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hearsed the rule to her, received her acceptance of it, and then . . . . threw over her the dismal drapery which was to hide her from all human eyes for ever! This done, he dismissed her, and she departed, chaunting some appropriate requiem. I presume her own and as her voice died away in the distance, I could not but think that the hearts of her mother and sisters must have died too.

... •

LETTER XX.

Rome the Pantheon of great Names. Effect of Rome upon the

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Mind in the Way of Education.-System of antiquarian Research pursued by a young Scotchman. Vatican, and at St. Peter's. House in which he died. and of Salvator Rosa.

English Party at the The Dwelling of Poussin. - The

The Dwellings of Claude Lorraine, Poussin not justly called an Artist of the French School of Painting, nor Gibson of the English School of Sculpture.

Rome, December, 1841.

If there were no other source of interest in Rome, sufficient might be found in hunting out the residences of all the great men who have, from time to time, taken up their abode here, and in picking up all the traditionary anecdotes that remain of them. .... Bien entendu, observe, that these reminiscences relate not to the Remus and Romulus people. Well as I love to look at all that is left of these, I do not devote much time to inquiring into personal anecdotes concerning them.... of which we have, it may be, already quite enough, without either learning or inventing any more. But, putting for awhile all antiquarianism, properly so called, aside, it is marvellous to think what an immense proportion of all the human beings who have distinguished themselves since the Christain era began have left traces of their great names here. First

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come, of course, the great Apostles, whose days of life, and whose hour of death, within these walls, have girded them with a halo of holiness that no human blundering can ever drive away. And then, as if this alone were enough of glory and renown to suffice even Rome for a few ages, there followed a strange series of adventures, not very prolific in good of any kind. But I am not going to attempt giving you an analysis of the first ages of Christian Rome, in about as many lines, but return to my assertion that a marvellously great number of mighty reputations have left traces of themselves here, and that one of the delights of finding oneself on this мMOST remarkable spot of the earth's surface arises from remembering this, and from being yourself as near to all that is left of them as possible.

It perpetually strikes me, in conversing with my own countrymen here, whether young or old, that their tone of conversation is somewhat higher than I should have found it at home. . . . Great men's names, and great men's memories, and great men's works, are in their mouths, with a familiarity that could never have been obtained any where else, and that, too, without any mixture of affectation; for, in truth, the affectation would be found in attempting to avoid it. I have strong doubts, as, perhaps, I may have told you before, whether several consecutive years passed abroad, even under the tuition of the very best of masters, is, on the whole, advantageous to young women, whom their

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friends wish should remain English, and whose hopes are to become English wives and English mothers; but I have no doubt at all as to the decided intellectual advantages to be obtained by bringing either young men or young women of inquiring minds to pass a few months at Rome. I should not quite choose to say that no education could be accounted good without it, but I certainly do think that nothing else, of any sort or kind, can quite supply its place. Remember, however, if you please, that I am not of those who consider Rome the seat of miracles, par excellence, and, therefore, that I do not mean to tell you that young ladies and gentlemen who come to Rome very stupid go away the reverse. On the contrary, I think that it is not a very slight degree of intelligence which is requisite, in order to draw from such a visit the benefit which I think it capable, under favourable circumstances, of producing. But where the material does exist I think it cannot fail of doing much towards increasing its value. I was struck by hearing the other day that a quite young Scotchman, whom I frequently meet in society here, of high birth, and rather remarkably endowed with the good gifts which are sometimes thought to make their possessors rather too welcome in the resorts of the young and fair to render grave pursuits very palatable. . . . I was struck by hearing that this young man not only employed his mornings in études suivées of all things connected with

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antiquities and art, but that he never visited any classic relic, without requiring the gentleman who is travelling with him to be prepared with such passages in the Roman poets and historians as could best awaken the interest of the spot.

The tutor, if tutor this travelling companion be, is himself quite young enough to enter into the enthusiasm which suggested this plan; and I can hardly imagine the possibility of a more delightful occupation for the young men, probably both of them fresh from the University, with all the elegant scholarship of well-taught Englishmen about them, and all the eloquent incentives to call it forth which Rome can give.

In matters of taste, and in every thing connected with the fine arts, it is interesting to watch the different degrees of excitement that the inconceivable richness of Rome, in this respect, produces. Some there are among us, I am sorry to confess, who kindle not with one single spark of enthusiasm at any thing.... but many, many more, seem to live here in a state of enchantment; and I cannot but believe, that in all cases where a lively perception of the beautiful and the graceful in art has been awakened in the mind, the result of it will be felt and manifested, perhaps unconsciously, through life. I followed a party the other day, by no means a very stylish one, through one of the halls of the Vatican. It consisted of what I presumed to be a father, mother, and two daughters