ning around it I see all Rome lying of strength, of awe. There is majesty | underneath me, and away off beyond in darkness, there is sublimity in it. 'it' too, I have glimpses of towns and Light is gairish and vulgar. Here, sir, and villages all melting into the blue you are removed by distance from the distance. world, brought near to heaven, and just above earth's holiest spot.”

But there still remains a part of St. Peter's unvisited. A sort of funnel "Hallo," said I mentally, "here is a leads up into the ball, and thither with wonder for you-a philosopher or a little difficulty I ascended. What do madman rampant in the ball of St. you see there? Well, not much, to Peter's. The chap talks like a book." tell the truth. I saw a good deal of Then, turning toward the quarter I darkness, and felt a little peculiar fancied him to be located in, I said: when I began to think of my where- " You may be right, sir; I only spoke abouts and the contingency of a big of a little detriment from the thorough storm and the ball toppling over with enjoyment of this curious place. I its precious contents. But I bore up did not look at it in the light you do. bravely, and was just meditating a Of course you are right. Darkness scramble or a "grope" around the place, is great, sublime, any other adjective when I was almost frightened out of my you please, but you'll admit that it is life by hearing a stentorian voice in not very enjoyable." the darkness address me. What a rumble and roar that voice did make! I fancied the whole ball above, below, and all around me was speaking.

"Is not this fine?" was what it said,

in Italian of course.

"Enjoyable, sir! It is that I most strongly assert. It is enjoyable, sir. Else why should I spend my time here?"

Of course the last argument was unanswerable. So I showed the white

"Fine?" said I interrogatively to feather and tried to retire as gracefully the stentorian unknown. But the as I might from the discussion. moment I uttered the word I closed my mouth fast and made a wry face, for my own gruff bass voice made a roar like a cannon.

"Fine?" bellowed an echo that seemed to lose confidence and die out before it had the word completed.

"Yes, fine," repeated the voice louder than before. "Do you not call this fine?"

"Ah yes, certainly," quoth I conciliatingly, "it is fine-but do you not think that the view might be slightly improved."

"No, sir, it could not. This is the perfection of grandeur, sir, of power,

"Pardon me, invisible friend," said I, "but the truth is, the closeness of the atmosphere in this globe annoys me. So I shall be compelled to retire."

"I shall go with you," the voice returned.

Then I began the descent of the funnel, conscious as I went down, of a patter of feet above me. At last I emerged into the twilight of the upper gallery, and there I waited. Not long though. First came two slender nether limbs, then a lank body, and at last a shrivelled yellow face. That was the first I saw of Giacomo. We talked

FORE

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THE SOLITARY OF ST. PETER'S.

105

about the paintings, the sculptures, changing, was known to very few. For everything about us, as we traversed over two years he had been a daily the winding passages of the dome, and by the time we reached the ground, the sun, which had broken through the clouds, poured a glory of light into the great structure, and gilt the marble shafts and carved arches with its bright

ness.

"Do you not think, sir," said I, "that here you can best realize the grandeur and magnificent dimensions of this great temple?"

visitor at St. Peter's, but unlike all others he never stopped to admire its beauties, but hurried up to that strange, unpleasant spot he had in a manner associated with himself.

This was what the old man told me. I wondered at the story, and from that time I made Giacomo a study. But the more I knew him the more distant he became. His private story, whatever it was, never reached me. It died with him, and oh! in such a way.

His death was a fit ending to a life

"No," he answered emphatically and somewhat tartly. "No, it is only when you climb its entire height, and so strange. from this glare of gold and bronze and marble close yourself up in the darkness and solitude of its silent place that you come to fancy what a work

it is."

One evening as the watchmen on the cathedral roof were going their rounds they heard a shout as if of triumph far above their heads. The moon was high up in the clear sky and bathed in silver all the mighty dome. And high upon it, near the

When I left Giacomo it was with the understanding that we should meet again in the ball of the Basilica. He very cross, they saw a figure creeping spent much of his time there, he told me, engaged, I suppose, in meditation or perhaps mortification; for it seemed to me an infliction to be confined, if but for a half hour, in that dark, lonesome place.

upwards as if climbing by the projections. In vain they hallooed to warn the climber of his peril. Higher he went till like a speck he seemed, and just as he had reached the highest point and seemed about to grasp the glittering cross, he fell from the dizzy summit to the roof. They raised him from the ground, but he was dead. The moonlight shone upon the bruised face and shabby black garments. When they had washed the features clean of blood they saw that it was Giocomo.

Giacomo had a story. I learned it from an old Italian I chanced to meet in the cathedral-a sort of porter I believe he was. Giacomo, he told me, had come from some town in the north of Italy. He was well supplied with money, which he expended in acts of charity, and he was known to have supported during sickness many of the Roman poor whom he chanced to encounter in his ramblings. No one knew anything of his antecedents, for he made no confidants; and even his place of residence, which he was always its shadow.

So he died. None inquired for him. None knew how he had come hither. Some feeling men, who knew his strange love for the holy pile, had him buried near St. Peter's, where he still sleeps in

SHADOWS ON THE SIDEWALK.

BY AGOO.

Tell me not in mournful numbers
Life is but an empty dream!
For the soul is dead that slumbers,

And things are not what they seem.-H. W. Longfellow.

This proves at least there is one who has a heart to feel, as well as a brain to conceive the wants and desires of those allied to him by nature. Not so with the shadows of life that jostle the son of drudgery in his onward journey.

To those unacquainted with the se-1 cret workings of the human heart as manifested in our large cities, the words of the poet, "that things are not what they seem," would lose all force and pointedness in application. The stranger viewing for the first time the busy throng of stragglers that habitually The pretended pattern of honestyblockade the public avenues, lost in the merchant-that shadow of public amazement as gazing on the wealth safety, goes on with his pompous strut, displayed, the total indifference to care with his eyes directed straight ahead, or occupation, the general want of with an eye always to business, never reflection as to any settled destination venturing to look to the right or left, in their wanderings, would immediately lest a beggar should ask for alms. For decide that at best "life is but an this there would be no newspaper noempty dream."

Alas! how few of the many found on the promenade deserve any other name than that of shadows.

True, you will find the humble laborer of the morning, who as he went forth to work appeared to have no thought beyond the narrow limits of his own vulgar self, returning laden with fuel to brighten the dull hearthstone, where the partner of his joys and toils awaits to greet him with love's true welcome, while children send forth a shout of delight which gladdens the father's heart more than untold treasures could succeed in doing.

tice, therefore he passes on, dreaming only of the next public meeting, ostensibly for the "Union" while at the bottom lies a petition to Congress to reduce the tax on hides, tallow, tar, and a thousand other articles. No, he must go on, time is too precious to be wasted in anything but that which will give a large dividend and place a handsome balance on his books.

A shadow with a slow, cautious gait, presenting to the beholder a cadaverous appearance, next approaches.

This miserable specimen of the human plant-the prickly-pear in the garden of life, which, if touched, it is

at your cost, is dignified with the title more than ordinarily gifted, is not desirof broker. Having only one thought, ous of improvement. The demands of and that of gain, no matter whether society and fashion must be complied the widow's sobs, the orphan's tears, with in all their details. It is only necesor the bleeding form of his country, be sary to play loudly on the piano, withpresented to his eye, it is of no avail. out any discernment of the beauties of Self-all-absorbing, greedy self-the composer, the most popular pieces must be appeased, and that at the of the day; to screech, when asked to highest rate per cent.

The professional shadows I will pass by, and devote the remainder of this article to the fairest, but, unfortunately, the faintest shadow to be found on the sidewalk.

This shadow demands the greatest care in description. Clothed in garments of the most costly texture, adorned with robes in search of which the forests and wild woods have been traversed by many a hardy hunter, glittering with jewels that the bowels of the earth were opened and forced to yield up its hidden gems, to display to better advantage a poor tenement of clay, whitened sepulchre of mortality, the Highted bud of promise, once the hope, now the curse of society. This shadow, now known, will allow a change of languge, and may be addressed as becones so appropriate a theme.

sing, until the tympanum of the listener's ear causes him to seek relief in the howl of a dog in the neighboring yard, or, perchance, the bashfulness of the fair shadow (and that seldom happens) drives her to relinquish the task, and naively assign as a reason that neverto-be-forgotten excuse-a severe cold. As to other accomplishments, they are innumerable. Tapestry, which consists of two pieces, one completed almost entirely by the teacher, and handsomely framed and placed in the most conspicuous place the parlor can afford; the other, as yet unfinished, and never to be. That belongs to the work of school days, now so thankfully at an end. French! certainly; eight or ten set phrases and no more. "Oh! the verbs were so hard I never could learn them. Thank fortune, I never will have to make any use of French, as I have no wish to marry a French count, for Augustus Petroleum is paying me his addresses, and I am sure he is dying with love for me."

The fashionable lady of the present day may be found largely represented among the daughters of our land. Fair, beautiful, in a word, lovely in everything that pleases the eye to look upon, Thus reasons that senseless shadow or he imagination to reflect. Out-of womanhood. She who should be wardy, the beau ideal of painter or the pride and joy of the household, the sculptor, internally, that is, mentally, defender of purity and faith, the conthe cude marble of the sculptor, or the soler in the hour of need, now only the unfinished canvas of the artist, with a play-toy of vicious and licentious youth, few mister strokes by the chisel of the the dread of honest manhood, the former, or a few slight traces by the plague-spot on the domestic circle. Raphalean hand of the latter. This Where rests the remedy? I answer, daughter of fortune, in many cases with home culture; with the mothers,

who, rather than permit the dainty arising from sincere and unselfish mohands of the daughters to be soiled tives be impressed upon their tender with labor, do all themselves, exempli- minds; and by learning self-dependfying the old story that they who are ence, and that only by a faithful adwet with rain should go out to the well herence to industry and perseverfor water. All this may express good-ance in all that belongs to the nature on the part of the parents, but duties of their sex, can they hope Thus Nature's signs more feelingly portray to be placed in the list of illustrious A thousand ends of life than all a voice could say. women-real substances, not fleeting Let the pure and noble sentiments shadows.

COURTESY.

Nowhere is well-bred courtesy, or of the annoyance she gives her neighthe lack of it, more observable than bors. In this democratic country we in travelling. On the steamboat and travel in public conveyances too much in the cars the quiet observer readily as though they were our own private detects those who have been edu- carriages. How often the elevent! cated under refined influences, or and twelfth passengers in a city omnthose who, without special cultivation, bus, who know they have full claim to are possessed of native politeness. It a seat, are discomforted by the outis not education alone, nor wealth, nor spread garments, the immovable ettihigh social position, nor costly trap-tudes and blank faces of those who pings that make one a pleasant travel-happen to have entered the stage beling companion. There must exist a fore them! Common civility demands kindness of feeling toward strangers, a that a movement be made to give room general recognition of equal rights in until the complement is filled out; afterthe comforts and conveniences provided ward courtesy and generosity will often for the public, and a quickened discern- prompt to attentions which justice may ment for the needs of others. The not require. It is surprising how much gentleman who spreads out his luggage the comfort and pleasure of any jouron a couple of seats in the cars, and ney, whether long or short, is enhanced persistently reads his newspaper, de- by those little nameless courtesies terminately unconscious that others who which are offered instinctively and unhave paid as much as he has are look-officiously to strangers, by refined, ing in vain for a seat, is as truly ill- well-bred travellers, and persons in bred as the country girl who noiseless- whom native tact and delicacy almost ly eats her pint of pea-nuts, scattering make up for the lack of the elucating the shells on seats and floor, regardless and refining influences of good society.