looks that bit of the oldest, old wall, (hardly the one that Remus leapt over, however, for methinks it is rather too high for that,) the Muro Torto; and, standing with faces toward the dim, distant Soracti, looking over the Campagna lying without the walls, a visionary Faun walked through the Flaminian Gate, soon followed by those other fictitious characters so closely connected with our tale. We went slowly beside the parapet, winding our way among the crowds of people speaking in almost every language but Italian, in the midst of carriages bearing many who like ourselves came from the far Western wilds, by the side of amusements which recalled the gay Champs Elysées and brought together all ages and ranks; we looked upon Rome, the Rome of all time. We saw St. Peter's, the church of the world, over which the spirit of Michael Angelo seems to hover; we saw the round Pantheon with the relics of Raphael, whose single eye looks constantly heavenward; we saw - we saw we saw all this city which has stood so long that it has become its own sepulchre, which has covered and dug up its own bones, which has burned and resurrected its offspring. We looked upon the evening sunset, we listened to the vesper bells, and from the summit of the oft ascended steps, from the Piazza di Spagna, we went down the Via Sistina, and near the Fountain of the Triton refreshed tired nature with food and drink requisite for the occasion.

NORTHERN ITALY.

CHAPTER XVIII.

'OME has become a vision of the past, gone with her walls and her hills and her ruins and her Tiber into the storehouse of memory, with Naples and her dreamy bay, with Venice and her funereal gondolas, with all Italy and her sunny views. In the light of the twinkling stars we drank our au revoir from the waters of Trevi, and slept one more night in the city where seven weeks had passed as a day. Then began our course from Italy to England, from Rome to London, from the Tiber to the Thames, from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic, and with fair Spring everywhere greeting us, we were homeward bound.

A day's ride of but little interest, through a country which looked as though it had delivered up its wealth in ages long gone by, or was waiting for the presence of our goddess to restore the powers which Winter had benumbed, brought us to Pisa, where, we need not tell our friends, the celebrated Tower has leaned for more than six hundred years and been a source of attraction to thousands visiting the land. Of course we went to its very summit, up the stairs which wind about its eight stories, and there sat down to contemplate the scene. Although our point of observation overhung the base to the extent of fifteen feet, yet we felt no fear, for the centre of gravity lay ten feet within the base, and we looked upon the sun, as it went out of sight, in perfect composure, and rejoiced that its brilliant setting portended a fine day for our ride over the Appenines.

It was even so, the finest of days, and seven o'clock saw us at the depot for the short ride to the Gulf of Spezia, where we took the more desirable carriage, throwing back its top to let us look upon the grand mountain scenery, and drawn by four noble steeds. Over the Appenines! In Italy especially, the bays are beautiful, the lakes are lovely, and the cities are curious; but on the morning of which we write the country was charming and the mountains magnificent. The wand of Spring had produced a magical effect, and a halo of freshness encircled the earth, a golden haze floated in the air. The little village of Spezia looked like an Aladdin's palace on the borders of the bright water, gilded with the lustre of the sun's rays, and it is not strange that the Romans called it the Portus Lunæ (Gate of the Moon); indeed, we fancied we were accompanying the identical Old Man whose features are so often traced by the romantic in the fair orb of Luna, for the route was so enchanting; the modest little marguerites nestled along the roadside and the golden anemones were showered upon us, while little feet kept pace with the rolling wheels and little hands were extended into our very midst, pleading that it was better for us to give than to receive. The peaks appeared in rapid succession, but just as rapidly disappeared, and it was all one beautiful, changing panorama. Our guide did not for one moment desert us, although she was not so profuse in the variety she presented the entire route, and on the neighboring summits we could see that Winter had not yet yielded the sceptre to the queen following so closely upon his footsteps. All along our winding way occasional glimpses of the sparkling sea contrasted beautifully with the bare brown rocks. and the sombre evergreens and the purple heather, and our trip across the Appenines, with our number increased by the addition of two to our party, will ever be prominent in our "sunny memories of foreign lands."

The mountains crossed, the sea-shore reached, and then commenced such a roaring, and screeching, and diving into darkness, that we could

imagine we were playing hide-and-seek with the imps of the infernal realms. It was, however, only the cars passing in and out from the many tunnels on the road to Genoa.

From the home of Columbus to Milan and Lake Como the lake so famous, so justly famous; the lake whose beauties the artist has delineated with the tints of the rainbow and the shades of the sunset, which the poet has portrayed in sweet-sounding rhyme and soft-rolling verse, but whose beauties are best seen from the hand of the Master Artist and in the book of Nature. Our place of sojourn was at Bellaggio, where the two arms come up from Lucca and from Como, unite in one body, and flow on in one round of loveliness.

It was at the broad hour of noon that the Three went forth from the little, close Italian town, leaving behind the workers in olive-wood, and going up higher to sit under the vine and olive, there to feast the body and please the mind, to delight the eye and rejoice the soul. Picnics are always pleasant affairs, and we remember many in the year of wandering and some in the years before we crossed the sea, but none with more pleasure than the one taken on the heights of Bel Monte the first day of April, 1874. The sky was our covering, of a blue so fair and yet so deep that it seemed to reach to the very portal of heaven, and the fleecy clouds, so soft and white, sailed swiftly on toward the haven of rest. The mountains in the dim distance lifted their snowy summits so etherially and so uncertainly that it was impossible to say where earth was finished and heaven begun, and the peaks in the near horizon rolled along like the billows of ocean, bearing upon their breasts the moving shadows of the clouds. The hand of the early springtime was upon everything about us; tenderest green decked the brown branches, varied with the pink of the prunella and peach, and the shrubs were so delicate that we scarcely knew whether they bore leaves or flowers, while the golden anemones shone in the grass by the side of the meek and modest

daisies. On our right and on our left, down through the vines and olives, all this loveliness was repeated over and over again in the waters of the two lakes as they rolled around the green point with its far-seeing palace, and joyfully leaped on to receive together the sunny skies and silvery clouds, the snow-capped mountains and vine-clad hills. Who would not have enjoyed the picnic on Lake Como?

A sail of two and a half hours, a flying trip on the railroad, and we halt at Milan, and at early sunrise visit the Cathedral. "Strange, pure, immaculate mountain of airy unearthly loveliness-the most striking emblem of God's mingled vastness and sweetness that ever it was given to human heart to desire or hands to execute. If there be among the many mansions of our Father above, among the houses not made with hands, aught purer and fairer, it must be the work of those grand spirits who inspired and presided over the erection of this celestial miracle of beauty-thousands of glorified saints standing on a thousand airy points of brilliant whiteness ever solemnly adoring. It had the etherial translucence of wintry frost-work. The beautiful plains of Lombardy lie beneath like a map, and the northern horizon line is glittering with the entire sweep of the Alps like a solemn senate of archangels with diamond mail and glittering crowns. Mount Blanc, Monte Rosa with its countenance of light, the Jungfrau, and all the weird brothers of the Oberland, rise one after another to the delighted gaze and the range of the Tyrol melts far off into the blue of the sky. On another side the Apennines, with their picturesque outlines and cloud-spotted sides, complete the enclosure. All around is the unbroken phalanx of mountains. And this temple, with its thousand saintly statues standing in attitudes of ecstacy and prayer, seems like a worthy altar and shrine for the beautiful plain which the mountains enclose; it seems to give all northern Italy to God.

ILLUSTRATIONS.-1. Tower of Pisa. 2. Leaning Tower of Bologna, (see page 140.) 3. Milan Cathedral. 4. Leonardo da Vinci. 5. Last Supper.