The

ranean church, signified the moral death of man. cruciform shape of the church recalled also the Atonement; the cupola, heaven.*

"I love Gothic architecture best of all," Janet remarked; "and yet the Lombard style, so much of which we shall see in Italy, has its own peculiar beauty."

"Before I came to Europe," I answered, "I was sure I should never be content with anything but the pure Gothic; my opinion, however, has changed very much. I now find more repose and calm beauty in the circular arches, horizontal lines, and expanding cupola of the Lombard architecture. The Gothic, with its pointed arches, springing vaults, and elaborate tracery, fatigues me beyond expression. There is infinite rest and peacefulness in the beautiful Basilica. The Lombard church, with its octagonal baptistery and the graceful campanile or bell tower grouped around it, seems to me just the perfection of religious architecture. It is so complete and satisfying, while the Gothic is more like human life, yearning, aspiring, incomplete."

66

"The Gothic is an emblem of the unapproachable ideal," said Janet. However, I will not argue with you, for, like all new converts, you are of course bigoted. Your excellent author, Lord Lindsay, says, you may possibly remember, that the mind capable of comprehending the Gothic would be likely to appreciate the Classic more justly than the devotee of the Classic would the Gothic."

The Sacristan, just at this moment, told us, with many civil excuses, that the hour for closing the church had arrived; so we left our fine cupola seat on the Santa

* Essai Sur les Legendes Pienses du Moyen Age, par M. Alfred Maury.

Marie de Carignan, though very loath to do so, and thus put an end to our pleasant talk on the calm Greek Basilica and the restless Teuton Church.

On returning to our carriage we found we had nearly an hour at our disposal, for we had given orders that dinner should not be served until after sunset, that we might have all the daylight for sight-seeing. We drove again through the Strada Carlo Alberti, which fronts the harbor.

When we reached the Douane we alighted and walked on the marble-floored promenade, which extends from the Douane, or Custom-House, to the Darsena, or Water Dock, and Marine Arsenal. This walk or terrace is supported on fine porticos, and is one of the beauties of the city; from it the whole port can be seen.

We looked up at the Douane very earnestly, when Janet told us that in it were the rooms which had been formerly used for the famous Bank of St. George, which had begun to receive deposits and make loans before Columbus crossed the Atlantic; it was the India House of the Middle Ages.

Our courier, a quiet, intelligent person, showed us a heavy iron chain, which hangs over the principal entrance door; it was formerly the chain with which the Pisans closed their gates, and which the Genoese, after the fatal battle of Meloria, in 1290, broke and carried off in triumph to Genoa, nearly six hundred years ago!

It was the hour of sunset, and, though a mid-winter month, the air was soft and balmy. We returned to the carriage, and drove slowly, enjoying the lovely sight of the sunrise and sunset shores of the Genoese Gulf, as they are called, Riviera di Levante, where the coast stretches out towards Tuscany in the east; and Riviera di Ponente, where the shore leads off towards Nice in the

west. We examined the distance with our glasses. The long western coast, with its Lantern, or Lighthouse, at Cape St. Benigne, was brilliantly illuminated with the twilight glories, for the sky was

"Robed in flames and amber light,

The clouds in thousand liveries dight."

Nearer to us, on a rocky terrace projecting out on the water, almost in front of the port, we observed a group of ilex-trees; and back of them, the palace of Genoa's great Admiral, Andrea Doria, who gave his state a Constitution which lasted near three hundred years.

As we talked of this Palazzo Doria, its famous master, and the regal banquet he had given to Charles V. on that ilex-shaded terrace, we were very naturally led to the memory of his unfortunate young rival, Count Fieschi.

"In these very waters of the Darsena,” I remarked, "the unhappy young man perished. It was just touch and go with Admiral Doria's power then; but for that fatal midnight mistep of the young Count, history might have had a different tale to tell. At the moment Fieschi was treating the Marquis di Sauli so haughtily, he was probably planning his conspiracy; therefore, was it, that he did not like being approached as an equal when dreaming of sovereignty.

666 Madam,' he said to his startled wife, on that sorrowful night three hundred years ago, when he disclosed to her his intended revolt, 'you shall never see me again, or you shall see everything in Genoa under your feet.'

"She never did see him again! He left his palace; one short hour after, when he was stepping on board the captain galley, which lay here in this Darsena, to take command, and bring his masterly-planned conspiracy to a successful conclusion, the plank broke on which he strode.

Nothing could be seen, for it was dark midnight; but a plash of heavy armor falling on the sullen waters was heard, a plunge, a short gurgle, that was all! The Fieschi pride had met its fall; and the long line of popes, cardinals, and great generals ended in this young nobleman of twenty-two, while his ill-fated ambition became a mere fact for history to mention and people to forget, until, three centuries after, a bold young German poet made it into a famous play; for although Schiller's Conspiracy of Fieschi may not be equal in literary merit to his other historical dramas, it is more popular on the German stage than anything he wrote, except the Robbers."

"It was the old political quarrel between Guelph and Ghibelline," observed Janet, "that struggle which had then been raging five hundred years. Doria was a Guelph or Papal adherent; Fieschi, a Ghibelline or Imperialist. You should not be sympathizing with young Fieschi, Ottilie; he did not belong to your side of the question at all."

"No; that is very true," I replied; "but Fieschi was bold, young, aimed high,—and failed! Nine times out of ten that is the side on which women will be found, utterly regardless of all reason, principle, or opinion, simply from admiration for that which she does not possess, high courageous daring; and tender, loving pity for that which is so often her own fate, — failure!"

The twilight deepened; the driver turned his horses' heads towards the hotel, and quickened their gait. In a short while after, we were enjoying a capital dinner, and a merry talk on the trifles of the present moment, quite forgetting for the while history's tales of mingled luck and wanluck.

E

NAPLES, Strada Mergellina.

HAVE no visit to Pisa or Civita Vecchia to tell of,-no sweet raptures over the voyage from Genoa to this place, on the beauti

ful Mediterranean, with historical memories aroused at every turn. During the whole period I was ill,ill in body and mind, heart and soul.

Apprehension stalked beside me like an evil genius, stretching out its long, spectral finger to deaden every pleasure. A crowd of forms surrounded me, all the shadowy beings that people the lands of presentiment and memory; and there arose before me "those towering gates of the Past which seem to stand forever open." Once in a while the eager, hot breath of love and longing sweeps aside the sombre curtain, and discloses for one brief instant joys, hopes, and aspirations forever gone; then the black folds fall with dumb, appalling weight, and we move onward oppressed with the dreary thought, that forever in this life our hands are unclasped from the loved one's neck, our lips forever parted, our confidences forever stilled, for the ear of the fond, indulgent friend is filled with the dust and ashes of death!

But these sorrowful thoughts are quite out of place here; they sound like harsh dissonances in a beautiful