Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1890-01-12
CLASSIC SCENES.
A sACRAMENTAN AMONG THE RUINS
OF ANCIENT ROME.
Some Days Spent in the French Metropo-
Hs-AIpine Wonders, and an Ital-
ian Country Fair.

A few days ago was announced the re
turn from Europe of Charles W. Mier, 6
young gentleman of this city, who left here
last summer in company with Rev. Father
Gualco and Add. G. Hinkson, Jr., for 6
few months trip through Europe. At the
SUNDAY UNIONS request, he has consented
to relate his experiences there in series
of articles, the first of which is given be-
low. Mr. Mier is a young gentleman Of
intelligence and careful observation, and
his account of his wanderings will be found
of interest. He writes:
During my stay in the bright and gay
city of Paris, few places of note and inter
est escaped my observation. In the even
ing (of Sunday particularly Paris is gay
indeed, and all places of public amusement
are crowded. An American had better
spend his evening where prudence dictates,
as many eyes watch an English-speaking
tourist, and people are not slow to remark
when he does that away from which he
would not do at home.
found it advisable to always keep ones
temper, particularly when in the Custom
house. And, to secure comfort and atten-
ton, tipping an evils neces-
sity. In many shops where the words,
English spoken" appeared on the win
dows, it often meant paying through the
nose" English is understood everywhere,
whether currently spoken or not. English
is spoken in all first-class houses.
Partisan food is always well cooked and
wholesome, and one can be thoroughly sat
isfied, if he eats the same food at the same
hours as the French do, without asking
questions Besides, suails and frogs are not
likely to be ever offered you.
October 1st.-Start for Italy. Travelling
through France, at the frontier my baggage
was examined; then through Mt. Gents
tunnel, nine miles long, ana beyond this
point pass most imposing scenery, and
many Alpine villages, arriving at Capriata
D'Orba October I'd, remaining one week in
this ancient Italian stronghold, from the
lofty towers of which one has superior
view of vast undulatiDg country, well
under the cultivation of the vine, and
dotted here and there by pretty villas.
A country fair was held for two days,
and the city was crowded with peasantry
from parts within circuit of i've to eight
miles There were takers with their differ
ent merchandise for sale, confectioners,
bakers, etc, yokes of oxen for sale, pigs
and their young, cattle, donkeys, sheep and
goats.
The walls of some of the residences were
from four to five feet in thickness. WIS.,
tied the Orsini Villa, which is the country
seat for family of that name tracing their
lineage back some hundreds of years.
This villa is built in the form of castle,
the entrance being surmounted by tower
with turrets, over which the flag of the
family would be raised, thereby indicating
to friends contemplating visit that the
family were at home. If lowered, one
might expect to find the representatives of
the household away from their estate.
The winner of gsme of hand ball, after
exerting himself during the game, which
occupies the best part of an afternoon, re-
ceives a franc-20 cents.
October 10th.-Leave Capriata D'Orba,
returning to Turin and am at Genos, THE
Grand" in the evening, remaining in this
CITY, which contains so many well-built
palaces, one week.
October 1Slh.--Start for Pisa. The rail-
road borders on the Mediterranean Sea,
gliding through some fifty tunnels and
passing groves of olives and many pretty
villas, and in the evening reach Pisa
Dreaming Pisa" This city begins to
give an idea of the wonderful conception
of architecture and of Italian genius.
From this point we pass the islands of
Elba and Corsica to the right and magnifi-
cent groves of cypress to the left, reaching
Rome October 18th.
Now for study of "Classic Rome" The
Forum is q visible, unmistakable ruin.
Here and there stately pillar towers aloft
unbroken BY the weight of 1000 years.
Temples, palaces and courts are now to be
traced only by their foundations. Anti
quarian zeal has unearthed much of the
ancient pavement, on which the Roman
cats sun themselves in the early morning,
close to the rostrum from which Cicero
pleaded-the sole occupants of a tribunal
whose DEGREES were once potent from the
ultima thule of the northern seas to the
remotest East.
The colossal ruins of the FlaYian amphi-
theater, the triumphal arches of Con-
stantine and of Titus; the Capitol, once
the supreme goal that crowned the Roman
triumph-now a mere museum of precious
fragments, snatched from the wrecks of
time-all attest, in fashion too plain to
be misunderstood, that the Forum, once
the nerve center of the world, from which
all roads ran, and where was woven into
one mighty whole the great web of Roman
laws, is now only the monumental sepul-
cher of dead Empire.
Yet the forces which surged from that
Roman heart are far from being spent.
Roman law, Roman ideas and Roman GUS
toms mold the lives of those who boast
themselves of being the heirs of all the
ages. There is not SINCE lumberman in
the forests of the Northwest, nor cigger
in the mines of Australia, nor poor strug
Cling peasant in the productive fields of
our own State, but in his Utmost heart and
soul bears the ineffsceable stamp of those
stern men of iron mold, who, in ancient
times, made this wilderness of ruin, that
stands majestically before me, the proud
temple of universal law.
Desolate and dead as it is to-day, it was
once the living womb of our civilization.
The life that went out from here has vital
lied the world. 1t has multiplied itself
from thousand centers, and goes on null
tiplying with undated force. But in the
Forum itself life is not. No hurrying feet
now tread the uneven blocks which mark
the sacred way; no car now climbs in tri-
umph to the Capitol. All is still and silent
as the crater of some extinct volcano whose
fiery lava had once overwhelmed world.
As you listen and remember, you hear a
far off murmur of many sounds, the hum
of the busy mart, the roar of applauding
crowds, the sharp clash OF arms-all
mingling indistinct and distant, like the
subdued sound of the sea-suIge within the
convolutions of shell.
Would that | were alive when that
august mortal, Caesar. lived-who was re-
garded as almost divine, and who swayed
the scepter of the woodland the Roman
Empire was in its early splendor.
POTELS WIFE.