The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-09-01
EEWS 0F THE DAY IN SOCIAL WORLD Birmingham Girl Writes from
 Brussels NOTES HERE AND THERE Lovely Fountain Completed By MT. Moretti and Placed on Exhbi- tlon, Madison Square-Pre-
 nuptiaI Entertainments. 
NOTES HERE AND THERE
BY MYRTLE MILES.
Telephones: Bell, 11eo; Peoples, ?

Telephones: Bell, 1160; Peoples, 299
 A recent letter from Miss May Collins in Brussels compares that city to Paris. She says: "They say Brussels is a min iature Paris, but it doesn't seem so to me, after the change, for the quiet is al- most appalling in contrast" Continuing, however, she tells some interesting things about the famous city.
 "We took a car to the Place Royal, which is the Royal Museum. We saw the sculpture and ancient picture gall leries there but we weren't very much impressed with the latter which were mostly of the Dutch and Flemish schools. Of course there were many Rubens, as there seem to be in all the galleries. We liked most of the sculptur very much. Notre Dame De Loretta is a very beautiful church opposite the mu- scum on one side of the Place, and the Countess of Flanders palace is also there. In the center is a bronze statue of Godfrey of Bouillon who preached and led the first crusade in 1909 and later was king of Jerusalem. The PaIais Royal is nearly across from the park where there is music each afternoon. The Kings summer residence at LaclSen near here is very beautiful and he stays there most of the time. Empress Jose phine used to live there.
 At the end of Regent street on a beau- tiful site which is well seen from the Place, is the Palais de Justice, one of the largest law courts in the world and said
 
 than any in the world It is certainly a very fine and imposing one.
 From the Place Royal we walked to Cooks which is on the Rue de la Made line, the principal shopping street here. The shops are certainly beautiful and they say things are much cheaper than in Paris There was an exhibition of laces here at the pension last night and the things certainly were exquisite. They were at factory prices and remarkably cheap.
 This morning we went out to the church of St. Gudule the cathedral here. It resembles Notre Dame de Paris a good deal though the exterior of it Is mostly new and restored Some parts of it date from the fourteenth century, while the painted glass in 1t is considered by many the finest in the whole world. In the chapel of the Holy Sacrament the windows are especially fine, some of them giving the portraits of their royal donors, and others the legend of the miraculous waters preserved there which, it is said, bled when the Jews desecrated them From there we walked to the Grand Place, the finest medieval square in Europe. It is certainly picturesque to see the beautiful flower market with its many brilliant colors in the center and the old buildings all around. There is the Hotel de Vile, the Maison du Roi-the various houses of the ancient guilds of the ancient guilds of city with their elaborate gilt decorations and coats of arms. We went through the Hotel de Vile, a very interesting fourteenth cen tury building. It is the most ornate structure I ever saw-just covered with figures, canopies and spires, while a great tall spire in the center of the front has a gilt figures of St. Michael, the patron saint, on top of it. The rooms in 1t are decorated in the old style so they are beautiful, though not in the same way as the Hotel de Vile in Paris. The pictures and tapestries