The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1886-06-02

eANNAt
amid such disadvantages of poor light and
foul air, we wondered they contrive to pro-
duce the indispensable necessities OF human
existence. In the shops we watched the
bakers mixing their biscuits of chestnut Hour
and taking from the ovens smoking hot short
cakes fully three feet in diameter These
were stuck all over with nuts, herbs and
scraps of tomato; and had lots of dimples,
which looked very much as if the babies had
played tit-tat-too on them, while the papa was
mixing the next batch. AS soon as cool they
were hung on a wooden pin outside the door
to tempt the hungry, where they showed such
a tenacity of fibre that they would make
good covers for molasses hogsheads. The
cooks were frying sprawling devil fish in
caldrons of boiling oil. A person who could
have swallowed one of these squirming in
fernals, in the days of the Salem Witchcraft
would have been convicted as a witch.
Everywhere the windows were festooned
with golden macaroni, such as we do not
see in America. 1t is certainly more taxing
to the eye, if not more palatable than that III
use at home. which we often saw spread
upon the tops of the flat-roofed houses, where
bare-footed children, not with spotless feet
or noiseless tread of angels footsteps were
sweeping it into little heaps or turning IL
over to cure in the warm sunshine.
PISA.
Pisa came next in our travels, where one
enclosure contains the four lions OF the place,
the Leaning Tower, the Cathedral, the Bap-
tistry and the Campo Santo. The Leaning
Tower, which was the wonder in our first
pictorial geography, awakening our earliest
curiosity to see strange lands, does not disap-
point the visitor in its apparent and persis-
tent defiance of architectural law. 1t has no
special external beauty. but when seen be-
side the perpendicular lines of the massive
buildings about it, its topping over at no
distant day seems inevitable, in spite of its
having stood in statu quo for seven centu-
ries. The Cathedral is very massive and
beautifully decorated with marbles of every
hue and finer mosaics. The old bronze lamp
SWANS to and fro from the centre of the
dome, Just as it did when Calico was lad.
1t is said he was but eighteen when these
oscillations suggested to him the practical
application of the principle involved in the
measurment of time by the pendulum. We
never appreciated the genius and love of in
vestigation of so young mind, until we
paced the floor in his footsteps, and locked
at it as trivial, everyday incident. Mil
lions of worshippers before him had re-
garded it, as we do many wonders, like the
rising and setting of the sun, without once
asking how, or by what power they are ac-
complished. Most likely the Pisa boys called
Calico an odd stick to steal away from their
frolics into the silent church to indulge in
useless reveries. The Leaning Tower was
his favorite resort at night to study the
movements of the heavenly bodies.
The Baptistry, where formerly every child
born in Pisa must be baptized into the Holy
Catholic church or forfeit the blessing OF
eternal life, possesses most wonderful ac-
coustic properties whether the result of ar
chitectural design or accident is not known.
As we were admiring the delicate carving OF
the marble pulpit, the sweetest and richest
strains of music startled us, not having no
ticed choir or organ. Turning suddenly,
we could not trace it to any source and be-
gan to query if we heretics were to be the
favored eye witnesses of one of those miracles
in which the legendary lore of the Romish
CluICil dUVuuuc, NllC1 W. ooN WV 'tpo nv y
of valet de place, who had escorted party
He had melodious italian voice, whose
single tones rose to the lofty dome and float
ed back to us like the blended chords of an
organ and band of sweet singers OF old.
The Campo Santo, whose soil was brought
from the Holy Land, in which to inter the
santed dead, is enclosed by arcades, whose
walls were once richly decorated by Giotto's
frescoes and whose sides were lined with
ancient monuments and inscriptions testify
ing to the virtues and victories of many
whose names even have passed into oblivion
Many of the paintings are colorless and the
statuary battered and blackened, but the
faded glory and loneliness Of Replace, stand
ing far out of the bustling town, is very sug-
geStive of pensiveness and repose. Time
has levelled all the graves, but the green
sward was starred with the golden-Tfhged
asphodel, whose seeds have been blown
hither and thither by the autumnal winds of
centuries. ''They crowned her with aspho-
dels," but they could not foresee how this
modest flower. which they POLITICALLY made
type of immortality, might outlive all the
splendor of their day and perennially teach
a lesson their darkened spiritual visions
CROPPED after.
AS we entered the cathedral grounds we
saw number of men bearing bier on the
opposite side of the broad square. They
were dressed in long black robes with cowls
and masks, so that nothing but their eyeballs
was visible to the passer by. We watched
them some minutes with interest, rs we rec
ognized in these brothers t.le DalId Ut the
Misericordia of whose good works we had
heard so much, and for whom we had felt
some. admiration; and we were truly sorry
afterwards to regard their apparent self
sacrifice in changed aspect. We have al
ways understood they were band of volun-
teers from the creme de la creme in every
large city, who held themselves ready at a
given signal to hasten wherever accident or
death occurred to the meanest and vilest
citizen and take the poor victim in their ira
ternal charge. AS these Samaritans did not
wish to receive applause or attract attention,
they have always performed these labors Of
love in disguise. We were just reproaching
ourselves for our harsh views of the practical
working of the old church as we saw these
servants of the Lord quietly carrying one OF
the least of his little ones to his long home,
when suddenly looking around we sprang
backwards as if an apparition had appeared
from the clouds. One of these figures stood
close by us, looking like an imp of darkness.
and glaring at us through two port holes in
his cowl, as he thrust with his sinuous gloved
fingers his charity box in our faces We
did not give him a sou, we were so COM
pletely thrown back upon our old convlc-
tions. He had not been so intent upon his
mission to administer to the dying that he
did not smell as from afar the stranger, and
seize the golden opportunity to appeal to our
sympathies. If these people not only gave
their personal efforts, and met all the ex-
penses from their own abundance, or by vol
untary aid from their own people, we could
thoroughly commend their Christian hero
ism; but begging under such a sanctimoni-
GUS garb strips the service of Christian man
illness. The railroad ride from Pisa to Rome
is very dull, as the line traverses wide marshes
and barren pastures. Pisa was within his
toric periods, a sea port town, but now lies
three miles from its harbor.
We have often read the accounts of the