legislature was formed solely from the aristocratic classes, which proved a fatal change for the public welfare, for now was introduced a system of espionage, which, in connection with official informers and secret courts, was one of the most cruel and infamous engines of tyranny, perhaps, ever known. No man's life, liberty, or property, was secure. When any fell under suspicion, they were privately arrested, and in most cases were heard of no more. Everything was conducted with the most profound secrecy; the accused victim knew not the secret tongue that betrayed him, or the secret hand that stabbed him. Near the ducal palace, and separated only by a canal, is a prison; this prison is connected with the palace by a covered bridge, called the Bridge of Sighs. This bridge has or had, for it is now closed up, two passages; one leading from the prison into the council chambers, and another leading to other more private apartments and dungeons under the palace itself. These dungeons were also accessible from the palace by a secret passage, unknown to the public until the arcana of these apartments of death were laid open by the French. Indeed, it is said, that the citizens generally did not know of the existence of these wretched cells. Here the trembling victims were led to the torture and to death. "We visited," says our traveler, "these gloomy prisons; they were dark as night, and consisted each of one arch of heavy masonry, with a single hole for purposes of respiration, etc. They had been generally lined with wood, but Napoleon permitted the citizens to enter, and tear out all that was moveable in these horrid cells. Here was a grated window, where the victims used to be strangled. They were seated on a block within, and a rope, fastened at one end, passed through the grate and round the neck, and out again to a machine, by the turning of which the head and shoulders were drawn up to the grate, and the poor wretch was strangled by the cord that passed around his neck.

Another place was fitted up for decapitation, like the guillotine. The heavy knife, fixed to a frame, was raised by a machine to the proper distance, (the victim being fixed in the right position), when it fell and struck the head from the body, and a trench in the stone, and holes made for the purpose, conveyed the blood into the waters below. All this was done by night, and with the utmost privacy; and here were the little arches in the wall, where the executioner placed his lamp, while he performed his bloody work. The whole was made so real, and brought so near, by the associations around us, that the blood was almost chilled with horror, and we were glad to leave those gloomy vaults where thousands had languished out years of solitary confinement, or perished miserably by the hands of the executioner.

Such was the government of Venice, up to the time when the French revolution, backed by the armies of the republic, came down upon Italy, like a tremendous tornado, which hurled kings from their thrones-broke up the foundations of nominal republics-unsettled the feudal aristocracies, that had for fourteen centuries. pressed upon the social system, and, what all must approve, unlocked the prison doors, and let the prisoners go free. This was literally true at Venice and elsewhere; we saw one cell from which a prisoner was liberated, who had been confined fourteen years. Soon after his libera

tion he became blind, from the effect of the light upon eyes that had for fourteen years been accustomed only to the darkness of a dungeon."

Under the French, Venice became first a part of the Italian republic, and later, of the kingdom of Italy. In the new distribution of Europe, made by the allied powers in 1814, Venice, with the whole of Lombardy, fell to Austria, under whose inauspicious rule it is retrograding with accelerated rapidity. Trieste has become its rival, and the pet city of Austria, on the Adriatic.

Venice, although reduced to less than half of its former population, is still a magnificent city. The effect is greatly heightened by its situation on seventy islets; it rises from the waters, with its numberless domes, towers, spires, and pinnacles, presenting the appearance of a vast city floating on the bosom of the ocean. Such a thing as a horse or a carriage is unknown in this city: gondolas serve for the one, and the muscular arms of oarsmen for the other. One hundred and forty-nine canals winding through it, answer, in a great measure, for streets, and up to the very threshold of the palaces, stand posts to fasten the gondolas, as elsewhere they stand to hitch horses.

More than three hundred bridges of marble span the canals, over which pass the streets, which are for foot-passengers only, and but a few feet wide; they number 2,100, and everywhere intersect the city. The grand canal is a prominent feature, it varys from ninety to 180 feet in width, and winds through the city like an S. It has over it but a single bridge, that of the grand Rialto. The row of magnificent but decaying palaces, which extend along this canal, with their light arabesque balconies, and casements, their marble porticoes, and peculiar chimneys, present one of the most superb and singular scenes in the world. They stand in majesty of ruin, and exhibit the most affecting combinations of past splendor and present decay.

The gondolas are peculiar to Venice. They are about forty feet in length, and about four wide, with a cabin in the center for passengers. Formerly, they were magnificently ornamented and painted, and whole fortunes often spent upon them. They are propelled by one, and sometimes by two gondoliers, and with unerring skill and great rapidity.

In the era of the city's prosperity, the boatmen were in the habit of reciting, with peculiar melody, the poems of Ariosto, Tasso, and other favorite Italian authors, and the effect at a distance, on a still evening, was indescribably beautiful. Now

"In Venice, Tasso's echoes are no more,
And silent rows the songless gondolier;
Her palaces are crumbling to the shore,
And music meets not always now the ear."

Within the city are several squares and market-places: of these, the Square of St. Mark is the most magnificent public place in Italy. Upon it is the Church of St. Mark, the Imperial Palace, and the ancient palace of the Doge. The Church of St. Mark is one of the most gorgeous edifices ever erected. Greek, Saracenic, and Gothic architecture, are here beautifully blended, and glitter with gold, gems, and marble. The five domes which swell from its

roof, the crowded decorations which cover its porticoes, give it the appearance of an Eastern pagoda.

The interior is enriched with spoils of Constantinople and the East, the monuments of long ages of glory. On the portico facing the piazza, are four bronze horses, the admiration of all strangers, for their beauty and antiquity. Their origin is involved in doubt, but it is generally believed they were sculptured by Lysippas the Greek, and that originally, they adorned the chariot of the sun at Corinth. They have been great travelers. When the Romans conquered Greece, they were carried to Rome; again they were transferred to Constantinople, when that city became the seat of the Roman empire; when the Venetians took Constantinople, they were carried trophies to Venice; when Venice was conquered by the French in 1797, they were transported to Paris, and then restored to Venice by the allied powers, after the fall of Napoleon.

The ancient palace of the Doge stands south of the Church of St. Mark. It is a splendidly ornamented building, mainly in the Saracenic style, and contains several hundred apartments. Its interior is adorned by many large and elegant paintings, by Titian, Tintoretto, Paul Veronese, and other eminent artists of the Venetian school. An unusual number of them are historical paintings, some of which, of enormous size, represent the great events of Venetian history. The glory of Paradise, in the library room, is thirty feet high, and seventy-four feet long, occupying all one side of the apartment. It took the artist seven years to paint it.

The fine arts in these countries have been, to a great extent, prostituted to the gratification of the depraved tastes of mankind. Exquisite forms of beauty illustrate the licentious loves of mythological characters. "The most sublime efforts of these arts-the most exquisite productions of the bright geniuses who have excelled in them, have sanctioned the exhibitions of the strongest and most corrupting incentives to licentiousness and crime. In the almost superhuman exhibitions of the art, we pardon the offense against moral purity, and while we admire, the more triumphant the achievement, the more insinuating the poison, which, unperceived, is drunk in and nour ished by the mixture of sweets that disguises it, until the moral sense is blunted, and the heart is seduced by the fascinating spell."

In the Ducal palace, the stranger beholds with emotion, the halls where the Senate and the dreadful Council of Ten formally sat, and the councilchamber of the Inquisition. The small hole is yet there by the side of the door, into which informers dropped their secret accusations. Woe unto the man so unfortunate as to be thus reported to the secret tribunal of the State.

Within the Square of St. Mark, are two lofty towers, one belongs to the Church of St. Luke, and stands apart, as was anciently the custom; the other is the "tower of the clock," with the town clock and a bell. The hours are struck with immense hammers, in the hands of a couple of large bronze statues. Near the center of the tower is a noble gilt image of the Virgin and the infant Jesus; an open gallery is in front of these figures, and on each side is a door. At a certain season of the year, for fourteen successive days,

1

at the striking of each hour, one of the doors flies open, and out moves a procession of statues, directed by machinery. First appears a trumpeter, who, as he comes before the Virgin, puts his trumpet to his mouth; he is followed by three other statues, dressed in the costume of eastern sages, one of them a negro. They move around in front of the Virgin, bow to her, straighten up and then disappear through the other door. This is designated as the visit of the Magi. Every day throughout the year, when the bell rings for this purpose, all the doves in Venice flock in myriads here to be fed, corn being at that hour thrown regularly to them, from a high window. This custom originated in the eccentric benevolence of a lady who bequeathed a perpetual legacy for this object, and so habituated have the doves become to it, that as the hour approaches, they gather in great numbers, on the house-tops, in the vicinity, waiting for the sound of the bell that calls them to dinner.

Venice has fine churches, some of which are adorned with beautiful scriptural paintings of the Venetian school. In some of these churches of the city-which, indeed, is very common elsewhere in Italy-is a representation of the Almighty," An attempt," says Dr. Fisk, "which I never witness without a feeling of horror, like that which comes over me in hearing the name of God blasphemed."

The Venetians are devoted to their religion, and so with the Italians generally; with them reverence of the Madonna, or Virgin Mary, and of images of her, is a striking feature. In various parts of Venice, along the sides of the streets, little shrines are fitted up, "a kind of Madonna shops," where images of the Virgin, relics, candles, beads, etc., are sold. In each of these is an image of the Virgin, before which, night and day, a candle is ever burning, and all the people, as they pass, lift their hats, cross themselves, utter a prayer, and often bow in adoration. Not unfrequently, these shrines and images are placed over the door of private residences, palaces, etc. From the great attention given to the image of the Virgin, it seemed to our traveler, that it was done as a kind of talisman, to ward off misfortune, and demoniacal influences. The Italian, on passing such, fears that if he neglects to pay his adoration, bad luck will ensue. Our traveler saw a postilion, one moment utter most horrid oaths, and the next, in passing the image of the Virgin, to lift his hat and repeat a prayer.

Our traveler left Venice with the poetic feeling, with which he had ever regarded her, increased. His course was through Padua, Verona, and Milan, noted for its cathedral, scarcely less celebrated than that of St. Peter itself, of the purest marble, and adorned by more than 4,000 statues. From thence, passing northwardly, by the beautiful lakes Como and Maggiore, he struck the highlands, entered the Simplon pass, and was soon among the snow-clad peaks of the Alps of Switzerland.

SKETCH of France-Landing at Havre-Fine appearance of the-People-Business WomenThe Seine-Rouen-Cathedral-Reverence of the Catholics-French river SteamersParis-Social Arrangements of the Parisians-Sunday in Paris-Delightful Walk-Fine Arts Galleries of Art open to the Public-Their Influence-Morals of the French-Licentiousness-Position of Woman-Marriages of convenience-Departure from ParisDijon-The Saone-Agriculture in France-French Peasant Life-Temperance of the People Departure from Lyons-Peasant Women-A Reflection.

FRANCE has an area of about three times that of the State of Virginia. Its surface exhibits an advantageous mixture of high and low lands. Its climate, though varying much in different localities, is in general genial, and well adapted to extensive and profitable agriculture. On the north it approaches that of England; in the central regions the winters are mild and short, and all seasons are exempt from extremes. In the south the midsum mer is oppressively hot, and irrigation necessary to agriculture.

(270)