in a Catholic" (Romish) "church; and might, moreover, entail results by no means agreeable to the offender.

"At the first step within, I was struck with amazement. I seemed to be at Venice, and entering from the Piazza, beneath the nave of St. Mark; only that the dimensions had enlarged immeasurably, and assumed colossal proportions. The columns rose gigantic from the mat-covered pavement; the dome of the cupola hung overhead, like the arch of the sky; the galleries, in which the four sacred streams pour forth their waters in mosaic, described immeasurable circuits; the tribunes seemed destined to contain whole nations! St. Mark, in fact, is but a miniature of St. Sophia; reduced, on the scale of an inch to a foot, from the basilica of Justinian. Nor is there anything surprising in this; for Venice, separated by only a narrow sea from Greece, lived always in familiarity with the Orient; and her architects would naturally seek to reproduce the type of that church, which was then considered the richest and the most beautiful of all Christendom. The erection of St. Mark was commenced about the tenth century; and its architects would have been able to see St. Sophia, in all its integrity and splendour, before it had been profaned by Mohammed II.; an event which did not take place until A.D. 1453.

"Although Islamism, in its hostility to the pictorial and plastic arts, has despoiled St. Sophia of the greater part of its noblest ornaments, it is still a magnificent edifice. The mosaics, upon a ground of gold, representing scriptural subjects, like those of St. Mark, have disappeared beneath a coating of lime. They have preserved the four gigantic cherubim of the galleries: the six wings of each shine through the scintillations of masses of gilded crystal; but the heads of these masses of gorgeous plumage are hidden behind enormous golden suns, the representation of the human face being the especial horror of the Moslemah. At the end of the sanctuary, beneath the oven-like arch which forms its termination, are vaguely traceable the outlines of a colossal figure, which the deposit of the lime has not altogether obliterated: this was the image of the patron of

the church,- -an embodiment of the Divine Wisdom in an individual form, the Agia Sophia; and which, beneath this half-transparent veil, still presides over the ceremonies of a hostile faith.

"The statues have been removed. The altar, made of an unknown metal,—the result, like the Corinthian brass, of a combination of gold, silver, bronze, iron, and precious stones, in a state of fusion,-is replaced by a slab of red marble, indicating the direction of Mecca. Above hangs an old and worn carpet, a mere dirty rag, which possesses, for the Turks, the unspeakable merit of being one of the four carpets on which Mahomet himself knelt to perform his devotions.

"Immense green disks, given by different Sultans, are attached to the walls, and inscribed with verses from the Koran, or pious maxims, written in enormous golden letters. A scroll of porphyry bears the names of Allah, of Mahomet, and of the first four Kalifs, Abu-Bekir, Omar, Osman, and Ali. The pulpit (nimbar), where the khatib stands to read the Koran, is placed against one of the pillars, and is reached by a steep staircase, decorated with two balustrades of open carving, of a delicacy unsurpassed by that of the finest lace. The reader always ascends with the Book of the Law in one hand, and a drawn sabre in the other, as in a conquered mosque.

"Cords, from which are suspended tufts of silk, and ostrich-eggs, hang from the dome to within ten or twelve feet of the floor, sustaining circles of iron wire, decorated with lamps to form a chandelier. Desks in the form of an X, similar to those which we use to support portfolios of engravings, in fact, a sort of tressels,-are dispersed about the mosque, to support manuscripts of the Koran. Many are ornamented with enamel, or delicate inlayings of brass, or mother-of-pearl.

"Mats of rushes in the summer, and carpets in the winter, cover the pavement, formed of slabs of marble, the veins of which are skilfully arranged, to give the appearance of three streams, congealed, as they flow in wavy undulations through the edifice. The mats also present a singular

peculiarity: they are placed obliquely, and contrary to the lines of the architecture; like the planks of a floor, placed diagonally, instead of parallel, to the walls which enclose them. But this strange peculiarity is soon explained. St. Sophia was not originally designed for a mosque, and consequently does not stand in the proper direction, relatively to Mecca.

"The chief cupola of St. Sophia, a little broken in its curve, is surrounded by several half-domes, like those of St. Mark. It is of immense height, and must have shone like a sun of gold and mosaic, before the Moslem coating of lime extinguished its splendours. But, such as it was, it produced upon me an impression even more startling than the dome of St. Peter. Despite its deteriorations of all sorts, St. Sophia still stands above all other Christian churches that I have seen; and I have seen many. Nothing can equal the majesty of its domes; the tribunes resting against its columns of jasper, of porphyry, and of verd-antique, with their strange Corinthian capitals; or the animals, the chimeras, and the crosses, enlaced among its sculptured foliage. The superb art of Greece, although degenerate, still makes itself felt.

"Some years since, St. Sophia was menaced with destruction. The walls began to bulge, fissures to appear in the domes, and the pavement to undulate; and the columns, fatigued, perhaps, with standing so long upright, leaned in all directions, like drunken men. Nothing was in line; the whole building leaned visibly on one side; and, despite the buttresses erected by Amurath, the church-mosque, worn by the lapse of centuries, and shaken by repeated earthquakes, appeared tottering to its fall.

"An exceedingly capable Tessinese architect, however, (Signor Fossati,) undertook the difficult task of rescuing this noble monument of antiquity from ruin; which he effected by under-pinning, portion by portion, with indefatigable caution and activity. Bands of brass were thrown about the riven pillars; supporters of iron propped the sinking arches; massive ground-works sustained the trembling walls; the crevices were filled up; the crumbling

stones replaced by those of fresher and stronger quality; masses of masonry, whose purpose was skilfully disguised under the garb of ornament, were made to bear the enormous weight of the cupola; and, at length, thanks to this elaborate and skilful restoration, St. Sophia could still promise itself many centuries of existence.

"During the progress of the works, Signor Fossati had the curiosity to exhume many of the primitive mosaics, from the bed of lime in which they were buried; and, before covering them again, he caused them to be carefully copied; a proceeding, the fruits of which, it is to be hoped, may be one day given to the world.

"From the height of the tribunes, (which are reached by gentle winding slopes, as in the Giralda or the Campanilla,) an admirable view of the mosque is obtained. At this moment, some faithful believers, kneeling upon the matting, are devoutly performing their prostrations; two or three females, wrapped in their feredgés, stand near one of the doors, and a porter, with his head supported on the base of a pillar, is sleeping with all his might. A soft and tender light falls from the elevated windows; and I can see, in the distant recess, opposite the pulpit, the sparkle of the golden gratings of the tribune reserved for the Sultan.

"A species of platform, supported by columns of finest marble, and ornamented with carved railings, rises at each point of intersection of the aisles. In the side-chapels (useless in the Mussulman ritual) are heaped trunks, boxes, and packages of all kinds; for, in the East, the mosques serve as storehouses, and those who are going away on a journey, or who fear being robbed at home, deposit their wealth under the immediate protection of Allah; and there has never been an instance of the loss of a farthing under such circumstances, for theft would need to combine itself with sacrilege. Heaps of dust accumulate upon masses of gold, or of precious objects, scarcely covered with wrappers of coarse cloth, or old leather; and the spider, so cherished among the Turks, for having thrown his web across the mouth of the cave in which the Prophet was concealed,

weaves his thread peacefully about the locks, which no one takes the trouble to use.

"Around the mosque are grouped hospitals, colleges, baths, and kitchens for the poor; for the whole of Moslem life gathers around the house of God. People without home sleep beneath the arches, where no police disturb them; for they are the guests of Allah. The faithful pray there; the females go there to dream away their time; and the sick are transported thither, to be cured or to die.'

SEBASTOPOL.

[THE following short but clear description of Sebastopol and its neighbourhood by Captain Spencer,+ written just before the war, receives fresh interest from the light thrown on some parts of it by recent events.]

THE first view of Sebastopol, when seen from the sea, is most imposing. After the eye of the traveller has glanced over the capacious harbour, studded with vessels of war of all sizes, he sees a noble town, with its numerous churches, barracks, and other public buildings, rising up in the form of an amphitheatre, here crowning the heights, and there shelving down to the sea; where stately houses and vast magazines are seen mingling with the tall-masted ships lying at anchor in the various creeks and bays that branch off in every direction, all attesting the importance of the principal naval station in the Russian empire.

Sebastopol, like Odessa, was a miserable Tatar village little more than sixty years ago. About that time, a Frenchman, who happened to be travelling in the Crimea, was struck with the natural advantages of a position which he at once saw, if properly fortified, might be made one of the first naval stations in the world. On his return to

"Constantinople of to-day." By Théophile Gautier. Bogue.

"Turkey, Russia, the Black Sea, and Circassia." By Captain Spencer. Routledge.