as a committee of experts should award.
+
+The unfortunate Pacetti resisted this injustice to the extent of his
+ability. He demonstrated the sale of the torso to have been made without
+reserve, the money for its purchase to have been raised by him with
+considerable effort. The further expense of the secondary statue was a
+heavy item. As an artist, he could not allow any one but himself to set
+a price upon his work.
+
+In spite of these arguments, the Barberinis, remembering that possession
+is nine points of the law, managed to confiscate the statue by armed
+force. Before this last measure, however, a mandate informed the artist
+that the pitiful sum offered to him in exchange (not in compensation)
+for his work, had been placed in the bank, subject to his order, and
+that from this sum a steady discount would mark every day of his delay
+to close with the shameful bargain.
+
+Pacetti now fell ill with a bilious fever, the result of this bitter
+disappointment. His recovery was only partial, and his death soon
+followed. His sons commenced and continued a suit against the Barberini
+family. They obtained a favorable judgment, but did not obtain their
+property, which the Barberinis sold to the King of Bavaria.
+
+I have thought it worth while to quote this history of a world-renowned
+work of art. I do not know that a more perfect and successful
+combination of modern with ancient art exists than that achieved in
+this Munich Faun. The mutilated honor of the Barberini name is, we
+should fear, beyond restoration by any artist.
+
+The Glyptothek closed much too soon for us. With the exception of the
+sculptures just enumerated, it possesses nothing that can compete in
+interest with the noted Italian galleries, or perhaps with the Louvre.
+But the few valuables that it has are first rate of their kind, and it
+contains many duplicates of well-known subjects. The building and
+arrangements are very elegant, and seem to cast a certain pathos over
+the follies of the old king, to whom it owes its origin, making one more
+sorry than angry that one who knew the Graces so well should not have
+fraternized more with the Virtues. The AEginetan Minerva is stern and
+hideous, however, and may have exercised an unfortunate influence over
+her _protege_.
+
+We closed the labors of this day by visiting the colossal statue of
+Bavaria, who, with a strange hospitality, throws open her skull to the
+public. The external effect of the figure is not grandiose, and the
+sudden slope of the ground in front makes it very difficult to get a
+good view of it. With the help of a lamp, and in consideration of a
+small fee, we ascended the spinal column, and made ourselves comfortable
+within the sacred precincts of phrenology. The circulation, however,
+soon became so rapid as to produce a pressure at the base of the brain.
+Calling to the guardian below to impede for the moment all further
+ascent, we flowed down, and the congestion was relieved. Of this statue
+an artist once said to us, "As for such a thing as the Munich Bavaria,
+the bigger it is, the smaller it is"--a saying not unintelligible to
+those who have seen it.
+
+Our remaining day we devoted, in the first place, to the new Pinakothek.
+Here we saw a large picture, by Kaulbach, representing the fall of
+Jerusalem. Although full of historical and artistic interest, it seemed
+to me less individual and remarkable than his cartoons. A series of
+small pictures by the same artist appeared quite unworthy of his great
+powers and reputation. They were exceedingly well executed, certainly,
+but poorly conceived, representing matters merely personal to artistic
+and other society in Munich, and of little value to the world at large.
+
+Here was also a holy family by Overbeck, closely imitated from Raphael.
+The diary speaks vaguely of "many interesting pictures, the religious
+ones the poorest." I remember that we greatly regretted the limitation
+of our time in visiting this gallery. In the vestibule of the building
+we were shown a splendid Bavaria, in a triumphal car, driving four lions
+abreast, the work of Schwanthaler. This noble design so far exists only
+in plaster; one would wish to see it in fine Munich bronze. Apropos of
+which I must mention, but cannot describe, a visit to the celebrated
+foundery in which many of the best modern statues have been cast. Here
+were Crawford's noble works; here the more recent compositions of
+Rogers, Miss Stebbins, and Miss Hosmer. An American naturally first
+seeks acquaintance here with the works of his countrymen. He finds them
+in distinguished company. The foundery keeps a plaster cast of each of
+its models, and the ghosts of our heroes appear with tie-wig princes and
+generals of other times, as also with poets and _litterateurs_. The
+group of Goethe and Schiller, crowned and hand in hand, suggests one of
+the noblest of literary reminiscences--that of the devoted and genuine
+friendship of two most eminent authors, within the narrow limits of one
+small society. The entireness and sincerity of each in his own
+department of art alone made this possible. He who dares to be himself,
+and to work out his own ideal, fears no other, however praised and
+distinguished.
+
+We visited the new and old palaces in company with a small mob of
+travellers of all nations, whose disorderly tendencies were restrained
+by the palace _cicerones_. These worthies did the honors of the place,
+told the stories, and kept the company together. In the new palace we
+were shown the frescos, the hall of the battlepieces, the famous gallery
+of beauties, and the throne-room, whose whole length is adorned with
+life-size statues of royal and ducal Bavarian ancestors in gilded
+bronze. The throne is a great gilded chair, cushioned with crimson
+velvet, the seat adorned with a huge _L_ in gold embroidery.
+
+Of the gallery mentioned just before, I must say that its portraits are
+those of society belles, not of artist beauties. However handsome,
+therefore, they may have been in their ball and court dresses, there is
+something conventional and unlovely in their _toute ensemble_, as a
+collection of female heads. I would agree to find artists who should
+make better pictures from women of the people, taken in their ordinary
+costume, and with the freedom of common life in their actions and
+expressions. An intangible armor of formality seems to guard the persons
+of those great ladies. One imagines that one could understand their
+faces better, were they translated into human nature.
+
+In the old palace, which has now rather a deserted and denuded aspect,
+we still found traces of former splendor. Among these, I remember a
+state bed with a covering so heavily embroidered with gold, that eight
+men are requisite to lift it. The _valet de place_ astonished us with
+the price of this article; but having forgotten his statement, I cannot
+astonish any one with it. Of greater interest was a room, whose walls
+bore everywhere small brackets, supporting costly pieces of porcelain,
+cups, _flacons_, and statuettes. Beyond this was a _boudoir_, whose
+vermilion sides were nearly covered by miniature paintings, set into
+them. Many of these miniatures were of great beauty and value. Clearly
+the tastes of the Bavarian family were always of the most expensive.
+They looked after the flower garden, and allowed the kitchen garden to
+take care of itself. Of this sort was the farming of Otho and Amalia.
+But peace be to them. Otho is just dead of measles, Amalia nearly dead
+of vexations.
+
+Our two days allowed us little time for the churches of Munich. The
+Frauenkirche has many antiquities more interesting than its splendid
+restorations. On one of its altars I found the inscription, "Holy
+mother Ann, pray for us." I suppose that ever since the dogma of the
+immaculate conception has become part of church discipline, the sacred
+person just mentioned has found her clientele much enlarged. The new
+Basilica is quite gorgeous in its adornments, but I have preserved no
+minutes of them.
+
+We had the satisfaction of seeing a number of Kaulbach's drawings, among
+which were his Goethe and Schiller series, very fine and full of
+interest.
+
+One of the last of these represents Tell stepping from Gessler's boat at
+the critical moment described in Schiller's drama. One of the newest to
+me was a figure of Ottilie, from the Wahlverwandtschaften, hanging with
+mingled horror and affection over the innocent babe of the story. The
+intense distress of the young girl's countenance contrasts strongly with
+the reposeful attitude of the little one. It made me ponder this
+ingenious and laboriously achieved distress. The very exuberance of
+Goethe's temperament, I must think, caused him to seek his sorrows in
+regions quite remote from common disaster. The miseries of his
+personages (vide Werther and the Wahlverwandtschaften) are far-fetched;
+and the alchemy by which he turns wholesome life into sentimental
+anguish brings to light no life-treasure more substantial than the fairy
+gold which genius is bound to convert into value more solid.
+
+And this was all of Munich, a place of polite tastes surely, in which
+life must flow on, adorned with many pleasantnesses. Neither would
+business seem to be deficient, judging from the handsome shops and
+general air of prosperity. Our view of its resources was certainly most
+cursory. But life is the richer even for adjourned pleasures, and we
+shall never think of Munich without desiring its better acquaintance.
+
+
+
+
+SWITZERLAND.
+
+
+Travelling in Switzerland is now become so common and conventional as to
+invite little comment, except from those who remain in the country long
+enough to study out scientific and social questions, which the hasty
+traveller has not time to entertain in even the most cursory matter. I
+confess, for one, that I was content to be enchanted with the wonderful
+beauty which feasts the eye without intermission. I was willing to
+believe that the mountains had done for this people all that they should
+have done, giving them political immunities, and a sort of necessary
+independence, while the hardships of climate and situation keep
+stringent the social bond, and temper the fierceness of individuality
+with the sense of mutual need and protection. It would be, I think, an
+instructive study for an American to become intimately acquainted with
+the domestic features of Swiss republicanism. It is undoubtedly a system
+less lax and more carefully administered than our own. The door is not
+thrown open for beggary, ignorance, and rascality to vote themselves, in
+the shape of their representatives, the first places in outward dignity
+and efficient power. The old traditions of breeding and education are
+carefully held to. Without the nonsense of aristocratic absolutism,
+there is yet no confusion of orders. The mistress is mistress, and the
+maid is maid. Wealth and landed property persevere in families. Great
+changes of position without great talents are rare.
+
+To our American pretensions, and to our brilliant style of
+manoeuvring, the Swiss mode of life would appear a very slow business.
+It seems rather to develop a high mediocrity than an array of startling
+superiorities. It has, moreover, no room for daring theories and
+experiments. It cannot afford a Mormon corner, a woman's-rights
+platform, an endless intricacy of speculating and swindling rings.
+Whether we can afford these things, future generations will determine.
+There is a great deal of moral and political fancy-work done in America
+which another age may put out of sight to make room for necessary
+scrubbing, sweeping, and getting rid of vermin. Meantime the poor
+present age works, and deceives, and dawdles, hoping to be dismissed
+with the absolving edict, "She hath done what she could."
+
+Hotels, railways, and depots in Switzerland are comfortable, and managed
+with great order and system. The telegraph arrangements are admirable,
+cheap, and punctual, as they might be here, if they were administered
+for the people's interest, and not for the aggrandizement of private
+fortunes. Living and comfort are expensive to the traveller, not
+exorbitant. Subordinates neither insult nor cringe. Churches are well
+filled; intelligent and intelligible doctrine is preached. Education is
+valued, and liberal provision is made for those classes in which
+natural disability calls for special modes of instruction. I dare not go
+more into generals, from my very limited opportunity of observation.
+Everything, however, in the aspect of town and country, leads one to
+suppose that the average of crime must be a low one, and that the
+preventing influences--so much more efficient than remedial
+measures--have long, been at work. It is Protestant Switzerland which
+makes this impression most strongly. In the Catholic cantons, beggary
+exists and is tolerated as a thing of course; yet the Protestant element
+has everywhere its representation and its influence.
+
+Swiss Catholicism has not the slavish ignorance of Roman Catholicism.
+The little painted crucifixes by the wayside indeed afflict one by their
+impotence and insignificance. Not thus shall Christ be recognized in
+these days. In some places their frequency reminded me of the recurrence
+of the pattern on a calico or a wall paper. Yet, as a whole, one feels
+that Switzerland is a Protestant power.
+
+For specials, I must have recourse to the insufficient pages of the
+diary, which give the following:--
+
+August 13. Museum at Zurich. Lacustrine remains, in stone, flint, and
+bronze; fragments of the old piles, cut with stone knives. Hand-mill for
+corn, consisting of a hollow stone and a round one, concave and convex.
+Toilet ornaments, in bone and bronze; a few in gold.--The Library. Lady
+Jane Grey's letters, three in number; Zwingle's Greek Bible.--The
+Armory. Zwingle's helmet and battle-axe; three suits of female armor;
+curious shields, cannon, pikes, and every variety of personal defence.
+
+August 14. Left Zurich at half past six A. M. for Lucerne, reaching the
+latter place at half past eight. Visited Thorwaldsen's lion, whose
+majestic presence I had not forgotten in twenty-three years. Yet the
+Swiss hireling under foreign pay is a mischievous institution. At two P.
+M. took the boat for Hergeswyl, intending to ascend from that point the
+Mount Pilatus. At half past three began this ascension. The road is very
+fine, and my leader was excellent; yet I had some uncomfortable moments
+in the latter part of the ascent, which was in zigzag, and very steep.
+Each horse cost ten francs, and each leader was to have a _trink-geld_
+besides. We stopped very gladly at the earliest reached of the two
+hotels which render habitable the heights of the mountain. We learned
+too late that it would have been better to proceed at once to that which
+stands nearly on the summit. We should thus have gained time for the
+great spectacle of the sunrise on the following morning. Our view of the
+sunset, too, would have been more extended. Yet we were well content
+with it. Near the hotel was a very small Catholic chapel, through whose
+painted windows we tried to peep. A herd of goats feeding near by made
+music with their tinkling bells. Swiss sounds are as individual as Swiss
+sights. Voices, horns, bells, all have their peculiar ring in these high
+atmospheres.
+
+We lay down at night with the intention of rising at a quarter of four
+next morning, in order to witness the sunrise from the highest point of
+the mountain. Mistaking some sounds which disturbed my slumbers for the
+guide's summons, I sprang out of bed, and having no match, made a hasty
+toilet in the dark, and then ran to arouse my companions. One of these,
+fortunately, was able to strike a light and look at his watch. It was
+just twelve, and my zeal and energy had been misdirected. When I again
+awoke, it was at four A. M., already rather late for our purpose. We
+dressed hastily, and vehemently started on the upward zigzag. As the
+guide had not yet appeared, I carried our night bundle, but for which I
+should have kept the lead of the party. Small as was its weight, I felt
+it sensibly in this painful ascent, and was thankful to relinquish it
+when the tardy guide came up with us. In spite of his aid, I was much
+distressed for breath, and suffered from a thirst surpassing that of
+fever. My ears also ached exceedingly in consequence of the rarefaction
+of the atmosphere. The last effort of the ascent was made upon a ladder
+pitched at such an angle that one could climb it only on hands and
+knees. We reached the last peak a little late for the sunrise, but
+enjoyed a near and magnificent view of the snow Alps. The diary contains
+no description of this prospect. I can only remember that its coloring
+and extent were wonderful. But a day of fatigue was still before us.
+Breakfasting at six o'clock, we soon commenced the painful downward
+journey. No "_facilis descensus_" was this, but a climbing down which
+lasted three full hours. We had kept but one horse for this part of our
+journey, but this was such an uncertain and stumbling beast that we
+gladly surrendered him to our chief, who, in spite of this assistance,
+was found more than once lying on a log, assuring us that his end was at
+hand. We had little breath to spare for his consolation, but gave him a
+silent and aching sympathy. A pleasant party of English girls left the
+hotel when we did, one on horseback and three on foot. The hardships of
+the way brought us together. I can still recall the ring of their
+voices, and the freshness and sparkle of their faces, which really
+encouraged my efforts. The pleasures of this descent were as intense as
+its pains. The brilliant grass was enamelled with wild flowers,
+exquisite in color and fragrance. The mountain air was bracing and
+delightful, the details of tree and stream most picturesque. For some
+reason, which I now forget, we stopped but little to take rest. At a
+small chalet half way down, we enjoyed a glass of beer, and were waited
+upon by a maiden in white sleeves and black bodice, her fair hair being
+braided with a strip of white linen, and secured in its place by a large
+pin with an ornamented head. We reached Alpenach in a state of body and
+of wardrobe scarcely describable. But our minds at least were at ease.
+We had done something to make a note of. We had been to the top of Mons
+Pilatus.
+
+Of Interlaken the diary preserves nothing worth transcribing. The great
+beauty of the scenery made us reluctant to leave it after a few hours of
+enjoyment. The appalling fashionable and watering-place aspect of the
+streets and hotels, on the other hand, rendered it uncongenial to quiet
+travellers, whose strength did not lie in the _clothes_ line. Our brief
+stay showed us the greatest mixture and variety of people; the hotels
+were splendid with showy costumes, the shops tempting with onyx,
+amethyst, and crystal ornaments. We saw here also a great display of
+carvings in wood. The unpaved streets were gay with equipages and donkey
+parties. A sousing rain soon made confusion among them, and reconciled
+us to a speedy departure.
+
+Of Berne and Fribourg I will chronicle only the organ concerts, given to
+exhibit the resources of two famous instruments. At both places we found
+the organ very fine, and the musical performance very trashy. No real
+organ music was given on either occasion, the _piece de resistance_
+being an imitation of a thunderstorm. Both instruments seemed to me to
+surpass our own great organ in beauty and variety of tone. The larger
+proportions of the buildings in which they are heard may contribute to
+this result. Both of these are cathedrals, with fine vaulted roofs and
+long aisles, very different from the essentially civic character of the
+music hall, whose compact squareness cannot deal with the immense volume
+of sound thrown upon its hands by the present overgrown incum--bent.
+
+
+
+
+THE GREAT EXPOSITION.
+
+
+It would be unfair to American journalism not to suppose that all
+possible information concerning the Great Exposition has already been
+given to the great republic. There have doubtless been quires upon
+quires of brilliant writing devoted to that absorbing theme. Columns
+from the most authentic sources have been commanded and paid for.
+American writing is rich in epithets, and we may suppose that all the
+adjective splendors have been put in requisition to aid imagination to
+take the place of sight. Yet, as the diversities of landscape painting
+show the different views which may be taken of one nature, even so the
+view taken by my sober instrument may possibly show something that has
+escaped another.
+
+I here refer to the pages of my oft-quoted diary. But alas! the wretch
+deserts me in the hour of my greatest need. I find a record of my first
+visit only, and that couched in one prosaic phrase as follows:
+Exposition--valet, six francs.
+
+Now, I am not a Cuvier, to reconstruct a whole animal from a single
+fossil bone; nor am I a German historian, to present the picture of a
+period by inventing the opposite of its records. Yet what I can report
+of this great feature of the summer must take as its starting-point this
+phrase: Exposition--valet, six francs.
+
+This extravagant attendance was secured by us on the occasion of our
+first visit, when, passing inside the narrow turnstile, with ready
+change and eager mind, we encountered the great reality we had to deal
+with, and felt, to our dismay, that spirit would help us little, and
+that flesh and blood, eyes and muscles, must do their utmost, and begin
+by acknowledging a defeat. Looking on the diverse paths, and flags and
+buildings, we sought an Ariadne, and found at least a guide whom Bacchus
+might console. Escorted by him, we entered the first great hall, with
+massive machines partially displayed on one side. A _coup d'oeil_ was
+what we sought on this occasion, and our movements were rapid. The Sevre
+porcelains, the magnificent French and English glasses, the weighty
+majolicas, the Gobelin tapestries, and the galleries of paintings,
+chiefly consumed our six francs, which represented some three hours.
+Magnificent services of plate, some in silver, and some in imitation of
+silver, were shown to us. In another place the close clustering of men
+and women around certain glass cases made us suspect the attraction of
+jewelry, which may be called the sugar-plummery of aesthetics.
+Insinuating ourselves among the human bees, we, too, fed our eyes on
+these sweets. Diadems, necklaces, earrings, sufficient, in the hands of
+a skilful Satan, to accomplish the damnation of the whole female sex,
+were here displayed. I was glad to see these dangerous implements of
+temptation restrained within cases of solid glass. I myself would fain
+have written upon them, "Deadly poison." There are enough, however, to
+preach, and I practised by running off from these disputed
+neighborhoods, and passing to the contemplation of treasures which to
+see is to have.
+
+Among the Gobelins I was amazed to see a fine presentation of Titian's
+Sacred and Profane Love, a picture of universal reputation. The
+difficulty of copying so old and so perfect a work in tapestry made this
+success a very remarkable one. Very beautiful, too, was their copy of
+Guido's Aurora, and yet less difficult than the other, the coloring
+being at once less subtile and more brilliant.
+
+I remember a gigantic pyramid of glass, which arose, like a
+frost-stricken fountain, in the middle of the English china and glass
+department. I remember huge vases, cups as thin as egg-shell, pellucid
+crystals in all shapes, a glory of hard materials and tender colors. And
+I remember a department of raw material, fibres, minerals, germs, and
+grains, and a department of Eastern confectionery, and one of Algerine
+small work, to wit, jewelry and embroidery. An American soda fountain
+caused us to tingle with renewed associations. And we hear, with
+shamefaced satisfaction, that American drinks have proved a feature in
+this great phenomenon. Machines have, of course, been creditable to us.
+Chickering and Steinway have carried off prizes in a piano-forte tilt,
+each grudging the other his share of the common victory. And our
+veteran's maps for the blind have received a silver medal. Tiffany, the
+New York jeweller, presents a good silver miniature of Crawford's
+beautiful America. And with these successes our patriotism must now be
+content. We are not ahead of all creation, so far as the Exposition is
+concerned, and the things that do us most credit must be seen and
+studied in our midst.
+
+Our longest lingerings in the halls of the Exposition were among the
+galleries of art. Among these the French pictures were preeminent in
+interest. The group of Jerome's paintings were the most striking of
+their kind, uniting finish with intensity, and both with ease. In his
+choice of subjects, Jerome is not a Puritan. The much admired Almee is a
+picture of low scope, excusable only as an historic representation. The
+judgment of Phryne will not commend itself more to maids and matrons who
+love their limits. Both pictures, however, are powerfully conceived and
+colored. The "Ave Cesar" of the _morituri_ before Vitellius is better
+inspired, if less well executed, and holds the mirror close in the cruel
+face of absolute power.
+
+Study of the Italian masters was clearly visible in many of the best
+works of the French gallery. I recall a fine triptych representing the
+story of the prodigal son in which the chief picture spoke plainly of
+Paul Veronese, and his Venetian life and coloring. In this picture the
+prodigal appeared as the lavish entertainer of gay company. A banquet,
+shared by joyous _hetairae_, occupied the canvas. A slender compartment
+on the right showed the second act of the drama--hunger, swine-feeding,
+and repentance. A similar one on the left gave the pleasanter
+_denouement_--the return, the welcome, the feast of forgiveness. Both of
+the latter subjects were treated in _chiaro-scuro_, a manner that
+heightened the contrast between the flush of pleasure and the pallor of
+its consequences. Rosa Bonheur's part in the Exposition was scarcely
+equal to her reputation. One charming picture of a boat-load of sheep
+crossing a Highland loch still dwells in my memory like a limpid
+sapphire, so lovely was the color of the water. The Russian, Swedish,
+and Danish pictures surprised me by their good points. If we may judge
+of Russian art by these specimens, it is not behind the European
+standard of attainment. Of the Bavarian gallery, rich in works of
+interest, I can here mention but two. The first must be a very large and
+magnificent cartoon by Kaulbach, representing a fancied assemblage of
+illustrious personages at the period of the Reformation. Luther,
+Erasmus, and Melanchthon were prominent among these, the whole belonging
+to a large style of historical composition.
+
+The second was already familiar to us through a photograph seen and
+admired in Munich. It is called Ste. Julie, and represents a young
+Christian martyr, dead upon the cross, at whose foot a young man is
+depositing an offering of flowers. The pale beauty and repose of the
+figure, the massive hair and lovely head, the modesty of attitude and
+attire, are very striking. The sky is subdued, clear, and gray, the
+black hair standing out powerfully against it. The whole palette seems
+to have been set with pure and pearly tints. One thinks the brushes that
+painted this fair dove could never paint a courtesan. A single star, the
+first of evening, breaks the continuity of the twilight sky. This
+picture seemed as if it should make those who look at it thenceforward
+more tender, and more devout. Among the English pictures, the Enemy
+sowing Tares, by Millais, was particularly original--a malignant sky,
+full of blight and destruction, and a malignant wretch, smiling at
+mischief, and scowling at good,--a powerful figure, mighty and mean.
+This picture makes one start and shudder; such must have been its
+intention, and such is its success.
+
+Among sculptures, the most conspicuous was one called the Last Hour of
+Napoleon--a figure in an invalid's chair, with drooping head and worn
+countenance, the map of the globe lying spread upon his passive knees.
+Every trait already says, "This _was_ Napoleon," the man of modern times
+who longest survived himself, who was dead and could not expire. Wreaths
+of immortelles always lay at the foot of this statue. It is the work of
+an Italian artist, and the only sculpture in the whole exhibition which
+I can recall as easily and deservedly remembered.
+
+Our American part in the art-exhibition was not great. William Hunt's
+pictures were badly placed, and not grouped, as they should have been,
+to give an adequate idea of the variety of his merits. Bierstadt's Rocky
+Mountains looked thin in coloring, and showed a want of design. Church's
+Niagara was effective. Johnston's Old Kentucky Home was excellent in its
+kind, and characteristic. Kensett had a good landscape. But America has
+still more to learn than to teach in the way of high art. Success among
+us is too cheap and easy. Art-critics are wordy and ignorant, praising
+from caprice rather than from conscience. It would be most important for
+us to form at least one gallery of art in which American artists might
+study something better than themselves. The presence of twenty
+first-rate pictures in one of our great cities would save a great deal
+of going abroad, and help to form a sincere and intelligent standard of
+aesthetic judgment. Such pictures should, of course, be constantly open
+to the public, as no private collection can well be. We should have a
+Titian, a Rubens, an Andrea, a Paul Veronese, and so on. But these
+pictures should be of historical authenticity. The most responsible
+artists of the country should be empowered to negotiate for them, and
+the money might be afforded from the heavy gains of late years with far
+more honor and profit than the superfluous splendors with which the
+fortunate of this period bedizen their houses and their persons.
+
+Among American sculptures I may mention a pleasing medallion or two by
+Miss Foley. Miss Hosmer's Faun is a near relative in descent from the
+Barberini Faun, and, however good in execution, has little originality
+of conception. And these things I say, Beloved, in the bosom of our
+American family, because I think they ought to be said, and not out of
+pride or fancied superiority.
+
+I am ashamed to say that I have already told the little I am able to
+tell of the Exposition as seen by daylight--the little, at least, that
+every one else has not told. But I visited the enclosure once in the
+evening, when only the cafes were open. Among these I sought a beer-shop
+characterized as the Bavarian brewery, and sought it long and with
+trouble; for the long, winding paths showed us, one after the other,
+many agglomerations of light, which were obviously places of public
+entertainment, and in each of which we expected to find our Bavarian
+brewery, famous for the musical performances of certain gypsies much
+spoken of in Parisian circles. In the pursuit of this we entered half a
+dozen buildings, in each of which some characteristic entertainment was
+proceeding. Coming finally to the object of our search, we found it a
+plain room with small tables, half filled with visitors. Opposite the
+entrance was a small orchestral stage, on which were seated the wild
+musicians whom we sought. A franc each person was the entrance fee, and
+we were scarcely seated before a functionary authoritatively invited us
+to command some refreshment, in a tone which was itself the order of the
+day. In obedience, one ordered beer, another _gloria_, a third
+cigars--all at extortionate prices. But then the music was given for
+nothing, and must be paid for somehow. And it proved worth paying for.
+At first the body of sound seemed overpowering, for there was no
+pianissimo, and not one of the regular orchestral effects. A
+weird-looking leader in high boots stood and fiddled, holding his violin
+now on a level with his eyes, now with his nose, now with his stomach,
+writhing and swaying with excitement, his excitable troupe following the
+ups and downs of his movement like a track of gaunt hounds dashing after
+a spectre. The cafe gradually filled, and orders were asked and given.
+But little disturbance did these give either to the band or its hearers.
+They played various wild airs and symphonies (not technical ones), being
+partially advised therein by an elegant male personage who sat leaning
+his head upon his jewelled hand, absorbed in attention. These melodies
+were obviously compositions of the most eccentric and accidental sort.
+Not thus do great or small harmonists mate their tones and arch their
+passages. But there was a vivacity and a passion in all that these men
+did which made every bar seem full of electric fire; and these must be,
+I thought, traditional vestiges of another time, when music was not yet
+an art, but only nature. Here Dwight's Journal has no power. Beethoven
+or Handel may do as he likes; these do as they please, also. This is the
+heathendom of art, in which feeling is all, authority nothing; in which
+rules are only suspected, not created. After an hour or more of this
+entertainment, we left it, not unwillingly, being a little weary of its
+labyrinthine character and unmoderated ecstasy. Yet we left it much
+impressed with the musical material presented in it. Our civilized
+orchestras have no such enthusiasts as that nervous leader, with his
+leaping violin and restraining high boots. And this, with the lights and
+shadows, and broken music of the outside walks, is all that I saw of
+evening at the Exposition.
+
+
+
+
+PICTURES IN ANTWERP.
+
+
+As you cannot, with rare exceptions, see Raphael out of Italy, so, I
+should almost say, you cannot see Rubens and Vandyck out of Belgium.
+This is especially true of the former; for one does, I confess, see
+marvellous portraits of Vandyck's in Genoa and in other places. But one
+judges a painter best by seeing a group of his best works, which show
+his sphere of thought with some completeness. A single sentence suffices
+to show the great poet; but no one will assume that a sentence will give
+you to know as much of him as a poem or volume. So the detached
+sentences of the two great Flemish painters, easily met with in
+European galleries, bear genuine evidence of the master's hand; but the
+collections of Antwerp and Bruges show us the master himself. Intending
+no disrespect to Florence, Munich, or the Medicean series at the Louvre,
+I must say that I had no just measure of the dignity of Rubens as a man
+and as an artist, until I stood before his two great pictures in the
+Cathedral of Antwerp. One of these represents the Elevation of the
+Cross. Mathematically it offends one--the cross, the principal object in
+the picture, being seen diagonally, in an uneasy and awkward posture. On
+the other hand, the face of the Christ corresponds fully to the heroism
+of the moment; it expresses the human horror and agony, but, triumphing
+over all, the steadfastness of resolve and faith. It is a
+transfiguration--the spiritual glory holding its own above all
+circumstances of pain and infamy. A sort of beautiful surprise is in the
+eyes--the first deadly pang of an organism unused to suffer. It is a
+face that lifts one above the weakness and meanness of ordinary human
+life. This soul, one sees, had the true talisman, the true treasure. If
+we earn what he did, we can afford to let all else go. The Descent from
+the Cross is better known than its fellow-picture. It had not to me the
+wonderful interest of the living face of Christ in the supreme moment of
+his great life; for I shall always consider that the Christ represented
+in the Elevation is a true Christ, not a mere fancy figure or dramatic
+ghost. The Descent is, however, more grand and satisfactory in its
+grouping, and the contrast between the agony of the friendly faces that
+surround the chief figure and the dead peace of his expression and
+attitude is profound and pathetic. The head and body fall heavily upon
+the arms of those who support it, and who seem to bear an inward weight
+far transcending the outward one. The pale face of the Virgin is
+stricken and compressed with sorrow. Each of the pictures is the centre
+of a triptych, the two smaller paintings representing subjects in
+harmony with the chief groups. On the right of the Descent we have Mary
+making her historical visit to the house of Elisabeth; on the left, the
+presentation of the infant Christ in the temple. On the right of the
+Elevation is a group of those daughters of Jerusalem to whom Christ
+said, "Weep not for me." The subject on the left is less significant.
+
+With these pictures deserves to rank the Flagellation of Christ, by the
+same artist, in the Church of St. Paul. The resplendent fairness of the
+body, the cruel reality of the bleeding which follows the scourge, and
+the expression of genuine but noble suffering, seize upon the very quick
+of sympathy, weakened by mythicism and sentimentalism. This fair body,
+sensitive as yours or mine, endured bitter and agonizing blows. This
+great heart was content to endure them as the penalty of bequeathing to
+mankind its priceless secret.
+
+The churches of Antwerp are rich in architecture, paintings, and
+marbles. In the latter the Church of St. Jacques excels, the high altar
+and side chapels being adorned with twisted columns of white marble, and
+with various sculptures. The Musee contains many pictures of great
+reputation and merit. Among these are a miniature painting of the
+Descent from the Cross, by Rubens himself, closely, but not wholly,
+corresponding with his great picture; the Education of the Virgin, and
+the Vierge au Perroquet, both by Rubens, in his most brilliant style.
+Another composition represents St. Theresa imploring the Savior to
+release from purgatory the soul of a benefactor of her order. Rubens is
+said to have given to this benefactor the features of Vandyck, and to
+one of the angels releasing him those of his young wife, Helena Forman;
+while the face of an old man still in suffering represents his own.
+
+This gallery contains three Vandycks of first-class merit, each of which
+will detain the attention of lovers of art. The one that first meets
+your eye is a Pieta, in which the body of Christ is stretched
+horizontally, his head lying on the lap of his mother. The strongest
+point of the picture is the Virgin's sorrow, expressed in her pallid
+face, eyes worn with weeping, and outstretched hands. The second is a
+small crucifix, very harmonious and expressive. The third is a life-size
+picture of the crucifixion, with a very individual tone of color. The
+Virgin, at the foot of the cross, has great truth and dignity, but is
+rather a modern figure for the subject. But the pride of the whole
+collection is a unique triptych by Quintin Matsys, his greatest work,
+and one without which the extent of his power can never be realized. The
+central picture represents a dead Christ, surrounded by the men and
+women who ministered to him, preparing him for sepulture. The right
+hand of the Christ lies half open, with a wonderful expression of
+acquiescence. The faces of those who surround him are full of intense
+interest and tenderness; the Virgin's countenance expresses heart-break.
+The whole picture disposes you to weep, not from sentimentalism, but
+from real sympathy. Of the side pieces, one represents the wicked women
+with the head of John the Baptist, the other the martyrdom of Ste.
+Barbe. Add to these some of the best Teniers, Ostades, Ruysdaels, and
+Vanderweldes, with many excellent works of second-class merit, and you
+will understand, as well as words can tell you, what treasures lie
+within the Musee of Antwerp.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Copy is exhausted, say the printers. Perhaps patience gave out first. My
+MS. is at end--not handsomely rounded off, nor even shortened by a
+surgical amputation, but broken at some point in which facts left no
+room for words. Observation became absorbing, and description was
+adjourned, as it now proves, forever. The few sentences which I shall
+add to what is already written will merely apologize for my sudden
+disappearance, lest the clown's "Here we are" should find a comic
+_pendant_ in my "Here we are not."
+
+I have only to say that I have endeavored in good faith to set down this
+simple and hurried record of a journey crowded with interests and
+pleasures. I was afraid to receive so freely of these without attempting
+to give what I could in return, under the advantages and disadvantages
+of immediate transcription. In sketches executed upon the spot, one
+hopes that the vividness of the impression under which one labors may
+atone for the want of finish and of elaboration. If read at all, these
+notes may be called to account for many insufficiencies. Some pages may
+appear careless, some sentences Quixotic. I am still inclined to think
+that with more leisure and deliberation I should not have done the work
+as well. I should, perhaps, like Tintoretto, have occupied acres and
+acres of attention with superfluous delineation, putting, as he did, my
+own portrait in the corner. Rejoice, therefore, good reader, in my
+limitations. They are your enfranchisement.
+
+Touching Quixotism, I will plead guilty to the sounding of various
+parleys before some stately buildings and unshaken fortresses. "Who is
+this that blows so sharp a summons?" may the inmates ask. I may answer,
+"One who believes in the twelve legions of angels that wait upon the
+endeavors of faithful souls." Should they further threaten or deride, I
+will borrow Elizabeth Browning's sweet refrain,--
+
+    "I am no trumpet, but a reed,"--
+
+and trust not to become a broken one.
+
+Conscious of my many shortcomings, and asking attention only for the
+message I have tried to bring, I ask also for that charity which
+recognizes that good will is the best part of action, and good faith the
+first condition of knowledge.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The following typogrphical errors were corrected by the etext
+transcriber:
+
+embarassment=>embarrassment
+
+Minature=>Miniature
+
+procesison=>procession
+
+pivations=>privations
+
+the shonlder of the garment=>the shoulder of the garment
+
+fortutunate=>fortunate
+
+Bronner pass.=>Brenner pass.
+
+Pinakethek=>Pinakothek
+
+antiquitties=>antiquities
+
+Macchiavelli's Principe=>Machiavelli's Principe
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's From the Oak to the Olive, by Julia Ward Howe
+
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