The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1853-01-27

see IN III al tu3t OtDcIs nave Seen--au the
wonders and sublimities that critics point out
and so eloquently dwell upon. For myself,
cannot recognize it as the most perfect crea-
ton, the browning achievement of Raphaeps
genius Some of his minor and simpler COM
positions impress me Infinitely more. Nor can
| find all that poets have found in Guido's ia
nous portrait of Beatrice Ceuci, in the Barbe-
RIM Palace, The upper part Of the face is
truly beautful--the brow is noble, and the
eyes, in the full living look they cast on you,
have sweet appealing sadness, and mournful
hopelessness, which haunt you through days
and weeks; but the mouth / think childish
and characterless | cannot imagine those
lips, falling so listlessly apart ever set with
heroic energy and deadly determination.
cannot believe that this expression of weakness
! could have resulted altogether from the past
torture or the coming death-agony; and hold
to the opinion, that if Beatrice Ceuci was gull
ty Of the terrible vet noble crime for which she
suffered, and bore herself so grandly through
| all, as we have been told she did, then this is
not q perfectly true portrait of the heroic girl.
| One lovely afternoon lately | drove with my
| friends Mr. and Mrs s., to the villa Bor-
CHEESE, where, among many other fine works of
| art, | saw Canova's Venus Victorieuse. This
| is an exquistely graceful and elegant statue,
altogether my fayorite among Canoyas female
| figures. For this you will remember, Pauline
| Bonaparte sat, or rather refined and it was
referring to this, that she afterwards made the
famous reply to a somewhat more scrupulous
lady who wondered how she could bear the
exposure" Oh | assure you it was not I'M
| comfortable the room was well warmed -
simply treating it IS question of Fahrenheit
| This villa is one of the loveliest places in
the neighborhood of Rome shall never for
| get our coming ont into the grounds at sunset,
and the long draughts of pure delight which
drank in as gazed around and above me.
Stately trees cast their s1ft shadows across my
path fallen leaves, golden, and bronze, and
crimson, stirred into little eddies by the rising
wind rippled about my feet-fountains muir
INJURED dreamily in the distance, and intermin-
| ged Lights and shades played over the pleasant
lawn The sky was gorgeous with purple and
gold, shading of into the softcst lilac and the
serenest blue. Wherever looked, on earth,
or heaven, there was beauty-beauty indeScri-
bable, onimagnallc, and exclaimed-" Oh
God must have brooded longer over this land
than over any other ON the broad face of the
wordin
We have spent one day at Tvoii, where we
saw the yet beautiful temple of the Sibyl, the
famous grotto, the falls, the ruins--hsd a long
donkey-ride over the hills, and pic-niced under
olive and 6g-trees, in sight of halEa-dozen sill
very cascades. Tivoli is a striking, unique,
picturesque, wonderful old place, where one
could linger for months, Tapped in long luxu-
rious dreams of its past glories and splendors,
where the princely villas of Hadrian Mace
mas Propertius, Sallust, Brutus, and Cassius,
cleaned white and beautiful among its woods
nd oil in, iof f-aoh
ment of the indestructbe LONELINESS of Nature
/ Yesterday we attended high mass in the SIS
tine Chapel, the Pope officiating The eard-
mails were present in strong force and grand
array; and on this occasion | first witnessed
the ceremony of kissing the cross on the Pope's
robe, and ON the toe OF his Holiuess's shoe.
After service we drove To the Basilica Of San
Paolo, large and splendid church, now being
erected on the site of one destroyed by fire
When finished this will even rival ST. Peters
in beauty and grandeur. | have never beheld
anything in architecture more magnificent
than the double rows Of pillars down the i'm
mense nave Yet my admiration was mingled
with bitterness and grief | felt that they
weighed on the crushed souls of the people, ON
liberty and true Christianity. When ! thought
OF this once noble race, oppressed, debased,
beggaEed, and beheld this waste of wealth
wruug from them by the soul-rack of SUPER
stition, all seemed to me but gigantic mock.
cry reared in the face of a Just God, who
dwelleth not in temples made with hands ~
To-day we have assembled St Peters, To the
very lantern. We found the ascent much less
tedious and fatiguing than~we expected, and
that we had had but faint and narrow concep-
tons Of the grandeur, height and immensely
OF this stupendous building. 1t WAS strange
To wander about on the vast roof, among the
cupolas and workshops, which seemed to con-
stituse q small village of themselves; and after
having accomplished the ascent, the down look
from the top of the great dome was awfally
grand. The head swan, as from the height Of
that pictured heaven the eye fell from circle
to circle Of those wondrous mosaics-seraphs,
cherubs, prophets, apostles-to the illuminated
altar below. Yet here also | was saddened-
remembering how thousands on thousands of
Gods poor children had CROPPED in the pro-
foundest night of ignorance and error, from
the cradle to the grave that this vast pile of
marble, and gliding, and gorgeous colors,
might dazzle the world | remembered with
how much spiritual wickedness in high pla-
cess with how much fraud and crime, the
wealth here layished had been wrested from
the hands of the poor and the deluded, and
methOaght over such sights as these would
Jesus weep tears more bitter than those he
shed over JerusalAm.
We have visited the Coliseum by moonlight,
and bathed our very souls in the Wild dreamy,
desolate beauty of the scene. The Forum Ro-
manum and the Forum of Trajan are scarcely
less impressive at night, but always feel and
realize most in gazing on the ancient arches of
Titus OF Septimius Severns, Constantine, Dru-
sus, and Janus. What floods of glorious life
poured through these in the prosd old warlike
days-in the slow sweep of victorious armies,
or the wild surge of battle and fight or the
quiet, continuous flow of prosperous peace, OF
the full sparkling gush Of pleasure; what
countless religious and festal pagesnt~, mar
riage and funeral professions have passed I'M
der them! What stormy crowds have gathered
round them What murderous faces have
lurked behind them What stars Of womanly
loneliness have cleaned out the brighter from
their momentary shade What sweet childish
daughters have rung through them tumult
and crime layed and avenged, lights of beauty
and childish daughters quenched and hushed
these many, many centuries. And the stately
columns Of Antonipus and Trajan, nearly AS
old ss Christianity, yet still wresthed with rare
sculptures, alive with the matches forms of
antique art-what triumphs and captiyities,
splendors md desolations, have we behcld
Oh! wondrous dumb witnesses Of a mighty
past
From amid the grand shadows and tender
sunlight which fall about me here, look ont
ON the world, if not gaily, surely not sadly-in
melancholy, perhaps, hut never in despair
aud So bid you adieu
GRACE GREENWOOD.
LITERARY NOTICE
ROMANCE OF STUDENT LIrr AssoAD. BY Richard
b. Kimbsll, author Of St. Legsr or, The Thrcsds
Of Life" One vol DID, 26l Published by q. p.