GIFT OF 
 
 PROFESSOR C,A, KOF3IC 
 
UNITED STATES (&IRLS 
 
 Across tljc Atlantic. 
 
GIFT OP 
 
 PROFESSOR C,A, KOFOIO 
 
TO THE THREE 
 
 WHO IN YOUTH DIRECTED THE THREE PARTS OF HER NATURE IN 
 WAYS OF RELIGION, LEARNING AND HEALTH 
 
 TO 
 
 H. HARVEY, D. D., PROFESSOR AT MADISON UNIVERSITY, 
 
 S. B. WOOLWORTH, LL. D., SEC. BOARD OF REGENTS, ALBANY, 
 
 C. GREEN, PHYSICIAN AT HOMER, N. Y., 
 
 THIS BOOK IS MOST RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED BY ONE OF THE 
 THREE UNITED STATES GIRLS, 
 
 MARIA WELCH HARRIS. 
 
 MS16897 
 
Truair, Smith & Bruce, Printers and Binders, 
 
 "Journal Office, 1 ' Syracuse, N. Y. 
 
 1876. 
 

 
 PAGE. 
 
 THE OCEAN VOYAGE, g 
 
 GLASGOW AND AYR, x 5 
 
 SCOTTISH LAKES, 20 
 
 STIRLING, EDINBURG AND MELROSE, , 28 
 
 LONDON, 35 
 
 PARIS, 52 
 
 SWITZERLAND, 69 
 
 PASS TETE NOIRE TO MARTIGNY, 83 
 
 CASTLE OF CHILLON. LACUSTRINE CITIES.* : 
 
 THE AAR AND JUNGFRAU, 87 
 
 THE HOME OF TELL, 97 
 
 LUCERNE, 101 
 
 MUNICH, in 
 
 INNSPRUCK INTO ITALY, , 119 
 
 VENICE, 126 
 
 FLORENCE, 142 
 
 NAPLES,* 150 
 
 ROME, 168 
 
 NORTHERN ITALY, 187 
 
 HOMEWARD BOUND, 192 
 
 * ILLUSTRATIONS OPPOSITE PAGE 84. 1. Chamois. 2. Castle of Chillon. 
 
 ILLUSTRATION, 5. (Opposite page 108,) Mold of Dea4 Man found at Pompeii, 
 
BREVITY is the soul of wit, and it is also a desirable characteristic in 
 the preface of a book ; but the writer can scarcely permit the opportu- 
 nity to pass without a few words to the friends for whom this volume 
 was prepared. A package of letters is stored away in the secret drawer 
 of one of the Three, kind words are treasured in the storehouse of Mem- 
 ory, and Imagination accompanies these pages to the pleasant homes 
 where teachers, and pupils, and the friends of all days, read and talk 
 of the wanderings of their independent friend. Accept most heartfelt 
 thanks for your prompt replies and generous offers, and be assured that 
 labor has been amply rewarded, as is always the case with the labor 
 of love. 
 
THE OCEAN VOYAGE. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 T was at the close of spring-time, 1873, that we United 
 States Girls left our homes to become a party of ad- 
 venturers. We did not call ourselves triumviri, for not a 
 man entered our ranks ; we were scarcely triumfemince, for 
 one of our number could not yet claim the name of woman ; 
 but we were, nevertheless, three, crossing the broad Atlantic 
 to visit the Old World. 
 
 We did not represent many of the professions so actively pursued in 
 Uncle Sam's dominions, for one had not reached the age to choose her 
 walk in life, and one was a lady of leisure ; one of the three had for a 
 score of years borne the name of teacher. 
 
 We adopted as our watchwords, Independence and Self-Reliance, and, 
 with sachels and shawl-straps, boldly entered upon our journey. We 
 were among the first to go on board the California, and we lingered 
 upon the deck to make a survey of our fellow-passengers, who came in 
 such numbers that we feared for the capacity of the ship to harbor them 
 all comfortably ; but when the bell sounded as a signal for departure, the 
 crowd went toward the land, and the few remained to embark upon the 
 bosom of the deep. The day was all that human beings could ask, 
 bright and beautiful, giving promise of future good to both land and 
 sea of spring-time and harvest to the one, of prosperous voyage and 
 2 
 
10 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 safe return to the other. The people on the shore waved a long adieu, 
 to which the voyagers responded heartily. Slowly but surely we moved 
 away, and soon the connection with those upon land was only by the 
 unseen bonds that unite kindred hearts, however wide they may be 
 separated. Beautiful beyond description was the first day's sail ; calm 
 and peaceful was the deep, and clear and bright was the dome of heaven. 
 The sun sank peacefully behind the waters, and the moon and stars 
 looked familiarly upon us. With a feeling of trust we went to our 
 berths, and we said within our hearts that it was a good beginning. 
 
 Equally promising was the following day the first day of the Sum- 
 mer and it was also the Sabbath day upon the sea as it was upon the 
 land. The church bell sounded at the usual hour, not, however, from 
 lofty tower, sending its peal through hill and dale, but calling in unmis- 
 takable tones to assemble for the worship of God. Closing the eyes to 
 all evidences of the fitness of the room for administering bodily food, 
 we were permitted to receive spiritual food at the hands of a pastor from 
 the sister State of Kentucky. The remainder of the day was not par- 
 ticularly marked in its observance as the one in seven, but was pleasantly 
 spent in friendly intercourse. 
 
 The hours thus far had been bright, golden ones, and the vessel seemed 
 a miniature world sent adrift on the ocean of space sailing on and on 
 to find its orbit far beyond the lesser stars which dotted its course when 
 first it was launched. No excitement disturbed the breast of the 
 passengers save when the report became current that a lady with 
 children had left her well-filled trunks in the hands of a careful husband 
 and they were still safe on dry land. The question was freely discussed 
 how they should manage to procure a change of garments and all the 
 little conveniences of travel. The sachels of the three contributed 
 something to alleviate the perplexities of the occasion. The monoto- 
 nous round of chit-chat and game, and the measured walk over the deck 
 of the vessel was occasionally varied by the sound of the bell at the 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. \ I I 
 
 regular hours for meals. First of all, at 7 A. M., it invited to partake 
 of the wholesome oatmeal served in various ways in porridge or gruel, 
 with milk or sugar, and at the table of the dining-room or in the berth 
 of the state-room ; at 8 : 30 to breakfast ; 9 : 30, children's breakfast ; 
 12, lunch ; i, children's dinner ; 4, dinner ; 6, children's tea ; 7, tea ; 9 to 
 11, supper. To these numerous calls the response was ever ready, and 
 the long lines of tables were crowded to the utmost with the one hun- 
 dred and twenty-five first-class passengers. But on the fourth morning 
 there was a change in the state of affairs, and the teacher was waked at 
 4 A. M. by the smaller third of their party ".calling for New York," as 
 they say on shipboard. Hastening to assist the sick and afflicted, she 
 soon learned that chanty begins at home, so she and her charge lay down 
 together, and comforted and consoled each other to the best of their 
 ability. There was no sunshine that day, only clouds and rain and dis- 
 mal cold weather thermometer at 35. But a blessing on the pure air 
 of heaven, how reviving it was, and is, and ever will be, especially to the 
 sea-sick. The deck was almost deserted, except by those on duty, and a 
 few who still had sufficient strength to seek the fresh sea air. A strong 
 arm was offered at the door, and a chair was placed in a spot somewhat 
 sheltered from the rain, and it was held for an hour in spite of wind and 
 storm. No, we retract, the wind blew the chair and its occupant over 
 upon the deck, and a seat in the form of a beam was taken. We must 
 all yield to the elements when in a state of active exercise, especially 
 if they are assisted by life-exhausting nausea, so with all the grace attain- 
 able under the circumstances, she descended to the regions below, and 
 they saw her no more that day. We had been sailing in a northerly 
 direction in a line nearly parallel with the shore of our own loved land, 
 and off the banks of Newfoundland we saw the last living creature 
 whose home is not on the bosom of the deep, two of Mother Carey's 
 chickens flying out in quest of food. 
 
12 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 We received ample compensation for early rising on Wednesday, the 
 fifth day of the voyage. We hastily responded to the call to come upon 
 deck and see an iceberg, and the remembrance of the sight will be a joy 
 forever. We were five miles off Cape Race, lat. 45 deg. i min., long. 
 5 1 deg. 56 min. Airy and white, it seemed a creation of fancy, and we 
 scarcely dared turn our eyes for fear that when we looked back again it 
 should have gone from our sight forever. On it sailed, like some mon- 
 ster cathedral raising its lofty spire high toward heaven's gates. The 
 hues were varied as the sunlight fell upon it from different directions 
 (this was about the only glimpse of sunshine we had for seven days), and 
 it assumed a variety of forms as we left it in the distance. Can Stras- 
 bourg or Milan equal this creation of nature's architect ? This was but 
 one of a number, and soon we were surrounded by icebergs both great 
 and small. One seemed an Esquimaux hut with a smaller one by its 
 side, one a noble fort manned by imaginary heroes, stiff, stern and cold, 
 standing at the post of duty till their life-blood flowed away. In the 
 varying light, dark evergreens rose in the background, and the picture 
 was complete. Thejargest one was thought to be about two hundred 
 feet above the surface of the water, and half a mile distant from the ship. 
 Day after day we were only occasionally assured that there was a 
 living being in existence except the four hundred persons on board the 
 steamer California, and that by the sight of a far-distant sail. Oh, how 
 broad the Atlantic is ! yet we did not feel ourselves so insignificant as 
 we had supposed we should when upon its bosom, but, on the con- 
 trary, as we stood in the centre of the ship she seemed to reach from 
 horizon to horizon, and her masts and sails to take a strong hold upon 
 heaven. We felt that man had been almost enabled to hold the ocean 
 with an iron hand, and to enforce submission by the breath of steam. 
 But the grandeur and- the beauty of the ocean, mortal need not attempt 
 to describe, nor pen to paint. Imagination cannot picture it ; every mo- 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 13 
 
 ment it changes, every wave is different. The grandest sight was 
 reserved for the last. As we approached the shores of the Old World, 
 and we thought the land would hold out her arms to receive us, the 
 winds and the waves seemed determined to retain us in their power. 
 They rocked us so vigorously that sleep was driven from our eyelids for 
 the first time since we had trusted ourselves to their care. Many made 
 their appearance with anxious looks, to learn the cause of the commo- 
 tion. The scene was more than beautiful. Once again the sun had 
 made his appearance in the midst of white, fleecy clouds, chasing each 
 other over the bluest sky that the hand of Nature can paint a real 
 October sky. The waves lifted their foaming crests, then bowed as if in 
 silent adoration, then melted away in flecks of foam and emerald green 
 too lovely to imitate Toward the sun a sheet of silver sheen overspread 
 the whole, and we seemed to be sailing on a sea of glass. Nature never 
 seems complete without a thing of life in her midst ; and so the sea-gulls 
 in great numbers gloried in this bright scene, and presented their ebon 
 bodies borne upon white wings. The passengers had been tossed about 
 until they were afraid to move, and placed themselves in some position 
 which they supposed secure ; but alas for the fallacy of human hopes ! 
 A gentleman who was very gallant in bracing himself to steady a lady, 
 found himself seated upon the floor by her side ; one young lady, finding 
 a wave in rather too close proximity to her skirts, to save herself from a 
 wetting, swept books and papers from the lap of her friend and sent 
 them flying in all directions. It was too much to see the labor of hours 
 swept away in a breath, so with a frantic rush she went after them. 
 Backward and forward they rolled, letters, chairs, men, women and 
 water, (only one sheet sailed away on the wings of the wind ; did it 
 reach its destination on the American shores ?) All of a sudden the 
 sound of the engine was hushed, and the waves rolled higher than ever ; 
 the vessel was turned about, like a steed at the will of his rider, and 
 
j^ UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 although seeming to resist to the utmost, it was still forced to obey the 
 guiding hand. Now came the solution of the matter ; owing to the 
 entire obscuring of the sun's rays for seven days, only dead reckoning 
 could be taken of the ship's course, and when our captain expected to 
 see the green land of Erin, suddenly emerging from a blinding fog, he 
 found himself just off the shore of Tyree island, away to the north of 
 Scotland, and in danger of being dashed in pieces upon her rocky coast ; 
 so in haste he gave the order to stop the motion of the vessel, and we 
 were thrown into the trough of the sea and became the plaything of the 
 waves for a time. A day's more sail brought us to Moville, where we 
 put off passengers at the dead of night, under a broad, full moon, which 
 was just appearing in sight. 
 
 "Blessings brighten as they take their flight," is a lesson we learn 
 early in life, but we realized on Wednesday, the nth day of June, that 
 they brighten still more as they come back to sight. There is scarcely 
 any night in this northern latitude at this season of the year, so we had 
 not thought to be up with the morning, but we had hoped to be on deck 
 when our steamer entered the Clyde. Our first sight of " Bonnie Scot- 
 land," however, was Ailsa Craig, a mountain of stone rising from the 
 water almost directly in our course. This black rock was first presented 
 to sight as if to bring us back by degrees to our lost estate ; then Holy 
 Island rose before us, a rock to be sure, but picturesque in form and 
 having its barenness covered with a velvety green robe of moss. Had we 
 forgotten how the land looked, the green grass of our native soil ? or had 
 these far-away coasts borrowed the emerald green of the sea and be- 
 decked themselves for our landing ? 
 
 Eleven days at sea had made the earth a paradise, and we were in a 
 state of perfect delight. We were introduced to the mountains of Scot- 
 land by a sight of Goat Hill, rising also from the water, its base and 
 sides covered with moss and evergreens, and its peak high up among 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 15 
 
 the clouds. Mt. Stuart, home of the Marquis of Bute, the " Lothaire " 
 of Disraeli, and Rothsay Castle, where the Fair Maid of Perth was kept 
 a prisoner, showed us what art can do when combined with nature, and 
 strongly reminded us that we were in the land of Scott, whose song and 
 story have made the world familiar with these interesting localities. 
 
 Fairly within the land, the banks upon each side presented a view 
 never to be forgotten ; bays, harbors, yachts, light-houses and castles 
 bewildered and almost entranced us. The first British engine gave us a 
 shrill welcome to their shores ; handkerchiefs waved a glad greeting, and 
 the pack of hounds on the beautiful lawn wagged their tails with -delight. 
 The larks sang the old, old song as they settled in the branches of the 
 trees, which also told the story of age. But the sad story of centuries 
 ago was forcibly brought to mind at sight of Dumbarton Castle. We 
 knew that we must meet at every turn mementoes of the unfortunate 
 Mary, Queen of Scots, whose fate had brought a tear in childhood and 
 many a sigh in later years. This day of sight-seeing was rendered per- 
 fect by a view, indistinct though it was, of the friend of old, Ben Lomond. 
 He had his nightcap on, as usual, and the rusts of ages crept slowly 
 over his brow. 
 
 All pleasant things must have an end, so it was with our sail up the 
 Clyde. Just before we reached the place of landing we met a steamer 
 bound for the American shores ; the hearts of the three went along with 
 her, but their faces looked toward the land of the East, where they 
 hoped to wander under Italian skies and through fields of snow during 
 the days of the coming twelvemonth. 
 
GLASGOW AND AYR. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 HE royal authorities acknowledged the independence of the 
 United Three, and sent them on shore without deigning to 
 notice the sachels and shawl-straps. Immediately begins the 
 search for things new and old. We see at once that the houses 
 stand on a solid foundation, and that there is a great sameness 
 in form and color ; not a white house, not a house of wood 
 all stone or brick, and dingy brown. The people too, stand on a sure 
 foundation that of honesty ; they take the world slow and easy, and 
 are never too much hurried to be courteous and kind. If you ask a 
 question which they do not understand, they " beg your pardon," and if 
 you require a favor they " thank you." 
 
 The modes of conveyance looked somewhat strange, the fancy Han- 
 som cabs and the cozy wagonets, drawn each by one noble-looking horse. 
 In but very few instances are seen two horses working side by side ; it 
 is either one or three. In one of these wagonets (an open omnibus for 
 four) we went over the city of Glasgow, with one stout Scotch horse. 
 We visited the Cathedral, famous for its antiquity and for its stained 
 glass windows, which are modern, one having been presented by Queen 
 Victoria, which cost six thousand dollars. The Necropolis, one of the 
 most beautiful of cemeteries, stands near the Cathedral, a monument to 
 John Knox crowning the summit of the high hill. Now begin to be 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 1 7 
 
 repeated the names which were learned in childhood, but which the 
 learner knew not where to locate ; for as we rode along the Bromislaw, 
 one of the finest river-side drives in Europe, we were reminded that here 
 once lived two famous Scotch characters, who differ greatly in the repu- 
 tation which follows them, as they doubtless did in the lives so long 
 past Rob Roy and Robert Burns. One beautiful feature of this city, 
 which is second only in Scotland, are the crescent parks, smiling and 
 beaming like the new moon on all who come within their sight. People 
 seem to live in the streets, as one might judge by the crowds which fill 
 them. The travelers learned to use the Scotch umbrella, and did not 
 forget it during their stay in Glasgow, for it rained and the sun shone so 
 much together that they became inseparable companions. 
 
 From Glasgow it is customary to make many pleasant excursions, 
 and, perhaps, first among the number is that to Ayr, the home of Burns. 
 
 " Auld Ayr, whom ne'er a town surpasses 
 For honest men and bonnie lasses." 
 
 We could but draw a contrast, standing in the ticket office at the depot 
 in Glasgow. So many minutes before the departure of the train a door 
 was unfastened and the crowd came in single file, passing slowly along, 
 almost as at a funeral. No one jostled his neighbor no one pressed 
 by to procure his ticket first ; altogether it was a new sight, and we 
 said, " Sloo, but sure Scotch." 
 
 When we left Glasgow we made our first acquaintance with European 
 cars, an acquaintance which, though continued through the next twelve 
 months, never tempted us to transfer our preferences from the more 
 convenient and agreeable ones of home travel. The coaches all open in 
 the centre and upon both sides, but the doors are not of much service 
 most of the time, for they are closed and fastened before the train starts, 
 and the conductor is only occasionally seen walking past the window and 
 looking in upon us as though we were prisoners who needed watching, 
 3 
 
1 8 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 At the station he takes his time for unlocking the door which is on the 
 side of the depot. On almost every train there are three classes of cars, 
 so that those who wish to travel in ease, or who think their family 
 unapproachable, almost royal, can take the first-class cars ; those whose 
 money has been hard-earned and must go a great way can take the third- 
 class cars, if they can be blind to their immediate surroundings and have 
 their conversation with the new scenes in nature through which they are 
 constantly passing. Those that are neither one nor the other can take 
 the middle class, so everybody may be suited. 
 
 Through Paisley, whose shawls had not much attraction for us, in a 
 southeasterly direction, toward the coast along which we had sailed when 
 we were leaving the Atlantic and upon which we hoped to cast our fare- 
 well glance when we should embark again after a year of wandering, and 
 the home of the poet is reached, the poet who, in his short life of less 
 than thirty-eight years, furnishes the example of a single man who has 
 rendered classical his native tongue by the outpouring of poetry and 
 song. A short survey of the High Street of Ayr, and in the little 
 wagonet we hasten on to scenes more closely connected with the hero 
 of the hour. Two miles through a broad street, which June had made 
 green in oft-returning summer, and which Burns keeps green in the 
 memories of his admirers, we pause before the walls which echoed his 
 first cry, and swift as Time the years of his childhood glided away, and 
 in maturer years we plainly heard him say : 
 
 " To you I sing in simple Scottish lays 
 The lowly strains in life's scenes." 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. Ayr, the Home of Burns. High Street with the Braes of the River Doon, 
 two miles and a half from Ayr, on the left, and the old Bridge of Doon. which figures so promi- 
 nently in Tarn o' Shanter's flight, on the right. Statues of Tarn o'Shanter and Souter Johnnie in 
 a grotto in the Cemetery of the new Church of Alloway. Tarn o' Shanter's Inn. New Bridge 
 of Ayr and Old Bridge of Ayr. Burns' Cottage, where the Poet was born, with the Relics of 
 Burns his Bust and Portrait and the Bible he gave his Highland Mary, on the left, and the 
 Monument of Burns, sixty feet high, raised in 1830, on the right. Robert Burns and Highland 
 Mary with the Banks of Doon (Monument in distance) on the left, and the Old Church of Allo- 
 way, scene of the Witches' Dance in the Poem, Tarn o' Shanter, on the right. 
 
*a 
 
 TO M(Hi>? >-.' 
 
 'S AtAflT-E'O'MIWE. 
 
 'II mi ow AIBUMS TO WE ENO 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. IQ 
 
 And we heard him describe the Cotter's Saturday Night, when 
 
 " Wi' joy unfeigned brothers and sisters meet, 
 
 And each for others' welfare kindly spiers ; 
 The jovial hours, swift- winged, unnoticed fleet ; 
 
 Each tells the uncos that he sees or hears. 
 The parents, partial, eye their hopeful years, 
 
 Anticipation forward points the view ; 
 The mother wi' her needle and her shears 
 
 Gars auld claes look amaist as weel's the new ; 
 
 The father mixes a' wi' admonition due." 
 
 Our hearts beat in sympathy when we remembered the words : 
 
 " From scenes like these old Scotia's grandeur springs, 
 
 That makes her loved at home, revered abroad. 
 Princes and lords are but the breath of kings, 
 An honest man 's the noblest work of God ! " 
 
 Our thoughts ascended in the prayer : 
 
 " O Thou who poured the patriotic tide 
 
 That streamed thro' Wallace's undaunted heart, 
 Who dared to nobly stem tyrannic pride, 
 Or nobly die, the second glorious part, 
 Oh, never, never Scotia's realm desert." 
 
 Burns' cottage is now used as a small public house. Half a mile fur- 
 ther and again we stood before an old churchyard, and in memory, aided 
 by imagination, went back to the time of Tarn o' Shanter, when he had 
 lingered at the old inn with Souter Johnnie, till 
 
 " The time approaches when Tarn maun ride. 
 That hour, o' night's black arch the key-stane, 
 That dreary hour he mounts his beast in. 
 Weel mounted on his gray mare Meg, 
 A better never lifted leg, 
 Tarn skelpit on through dust and mire, 
 Despising wind and rain and fire ; 
 Whiles glow'ring round wi' prudent cares, 
 Lest bogles catch him unawares, 
 Kirk Alloway was drawing nigh, 
 Where ghaists and houlets nightly cry. 
 * * * Tarn saw an unco sight, 
 Warlocks and witches in a dance. 
 There sat auld Nick in shape o' beast, 
 A loosie tyke, black, grim, and large, 
 To gie them music was his charge. 
 Coffins stood round like open presses, 
 That showed the dead in their last dresses, 
 
2O UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 Wi' mair so horrible and awfu' 
 Which even to name wad be unlawfu'. 
 
 " Tarn stood like one bewitched," then 
 
 " Laist his reason a'thegether 
 And roars out, " Weel done, cutty-sark!" 
 And in an instant all was dark ; 
 And scarcely had he Maggie rallied, 
 When out the hellish legion sallied." 
 
 Feeling as though the witches were after us, we rode on to the " running 
 stream they dare na' cross," where 
 
 " Nannie, far before the rest, 
 Hard upon noble Maggie prest, 
 And flew at Tarn wi' furious ettle ; 
 But little wist she Maggie's metal. 
 Ae spring brought off her master hale, 
 But left behind her ain gray tail." 
 
 This was by the Auld Brig o' Boon, and we rode by its braes where the 
 poet said, 
 
 " Oft hae I roved by bonnie Doon, 
 
 To see the rose and woodbine twine ; 
 And ilka bird sang o' its luve, 
 And fondly sae did I o' mine." 
 
 Last of all we visited the monument erected in 1820 to the one whose 
 words are his own best monument. Here are preserved many memen- 
 toes of Robert Burns and his Highland Mary, of whom he wrote : 
 
 " The golden hours on angel wings 
 
 Flew o'er me and my dearie ; 
 For dear to me as light and life 
 Was my sweet Highland Mary." 
 
 Here is his library and the very Bible he gave to her. All of a sudden, 
 as we went round a projecting corner, there sat Tarn o' Shanter, 
 
 " And at his elbow Souter Johnny, 
 His ancient, trusty, drouthy crony," 
 
 so natural that we were tempted to flee away, feeling that the witches 
 had not finished their work in this noted town. We left Ayr saying : 
 
 " Read the names that know not death, 
 
 Few nobler ones than Burns' are there, 
 And few have worn a greener wreath 
 Than that which binds his hair." 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 21 
 
 A delightful excursion to the Falls of the Clyde, where nature plays 
 most wonderful freaks in rowing her waters to the sea "a fall of a few 
 feet, a fall of about thirty feet, a cataract of ninety feet, and a grand 
 final leap," where Romance circles with rainbows of light the dark 
 retreat of the chief of Scottish Chiefs, Sir William Wallace ; and to 
 Lanark, where, in an Established Church of 1777, a colossal statue of this 
 same chief is elevated high over the entrance, as he stands high in their 
 records of fame ; and we leave Glasgow, to return no more till the year 
 again comes around. 
 
SCOTTISH LAKES. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 ( COTLAND acknowledges Rob Roy as one of her most 
 celebrated characters, and everywhere we were met by re- 
 minders of this bold mountaineer as we passed through the 
 regions where 
 
 " The eagle he was lord above, and Rob was lord below." 
 
 The journey was fraught with interest for its historical asso- 
 ciations, and also because 
 
 " It was so wondrous wild, the whole sight seemed 
 The scenery of some fairy dream." 
 
 Under very favorable circumstances for this country, we took a steamer 
 at the foot of Loch Lomond. No fog or glaring sunlight interfered with 
 our view, and beautiful fleecy clouds sailed in the blue above and were 
 mirrored in the blue below. All around us rose 
 
 " The mountains that like giants stand 
 To sentinel enchanted land." 
 
 As we glided along on the bosom of this lovely lake, the most beautiful 
 dissolving views were presented, and before we could fairly take in one 
 it became another, each more pleasing than all the rest. 
 
 " The rocky summits, split and rent, 
 Formed turret, dome, or battlement, 
 Or seemed fantastically set 
 With cupola or minaret." 
 
 The ghost of Rob Roy seemed to haunt the entire scene, and the dark 
 heather and the broom on the mountain sides to be evil spirits seeking 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 23 
 
 whom they might devour. Many of the Bens "heaved high their 
 forehead bare" in apparent veneration for their hoary brother, Ben Lo- 
 mond, whose aged head is much of the time covered with the white cap 
 which served as a signal to get ready the Scotch umbrellas. We were 
 constantly shut in by those many mountains, all run in a different mold, 
 some lifting a huge bare peak all unadorned, others bearing vegetation 
 to their very summits, while their sides were varied with the dark moss 
 growing in large patches here and there, intermingled with the broom, 
 which gives great variety by its different appearance at different stages 
 of growth bright green when young, and becoming very dark, and 
 covered in time of blossoming with the yellow papilionaceous flowers. 
 The numberless little islands were all bowers where Cupid might dwell, 
 and the names of many of them very appropriately commence with 
 Inch, giving only an exaggerated idea of their baby size. Seventeen 
 of the twenty-one miles where this romantic lake finds for itself a bed, 
 winding around at the base of these heathery mountains, receiving to its 
 bosom the leaping, sparkling waterfalls, taking up the burns hastening 
 on their way to the sea, and giving frequent glimpses of realms little less 
 than fairy through the glens and dingles on its sides, seventeen miles 
 among the islands Inchcruachan, Inchgalbraith, Inchtaranach, and all 
 the other Inches, from the wee ones with scarcely soil for a single tree to 
 find root, to Inchlonaig, where are still growing the yew trees planted by 
 Robert Bruce, and Inchmurrin, the largest of Lomond's isles, measuring 
 a mile and a half in length by three-quarters of a mile in breadth, where 
 one of Scotland's dukes now feeds his deer, seventeen miles the 
 U. S. G. sailed from the foot of the lake, where the Leven takes these 
 waters on to the Clyde, to within four miles of its head where it receives 
 Falloch Water. We landed at Inversnaid in the face of two tall Bens 
 across the lake, and in the neighborhood of Craigroyston Cave, where 
 Rob Roy oft retreated to hold council with his men. At Inversnaid a 
 
24 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 fort was built in 1715 to overawe the Macgregors, with Rob Roy at their 
 head, which was commanded by General Wolfe ; but now the peaceful 
 Inversnaid House invites the traveler to roam at will through these 
 romantic regions, and to rest in safety within its walls, without fearing to 
 hear the sound of the slogan or to catch a glimpse of the Highland 
 robber. The next morning our omnibus was filled with twenty-two 
 persons, and, drawn by four horses, we rode up the mountain sides in 
 the midst of heather and blue bells, and saw the long-haired cattle and 
 sheep feeding where the foot of man could scarcely tread ; the little 
 lambs, with black feet and noses, frisked and played as only lambs can 
 do ; past the house (a small part of which remains) where Helen Mac- 
 gregor, the wife of Rob Roy, was born ; by the side of Inversnaid burn, 
 which throws itself down to Loch Lomond in a fall of thirty feet ; up 
 and on beyond wee lochs and tarns, five miles from Loch Lomond to Loch 
 Katrine and the lines of Wordsworth to the Highland girl at Inversnaid 
 found a ready response : 
 
 " Now thanks to Heaven, that of its grace 
 Hath led me to this lovely place ; 
 Joy have I had, and going hence, 
 I bear away ray recompense. 
 In spots like these it is we prize 
 Our memory, feel that she hath eyes." 
 
 The ride was ended at Stronachlachar, where, 
 
 " One burnished sheet of living gold, 
 Loch Katrine lay beneath us rolled, 
 In all her length far winding lay, 
 With promontory, creek and bay, 
 And islands that, empurpled bright, 
 Floated amid the livelier light." 
 
 Soon we stood on the deck of the dainty little steamer Rob Roy, and 
 were in the Lady of the Lake country, where all the incidents of that 
 beautiful poem seemed to be re-enacted. We sailed amid " islands that, 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 2$ 
 
 empurpled bright, floated amid the livelier light," and as we approached 
 Ellen's Isle, where 
 
 " The wild-rose, eglantine and broom 
 Wasted around their rich perfume, 
 The birch trees wept in fragrant balm, 
 The aspens slept beneath the calm, 
 The silver light, with quivering glance, 
 Played on the water's still expanse." 
 
 We heard the hunter wind his horn, 
 
 " When lo ! forth starting at the sound, 
 
 From underneath an aged oak 
 
 That slanted from the islet rock, 
 
 A damsel guider of its way, 
 
 A little skiff shot to the bay 
 
 That round the promontory steep 
 
 Led its deep line in graceful sweep." 
 " The boat had touched this silver strand 
 
 Just as the Hunter left his stand 
 
 And stood concealed amid the brake 
 
 To view the Lady of the Lake. 
 
 The maiden paused as if again 
 
 She thought to catch the distant strain, 
 
 With head upraised and look intent, 
 
 And eye and ear attentive bent, 
 
 And locks flung back and lips apart, 
 
 Like monument of Grecian art, 
 
 In listening mood she seemed to stand, 
 
 The guardian Naiad of the strand." 
 " A chieftain's daughter seemed the maid; 
 
 Her satin snood, her silken plaid, 
 
 Her golden brooch, such birth betrayed." 
 "And never brooch the folds combined 
 
 Above a heart more good and kind. 
 
 Her kindness and her worth to spy, 
 
 You need but gaze on Ellen's eye." 
 " Impatient of the silent horn, 
 
 Now on the gale her voice was borne : 
 'Father!' she cried ; the rocks around 
 
 Loved to prolong the gentle sound. 
 
 Awhile she paused, no answer came ; 
 
 ' Malcolm, was thine the blast ? ' The name 
 
 Less resolutely uttered fell, 
 
 The echoes could not catch the swell. 
 'A stranger, I, 'the Huntsman said, 
 
 Advancing from the laurel shade. 
 
 The maid, alarmed, with hasty oar 
 
 Pushed her light shallop from the shore, 
 
26 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 And when a space was gained between, 
 
 Closer she drew her bosom's screen." 
 
 * * * " Though fluttered and amazed, 
 
 She paused and on the stranger gazed," 
 " On his bold visage middle age 
 
 Had slightly pressed its signet sage." 
 " His limbs were cast in manly mould, 
 
 For hardy sports or contests bold." 
 " Slighting the petty need he showed, 
 
 He told of his benighted road." 
 " A while the maid the stranger eyed, 
 
 And, reassured, at length replied, 
 
 That Highland halls were open still 
 
 To wildered wanderers of the hill." 
 " The stranger viewed the shore around ; 
 
 'Twas all so close with copsewood bound, 
 
 Nor track nor pathway might declare 
 
 That human foot frequented there, 
 
 Until the mountain maiden showed 
 
 A clambering, unsuspected road, 
 
 That winded through the tangled screen 
 
 And opened on a narrow green, 
 
 Where weeping birch and willow round 
 
 With their long fibres swept the ground. 
 
 Here for retreat in dangerous hour 
 
 Some chief had framed a rustic bower." 
 
 We had not time to visit this bower and with the hunter spend the 
 night where " the stranger's bed was of mountain heather spread," but 
 we seemed to hear him name his rank : 
 
 ;i The Knight of Snowdoun, James Fitz- James, 
 Lord of a barren heritage," 
 
 and to hear him say : 
 
 " This morning with Lord Moray's train 
 He chased a stalwart stag in vain, 
 Outstripped his comrades, missed the deer, 
 Lost his good steed and wandered here." 
 
 We imagined we saw, on the morrow, 
 
 " The parting lingerer wave adieu, 
 
 And stop and turn to wave anew." 
 " While yet he loitered on the spot, 
 
 It seemed as Ellen marked him not, 
 
 But when he turned him to the glade, 
 
 One courteous parting sign she made." 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Ellen's Isle, on Loch Katrine. 2. The Trosachs. 
 

ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 2/ 
 
 Eight lovely miles amid these beauties were passed as a song, the 
 entire length of this miniature lake, and we reached the enchanted land. 
 
 " High on the south huge Benvenue 
 Down on the lake in masses threw 
 Crags, knolls and mounds confusedly hurled, 
 The fragments of an earlier world ; 
 A wildering forest feathered o'er 
 His rained sides and summit hoar, 
 While on the north, through middle air, 
 Ben-an heaved high his forehead bare." 
 
 We did not enter the Trosachs, as in the days of the Lady of the Lake, 
 by a ladder composed of the branches and roots of trees, nor, like James 
 Fitz-James, guided by the rebel chieftain, Roderick Dhu, but like him 
 we went through "a profound defile, a craggy gorge, a dark crevasse, 
 wild, wooded, beautiful and sublime." 
 
 " All in the Trosachs glen was still, 
 Noontide was sleeping on the hill." , 
 
 And where King James the Fifth of Scotland (for it was no humbler 
 character than he who was the hero of Scott's poem) looked upon his 
 own brave steed, in imagination we heard him say : 
 
 " Ah, gallant grey, 
 
 For thee, for me, perchance 'twere well 
 We ne'er had seen the Trosach's dell." 
 
 Pause ye who will with James Fitz-James and Roderick Dhu at Coilan- 
 tangle ford, where 
 
 " Each at once his falchion drew, 
 Each on the ground his scabbard threw, 
 Each looked to sun, and stream, and plain, 
 As what they ne'er might see again, 
 Then foot and point and eye opposed, 
 In dubious strife they darkly closed." 
 
 We left them to finish the fight, and our poetic journey through the 
 Scottish lakes being ended, 
 
 " Soon the bulwark of the North, 
 Grey Stirling, with her towers and town, 
 Upon our fleet career looked down." 
 
STIRLING, EDINBURG AND MELROSE. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 ,TIRLING home of many of the sovereigns of Scotland, 
 scene of many of the disasters of the most unfortunate family 
 of Stuart, city which was long capital of Scotland, and which 
 still contains buildings raised by four of the Jameses stands 
 on the right bank of the river Forth, thirty-six miles from 
 Edinburg. It commands a point of that river which was long 
 the main passage between the Highlands and Lowlands, and it is second 
 to no place in Scotland except Edinburg. 
 
 Stirling is a place of interest for many reasons, and we immediately 
 sought the Castle upon its wedge-shaped hill, ascending three-quarters 
 of a mile to an altitude of two hundred and twenty feet, and stooping 
 precipitously to the northwest. Imagine the exquisite beauty of the 
 panorama spread out before us. In the distance, the Grampians, the 
 Ochil Hills, Tinto, and Arthur's Seat thirty-six miles away ; just at its 
 base, the linked Forth winding itself in graceful curves which are often 
 so deep that it nearly unites with its own waters. Then count the bat- 
 tle-fields where the fate of nations has been decided fourteen, bearing 
 bloody records. The history of Scotland's chief, Sir William Wallace, 
 comes plainly to mind. When John Baliol, great-grandson of David by 
 his eldest daughter, and Robert Bruce, grandson of the same by his 
 second daughter, contended for the throne ; and when Baliol had placed 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC.' 29 
 
 himself and his country under the power of Edward I. of England, who 
 had sent a governor to lord it over the Scots, the patriotic heart of Wal- 
 lace could not submit, and he slew the son of the governor, and was an 
 outlaw for five years, living in the forests and caves of his native land. 
 Then, with an army, he held the castle of Stirling, and fought, in 1297, 
 the famous battle which still bears the name of this castle, and which a 
 colossal statue of Wallace commemorates. It was here that he gave his 
 characteristic reply to those demanding surrender : " We came to assert 
 our rights, and to set Scotland free." Would that we could leave him 
 here in the midst of his glory, but history will not allow it ; so we follow 
 him through nearly ten more years of varied victory and defeat, and find 
 him a prisoner in London Tower, and see him die, only thirty-seven 
 years of age, not, as the romance says, of a broken heart, but dragged to 
 Smithfield, beheaded, and his body quartered and placed in the four 
 extremes of the realm, as a warning to those who dared resist the claims 
 of England. But the world will always mourn that so brave a patriot 
 met so cruel a fate. 
 
 Another of the battle-fields, and the last we have time to mention, is 
 Bannockburn. Three miles from the height where we now stand, the 
 guide points out a flagstaff rising from the Bore Stane where Bruce 
 planted his standard, in 1314, when he addressed his army with the 
 
 words : 
 
 " Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled, 
 Scots wham Bruce has often led, 
 Welcome to your gory bed, 
 Or to glorious victory ! " 
 
 Some received one and some the other, for it was then and there that 
 the independence of Scotland was gained and Bruce was seated on the 
 throne which his descendants held for so many years. This castle was 
 sometimes called the Castle of Snowdoun, hence James V., whom we 
 have followed in his romantic and almost fatal visit to the Lady of the 
 
30 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 Lake, was called the Knight of Snowdoun ; and we visited the room 
 where 
 
 u Motionless and moanless drew 
 His parting breath, stout Roderick Dim," 
 
 who had been wounded in the encounter with James at Coilantangle 
 ford, and in a sort of dream, in which the closing incidents of Scott's 
 immortal poem were enacted with life-like distinctness, we took the cars 
 for Edinburg. 
 
 With minds crowded with these scenes of greatest historic interest, 
 we reached the end of our journey. 
 
 " Edina high in heaven wan, 
 Towered, templed, metropolitan, 
 Waited upon by hills, 
 River, and wide-spread ocean." 
 
 It was ten o'clock in the evening, scarcely past the twilight hour in that 
 northern latitude, and we walked to our hotel with eyes sharpened by 
 Imagination, and we looked upon the old, old city painted with the brush 
 of Fancy. We rested one day, and on Monday morning commenced 
 the examination of Edinburgh, daughter of that fortress of rock which 
 has been a stronghold from the days of the Saxon heptarchy, now a city 
 more than seven miles in circuit, containing two hundred thousand 
 inhabitants. From whatever standpoint we could take, Edinburg Castle 
 stood out in bold relief, hence we immediately directed our steps toward 
 this mountain supposed to have been occupied by forts from times before 
 the Christian era. The castle crowns the summit of Greenstone rock, 
 445 feet high and 700 yards in circumference. The entrance is over a 
 drawbridge, across a deep, dry fosse, through a gateway, up a causeway, 
 through an archway, etc., etc. ; in short, an enemy would be obliged to 
 pass through nine gates (if gates were there, and they could easily be 
 replaced if necessary,) in face of shot and shell, to gain the highest 
 point, the King's Bastion. We pause in our ascent before the " Old 
 Royal Palace," the abode of the kings and queens of Scotland. The 
 
* 
 

 
 
 ROM IHt -CASTLE. 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 31 
 
 I 
 
 room of Queen Mary is shown, where James VI. was born. He was let 
 down from the window in a basket and sent to Stirling to be christened. 
 This room is nine feet long, very irregular in shape, and would be unin- 
 teresting were it not for the associations connected with it. A gentle- 
 manly Highland officer conducted some of our party into the sergeants' 
 mess-room and showed us the portrait of their beloved Queen, lately 
 received. He also pointed out the Time Gun, which is discharged every 
 lawful day at one o'clock by means of an electric apparatus attached to 
 the Nelson monument on Calton Hill, a mile away. 
 
 We have reached the summit of the castle, are on the King's Bastion, 
 and before us is Mons Meg, the hero of army cannon, crippled to be sure, 
 but giving unmistakable evidence of having been in many battles. 
 Forged in 1476, used in the seige of Dumbarton Castle in 1489, burst 
 in 1682, removed to London Tower in 1754, it was restored to Scotland, 
 mainly through the intercession of Sir Walter Scott, in 1829. It is 
 thirteen feet long and weighs more than five tons. It stands sentinel 
 on the highest point of the castle, just in front of St. Margaret's Chapel. 
 This chapel is the oldest building in Edinburg and the smallest and most 
 ancient chapel in Great Britain. David I., the founder of this chapel, 
 was also the founder of Holyrood Abbey, and it was during his reign 
 that the city was first raised to the rank of a burgh, in 1129. 
 
 We left Castle Hill to thread the Canongate, made famous by the 
 " Chronicles" of Scott. It derives its name from the Augustine canons 
 of Holyrood. The Canongate is Scottish history fossilized. What 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Edinburg from the Frith of Forth Arthur's Seat, Salisbury Crags, Cal- 
 ton Hill, Castle. 2. Edinburg from Castle Hill, Mons Meg in the foreground ; Scott's Monument 
 on Prince's street at the left ; Calton Hill, with its monuments to Dugald Stewart and Nelson, 
 the National Monument to the Scotchmen who fell in the battles of Napoleon, and the new 
 Royal Observatory. Holyrood Palace, at the foot of Calton Hill, just back of the bridge. St. 
 Giles' Church, on High street (its square tower surmounted with an imperial crown), of which 
 John Knox was pastor at the Reformation, where Jenny Geddes threw her stool at the Dean 
 of Edinburg, and where the Solemn League and Covenant was sworn to and subscribed in 1643. 
 Grayfriars' Churchyard, where many of the Covenanters are interred. 
 
32 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 ghosts of kings and queens walk there! What strifes of steel-clad 
 nobles ! What wretches borne along, in the sight of peopled windows, 
 to the grim embrace of the " maiden ! " What lamentations over disas- 
 trous battle days ! James rode up this street on his way to Flodden. 
 Jenny Geddes threw her stool at the priest in the church yonder. John - 
 Knox came up here to his house after his interview with Mary at Holy- 
 rood grim and stern and unmelted by the tears of a queen. In later 
 days the Pretender rode down the Canongate, his eyes dazzled by the 
 glitter of his father's crown. Down here of an evening rode Dr. John- 
 son and Boswell, and turned into the White Horse Close. David Hume 
 had his dwelling in this street, and trod its pavements, much meditating 
 the wars of the Roses and the Parliament. One day a burly ploughman 
 from Ayrshire, with swarthy features and wonderful black eyes, came 
 down here and turned into yonder churchyard to stand, with cloudy lids 
 and forehead reverently bared, beside the grave of poor Ferguson. 
 Down the street, too, often limped a little boy, Walter Scott by name, 
 destined in after years to write its " Chronicles." Later still came those 
 philanthropists and Christians, Chalmers and Guthrie, gathering abun- 
 dant material for their " ragged schools." And last of all came the 
 United States Girls from across the Atlantic, on their way to Holyrood, 
 " Monaslerium Sancta Crucis de Crag? Monastery of the Holy Rood 
 (or Cross) of the Craig. 
 
 The cause of the erection of the abbey was this : The king had gone 
 hunting on the day on which was commemorated the Exaltation of the 
 Cross. He followed a stag, which stood at bay, and would have injured 
 him, but a piece of the true cross slipped into his hands. He was 
 warned by a vision " to big an abbey of Channones Regular in the same 
 place quhare he gat the crace." Hence the Abbey of Holyrood was 
 founded by David I. in 1128. Now it is roofless and falling to ruin, and 
 the remorseless rain falls on the graves of David II., James II., James V. 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 33 
 
 and Lord Darnley, the husband of Queen Mary. A palace rose long 
 ago by the side of the abbey and in connection with it, and the principal 
 events in its history are in relation to Mary, Queen of Scots. On the 
 second floor were her apartments, and there her bed still stands, sur- 
 rounded by hangings of crimson damask, with green silk fringes and 
 tassels, and tapestry illustrating the fall of Phaeton. . It looks as though 
 it would fall to pieces if the hand but touched it, so plainly is age written 
 thereon. Just outside the door to descend by a back passage is the blood 
 of Rizzio, which is as ineffaceable from the floor as is the story of his 
 tragical death from the minds of those who learned it in childhood. 
 
 We have but just begun to tell of the castle, the palace, and of this 
 strange city, but it has been so beautifully described by poets, philoso- 
 phers, and divines, that we only dare to say we have walked these old 
 streets, looked upon these old walls, visited the home of John Knox, read 
 the inscriptions upon the walls of his house, entered the church where 
 his voice sounded so fearlessly, and stood by the stone in the pavement 
 which, by the initials " J. K.," marks his resting-place. We have been 
 in the churchyard where the martyrs repose, and have seen the " Maiden " 
 (too cruel for such a name) which severed their heads. We have counted 
 the stories of the old houses till we came within one of a dozen, and we 
 have ascended the steps between the old and the new town till our limbs 
 refused to move. We have walked over Calton Hill, conspicuous for its 
 monuments, and spent three hours climbing that we might sit upon 
 Arthur's Seat and there date letters to send to our friends in America 
 (we feared that the wind would serve us worse than it did upon the 
 ocean if we attempted to do more than to date our letters, so we took a 
 lower seat to write them) ; and we rejoice to have stood by the monu- 
 ment reared by Scotland to the son who has brought such honor to his 
 country, Sir Walter Scott. 
 
 We bade good-bye to Edinburg with sad hearts. We would not be- 
 5 
 
34 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 lieve that we should come no more into her streets, hear the pleasant 
 greeting of old and young, and look upon the honest faces of those 
 Highland Scotch people. No ! let us rather believe that we shall some 
 time live over again those pleasant days, even though it be an illusion. 
 Nine days were spent in this city, so often compared to ancient Athens 
 crowned with her Acropolis, and one day in the suburbs at Hawthornden, 
 eleven miles away classic Hawthornden, where the poet Drummond 
 resided and received his friend Ben Jonson (who walked from London to 
 visit him) under the noble sycamore tree which still spreads its branches 
 to shelter the weary traveler through the picturesque glen on the bank 
 of the North Esk river, which can scarcely be surpassed in Scotland, a 
 mile in length and containing about twenty species of wild flowers, and 
 also some curious caves, one of which was occupied by Bruce for four 
 years ; then we left for Melrose, not quite forty miles from Edinburg. 
 We waited " to view fair Melrose aright, and visit it by the pale moon- 
 light," so the afternoon hours were spent in a walk to Abbotsford, three 
 miles on the banks of the Tweed. Abbotsford, the residence of Sir 
 Walter Scott, " a romance in stone and lime," embodies portions of Mel- 
 rose Abbey, Holyrood Palace, Linlithgow Palace, and Edinburgh old 
 Tolbooth, so arranged as to make it a grand museum. " It is beautiful 
 in itself, beautiful in its surroundings, and beautiful in the memory which 
 it perpetuates." Within was the library with its twenty thousand vol- 
 umes ; the study, where the author of " Waverley " prepared those works 
 which took the world by storm, and which has been left very nearly as he 
 occupied it ; the armory, which has the ring and clang of steel in the 
 air ; and the drawing-room, in which Sir Walter died, with its old furni- 
 ture of ebony, its beautiful carvings and stained-glass windows. A few 
 of the very interesting objects in this place were : Queen Mary's seal 
 and snuff-box, Rob Roy's purse, Bruce's candlestick, key of the old Tol- 
 booth, and the bust of Scott after death. We were obliged to leave his 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 35 
 
 great-granddaughter, twenty years of age, in peaceful possession of these 
 collections of art and antiquity, and walk again over the ground his feet 
 had trod so many times, with the bracing air from Scotland's hills and 
 the bright sun from Scotland's skies coming down upon us, back to Mel- 
 rose. Having returned to the neighborhood of that grand old ruin, 
 which the poet tells us to view by pale moonlight, we are so anxious to 
 get a glimpse within the mural enclosure that we set forth before the 
 sun has left the sky, thinking to surround the walls of the noble abbey 
 and steal a glance at the hidden relic. We recall to mind that it was the 
 work of the same David who reared Holyrood and gave to Edinburg her 
 fortress on Castle Hill three splendid creations destined to stand the 
 test of time and to be a wonder to coming generations centuries after 
 the one who designed the whole had passed away. Melrose was a suit- 
 able monument to Robert Bruce, who gave to Scotland the independence 
 since lost, and a fit mausoleum, too, for his patriotic heart, which had 
 been prepared by his countrymen to be taken to the Holy Land, while 
 his body was laid to rest in a neighboring abbey. With hearts burning 
 with enthusiastic patriotism, the earth was hardly the place for our feet, 
 and we had climbed as high as was possible under the circumstances. 
 The three had scaled a lofty stone wall, not questioning whether it was 
 laid by Picts or Scots, or whether by the Romans seeking a new world 
 to conquer. All in file we stood, like soldiers surveying a battle-field 
 after the fight is finished. Fearing to take too much from the pleasure 
 of the evening, one kind sister descended from her high position and 
 extended a hand to those still above. The teacher first accepted the 
 proffered hand, and with one bold leap confidently expected to land on 
 terra firma. But problems in algebra could be more readily solved, 
 French comedies more politely played, German verbs more musically 
 inflected, or cantos in Virgil more gracefully rendered ; for all of a sudden 
 there was a whirl of the brain, a holding back by strong power, an 
 
36 UNITED STATES GIRLS. 
 
 entire suspension of movement, then a sudden giving away, a crash and 
 a fall, followed by a cry that the little one had carelessly jumped upon 
 her friend. Opening her eyes to the condition of things, she saw with 
 wonder the American Coon (an epithet applied to the smallest one of our 
 party by a facetious friend, in allusion to her name) perched above the 
 fallen of the party, looking sympathizingly from her elevation, while 
 coldly extended before her eyes lay the barefaced perpetrator of the deed, 
 holding her fastened to the ground. A huge stone had caught her skirts 
 and held her suspended for a time in mid-air, then yielding the point, had 
 followed her and still held her captive as with heavy chains. After a 
 careful examination to see whether a fracture or a sprain or only a bruise 
 was the result of the accident above mentioned, the three concluded to 
 return to the hotel as speedily as possible ; so, with an arm on the 
 shoulder of each of her companions, she hopped on one foot, and the 
 landlady was summoned, the shoe removed, the foot bathed, and our 
 view of Melrose Abbey was all " moonshine." The state of affairs next 
 morning was not as bad as had been feared, and taking a broomless 
 handle which offered itself for a crutch, we limped to the depot and left 
 Melrose. 
 
 For reasons we need not specify, we did not walk around the English 
 lakes and visit the homes of the poets so celebrated, but we hastened to 
 London, where we knew the halt and the maimed and the lame are wont 
 to assemble. Once on the way, when it was necessary to change cars, 
 a kind-hearted Scotchman saw our condition and invited the crippled 
 one to sit on his truck and be wheeled with our baggage through the 
 long depot an offer too good to be rejected. 
 
LONDON. 
 
 CHAPTER V. v 
 
 iE could almost tell when we crossed into England, and 
 bonnie Scotland being left, we held our breaths in sus- 
 pense as we approached the largest city in the world. 
 We looked upon the green fields separated by hedges of 
 hawthorn, and suddenly we were in the midst of darkness, 
 which was dissipated only by a feeble lamp burning over our 
 heads, lighted we knew not when or how. After a ride of several miles 
 in this way, the cars stopped in the midst of daylight, and they said we 
 were in London. London ! Is it possible ? Where is the rush, and the 
 din, and the turmoil ? where are the beggars, and paupers, and disgust- 
 ing specimens of mankind ? where is the filth, and squalor, and abject 
 poverty ? Perhaps we shall see them when we become better acquainted. 
 The British metropolis in its largest sense is nearly one hundred miles 
 in circumference. It comprises 688f square miles, and the number 
 of dwellings is estimated at half a million. If placed in a straight line 
 they would extend from the north end of Great Britain to the shores 
 of the Mediterranean. A total length of its streets is 2,500 miles one- 
 third of the earth's diameter ; if stretched in one long line they would 
 reach from Liverpool to New York. The number of streets, lanes and 
 parks in the whole Metropolitan Police District is 10,500 miles. The 
 population is over three and a half millions. All the vehicles travel in 
 
^g UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 the course of a year about as far as the earth is from the sun. " London 
 is no longer a city, it is a province covered with houses." It was in this 
 city that we were set out of the cars to find a home, and we easily found 
 one, for everywhere we saw posted, " Rooms to let," and in a few hours 
 we had taken one, and were ready to see London. Our home in this 
 vast city was not many miles at most from its centre. To the curious 
 we would say that it was on Devonshire street, north of the Thames, 
 and west of St. Paul's Cathedral, which is about the centre of London. 
 The Thames goes through London from west to east very much as a 
 huge serpent makes its way through tall grass, writhing and coiling and 
 running almost out of sight until you are right upon it. One continuous 
 great thoroughfare runs also from west to east in a more nearly direct 
 course than the Thames, but it takes a variety of names in its different 
 parts, beginning at the west Uxbridge road, extending along the side 
 of Kensington Gardens and Hyde Park, which lie side by side ; Oxford 
 street, New Oxford street, High Holborn (the one which we were near- 
 est), Holborn Hill, Newgate, Cheapside (nearest to St. Paul's), Poultry 
 (nearest the Thames), Cornhill, Leadenhall, Whitechapel, Whitechapel 
 road, Bow road, and Stratford road. Our first attempt at sight-seeing 
 was in a stroll through the three parks, St. James, Green and Hyde, 
 which extend each an angle into the other so as to form one continuous 
 park, terminated by Kensington Gardens, at the extreme western part 
 of the city, which we have mentioned. These parks, as might be 
 expected, surround the homes of royalty. First of all, in Kensington 
 Gardens, two and a half miles in circumference, is Kensington Palace, 
 the birthplace of Queen Victoria in 1809. This is still a royal palace, 
 although not inhabited by royalty. Hyde Park contains 390 acres. At 
 the point where Hyde Park and Green Park overlap each other, at the 
 entrance from Piccadilly, stands a colossal bronze statue of Achilles, cast 
 from cannon taken at the battle of Waterloo, weighing thirty tons, 
 
ACROSS f HE ATLANTIC. $ 
 
 u erected to the Duke of Wellington and his companions in arms by 
 their countrymen." Green Park contains sixty acres, so named probably 
 for its undulating grassy surface. Near where Green Park becomes St. 
 James is Buckingham Palace, which is too small for the family of the 
 present sovereign, but is nevertheless occasionally occupied by her 
 Majesty. Just north of St. James Park, and lying between the Mall 
 and Pall Mall (so named from the old game, Faille Maille, a forerunner 
 of croquet,) are two more palaces St. James, built by Henry VIII., 
 and Marlborough House, where live the Prince and Princess of Wales, 
 who may change their residence some day for one more regal. St. James 
 Park contains ninety-six acres and is considered one of the greatest 
 ornaments to the metropolis. 
 
 There is one place in London in which children are much interested, 
 and we sought the spot where the American Coon informed us the 
 Laughing Jackass could be found, according to her little reader. We 
 had not many miles to go, in a northwesterly direction, before we found 
 Regent's Park, a nearly circular enclosure of about 470 acres, in the 
 northern part of which are the famous Zoological Gardens, established 
 during the present century. We sought in vain for the jackass, but 
 found almost every other kind of animal under the sun. The Sloth Bear 
 was a curious specimen of the Bruin family, that acted somewhat like a 
 Sloth, crawling slowly off after the crumbs thrown to him, and back 
 again as slowly, then, putting all four of his paws through the bars of his 
 cage, he would seat himself on his haunches and wait patiently for some- 
 thing else. The kangaroos were numerous, and -one was specially 
 interesting with her big baby hopping in and out from her pouch, which 
 was not large enough to hold the whole of it, but allowed its limbs to 
 touch the ground in her frequent turnings after food. We sat down just 
 in front of the cage where the king of the forest was lazily shutting his 
 sleepy eyes ; but what was our surprise when he suddenly opened his 
 
40 tJNITEt) STATES GlkLS 
 
 monstrous jaws and gave a roar that was truly the roar of the lion, and 
 we as suddenly withdrew from his presence. It would be difficult to 
 imagine any form under the sun that was not in Regent's Park that day, 
 and although we walked back in the midst of the rain, we were amply 
 paid for every step we had taken. 
 
 We must in truth say that the parks of the city of London do not 
 compare very favorably with the parks of our own country with La- 
 fayette Park in St. Louis, Lincoln Park in Chicago, Fairmount Park in 
 Philadelphia, and Central Park in New York. Although parts of them 
 are highly ornamented, yet they are not one continued scene of beauty 
 like the ones mentioned. As we walked slowly along we were passed by 
 many ladies on horseback, attended by their servants at a respectful 
 distance. Soon the question as to their destination was solved. We 
 approached a scene of gaiety and excitement Rotten Row ; a street 
 you might call it, in the midst of the park, where assemble daily at cer- 
 tain hours the equestrians of the city. Such a display of fashion and 
 rank and style one seldom sees. The horses here, and everywhere in 
 the country, are noble specimens and pleasant to look upon, and the 
 little boys of ten or twelve years, and the ladies of all ages, (both classes 
 of persons in high hats,) made the scene a novel one. 
 
 We were sufficiently fortunate on our approach to Buckingham Palace 
 to obtain a view of the Shah of Persia, with his suite, and the royal 
 family, on their way to a garden party with the Princess of Wales. We 
 could not feel quite the enthusiasm manifested by many of the crowd, 
 because we acknowledge no king or queen, but are our own princes and 
 rulers. 
 
 In returning to our London home from a visit to the parks first men- 
 tioned, we could pass through Trafalgar Square, whose tallest statue is 
 that of Nelson, high above " Landseer's four noble lions couchant," and 
 the one which has the most curious history is that of Charles the First. 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 4! 
 
 It was made during the reign of the latter king, but when civil war 
 broke out it was sold to a brasier, who was ordered to destroy it. He, 
 however, buried it, and it remained under ground till after the Restora- 
 tion, when it was erected, in 1674. There is an open space near Tra- 
 falgar Square of which we often read, and which is called Charing Cross, 
 from the old village of Charing, where Edward the First erected a cross 
 to the memory of his queen, Eleanor. Wherever her bier rested he 
 erected a cross. 
 
 " A royal game of Fox and Geese 
 
 To play for such a loss ; 
 Wherever she put down her orts, 
 There he set up a cross." 
 
 Thence we proceeded through the Strand, so called because it lies 
 along the bank of the river in the seventeenth century it was a kind 
 of country road connecting the city with Westminster ; under the famous 
 Temple Bar, which is a wide central archway with a smaller one on each 
 side for foot-passengers, the whole dividing the Strand from Fleet street. 
 There are doors in the main avenue, which used to be closed, but are 
 never so now except in case of some state ceremonial, when the royal 
 family knock for admission and the Lord Mayor opens unto them. This 
 is the place where the heads of criminals were exposed after having been 
 boiled in pitch to preserve them. The last ones, those of two Jacobites, 
 were well preserved, for they remained from 1745 till 1772, when they 
 were blown down in a gale of wind. A little way on Fleet street, which 
 has been called the " March of Intellect," it is so full of newspaper and 
 printing offices, then we turned off at Chancery lane, through Red Lion, 
 and so to Devonshire street, ready to rest after the first day in London. 
 
 On Tuesday, the first day of July, we visited the Tower of London, 
 the chief fortress of the monarchs of Great Britain and the depository 
 of the national arms and accoutrements. It does not, like its sister 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Temple Bar. 2. Houses of Parliament. 3. Westminster Abbey. 4. Wes- 
 ley. 5. Spurgeon. 
 
 6 
 
42 tJNJTEi) STATES GIRLS' 
 
 castles, occupy an elevated position overlooking the surrounding country, 
 but threading busy streets we look with interest upon this structure, 
 which has been palace, fortress and dungeon, in several cases, to the 
 same individual. We have the authority of Shakspeare for saying that 
 the Tower was begun by the Roman conqueror, Caesar, but most writers 
 date its origin to the time of William the Conqueror, 1078. It is sur- 
 rounded by a double line of walls and bulwarks, the outer one inclosing 
 thirteen acres. The moat is supplied with water from the Thames, but 
 it has been kept drained since 1 846. We enter the walls, fortified by six 
 towers, following one of the wardens dressed in the livery established by 
 Henry VIII. These wardens are often called " beef-eaters," a corruption 
 of beaufetiers, battle-ax guards, first raised by Henry VII. in 1485. 
 Within the inner walls, fortified by twelve towers, is the White Tower, a 
 quadrangular structure, erected for William the Conqueror ; it has three 
 stories above ground, and, the guard told us, three stories below. Its 
 walls are fifteen feet thick. One division of the first floor is occupied 
 by " Queen Elizabeth's Armory," in which the virgin queen may be seen 
 mounted on a carved horse, attended by her pages and officers of the 
 household in armor. Instruments of torture are shown here, and we saw 
 the thumb-screw applied, very gently, however, to one of our friends. 
 The beheading block and ax were there, used for the last time after the 
 rebellion in Scotland. The Horse Armory is a modern building, in 
 which are arranged equestrian statues of the kings in ancient armor (or 
 " tin pants," our little one said,) from the time of Henry VI., 1422, to 
 that of James II., 1685. 
 
 We must not stop to tell of the Bloody Tower, where the two sons 
 of Edward IV. were smothered, or the Bell Tower, where it is said Eliz- 
 abeth tasted the pleasures of confinement for a time ; the Devereux 
 Tower, which derived its name from Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex, 
 the favorite of Queen Elizabeth ; or the remaining nine towers, all 
 of which have an interesting history. 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 43 
 
 It would be pleasant to notice the records of the Tower as a palace, 
 were they not so soon changed to those of a prison in many instances. 
 Henry VIII. gave to all his wives receptions of great magnificence 
 within these walls, but what followed ? All was bright to Queen Anne 
 Boleyn in 1533, but in 1536 she inhabited the same apartments, and soon 
 was on her way to the scaffold on Tower Green ! the spot pointed out 
 to us where many had surrendered their lives. History tells of the 
 Tower as a prison. 
 
 During the eight centuries the walls of the Tower have frowned upon 
 the Thames, it has not been attacked by a foreign enemy, but during the 
 internal wars which have so often disturbed the country, it has been an 
 object of great importance for each party to gain possession of this im- 
 pregnable fortress, and therefore it has many times felt the shock of war. 
 
 The New Palace of Westminster, or, in other words, the Houses 
 of Parliament, built in consequence of the burning of the old Houses 
 of Parliament in 1834, lies just across the street from Westminster Ab- 
 bey, extending along the banks of the Thames for nine hundred feet. A 
 royal palace has occupied the same site since the time of Edward the 
 Confessor, who delayed his death, it is said, as long as possible in order 
 to dedicate his abbey. This is probably the finest Gothic structure in 
 the world ; it covers nearly eight acres and contains two miles of passages 
 
 and corridors and five hundred rooms. It is surmounted by numberless 
 
 
 towers, but the most important ones are the Victoria Tower, the largest 
 
 and highest square tower in the world (it bears a flagstaff four hundred 
 feet above the ground, which floats a royal standard twelve yards long 
 and nine yards wide, when the sovereign is within the walls), the Clock 
 Tower, supporting a clock with the largest dial in the world, and the 
 Central Tower, which also has something the largest in the world, but 
 we cannot describe it. Of the five hundred rooms we can notice but few. 
 The House of Lords is ninety feet long, forty-five wide, and forty-five 
 
44 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 high, and in one part of it is the throne where stands Her Majesty's state 
 chair, approached by three steps ; on one side of this stands one for the 
 Prince of Wales, and on the other one for the late Prince Consort, each 
 reached by two steps. The monograms in the compartments of the 
 throne, " V. R.," " P. A ," and " P. W.," show by whom the chairs were 
 designed to be occupied ; and the various carvings of ro'ses andfaurs de 
 Us, lions and unicorns, shields and escutcheons, tell the history of Eng- 
 land for the last century at least. The state chair is somewhat similar to 
 the coronation chair at Westminster Abbey. The House of Commons, 
 too, is no common place after all ; but, interesting as it is, we must leave 
 the New Palace of Westminster. 
 Then Westminster Abbey, 
 
 " Where royal heads receive the sacred gold ; 
 It gives them crowns, and does their ashes keep ; 
 There made like gods, like mortals there they sleep." 
 
 We look back into the ages for the history of this far-famed cathedral, 
 and find that as early as 616 a Benedictine monastery and church were 
 founded by Sebert, King of Essex, on a peninsula formed by the Thames 
 and a small tributary stream, and called Thorney Island, because over- 
 grown with reeds and thorns. It was called the West Minster in refer- 
 ence to its situation with regard to St. Paul's. This church was destroyed 
 by the Danes, and Thorney Island would have passed out of history had 
 it not been for Edward the Confessor, who laid the foundations of the 
 future celebrated abbey in 1065, and caused it to be dedicated eight days 
 before his death. William the Conqueror was crowned here with great 
 pomp in 1065. Little, however, of the work of Edward the Confessor 
 exists in the present building except the foundations, but his name has 
 been perpetuated by one of his successors on the English throne, Henry 
 III., who erected a chapel to his memory, and the bones of the canonized 
 Confessor now rest by the side of Henry III. in the chapel which bears 
 his name. The last great addition to this beautiful structure was the 
 
BOUSES OF PARLIAMENT. 
 
 Wit pteacb not 
 outsetUesbutdVist 
 3fesus 
 
 THEY THAT BE WISE 
 *HAU SHINE AS THE BRICHTNWS 
 
 or THE FIRMAMENT; 
 
 i AND THEY THAT TURN MANY 
 TO RIGHTEOUSNESS AS 
 STABS FOR EVER 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 45 
 
 chapel of Henry VII., in 1503. The two towers at the western entrance 
 have since been added under the direction of Christopher Wren. 
 
 The general plan of the building is that of a Latin cross ; length, 416 
 feet; breadth at the transept, 203 feet; at the nave, 102 feet; height 
 of the west towers, 225 feet. We can hardly tell about the Choir, the 
 Nave, the North and South Transepts, the Chapter House and Cloisters. 
 The interior of the Abbey is grand " with all its mystical effects of light 
 and shade, its lofty arches, its soaring roofs, its glorious windows, and its 
 elaborate sculpture " The building is divided into two tiers of arches 
 of unequal height ; above these are pointed windows with different kinds 
 of arches, then a gallery with carved moldings, and still above, lofty 
 windows. Everywhere, on the floor and on the walls, are monuments to 
 the celebrated dead whose dust reposes here. The mosaic pavements in 
 different parts, and the stained-glass windows representing scriptural 
 subjects, add to the beauty and interest of the whole. It is well worth 
 the English sixpence to visit the nine chapels of different dates and 
 listen to the accounts of their builders and occupants, only two of which 
 chapels we will notice. First, Edward the Confessor's, previously men- 
 tioned, containing the tomb of this founder of the Abbey, and also the 
 coronation chairs, one of which' covers the famous stone of Scone on 
 which the Scottish kings were crowned until 1297, when it was brought 
 to England by Edward I. But grandest of all is the chapel of Henry 
 the Seventh, in the centre of which are the recumbent effigies of Henry 
 and his queen, with hands uplifted to heaven, and surrounded by many 
 devices relating to the union of the red and the white roses. Here too lie 
 Mary and Elizabeth, nearer than they came to each other in their lives, 
 and Cromwell once had a resting-place here, but the royalists took up 
 his body and buried it, decapitated, under Tyburn gallows. Leaving the 
 remainder of the ninety monuments and shrines to royalty, this "acre 
 sown with royal seed," we turn to the Poet's Corner, where, Washington 
 
46 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 Irving says, " a kinder feeling takes the place of that cold curiosity with 
 which we gaze on the splendid monuments of the great and the heroic." 
 Oliver Goldsmith gave it the name, and the first monument erected there 
 was to Geoffrey Chaucer, " morning star of English poetry." On one 
 of the tablets we read, " O rare Ben Jonson," and learn that he was 
 buried beneath in an upright position. Many are far removed from this 
 Corner, where their names are read by the curious, as is true of Butler, 
 Gray, Milton and Shakspeare. The monument to Goldsmith contains 
 the line, " He touched no kind of writing which he did not adorn." John 
 Gay wrote his own epitaph : 
 
 " Life is a jest, and all things show it ; 
 I thought it once but now I know it." 
 
 The names of sixty-six not all poets, however are indelibly written 
 upon these walls, as their works have impressed themselves upon the 
 world. 
 
 Service within its walls gave a new train of thought a church and 
 a sepulchre combined ; fame and a monument afforded by the same 
 tablet ; the coronation chair, giving the highest power to a human 
 being, and the bed of death whence all power departs, in close prox- 
 imity. We visited the chapels, stood before the different carvings upon 
 the walls, admired the stained-glass windows, which alone excel those 
 of Glasgow Cathedral, previously described, and we felt that the day was 
 well spent. 
 
 An amusing incident occurred on the morning of the 4th of July. 
 While we three were still enjoying our beds in our new English home, 
 there was a sudden burst, as of fire-crackers, near our walls. Two 
 of our party hastily lifted their heads, with patriotism beaming upon the 
 face and the exclamation bursting from their lips, "It is the Fourth 
 of July ! " But they as suddenly disappeared at the suggestion of the 
 Teacher " Fourth of July in England ! " 
 
ACROSS tHE ATtAfrtid 4? 
 
 In this city of a thousand churches, where should we attend divine 
 service ? At the Tabernacle, of course, and hear Mr. Spurgeon ; and 
 the recollection of the day, and the people, and the church, and the 
 pastor, will remain long with us. Unostentatious but heartfelt were all 
 the services, and six thousand people went to their homes happier, 
 judging by personal experience. His text, "As is the apple tree among 
 the trees of the wood, so is my beloved among the sons of men," led him 
 into a home field, and in apparent sympathy with every heart he deliv- 
 ered a plain, forcible sermon. Standing just below the two galleries, 
 crowded to the utmost, the large choir just beneath him, he took the lead 
 in every exercise, and we wondered how he could have remaining 
 strength to enter the sabbath-school and again conduct the services. 
 May his influence be powerful to raise up others like unto him ! 
 
 St. Paul's Cathedral, the East Minster of olden times, stands on Lud- 
 gate Hill, about the centre of London, and is the most prominent object 
 in the metropolis. It is sufficiently near the truth, guide-books tell us, 
 to say that it is 365 feet high, and there are two handsome bell-towers 
 222 feet high. Its bell is tolled only on occasion of a death in the royal 
 family. It was built under the direction of Sir Christopher Wren, one 
 architect and one master-mason having been employed on it for thirty- 
 five years, and cost a million and a half of money a great sum in the 
 seventeenth century, the time when it was built to supply the place 
 of one destroyed by the great fire. We went up to the Whispering 
 Gallery, at the bottom of the inner dome, and seated ourselves to hear 
 somebody whisper from the other side of the dome. Looking straight 
 ahead to the point from which we expected the sound to proceed, sud- 
 denly our little girl jumped, turned- her head, and asked who whispered 
 in her ear. She examined the wall to find the place whence the sound 
 issued, and insisted that somebody was behind there, and at first wS were 
 childish enough to think the same thing, forgetting that we were in the 
 
48 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 Whispering Gallery. In the crypt beneath are the tombs of many 
 of England's noble men, and among the number is that of the architect 
 of fifty of London's noblest churches, Sir Christopher Wren ; also of Sir 
 Joshua Reynolds, the painters West and Turner, and of those who fought 
 her battles and gained her victories, side by side, Wellington and Nelson. 
 The outside coffin of the latter was originally intended for Henry VIII. 
 and cost $4,000,000, the proceeds of a tax on coal ; the inner one was 
 made from the mainmast of the ship L Orient, captured by Nelson. We 
 ended our visit to St. Paul's Cathedral by a choral service at 3 p. M., 
 when we listened to the grand tones of the organ, and the entire service 
 chanted by the choir. 
 
 There was one place in London where we could see the persons 
 of celebrity not merely of modern times but of preceding ages and dis- 
 tant lands. It was at Madame Tussaud's wax-works. There were as 
 natural as life, we suppose Henry VIII. and his six wives, all blooming 
 and fresh and beautiful, not looking as though they were going to be be- 
 headed, or divorced, or, what was worse, live with the old tyrant till his 
 days could be dragged out ; the present royal family, and the mother 
 of that same family undergoing the act of coronation before she had 
 even a husband so contradictory is life ; Shakspeare, and Napoleon III., 
 and our own countrymen too, Washington, and Lincoln, and William - 
 Penn, and Tom Thumb ; but not one United States woman. What an 
 interesting day was that spent with characters we had never expected to 
 meet ! 
 
 All people have their ideas of fairy-land, and ours were fully realized 
 when we visited the Crystal Palace. We do not expect to see any- 
 thing more beautiful in our life-time, if we reach the allotted age 
 of man. Nature and Art have here combined their powers, and the 
 result is an exquisite production. We were seven hours walking through 
 the building, stopping often, of course, to admire, and once to partake 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 49 
 
 of what became ambrosia and nectar to us, from their connection with 
 so much beauty. We seemed to be in the four quarters of the globe. 
 In the Greek Court we saw the Temple of Jupiter, more than two 
 thousand years old, surrounded by beautiful specimens of Greek art, the 
 celebrated Niobe group, the Venus de Medici, and many others. In the 
 Roman Court the walls were colored in imitation of porphyry and mala- 
 chite. Venus, Apollo, and Diana, with others of equal beauty, rendered 
 the scene attractive. These were followed by other ancient courts, and 
 these again by the medieval courts of different countries ; not the statues, 
 carvings and paintings themselves, of course, but imitations so perfect 
 that one at least who had never looked upon the originals might almost 
 think he stood before them. All these were interspersed with plants 
 and fountains, birds of beautiful plumage, and shells and fishes in their 
 native element ; also by the productions of hand and brain to delight the 
 eye and ear. Altogether it was enchanting. 
 
 We could hardly be expected to tell all that we saw, describe all that 
 we visited, in this city of cities during the three weeks we were there in 
 '73 and the nine days in '74 ; but friends may be sure we often went 
 through Threadneedle street and called upon our bankers, J. S. Morgan 
 & Co. ; went over most of the fourteen bridges which cross the Thames, 
 and once went under it through the Thames Tunnel ; to Bunhill Fields, 
 the " Campo Santo " of Dissenters, and visited the tomb of John Bunyan, 
 where the Pilgrim is represented as making but very little Progress 
 (except in crumbling away) on his monument of stone ; and just across 
 the way to the church where Wesley preached his last ; to Smithfield, 
 where now is an extensive market, but where once the good and noble 
 were sacrificed ; to Guildhall, the Hotel de Ville (Town Hall) of London ; 
 around the outside walls of Newgate Prison ; steamed under London for 
 many miles by the Underground Railway ; saw rough men drink and 
 fight, then walk bootless with the police ; had the hat of one of our 
 7 
 
J6 UNITEt) STATfcS GIRLS 
 
 company shaken by the hand of a shameless woman ; and our experience 
 in London was nearly finished. It only remained to visit Victoria in her 
 home at Windsor. 
 
 Twenty-two miles in a westerly direction and we approached the resi- 
 dence of her Royal Highness ; we saw the walls of the castle at a 
 distance, but no friendly flag threw its colors to the breeze to welcome 
 the three daughters of independent America. We soon learned the 
 cause of this apparent neglect. The Queen had remained longer than 
 is her wont in her winter home at Windsor to entertain the Shah 
 of Persia, and when he left for Paris, she immediately started for her 
 summer residence in Scotland, and so we were unwelcomed. But Wind- 
 sor is no insignificant place 10,000 inhabitants and there was much 
 to be seen if the Queen was not there ; her hundred horses were in their 
 royal stables, except the few she had taken to bonnie Scotland, and there 
 were grand views to be seen of the rooms in the palace. Said palace 
 was undergoing a thorough cleaning after its Persian visitation, hence 
 was not open to visitors, even if they did come from across the Atlantic. 
 We went into St. George's Chapel and saw the resting-place of grim 
 Henry VIIL, and we wondered how he could rest with but one of his 
 six beautiful wives by his side Lady Jane Seymour. At the summit 
 of the famous Round Tower of the castle we were amply repaid for our 
 trip by the view of the surrounding country ; for miles and miles around 
 it was all one grand park, including several rural villages with all their 
 attractive quiet and comfort, the white spires of their churches pointing 
 heavenward and the white marbles of their churchyards telling that 
 the occupants have departed. In the distance lay the churchyard 
 where Gray wrote his Elegy, sitting, perhaps, 
 
 " Beneath those rugged elms, that yew tree's shade, 
 
 Where heaves the turf in many a mouldering heap." 
 
 When we left the town which provides England's sovereign with a 
 home, we stopped by the way at Eton College, founded by Henry VI. in 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 51 
 
 1440 ; at Twickenham, where Pope lived and was buried ; and at the 
 Kew Gardens, where the palms are such a wonder to the world, rising to 
 the height of sixty feet in their beautiful crystal home. 
 
 One more night within this capital city, and early morning saw us on 
 our way to Dover. We left the shores of "Merrie England," but we 
 entered the limits of a merrier country. We sailed timorously over the 
 restless Channel, known to fathom men's stomachs not souls ; but we 
 anchored safely across from the white cliffs of Dover, took up the sachels 
 and shawl-straps, and spoke the new tongue with all the grace attainable. 
 As the spirits of Rob Roy and Mary Queen of Scots had seemed to 
 make their presence felt in the land of the north we have described unto 
 you, so, in this more southern clime, the eighteen Louises and all the 
 Napoleons have seemed to hover about us. 
 
 The transportation from the largest city in the world (at least in this 
 part of the globe) to its nearest rival was quickly accomplished, and the 
 sun which rose upon us in the precincts of the one, shed his parting rays 
 within the walls of the other. Almost all persons tell a story of long 
 delays and troublesome examinations as they pass from one country to 
 another, but the " United Three " walked through their gates undelayed 
 by custom-house officers or officials of any description. All remember 
 the thanksgiving, " Blessed be nothing," and ours is like unto it (some- 
 times.) 
 
PARIS. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 IND friends, we opened our eyes upon this charming 
 city at the witching hour of gas-light, and drove through 
 the mazes of the Champs Elysees until we almost thought 
 we were truly in Elysian Fields. Boulevards, avenues, pal- 
 aces, statues, fountains, arches, columns, and domes where 
 are they mingled so beautifully save in fairy-land ? Where 
 do they sip the nectar and taste the ambrosia under the open air 
 of heaven, save among those who feel not the needs of the body nor are 
 oppressed by the cares of the mind? Where do flowers bloom and 
 fountains play under the wheels of the chariot and the hoofs of the 
 steed, save in the realms where Beauty reigns and the Beast is a myth ? 
 Where does Cupid rule with a golden rod, save in the regions where 
 discord is not ? But we will not decide until the morning dawns, and 
 we walk the streets under the clear light of day. 
 
 Four weeks a Parisian. What of the city ? We have taken observa- 
 tions from the highest points, looking forward from the Arc de Triomphe 
 to the palace and garden famous in the history of this city, the Tuileries ; 
 noting the lines of trees that lift their heads toward the Pavilions in that 
 abode of kings and rulers ; viewing with wonder Cleopatra's Needle, 
 which adorns the Place de la Concorde, on the spot where the blood 
 of thousands flowed in the troublous times gone by ; admiring the com- 
 

ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 53 
 
 bination of nature and art in the flowers of the field and the productions 
 of man in the Champs Elysees ; then we have turned backward to the 
 same broad street stretching on to the finest park in the world the 
 Bois de Boulogne observing the whirl of carriages and the tramp 
 of feet, the fashion and display, and the marks of need. These two 
 boulevards, with ten others like unto them, meet around this arch, rightly 
 named Arc de TEtoile, (Arch of the Star,) the rays of which terminate 
 before they reach it, leaving it alone in its glory, bright and beautiful. 
 Nearly every one of the twelve boulevards ends in the distance with 
 some prominent building. This Arch of Triumph was commenced in 
 1806 by Napoleon I. to commemorate his victories in the East. The 
 four arches are 90 feet high in the centre ; the total height is 152 feet, 
 and it is 137 feet square a grand cube with a passage through its base 
 from east to west and another from north to south. There are four 
 magnificent bas-reliefs of colossal height, and on the vaulting of the 
 great arch are the names of one hundred victories and four hundred 
 generals of the Empire and Republic. But Napoleon the Great was not 
 allowed to do all the carving upon this monument of which Paris is so 
 justly proud. Passing over the reign of Charles X., it was completed by 
 Louis Philippe in 1836. At the close of the late Franco-German war, 
 it must have been a grand sight to see the noblest citizens of France 
 surround their loved arch and stand before the victorious William 
 of Prussia, with arms folded upon their breasts, telling the conqueror 
 that if he rode through it would be over their lifeless bodies. The noble 
 king could afford to pass around, for it was all within his victorious pos- 
 session. 
 
 Walking from the Arc de Triomphe eastward toward the palace of the 
 Tuileries it is one gradual descent half the way and the same ascent the 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Arch of Triumph. 2. Round Point on the street called Champs Elysees, 
 midway between the Arch of Triumph and the open square. 3. Place de la Concorde. 
 
54 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 other half, the first mile and a quarter through the Champs Elysees, then 
 through the Place de la Concorde and the Garden of the Tuileries. 
 These Champs Elysees, fields truly Elysian, were originally a great 
 space covered with prairies and thick gardens, which Marie de Medici 
 began to transform in 1616 by setting out three rows of trees for her 
 own pleasure and that of her court. These alleys still bear the name 
 of Cours de la Reine. Just half way between the Arc de Triomphe and 
 the Place de la Concorde we come upon the Rond Point, (round point,) 
 where are six of the most beautiful fountains constantly throwing off their 
 water in the form of spray and making one feel almost as if walking in 
 the clouds where the rays of sunlight linger and tinge with rainbow hues. 
 Here our boulevard widens and expands and multiplies itself until it is 
 nearly as broad as it is long, ornamented and divided by trees, charming 
 cafes and restaurants, resounding with music, furnishing every sort 
 of entertainment to every age and class. The younger one of our party 
 rode in a petit cabriolet drawn by four milk-white goats, while we occu- 
 pied the yellow iron chairs and enjoyed the scene. Magnificent flower- 
 beds, called riband-beds, added beauty and variety. It was in the midst 
 of these glorious Fields that the English army encamped in 1815, com- 
 manded by the Duke of Wellington, and on the same spot now rises the 
 Palais de 1' Industrie, built in 1855 for the great Exposition, but now 
 used for exhibitions of paintings. Passing out from the Champs Elys6es 
 between the Horses of Marly, we are in the place which the world 
 knows of under different names at different times. It has been baptized 
 with blood and truly named Place de la Revolution. At the marriage 
 of Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette, twelve hundred people were killed 
 on this spot in the midst of a panic which arose among the people and 
 horses ; and later in the lives of this unfortunate pair, blood flowed 
 freely indeed, and they with 2,800 people moistened the earth with their 
 blood in the space of two years and four months. In the centre of this 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. $$ 
 
 grand Place, where Louis XVI. was beheaded, now rises the Egyptian 
 obelisk, brought tit great expense from Luxor, and occupying three years 
 in its transportation. It formerly stood in front of the Temple of Thebes, 
 erected by the great Sesostris 1500 years B. C. It is of rose-colored 
 granite, eighty feet high, and covered with hieroglyphics, not very intel- 
 ligible, but very interesting nevertheless. On each side of this obelisk 
 is a beautiful fountain, (one devoted to maritime, the other to fluvial 
 navigation,) where eight dolphins spout streams of water on the images 
 in the centre, which falls back to be thrown again. Around the outer 
 part of the Place are eight very large marble statues, which represent 
 the principal cities of France Lyons and Marseilles, Bordeaux and 
 Nantes, Rouen and Brest, Lille and Strasbourg, (they have the image 
 of the last, if not the reality.) The ground is covered with white sand, 
 and in the sun is glaring and hot, presenting a most perfect contrast to 
 the avenue on the west and the garden on the east, both a forest of trees, 
 and to the magnificent buildings, the Madeleine on the north and the 
 Corps Legislatif on the south across the Seine. In 1814 the Allies 
 encamped here; in 1848 the insurrection commenced here; the consti- 
 tution of the Republic was read here ! What next ? 
 
 The Jardin des Tuileries (Garden of the Tuileries) was so called be- 
 cause it was a large spot of ground taken by Catharine de Medici, in 
 1554, as a suitable place to rear for herself a palace which should surpass 
 in magnificence all that had been raised in earlier times. It is about 
 half a mile long, a fifth of a mile wide, and contains seventy-five acres, 
 lying along the bank of the Seine, planted with horse-chestnut and lime 
 trees and ornamented with statuary. Having passed through the gar- 
 den, where we lingered by the way to listen to the band which plays 
 there nearly every day of the year, we come face to face with what was 
 once the Palace of the Tuileries, and we stand aghast as in imagination 
 we follow old Father Time through the work of three centuries, and in 
 
56 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 the destruction locks grow gray, his scythe pierces to the very heart, and 
 palaces rise and fall. Here first was the bare brickyard which supplied 
 Paris for four centuries with material for building (tuile, hence the name 
 Tuileries,) the spot which Catharine de Medici selected as a site for her 
 palace. We quote from the French : " The labor commenced under the 
 direction of Philibert de Lorme ; he had scarcely finished the pavilion 
 of the centre, known now under the name of Pavilion de P Horloge, and 
 the two adjacent wings, when he was stopped by the superstition of his 
 mistress. An astrologer had predicted that St. Germain would be fatal 
 to her, and, St. Germain being the name of the parish in which her 
 palace was situated, she withdrew to the Hotel of Soissons. She did not 
 escape her fate, however, for the priest who assisted her in her last 
 moments was Lawrence of St. Germain." So we see that the central 
 pavilion, which so long bore the clock of the Tuileries, (just three miles 
 away from the famous Arch of Triumph, hidden there by more than two 
 centuries of time,) was the first of this stupendous building, which has 
 since stretched itself in both directions until it measures about a fifth 
 of a mile in length. At the two extremes of the present royal structure, 
 covering and enclosing sixty acres of ground, the Tuileries and the 
 Louvre were originally located, but Father Time has wielded a wand 
 more than a scythe, and pavilion after pavilion has sprung from the earth 
 and taken its stand by previous constructions, until now it is lengthened 
 beauty long drawn out, and the Tuileries and the Louvre are all one. 
 How many Louises and Henries and finally Napoleons has Time brought 
 into his ranks to act their parts in the drama of life, and fight the battles 
 which are still unfinished to rear this proud pyramid of man's great- 
 ness, and with it fall to the ground in man's weakness ; for with Napo- 
 leon III. fell the palace of the Tuileries, torn down by the Commune, so 
 that no emperor or king should have a place for his royal head. 
 
 We stood in the room of the Louvre where the cruel Catharine, 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 57 
 
 wickedest of women, (who had fled in superstition from the palace to the 
 fortress,) looked across to the bell in the church of St. Germain de 
 1'Auxerrois and gave the signal to begin the massacre of St. Bar- 
 tholomew a massacre in which seventy thousand Protestants were 
 butchered, when " the streets were red with blood and the river choked 
 with mutilated bodies." Thence we passed slowly through the almost 
 numberless rooms and the sixteen museums, furnished with the chefs 
 d'ceuvre of deceased artists and the curiosities and wonders of every age ; 
 through the various salles Salle des Caryatides, from the four colossal 
 caryatides of Jean Goujon, who ceased not in his work during the 
 terrible massacre and was shot at his post, (here is the famous Venus de 
 Milo, most magnificent specimen of Grecian art) ; Salle des Sept Chemi- 
 nees, in which died the loved Henry IV., first of the race of Bourbon 
 and the one who granted the famous Edict of Nantes died by the 
 assassin's hand ; Salon Carre", containing the richest of gems, Murillo's 
 Conception ; Long Gallery, of five compartments, with eighteen hundred 
 of the finest specimens the world furnishes, one devoted to Rubens' 
 pictures ; Musee Grec et Romain, the most interesting room, perhaps, in 
 the Louvre, where we see the sceptre of Charlemagne, a shoe worn by 
 Marie Antoinette, and the chair of King Dagobert, who, in the twelfth 
 century, had a hunting-tower on this spot of ground, destined to become 
 so interesting to future generations ; Salle de 1' Empereur, containing the 
 sword of the First Consul, Napoleon the Great, and the hat he wore in the 
 campaign of 1815, when he came back and took possession of his loved 
 palace for a very brief period, however ; and the Musee des Dessins, 
 where fourteen rooms were filled with models of interesting localities 
 and things the Belle Poule, (the vessel which brought the remains 
 of Napoleon from St. Helena,) the country around Luxor, the home of the 
 obelisk in the Place de la Concorde, etc. 
 
 From the Old Louvre, 404 feet square, surrounding the square Court 
 8 
 
$8 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 of the Louvre, through the New Louvre, most modern part of these 
 buildings, planned by Napoleon I. but finished by Napoleon III. in 1857, 
 and surrounding Place Napoleon III., we come upon the Place du Car- 
 rousel with its Arc de Carrousel, raised by Napoleon I. in 1806 to the 
 glory of the French armies, and standing just back of what was once 
 the Palace of the Tuileries. Under this Arc de Carrousel rode, in the 
 great Exposition time, Napoleon, Alexander of Russia, Bismarck, and 
 William of Prussia, by the side of Eugenie, under the horses of St. Mark, 
 (which have since that time been restored to their true owners and we 
 shall meet them at Venice.) But where is the palace we have come so 
 far to see the palace which figured so largely in the French Revolu- 
 tion, to which Louis XVI. came smiling in 1789, but from which he stole 
 by night in 1792, when his faithful Swiss guards were nearly all massa- 
 cred the palace which Louis Philippe entered with the insurgents in 
 1830, but from which he fled before them in 1848 the palace which 
 the nephew of the great Napoleon took under the title of President 
 of the French Republic, held under that of Emperor Napoleon III., but 
 was forced to give up with his sword at Sedan ? Where is the Palace 
 of the Tuileries ? We saw everywhere pictures of a burning palace ; we 
 heard tales of a mad mob clambering up the steps of the imperial 
 entrance, entering the sleeping apartments of the Emperor and Empress, 
 drawing caricatures upon the walls, and writing over the doors, " The 
 French Republic is again declared," and " Libert^, Egalite" et Frater- 
 nit6 " ; and we saw a long line of ruins facing the beautiful Garden of the 
 Tuileries and the Arc de Triomphe three miles away. Has old Father 
 Time, surfeited with reaping, yet laid down his scythe ? 
 
 Again, from the pinnacle of the Tour St. Jacques we have looked 
 around upon the many ecclesiastical edifices of the city. Notre Dame, 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Palace of the Tuileries and the Louvre. 2. Tour St. Jacques (Tower of 
 St. James.) 3. Church of the Invalides. 4. Cathedral of Notre Dame. 5. Tomb of Napoleon. 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 59 
 
 dating . from the sixth century, (or at least from the twelfth,) rich in 
 decorations of art and interesting in historical associations ; the scene 
 of nearly every extreme in the life of man ; the preaching of the Gospel, 
 offering eternal life unto all who believe, and the taking away of the life 
 of the body ; the coronation of the emperor and the baptism of the 
 laborer's child ; a hay loft, a wine store, and a church. The Madelaine, 
 designed by Napoleon as a temple of glory, the doors of which church 
 are next in size to those of St. Peter's. The Pantheon, built to receive 
 the ashes of great men - the place where Mirabeau, Voltaire and Rous- 
 seau were buried. Sainte Chapelle, a lovely little gothic shrine, con- 
 structed to contain the holy relics brought from Jerusalem, but now in 
 Notre Dame. St. Germain de TAuxerrois, just opposite the palace of the 
 Louvre, bearing the bell which gave the signal for the destruction of the 
 Protestants in the cruel days of Catharine de Medici. The Invalides, 
 rising high above every surrounding object, and marking in colors of gold 
 the resting-place of the great Napoleon. St. Jacques has given us the 
 opportunity of looking down upon these and many other churches ; and 
 we have also examined them from a different stand-point, walking their 
 aisles alone and with the busy throng, admiring their beauties and striv- 
 ing to be charitable toward their defects. 
 
 " Few buildings in Paris offer greater attraction for strangers than the 
 magnificent monument which is so closely connected with the memory 
 of the first Napoleon. From the reign of Henry IV. an asylum for 
 disabled soldiers was established in an old convent in the Faubourg St. 
 Marcel. Louis XIII. removed it to Bicetre. In order to receive the 
 increasing number of soldiers put out of service by his annual campaigns, 
 Louis XIV. ordered the construction of an edifice, and laid the first 
 stone in 1670. The principal body of this building was finished by 
 Bruant in 1706. It was he who finished the first church. The second, 
 more magnificent than the other, and which is known under the name 
 
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 of the Church of the Invalides, is the one whose colossal dome, 323 feet 
 in height, covers the tomb of the hero of Austerlitz. It is the work 
 of Mansard, and was finished in 1706. The buildings as a whole cover 
 an extent of twenty-eight acres. In 1789 it was called the Temple 
 of Humanity, and under Napoleon, who enlarged and adorned it, it was 
 called the Temple of Mars. Its present name was given to it in 1815. 
 The facade is 612 feet ; it is four stories in height, and is ornamented 
 with a profusion of military subjects, bronze statues of vanquished 
 nations, and an equestrian statue of Louis XIV. The galleries which 
 surround the Court of Honor are adorned with paintings of the four 
 historical epochs of France those of Charlemagne, St. Louis, Louis 
 XIV. and Napoleon I. Provisions are made for six thousand private 
 soldiers a day, three thousand pounds of meat being cooked daily. War 
 is everywhere glorified. Of the sombre reflections which it inspires one 
 sees nothing, except when he regards the mutilated bodies of the occu- 
 pants of this magnificent edifice." We have translated from a book 
 purchased in sight of this building, but it does not tell the whole story. 
 Directly beneath the dome of the Invalides lies the body of him who 
 said, " I desire that my ashes may repose on the banks of the Seine, in 
 the midst of the French people, whom I have ever loved." Surely 
 mortal ambition ought to be satisfied to rest beneath such a splendid 
 monument. Unwittingly perhaps, Napoleon prepared it for himself; for 
 when informed that his people had become uneasy during his long 
 absence in the wars, he ordered them to gild the dome of the Invalides, 
 and so give the people employment and something new to think about. 
 So the gilded dome of the Invalides towers above everything else, and 
 marks the spot where the Emperor lies. The rays of the sun come 
 through the windows of stained glass, shedding a halo of glory upon 
 everything, down into the crypt where stands his mausoleum, twelve by 
 six feet, on a base of green granite. The pavement is decorated with a 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 6 1 
 
 crown of laurels in mosaic, and the principal victories of Napoleon are 
 represented by twelve colossal statues of red granite. 
 
 Just back of this beautiful church, and seen through the windows 
 between them, is the other church of St. Louis where military mass 
 is attended every Sunday at 12 ornamented with the tattered flags 
 of vanquished foes. It was one of the most interesting exercises which 
 we attended, to listen to the martial music and see the files of soldiers 
 march in with measured tread, and the Hotel des Invalides has a promi- 
 nent place on memory's page. 
 
 Where are the ruins of Paris ? Where are the marks of devastation 
 and war ? Where the sounds of lamentation and woe that reached to 
 our shores but two short twelvemonths ago ? Paris in ruins, her people 
 in grief ? There are marks of the destroyer's hand ; there are some 
 shattered walls in the midst of surrounding beauty, some buildings razed 
 to the ground ; but the work of reparation goes on, and soon the city 
 will be renewed, and perhaps be all the brighter for the cleansing it has 
 received. The Arches of Triumph rise just as proudly in her midst if a 
 few of the topmost stones have been displaced, and the French stand 
 before them with arms upon the breast, bidding the conquerer go around 
 or walk over their bodies. (King William of Prussia was generous 
 enough to do the former.) The Arc de Carrousel, although in the very 
 midst of ruins, stands a memento of former rejoicing rejoicing when 
 crowned heads rode in gilded carriages beneath this arch, as the fabled 
 goddess still drives her brazen steeds on the spot where stood the famous 
 horses of St. Mark, crowning this arch of joy. And where are the 
 crowned heads ? They, too, lie low. Will they rise again, to wear a 
 more brilliant crown ? Will the regal hand be stretched forth to resume 
 the sceptre again ? Echo answers Again. The Place Vendome has 
 lost its ornament, the square is without its glory the statue of Napo- 
 leon. First there was the statue of Louis, then of General Bonaparte 
 
62 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 with the familiar three-cornered cocked-hat, and afterwards the Emperor 
 Napoleon in citizen's dress, which the enraged Commune tore down with 
 ropes when they took the government in their hands. Time will tell 
 whom the French will raise on pedestals in the days to come. 
 
 This people have often been censured because they have no word for 
 home in their language. Perhaps they do not need one ; they make 
 their streets so attractive, their public buildings so pleasant, their tables 
 in the open boulevards and at the doors of the restaurants and cafes so 
 tempting, the society of one another so desirable, that home may be 
 of minor importance. Certain it is that they seem very happy at their 
 dejeuners at noon and their diners at six. We cannot vouch for their 
 suppers toward the hour of midnight, as we were never present at this 
 meal. Everybody, from the baby up, drinks wine, but there is certainly 
 less disturbance in the streets, fewer marks of the effect of strong drink, 
 than we see in our quiet little towns at home. The independent three 
 have been great cause of wonder to those who supplied them at the 
 table because they drank what they pleased. 
 
 The French must be a domestic people, as their love for pets would 
 conclusively show ; scarcely a person walks the street without a quad- 
 ruped of some kind either in the arms or at the heels. What must have 
 been the state of things before the thirty thousand canines fell victims 
 to cruel war ! Speaking of the domestic qualities of this people reminds 
 us of their bread. The first time we sat at a French table we thought 
 the polite waiter had been extremely remiss in placing a stick of wood 
 on one end of the table; but our friends, better informed, took up said 
 article and proceeded to demolish not the waiter, but the stick ; 
 and French bread, we must acknowledge, is good, if it does stand 
 uncovered in all public places and pass through all manner of trans- 
 portation. 
 
 But of all strange things in this strange country, the strangest is the 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 63 
 
 spending of the Sabbath day. Some people do not work, but if not, they 
 usually play. If the doors are closed to business, it is usually because 
 the employers and employed are in places of amusement. 
 
 We can say but little of the straight-forward honesty of the French 
 people; of one thing, however, we are sure whenever they could get 
 a few sous out of American pockets their consciences allowed them to 
 do so. A gentleman whose knowledge of French consisted in " Cin- 
 quante centieme beef-steak" drew forth a handful of the coins .of the 
 country to allow a guide to satisfy himself, and every piece of it instantly 
 disappeared. In a small store where room was scarce and goods were 
 arranged on high shelves, a purchase was made and the wrong change 
 returned as usual. The customer was indignant, and made use of all 
 the French at command to convince the merchant of the dishonesty 
 of the transaction, but he deliberately ascended some steps used for the 
 purpose of taking down goods, and seated himself on the topmost one, 
 coolly surveying those standing below, and at the energetic threat, " Je 
 ne patronize vous" he burst into a loud laugh, and they left in disgust. 
 
 There is more in this city of Paris than we could visit in three weeks 
 of 1873 and in six of 1874, and more that we visited, improving nearly 
 every day of the time, than we could think of telling our friends about ; 
 but some of the excursions to the environs are too interesting to omit. 
 Four miles will be considered by many a long distance for a lady and 
 little girl to walk, but we did it more than once to the Bois de Boulogne, 
 and there met those who preferred to go by the chemin deferAmericain, 
 (American street-cars,) or by one of the many omnibus lines going in 
 the same direction. We have before this taken our readers from the 
 Arc de Triomphe eastward to the Tuileries, now we will start from the 
 same point and go in an opposite direction through the Avenue de la 
 Grand Armee to the Porte Maillot, one of the seventy gates by which 
 we can leave Paris. Probably an officer stands there to scrutinize us 
 
64 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 closely, but the innocent need not fear, so we walk through, paying no 
 attention to his keen glances. We are already just upon the border 
 of the ancient wood Bois de Boulogne four miles long and two miles 
 wide, enclosed in its entire length between the fortifications of the gay 
 city and the river Seine, which winds about like a serpent, as if loth to 
 leave so much beauty and pleasure. And we wonder not that the rays 
 of the heavenly bodies and the water of earth's river should travel to this 
 point with the children of men, for here is wherewith to please every 
 nature and every mood, from the quiet scenes of the wild wood to the 
 festive ones of fashionable life. Soon after we entered the precincts 
 of the wood we noticed an enclosure, for admission to which a few sous 
 must be given, and then we were in the Jardin Zoologique d'Acclimata- 
 tion, where every plant and animal under the sun may find a home. 
 Even the dogs of all lands had their kennels in close proximity, but 
 they did not have their liberty, or some of them would evidently have 
 left when a darling little French poodle came into their neighborhood at 
 the heels of its master, for no sooner had it appeared in sight than every 
 canine, up to the bull-dog and blood-hound, ran to the limits of his wall 
 or chain, then lifted up his voice and barked. What a concert ! We 
 have heard of " Bedlam let loose," and we are sure that said poodle 
 thought he was in the midst of said region, for he was too frightened 
 to stir, and was borne off in the arms of his owner. 
 
 The Aquarium is a building fifty yards in length, so constructed that 
 no light enters except from the sides through fourteen reservoirs filled 
 with water, in which the curious ways of the finny tribes may be studied, 
 and as we walked through the entire length we seemed to be, with the 
 famous French writer, Jules Verne, many leagues under the sea. 
 
 Approaching one of the picturesque lakes, we saw a natural prejudice 
 toward color acted with all the dignity of the race of swans. Several 
 noble looking specimens of the forementioned genus, but of the species 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. t 65 
 
 Niger, came sailing toward the shore with too much haste to be graceful, 
 and stepping quickly upon the grass, ran far from the water's edge, while 
 in the distance appeared a single grand Cygnus moving majestically over 
 the waters, with snow-white plumage all erect and neck curved in proud 
 disdain. A single step upon the land, and seeing the fugitives beyond 
 her reach, she left them in entire possession and returned to the water 
 from which she had driven them. 
 
 To complete the feeling that we were in all parts of the world at the 
 same time, we stood where all sorts of beasts of burden and equipages 
 were in readiness to accommodate the traveler in this part of the Bois. 
 Two mammoth elephants gave their backs to the foreigner, whose 
 names, Romeo and Juliet, showed that they came from beneath Italian 
 skies, and we were told that they were a gift from the King of Italy to 
 supply the place of Castor and Pollux, who were eaten during the late 
 siege of Paris, together with most of the animals then accumulated. 
 Camels from Algeria kneeled for their riders and shook them unmerci- 
 fully, lifted up among their peaks. An ostrich from the desert bared its 
 breast to the harness and presented the unique spectacle of a two-legged 
 horse. All kinds of ponies and donkeys from Java and India and other 
 remote lands completed the conveniences for being borne through this 
 forest, and we pedestrians walked back to our Parisian home. 
 
 Another day we went almost directly across from the Bois already 
 visited to one which began even earlier to send its legends down to 
 coming generations. The Bois de Vincennes contains more than 2,500 
 acres, (we hardly need to say it lies without the walls.) The chateau 
 dates back almost to the middle of the twelfth century and comes along 
 up with the centuries until it is now a fortress, containing within its walls, 
 nine feet thick, an arsenal, barracks, etc., watched over by the same grim 
 old donjon, rising one hundred and sixty feet in the air. Exercising the 
 rights of independent women of America, we ascended the five stories 
 9 
 
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 of this only remaining tower of the, nine original ones, and looked upon 
 the "playful Marne rippling merrily along" till it joins its sister, Seine, 
 and, clasped in each other's embrace, they enter the " city of gardens " in 
 the southeast part and pass frolicking through the most beautiful portion, 
 having their waters, about a sixteenth of a mile wide, bridged twenty- 
 seven times. Mirabeau, the Duke d'Enghien, and Madame de Pompa- 
 dour, with a host of other historical characters, passed in procession 
 before our minds, and the Bois de Vincennes became a new place unto us. 
 
 A day in the cemetery of Pere Lachaise showed us the resting-place 
 of persons of note and the interesting tomb of Abelard and Heloise, 
 with five beautifully sculptured steeples, fourteen columns and ten arches, 
 formed from the ruins of the Abbey of the Paraclete, which Abelard 
 founded and of which Heloise was the first abbess. Here was practiced 
 the novel method of renting a burial-place for from one to five years and 
 then giving it up to other occupants. 
 
 One of the most interesting of churches was St. Denis, four miles 
 from Paris, the burial-place of the kings of France from Dagobert, in 
 580, to Louis XVIII. It stands on the site of a chapel built for the 
 remains of St. Denis, who was beheaded for propagating the Christian 
 faith. Down two flights of stairs we came into the presence of the old 
 in death. The statue of Mary, Queen of Scots, kneeling with uplifted 
 hands, stands by the side of her husband, Francis II. ; but where is her 
 body ? The father and mother of Charlemagne lie here, but only the 
 sarcophagus in which the great emperor was buried at Aix la Chapelle, 
 for his body was found there sitting in its tomb. Napoleon I. intended 
 to lie here surrounded by those of his dynasty, but others planned dif- 
 ferently when they sent him to St. Helena. 
 
 After many more excursions which it is impossible to describe, on the 
 1 3th of August, 1873, we left for a season the beautiful city which had 
 been our home for three weeks, with two faces upon our shoulders, one 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 6/ 
 
 looking backward with regret to the joys behind, and one looking 
 forward with delight to the pleasures before us, 
 
 The principal point of attraction to us was the Chateau of Fontaine- 
 bleau, so after a two hours' ride in a southeasterly direction we came to 
 another stopping-place on the banks of the same Seine, and in the midst 
 of a magnificent forest over sixty miles in circumference and containing 
 from forty to sixty thousand acres of wooded land, interspersed with little 
 white villages where artists paint and rusticate. A neighboring city, 
 Melun, is mentioned by Caesar in his Commentaries, under the name 
 of Melodunum, so doubtless the great general has been here before us, 
 but on a less peaceful errand. The origin of the name of this forest 
 seems to be a somewhat contested one, but the oldest form was Fons 
 Blialdi, the Fountain of the Cloak, in reference to a hidden spring 
 of water. It is said that one of its royal occupants, Henri IV., dated a 
 letter, " From our lovely wilderness of Fontaine Belle-Eau." The cha- 
 teau is composed of buildings of different epochs grouped around several 
 courts, and we entered it by the one long known as the Court of the 
 White Horse, from the statue of a horse moulded after that of the statue 
 of Marcus Aurelius on the Capitoline Hill at Rome. It is now called 
 the Court of Adieux, because here Napoleon bade his soldiers farewell 
 on the eve of his departure for Elba. Passing through the long line 
 of rooms, all of which are a sort of geographical museum, we saw the 
 table which bears the inscription, " The 5th of April, 1814, Napoleon 
 Bonaparte signed his abdication upon this table in the king's study." 
 The ghost of Marie Antoinette haunts this scene as it does many spots 
 of historical interest in the land of France. We pass through her 
 chambre a cottcher, and the adjoining one, her dressing-room, where the 
 window fastenings were made by her husband's own hand, out into the 
 garden, where the Chasselas grape covers a wall of a mile in length. 
 The carps rise out of their watery beds with mouths, too large for beauty, 
 
68 UNITED STATES GIRLS. 
 
 stretched wide open for the crumbs we bring with us. A long walk 
 through the picturesque forest carpeted with brown heather, and another 
 refreshing sleep before we take the cars for Dijon. 
 
 Shall we stop to tell you of the old church where the Jacquemars rang 
 the bell, or go to Lyons and wander between the Rhone and Saone, 
 flowing side by side through this old city, where Claudius and Caligula 
 were born, (there certainly is not time to talk about the manufacture 
 of silks, although many people may be interested in that subject,) cross 
 both these streams and ascend the heights of Fourvieres, or, higher still, 
 up to the dome of Notre Dame de Fourvieres, and, if the day is clear, 
 get the first glimpse of Mont Blanc ? 
 
SWITZERLAND. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 UR newly-adopted watchwords are " On to the moun- 
 tains," so on we go, and before we are aware of it the 
 mountains are reached. The country is magnificently wild, 
 the peaks rise higher and higher around us, and we ever and 
 anon dive into the depths of the mountain beds, and in 
 darkness the minutes lengthen out to hours. But darkness comes upon 
 us by the going down of the sun, and a heavy shower waits upon us 
 into the capital of Switzerland. The borders have been passed by 
 simply repeating the word " Americans," and a bow and a smile bid us 
 God speed. 
 
 After the first rainy day in Europe, (the first that has overtaken the 
 United Three,) a tour of observation is begun out of the city into the 
 country. Yes, out of Switzerland into France, to visit the home 
 of Voltaire. Who would ride when the roads are like the floor, smooth 
 and clean, the roadsides grassy and decked with flowers that remind us 
 of home across the deep waters dandelion, thistle, spearmint, and the 
 darling little Flirt Robert, that always brings before us loved faces 
 of yore ; the hedges, inviting and green, ofttimes loaded with tempting 
 berries ; who would ride, if they had health and strength to walk ? Not 
 we. The guide-books say that a fine view of Mont Blanc is to be 
 obtained somewhere on this route, so with one eye over our shoulder, for 
 we know it is behind us, we set out. All of a sudden, between the 
 
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 green poplars, a vision bursts upon us. Could it be aught but a vision ? 
 Could anything earthly put on such an appearance of the everlasting 
 hills in the realms where foot of man never trod ? Just above the 
 horizon, yes, up in the azure blue, the home of the clouds, appeared a 
 creation like unto the clouds themselves in delicacy and whiteness, 
 seeming to melt away at a breath of the wind and assume a new form at 
 every change of the atmosphere. Two objects our eyes have looked 
 upon which have seemed somewhat similar unto this the National 
 Capitol at Washington seen from the Potomac many miles away, and 
 icebergs upon the ocean ; but this is the grandest sight of all. 
 
 At Fernet, the home of Voltaire, were the faces of Washington and 
 Benjamin Franklin seen for the first time on this continent, and the 
 sight did our eyes good. From the garden a most enchanting view 
 of Mont Blanc was again obtained, and it was enough for one day. 
 
 Another day, the junction of the Arve and the Rhone was sought, and 
 found about a mile away. They flow quite closely together for a little 
 distance, a long, sharp point of land separating them, each showing its 
 source and its course. The Arve, coming from the mountains whose 
 .peaks are in the clouds, down through the fissures in the glaciers, bear- 
 ing along dirt and sand and stone, bears the hue of cloud and stone, and 
 rolls boldly along as if ready and anxious to encounter obstacles ; the 
 Rhone, washed in the waters of the lake which it has just left, comes 
 smiling peacefully with a look of heavenly blue mirrored in its face, 
 rightly called " the blue Rhone." And so they come together, the blue 
 and the gray. The gray rolls out into the blue, just as in the ether 
 above the fleecy clouds of Autumn are followed by heavy darker ones ; 
 and the blue yields not to the gray, but continues on its course all undis- 
 turbed, yet determined to gain the victory. The struggle goes on as far 
 as the eye can reach. Standing at the point of contact, and watching 
 this apparent struggle, we strive to recall the words of a touching little 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 7 1 
 
 poem so familiar to us all, " The Blue and the Gray," and in imagination 
 we see two armies before us in fierce contest ; the waves become the din 
 of battle in our ears, and also the smoke of the cannon to our eyes ; the 
 life-blood of brothers flows freely ; but we remember the conclusion 
 of the poem : 
 
 " They sleep peacefully side by side, 
 Yea, in one grave, the blue and the gray." 
 
 A week passed at Geneva, and we start for those mountains we have 
 looked upon so admiringly, feeling somewhat afraid that we shall prove 
 the truth of the words, " Distance lends enchantment to the view." At 
 the appointed time we are at the starting point, and with alacrity we 
 mount the ladder which takes us to the upper seats of the diligence, 
 bound for Chamouni. Up, up we go, higher than we ever rode before, 
 to the front seat of the coach, which carries about thirty persons, twenty 
 outside and ten inside. (How we pitied those below ! ) Five horses, 
 three in front and two in the rear, stand ready before the coach to bear 
 us along. Crack ! crack ! crack ! goes the whip, and we are on our way. 
 Now we are in a place where we can look over those walls which have 
 troubled us so much in Europe, and we gaze into pretty, flourishing gar- 
 dens, much pleasanter to look upon than the walls which hide them from 
 view. 
 
 The day is all that we could desire and the company agreeable. Some 
 Frenchmen in the rear discuss in an interested manner affairs of state 
 and the consequences of war ; at our side some Germans talk of Deutch- 
 land in their own guttural tongue ; in more familiar accents some English 
 enumerate the virtues of their land and queen, and an American girl 
 eulogizes the sweets of maple sugar. We are quiet, and wonder if we 
 are not up in the Tower of Babel. 
 
 We leave the beautiful little city on the lake in the background, and 
 drive through little old towns and villages, through a country beautiful, 
 more beautiful than parks. The mountains grow higher, more bold and 
 craggy, till finally Mont Blanc completes the picture. 
 
jl UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 Everybody tells of fleet-footed children running after the carriage a 
 long distance, and with extended hand begging for a pittance. We heard 
 below us a sound like the mewing of a kitten, and looking down, there 
 was the identical little beggar, with red cheeks, blue eyes, and flaxen 
 hair, pursuing the coach at the top of her speed, and keeping up with it 
 too, holding out her father's hat for the sous which she might receive. 
 But it was not merely pretty little girls who asked for alms. There were 
 great foolish boys, whose faces showed that they had not sufficient intel- 
 ligence to care whether they received aught or no ; and old blind men 
 led by a child or dog ; a mother with a neck larger than her head, and 
 carrying in her arms a pitiably simple child. The scenes are inter- 
 mingled, not all lowly and disgusting, not all glorious and sublime. 
 
 Our ride for thirty miles from Geneva, nearly all the time by the side 
 of the Arve, was very enjoyable ; but at mid-day the sun beat down upon 
 us, and our seat was too high and the movement too fast to examine all 
 the points as we desired, or to distinguish the genera or even the order 
 of the numerous botanical specimens scattered in profusion about us ; so 
 we descended from our elevated position and became pedestrians. Then 
 we were independent, and provided with note-book, guide-book, writing 
 materials, Botany of Switzerland and French Testament, who could 
 enjoy the remaining twelve miles to Chamouni better than we ? Mont 
 Blanc is straight before us, they say twelve miles away, but we feel like the 
 little girl of our party, who is ready to argue the point, saying it cannot 
 be more than half a mile away, for there are the footsteps in the snow. 
 We shall soon find out, however. 
 
 Not only the people of this land, but of all lands, for they seem to be 
 represented here, should bless the name of Napoleon for one good he 
 accomplished the making of splendid roads -in this otherwise wild 
 country. The Nicholson pavement of our cities is no better, the hard 
 stony pavements not nearly so good. 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 73 
 
 The pines and poplars are everywhere, fences are few, and if a cow 
 chances to be in sight, it is with a bell around her neck and some 
 old man or woman at her side watching every mouthful she takes. 
 Where are the men of Switzerland, while the women are raking the hay, 
 driving the mules, caring for the babies, and cooking the meals ? Perhaps 
 they are making the beds, as we found strong, healthy young men doing 
 in Paris ; or perhaps they went to the war and never came back again. 
 Where, too, are the lovely little Swiss cottages of which we have seen so 
 many models? We have looked for them wherever a building was 
 visible in the fields and among the trees, but instead we have found a 
 dwelling-place for man and beast under the same roof, with better accom- 
 modations for the latter than the former, and an unmistakable animal 
 odor pervading the entire premises. But we continue the search for the 
 pretty Swiss cottages. Was ever road so beautiful, so romantic, as the 
 one we pursue ? Winding in all directions at the foot of towering 
 mountains, and high above that frisking, leaping, passionate little stream 
 of whose end we have already told you, and which we have learned to 
 love by following it in its wanderings, as the mother does the wayward 
 child. 
 
 We took one interesting meal during this our first walk among the 
 Alps. " A word to the wise is sufficient," so we had provided ourselves 
 with a spirit-lamp and materials for preparing a lunch should circum- 
 stances require it. Just at the hour of noon we came upon a wee 
 cornfield, a few stalks growing up fresh and vigorous from among the 
 stones laid down perhaps to draw the heat of the sun, and we asked the 
 farmer to sell us an ear or two of corn, which he very kindly did. Sitting 
 down by a spring on the roadside, with the rocks so high that old Sol 
 could hardly get a glimpse of us, and the Arve playing the wildest music 
 away below out of sight, and the long line of mountains in front of us 
 bearing the name of Tete de Napoleon, from the fancied resemblance 
 10 
 
74 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 of its summit to the profile of the Little Corporal, we had our lamp 
 trimmed and burning, and our corn cooking, while we sat lost in admira- 
 tion and awe. We were suddenly brought to our senses by falling rain- 
 drops glistening in the sunshine. The romance was gone, and we were 
 soon gone too ; our fires were extinguished, and with provisions in hand 
 we were seeking a shelter. We soon found a Swiss not cottage 
 exactly, but al least a house, and knocking at the door, a woman opened 
 unto us and cordially invited us in French to come in. We explained 
 the state of things, and she gave us permission to finish our repast then 
 and there ; so, on the dirt floor, with the bare black walls about us, and 
 the odor coming to our nasal organs which showed that the cattle occu- 
 pied the same house at least a part of the year, we dined on our corn 
 and black bread procured of the woman, (should have had milk also, but 
 the goats had just been driven to the mountains in search of greener 
 pastures.) The shower and the lunch were finished at about the same 
 time, and we continued on our way. The sun sets at four o'clock, and 
 we seek shelter, after a walk of six miles. 
 
 Of course we have bread and honey for breakfast, and then continue 
 the walk by the side of the Arve. Gladly would we paint the bright, 
 starry specimens we saw in that walk the same heather we saw on the 
 Bens of Scotland and in the forest of Fontainebleau ; the same yellow 
 papilionaceous blossoms we, have seen in all countries on this continent, 
 and others of the same form of corolla, white, purple, blue and yellow, 
 which turn to us such expressive faces that they need no words to tell 
 interesting stories ; the lovely species of viola which we have seen in no 
 country except Switzerland, (what violet is not lovely ?) with the tints 
 of the sky and the sunset ; the delicate campanula, and the varieties 
 of composite and labiate plants. And we would not stop our painting 
 with the flowers, but would present to you a lovely landscape, taken at 
 the hour of twilight, within a narrow valley, the vale of Chamouni, a 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 75 
 
 most perfectly rounded basin of green grass, not one solitary shrub or 
 tree or building, only a velvety green basin, dotted all about with trees 
 and white houses ; the Arve flowing around these, bringing the color 
 and the air of the hills ; the cows winding their way along, each and 
 every one ringing its bell incessantly ; a little higher up on the mountain 
 side a circle of pines, dark and green ; then streaks of snow and dark 
 rocks intermingled, but soon an entire mass of snow and ice ; still above, 
 in the face of the young moon, slender as she ever appears, yet giving 
 promise of light, the crimson clouds heaped up after the manner of the 
 mountains, fading away into the grayish blue dome of heaven, directly 
 above the grassy basin below. No picture is complete without some 
 sign of animal life, so in imagination you may add to this the wandering 
 trio who are threading their way through the romantic vales and glens. 
 
 We had walked about seven miles and a half from St. Gervais to 
 Bellevue, and spent the night at a lonely wayside inn. Pursuing our way 
 toward Chamouni, we met some of our English friends who had con- 
 tinued with the diligence to the end of the route, and were now retracing 
 their steps to visit the Glacier des Bossons ; so we walked several miles 
 along the road, through the fields and up the mountain side to cross this 
 glacier, which is in full view of Chamouni. Alpenstocks and socks are 
 the first requisites for the passage. Then the question was solved which 
 we had propounded to ourselves so many times, as to why the Swiss 
 women were always knitting. Everybody who visits a glacier must have 
 a pair of socks, women at least, and men must have nails in their boots, 
 and everybody is expected to wear out the socks crossing once, so the 
 Swiss women must knit or other women cannot cross glaciers. 
 
 If you can imagine the ocean in a terrific storm, waves mountain high 
 and yawning chasms between, suddenly frozen, then you have some idea 
 of a glacier. It is a frozen river coursing down between the mountain 
 peaks, extending in some cases miles before it becomes a stream of run- 
 
76 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 ning water merely. It is no easy matter to climb over these icy waves, 
 and often we are reminded that the icy fetters are broken down between 
 these waves and that the water has started on its course to the sea ; so 
 we tread more carefully these peaks above, that we may not be plunged 
 into the waters below. 
 
 The first glacier crossed, we climbed the precipitous banks, and just at 
 the edge of the ice gathered the blue gentian and other bright Alpine 
 flowers. Men are not alone in contradicting themselves, but nature too 
 plays strange freaks. We spent the night with the guide de chef, Balmat, 
 (the same in name and occupation, if not in person, as the one to whom 
 Tyndall so often alludes in his journeyings among the Alps.) In the 
 morning we reached Chamouni, August 28th. 
 
 Chamouni ! Champs munies fortified places ; name given doubtless 
 with reference to the natural fortifications, the everlasting hills which 
 crown the sides of the valley, two miles wide and' fifteen miles long, 
 highest of which is Mont Blanc. To obtain a view of the face of this 
 queen of mountains, with her numerous attendants ranged all about her, 
 we ascended first to an opposite peak, La Flegere. It was impossible to 
 go up the steep mountain path in a straight line, but necessary to follow 
 a zigzag road which made the way many times as long. Having ascended 
 high enough to be in the clouds, was it strange that thunder burst upon 
 our ears ? There was no Swiss cottage to which we might retreat, so, 
 improvising a shelter out of our waterproofs, we stood the storm as 
 patiently as might be. The thunders rolled about us and the lightnings 
 flashed below us, and we felt that we had gone beyond our sphere. The 
 rain did not entirely cease, and we began to fear we should lose our 
 journey, but walking upward in faith nevertheless, we at last found our- 
 selves at the end of the route and in the sunshine above the clouds. 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Chain of Mont Blanc as seen from La Flegere, opposite. 2. Source 
 of the Arveiron from the extremity of the glacier Mer de Glace. 3. Chamouui, at the foot 
 of Mont Blanc. 4. The American Girl with her alpenstock. 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 
 
 77 
 
7 6 
 
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ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 
 
 77 
 
 
UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 ":L : -\v\ : 0' : i JA 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 77 
 
 What a position for mortals ! Two rainbows spanning the clouds through 
 which we had passed, and which showed us occasionally through their 
 rifts the vale of Chamouni, and, higher still, that long chain of mountains 
 so brilliant with the sunshine that it was truly golden, and suitable for 
 the adorning of her majesty, the White Queen. Time was fleeting 
 and the scene was changing, so we commenced our downward course at 
 a very rapid rate and continued it just as rapidly for the space of three 
 hours ; and we slept well the following night. 
 
 On the third day in Chamouni we visited the Mer de Glace. To 
 reach this so-called sea of ice from Chamouni, one must travel about 
 four hours up the mountain's side, around and around, backwards and 
 forwards, (most people ride on mule-back or are carried in chairs,) until 
 the summit of Mountain Vert is reached ; then begins a descent among 
 boulders and rocks and stones and pebbles and sand it seems as 
 though the world had turned to stone. 
 
 One can see all sorts of bodies of water on and within this Mer de 
 Glace ; there are straits and channels innumerable ; there are quiet little 
 lakes standing upon its surface and sleeping within its bosom ; there are 
 cascades and waterfalls down in the blue depths, so romantic that one 
 involuntarily looks for naiads and nymphs with flowing tresses ; then 
 there are torrents and whirlpools that make the beholder shudder and 
 draw back with affright. 
 
 Standing on this icy sea, we recall the words of Tyndall : "The 
 great agent which nature employs to relieve her overladen mountains is 
 the glaciers. At its origin a glacier is snow, at its lower extremity it 
 is ice. The change from white to blue consists in the gradual expulsion 
 of the air which was originally entangled in the meshes of the fallen 
 snow. The snow which falls on the mountain tops is dry, and the first 
 action of the summer's sun is to raise the temperature to thirty-two 
 degrees, and afterwards to melt it, The water thus formed percolates 
 
78 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 through the colder mass underneath and is the first agency in expelling 
 the air entangled in the snow. Although the sun cannot get directly at 
 the deeper portions of the snow, by liquifying the upper layer he charges 
 it with heat and makes it his messenger to the cold subjacent mass." 
 And Tyndall tells us too whence come these water-courses in the gla- 
 ciers : "The crevasses are produced by the mechanical strains to which 
 the glacier is subjected. They are divided into marginal, transverse, and 
 longitudinal crevasses. The first is produced by the oblique strain con- 
 sequent on the quicker motion of the centre ; the second, by the passage 
 of the glacier over the summit of an incline ; the third, by pressure from 
 behind and resistance in front, which causes the mass to split at right 
 angles to the pressure." The same author says : " The glacier has the 
 appearance of a sea, which, after it had been tossed by a storm, had 
 stiffened into rest. The ridges upon its surface accurately resemble 
 waves in shape, and this appearance is caused in the following way : 
 Above the Montanvert, (the point whence we descend to the glacier,) 
 opposite the Echelets, the glacier in passing down an incline is rent by 
 deep fissures, between each two of which a ridge of ice intervenes. At 
 first the edges of these ridges are sharp and angular, but they are soon 
 sculptured off by the action of the sun. The bearing of the Mer de 
 Glace being north and south, the sun at mid-day shines down the glacier 
 or very obliquely across it, and the fronts of the ridges which look down- 
 ward remain in shidow all the day, while the backs of the ridges meet 
 the direct stroke of the solar rays. The ridges thus acted upon have 
 their hindmost angles wasted off and converted into slopes which repre- 
 sent the back of a wave, while the opposite side of the ridges, which are 
 protected from the sun, preserve their steepness, and represent the front." 
 We could not realize that this seemingly solid mass was all moying at 
 the rate of about one foot in twenty-four hours, the centre moving a little 
 faster than the sides, the latter being retarded somewhat by contact with 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 79 
 
 the banks ; but as it is conclusively demonstrated by Tyndall on Glaciers, 
 we are obliged to accept the fact as truth. 
 
 We decided not to cross this glacier, so two of the party sat down 
 upon the banks and waited for the Teacher to run out upon the ice 
 and see how it appeared. At first it was quite level and not slippery ; 
 after going a little distance the writer came in contact with one of the 
 much-talked-of crevasses, and, full of curiosity, looked into its depths, 
 where were, occasionally, immense rocks brought down from unknown 
 heights. Passing quickly along beyond the point where the crevasse 
 ended, she turned around and came back on the other side of 'the cre- 
 vasse, which gradually enlarged, and all of a sudden .he found herself 
 where it joined with another, making one still larger. They were 
 too wide to leap across for fear of falling into their icy jaws, so she 
 was obliged to retrace her steps and go back to the shore the same way, 
 where her friends waited in great anxiety. It was a beautiful sight to 
 look upon the background and see the Aiguilles (needles) of different 
 names, all white and pointing heavenward, as the magnetic needle points 
 to the North Pole, and to trace the course of the three branches which 
 form this main glacier, up among the mountain peaks. Just thirty min- 
 utes were necessary to retrace our steps to Montanvert by the steep 
 winding path among the rocks, and we stood again on the elevated 
 pasture prepared to return to Chamouni. We should have done what 
 most people do, gone entirely across the Mer de Glace and come down 
 the other side, had not the guide-books told us of dangerous paths for 
 little feet to tread, (and large ones too, for that matter.) At Montanvert 
 a small party, with their homes upon their backs, (for what is home 
 without food and fire ?) were starting with their guides for Mont Blanc, 
 highest peak of the Alps, (15,780 feet,) but having no anxiety to go 
 higher that day, we returned, in an hour and a half, to the interesting 
 little village nestled under the shadow. 
 
80 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 Bells in Chamouni told us several new tales. Once, the soft tinkling 
 of scores of tongues broke our morning slumbers, and going to the 
 window, the sight was a novel one a hundred or so of goats, each with 
 its musical accompaniment, having left their milk to feed travelers from 
 all lands, were going in search of the pastures which should supply them 
 again. Another time, joyous bells rang out, and then everybody greeted 
 some returning heroes who had been victorious in their contest with 
 snow and rocks. Imagine with what regret we left Chamouni, singing 
 all the time the sweet Swiss song : 
 
 "Chamouni, sweet Chamouni, 
 Oh, the vale of Chamouni ! " 
 
 By this time we had become practiced pedestrians, and Bradshaw told 
 us that the most interesting way of reaching Montigny was over the 
 picturesque pass of the Tete Noire, which was accessible by mules and 
 could be done in nine hours. But mules are too slow and too obstinate, 
 so the Three set out on foot, and had gone but a little distance before the 
 clouds became thick and overcharged with rain. What a silver lining 
 that cloud had we did not at first discover. We shortened our analysis 
 of flowers and quickened our steps to find a shelter, which we unexpect- 
 edly, and joyfully too, did find at Argentiere, four miles from Chamouni. 
 The day was not half gone, but as it was the last day of the week, we 
 concluded to remain there over the Sabbath. Had it not been for 
 friendly intercourse with congenial hearts across the sea, it would indeed 
 have been a dismal day. The clouds settled down almost upon our 
 heads, and the mountain peaks, which had seemed so near and looked so 
 pure, had almost withdrawn themselves-from the panoramic view. It was 
 Switzerland without the mountains, and the charm was gone. But on 
 Monday morning, the first day of Autumn, our eyes opened upon a 
 gorgeous sight. A silver lining we said the cloud had, but we thought 
 then it was a golden one. One bound to the window, and no sense 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. * 
 
 of propriety or decorum could restrain the bursts of enthusiasm and the 
 clapping of hands. Aladdin's palace never rose more suddenly than the 
 palaces of the Alps had sprung from the gloom. Awestruck, we said 
 with Coleridge : 
 
 " Who bade the sun 
 
 Clothe you with rainbows ? Who, with living flowers 
 Of liveliest blue, spread garlands at your feet ? 
 God ! let the torrents, like a shout of nations, 
 Answer ! and let the ice-plains echo, God ! 
 God ! sing, ye meadow-streams, with gladsome voice ! 
 Ye pine-groves, with your soft and soul-like sounds ! 
 And they too have a voice, yon piles of snow. 
 And in their perilous fall shall thunder, God ! 
 Thou great ambassador from earth to heaven, 
 Great hierarch ! tell thou the silent sky, 
 And tell the stars, and tell yon rising sun, 
 Earth, with her thousand voices, praises God ! " 
 
 Quickly attiring ourselves lest the vision should fade, we went hastily 
 through the little Alpine village, where the women had collected around 
 their troughs and tubs and were lost in gossip and the labor of washing, 
 out into the fields to see the snow-clad mountains and find the Glacier 
 des Bois, the source of the river we had followed so long and the 
 delight of the writer must have been somewhat akin to that of Dr. 
 Livingstone when he thought he had discovered the source of the Nile. 
 The source of the Arve was not found, but it was its twin, the Arveiron. 
 Yes, just above Chamouni we found that the gay little river was blessed 
 with two heads. We kept them both in sight a long time, and finally 
 found one of them hidden under the rocks of ice in the Glacier d'Argen- 
 tiere. A most beautiful sight it is where it breaks out from under the 
 icy arch and goes tumbling along, as it tumbles all the way till it meets 
 the blue Rhone. No arch of triumph is carved more beautifully or more 
 thickly set with shining crystals. Transparent blue are the juttings 
 of rock, and weird and dark the caverns whence the water rushes out. 
 We pluck a bouquet from the midst of the rocks near the fountain head, 
 and with sorrow we part from the waters which have given us so much 
 ii 
 
82 UNITED STATES GIRLS. 
 
 joy. We shall doubtless find other rivers coming down from these hills 
 of snow, but we shall never forget the Arve. 
 
 Another has described the termination of this glacier as " An enor- 
 mous mass of ice twenty times as large as the front of St. Peter ; a mag- 
 nificent palace cased over with the purest crystal; a majestic temple, 
 ornamented with a portico ; columns of several shapes and colors ; it has 
 the appearance of a fortress flanked with towers and bastions to the right 
 and left, and at the bottom is a grotto terminating in a dome of bold 
 construction. The whole is so artistically splendid, so completely pic- 
 turesque, so great and beautiful beyond imagination that the art of man 
 can hardly produce a building so grand in its construction or so varied in 
 its ornaments." Truly there is often much in a name, as was proved in 
 the present instance. Among the Latin nouns declined in childhood 
 was Argentum, meaning silver, so like unto Argentiere, where was dis- 
 closed the cloud's silver lining in the silver dome of ice and the silvery 
 waters of the Arveiron, rushing forth as if glad to meet the sunlight, of 
 which the silvery tones of memory will keep our recollections bright. 
 
PASS TETE NOIRE TO MARTIGNY. CASTLE OF 
 CHILLON. LACUSTRINE CITIES. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 UR meanderings in this mountainous land may seem some- 
 what unaccountable. From Geneva on the western ex- 
 tremity of Lake Geneva, we had passed into France when 
 at the foot of Mt. Blanc, and now on our way to Martigny, 
 we again crossed the boundary between these countries, but 
 at what point we know not. It was enough that three American 
 girls walked sixteen miles that day and came down at the foot of 
 the Pass Tete Noire, rather late in the day and quite footsore. 
 Morning showed us what we could not see at that time, the place 
 where the monks find a home when they have passed many less 
 years than threescore and ten, on the Great St. Bernard saving 
 the lives of men, for they can spend but a few years so high above the 
 world, and they come down to end their days in the valleys below. This 
 is the place where many start for the Great St. Bernard, which is twenty- 
 two miles away. We should have been glad to follow in the footsteps of 
 Charlemagne, Fred. Barbarossa and Napoleon the Great, but we con- 
 cluded to take more peaceful ones. Passing over the Dranse on a bridge 
 so old that we imagined the armies of Charlemagne keeping watch over 
 it, we walked a little distance in the valley of the Rhone, and then for 
 variety, took the cars to Bouveret where we cut off in a boat the south- 
 
84 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 eastern part of Lake Geneva sailing across the waters of the Rhone 
 (these waters are aristocratic and do not wish to mingle with common 
 waters,) to the Castle of Chillon at Villeneuve. The Church of Calvin 
 and the Castle of Chillon confront each other at the extremes of Lake 
 Leman (Geneva). 
 
 Here we must pause, for the poet has pointed out the way. Going 
 down into the depths of the castle and standing by the column to which 
 the prisoner of Chillon was chained and around which he had walked 
 till he wore down the earth, we plainly heard him say : 
 
 " My hair is gray but not with years, 
 Nor grew it white in a single night, 
 As men's have grown from sudden fears ; 
 My limbg are bowed though not with toil, 
 But rusted with a vile repose, 
 For they ha\e been a dungeon's spoil." 
 
 We seemed to hear him give his own history in the words of Byron : 
 
 " We were seven who now are one. 
 Six in youth and one in age, 
 Finished as they had begun. 
 Proud of Persecution's rage, 
 One in fire and two in the field," 
 Their belief with blood hath sealed ; 
 Three were in a dungeon cast, 
 Of whom this wreck is left the last." 
 
 They tell us that when at last Bonnevard was set free he ran back to 
 his column and begged to be left there in his second home, and Byron 
 makes him say, 
 
 "I regained my freedom with a sigh." 
 
 Twelve miles we walked that day by the side of the bluest waters 
 and under the bluest sky that we imagine earth affords. We had pur- 
 chased pictures at Geneva with which to confront the artist, and defy 
 him to take us where we could find such colors except in the hues of the 
 rainbow or upon the artist's brush ; but we nevermore say that the views 
 of Swiss skies and Swiss lakes are too highly colored. Concluding to 
 stop for the night, although the sun was high in the sky, we left our lake 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 85 
 
 road and entered a village old and curious, and walked through its one 
 street in search of hospice, or anberge, or hotel, whichever you wish to 
 call it, but we discovered none, and so continued on our way. When we 
 reached Lausanne at the very northern point of Lake Geneva, we hastily 
 sought the baggage room and asked for stray sachels which had preceded 
 their owners by ten days. Nothing to show for them, how would our 
 sachels be known from those of all the rest of the traveling world? 
 But taking us back through several rooms they hauled up the identical 
 sachels and straps which had been so bold at the beginning of the jour- 
 ney and were still just as fearless though they had traveled alone. We 
 had sent them from Geneva and were glad to meet them once more. 
 
 The second week in September the beautiful lake of Geneva was left 
 behind to traverse the shores of a neighboring lake, where a short time 
 ago Lacustrine cities were exhumed, and the mode of living of an early 
 and a very different race of men was made plain by articles suddenly 
 brought to light which had been hid for thousands of years. At Yver- 
 don, one extremity of Lake Neuchatel, cars were exchanged for our old 
 mode of advancement in this land of lakes and mountains pedestrian- 
 ism. Sky was bright and lake was blue, but, relics of the past, antiqui- 
 ties, our eyes sought everywhere. Order and quiet reigned, and we 
 walked the streets scarcely seeing sign of life or meeting living being ; 
 but feeling convinced, nevertheless, that other implements of husbandry 
 had been used in these fields, and that other races of men had occupied 
 these houses than the ones made familiar by studying the records so 
 lately found within the bosom of mother earth. We thought to find 
 something at Concise, but were directed to a chateau some miles away, 
 where it was said the exhumed articles were kept in store for the eye of 
 the curious to see. A romantic walk through private fields bordered with 
 shrubbery and watered with fountains, brought us to the walls of a castle 
 which looked as if built to protect, but which we scarcely dared to enter 
 
86 UNITED STATES GIRLS. 
 
 for fear they were built also to incarcerate the unwary. The bell at the 
 gate house was rung, the servant withdrew the bolts, and with a look of 
 curiosity invited the " Three " to enter. Ushered into the court we 
 made known our errand, and were informed that the lord of this manor 
 had deceased, and that his collections were scattered among the museums 
 of the land, some of them to be found at Neuchatel, whither we were 
 journeying. Begging pardon for trespassing upon the quiet of this very 
 quiet house, we departed, feeling somewhat uncertain whether we were 
 pursuing the ghosts of the past ages, or whether the pursuit was on the 
 other side ; but Neuchatel reached, we were convinced of our own sanity 
 and also of the truthfulness of newspaper reporters and of letter writers 
 for magazines, for our own eyes looked upon the instruments of warfare, 
 many in number but very similar ; implements of husbandry, evidently 
 not much in vogue during that hard age, and cooking utensils fewer still, 
 as they probably took their food in the natural state. But we refer our 
 friends to the libraries of those who keep pace with the discoveries of 
 the times, where they will find accurate descriptions of the Lacustrine 
 cities of Switzerland. 
 
THE AAR AND THE JUNGFRAU. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 URSUING our route across the country to Berne, in 
 that city of bears we first made the acquaintance of an- 
 other dancing, sparkling stream, along whose banks we 
 have since wended our way for many a day, and whose waters 
 we have traced high up among their mountain beds. Berne, 
 the capital of Switzerland, stands upon a rocky citadel and 
 looks down upon the Aar surrounding it on three sides, but at a great 
 distance below much of it. True to the teachings of William Tell, (we 
 shall not try to believe that such a man never lived,) Switzerland is still 
 a republic, and this city is the seat of the Federal Council, and all its 
 operations are carried on in three different languages, French, German 
 and Italian ; indeed it was difficult to tell in which tongue one would be 
 answered if he addressed a person in the street. German, however, had 
 become perhaps by this time the language most generally spoken. It 
 takes all sorts of people to make a world, and it takes all sorts of cities 
 too, and Berne is a sort by itself. Some of the streets are arcaded, and 
 one walks a long-distance as if in a continuous line of stores. Through 
 the centre of many of the streets is a stone channel in which the water 
 rushes swiftly to the Aar. Then such curious fountains are everywhere 
 to be seen, many of them representing the bear as performing some 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. General view of the city of Berne surrounded by the river Aar. 2. The 
 Ogre Fountain. 3. Clock Tower. 
 
&8 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 wonderful feat. In one, called the Ogre, monster Bruin is satisfying his 
 appetite by destroying innocent children, of whom he holds great 
 numbers within his pockets. On one of the clock towers a procession 
 of bears walk around and strike the hour of the day. In all the Swiss 
 carvings displayed for sale the bear acts a prominent part, plays the 
 fiddle, carries match-safes on his back larger than himself, sits at table, 
 etc., etc. Real live bears, too, climb a pole within their pit, and watch 
 for the morsels which are thrown to them, or for the unwary who occa- 
 sionally drop themselves into their paws. In short, everything impresses 
 upon the mind that the name Berne is derived from some word meaning 
 bear, for what reason we cannot tell exactly, although we have heard 
 many solutions of the matter. 
 
 When we leave the society of the bears and take a somewhat elevated 
 position, we are fascinated with the view which rises before us. The 
 silver horns rise up in plenty and the sun gilds them till they are like 
 unto diamonds of the purest lustre Schreckhorn, and Faulhorn, and 
 Wetterhorn, and Silberhorn and over all the grand array presides the 
 Jungfrau, (young woman,) whose white veil sparkles in the setting sun 
 as if adorned for the bridal feast, but who ever remains cold to the 
 addresses of adoring ones. 
 
 The Aar and the Jungfrau are by v no means all that are interesting in 
 a visit to this city, but we left them all to follow these two follow them 
 by land and by water, over mountains and through valleys. 
 
 At Interlaken we took up the march anew, and facing the Jungfrau, 
 ended a good week with a most delightful walk up into the one street 
 of Lauterbrunnen. What a glorious place to spend the Sabbath ! 
 Rightly named nothing but fountains ; for within reach of the eye ten 
 waterfalls come leaping, bounding, pouring down the mountain side, 
 
 ILLUSTKATIOMS. 1. Lauterbrunnen, with Jungfrau in the distance and Staubach Fall at the 
 right. 2. Hotel at Handeck, on the Grimsel Pass. 8. Hotel at the summit of Furca Pass. 
 

 . ' \ 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC:. 89 
 
 among the number the celebrated Staubach Fall, one thousand feet high, 
 which the poet says is like the tail of the pale horse on which Death 
 rides. So the waters pour constantly into this valley, which has not a 
 particle of flat surface except the river Aar at its base, and the Swiss 
 cottages deck the hillsides everywhere, while the Young Maiden looks 
 ever down upon the scene, adding life and contrast by her presence. 
 
 High up on the right of this valley, so blessed with flowing fountains, 
 is Murren, the highest village in Switzerland, so of course we felt chal- 
 lenged to extend our walk up there, and after a climb of three hours 
 where even mules do not go, we met on our return lines of little boys 
 playing the part of beasts of burden, and we wonder no more that they 
 are called simple Swiss, since they must necessarily pay more attention 
 to their heels than their heads. 
 
 On the following day we pursued our course toward the Jungfrau, 
 taking the other side view of the same pleasant valley, and it lost nothing 
 by this examination upon all sides, the test of true worth. It sparkled 
 with new brilliancy when, after a half-day's walk, we stopped for the last 
 time to look over the scene and impress it indelibly upon our minds to 
 carry across the ocean the next year. 
 
 A deep, deep gorge lay between us and the glorious Jungfrau, whose 
 white peaks were towering before* us. A sound which seemed familiar 
 broke upon the ear, and was attributed to a train of cars in the distance ; 
 but soon it came again, and this time near enough to see the smoke, for 
 right before our eyes aud thundering in our ears down the mountain side 
 rolled the terrible avalanche. It was a glorious sight. No torrent ever 
 rolled more majestically down, down to the depths. It came like a large 
 body of water till it reached the top of the precipice, then all of a sudden 
 it became a light, glorious cloud, which melted gradually away, and we 
 felt that we had seen a vision. We slept in front of the same cold 
 mountain, and our dreams were haunted by avalanches, and they were 
 
 12 
 
go UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 not all dreams either. In the morning the snow came down upon uS, 
 and we wondered if winter had come to cut short our delightful wander- 
 ings. But we drew our water-proofs around us and ran down the 
 mountain sides, (for we could not walk, they were so steep,) and after 
 three or four hours we found it was not winter, only a storm of rain, and 
 we went to our rooms in the valley of Grindelwald to bide the return 
 of the sun. Old Sol did not withdraw his presence long, for early the 
 next morning he was inviting his three friends out to visit the glaciers 
 in the vicinity of Grindelwald. 
 
 It is a very up-and-down life this traveling in Switzerland. Four 
 hours we had been approaching Grindelwald, all the time in view of her 
 cottages ; now again we were six hours leaving her with her glaciers in 
 the valley ; and again, with fingers chilled with cold, and getting some- 
 what anxious lest the bare mountain peaks must be our beds, we greeted 
 with joy the noble St. Bernard dog which came out to welcome us to the 
 chalet at the top of the Great Scheidig. 
 
 In the valley again, the Vale of Meyringen, an old friend appeared, the 
 Aar, easily recognized, although somewhat diminished in size, and we 
 walked by the side of this recovered friend until its tones were familiar 
 as those of childhood, and we were lonely when they were heard no 
 more. 
 
 For hours we passed on over a level but not straight road, just as good 
 as labor can make it, winding around at the base of the mountains, 
 following the windings of the Aar, until we almost came to the conclu- 
 sion that a mountain pass was very different from what our inexperienced 
 minds had pictured it. But wait ! We have spoken of fearing that 
 winter had come, but with the fervent sun pouring down upon our heads 
 we came to a very different conclusion. At two o'clock, however, it was 
 sundown, and we enjoyed the delightful long twilight hours. As we 
 climbed, climbed, climbed, we could but say, How like to the journey 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 9 1 
 
 of life ! Away back in the distance were the beautiful days of youth, 
 rugged and uneven, to be sure, but purple with the haze of time and 
 gilded with the brush of memory. Around about us was middle life, 
 struggle and labor and work and climb, precipices to avoid and heights 
 to gain ; but far ahead was the sunshine, and perhaps we should get into 
 it at the last. We were supported by this hope until the day's journey 
 was finished, and we found a resting-place for the Sabbath, which was 
 close at hand. 
 
 The Sabbath in Switzerland is a very different matter from what it is 
 in some other countries. The little white church stood in the midst 
 of the cottages, all huddled so close together that they reminded one 
 of frightened sheep crowding around the shepherd for protection. At 
 the proper hour the villagers came together, the women all wearing red 
 handkerchiefs over the head, (except three unruly spirits whom fashion 
 had led astray and placed the jaunty hat upon the young hair,) large 
 woolen aprons, and a handkerchief tied demurely across the shoulders, 
 the hymn-book held with both hands in the self-same position, completed 
 the dress. Excuse a description of the elaborate attire of the other sex. 
 Invited to occupy the one pew in the church by the old minister, who 
 had filled its pulpit for thirty years, we listened to a good Dutch sermon 
 on the very appropriate subject of Freedom. The services were con- 
 ducted with the utmost decorum, and everybody seemed to feel the force 
 of the truths presented and to live accordingly. This was the Swiss way 
 of observing the Sabbath in the little village of Guttannen. 
 
 Another whole day's journey to the highest point in the route, past the 
 Falls of the Aar to the Dead Sea. We were truly and literally in the 
 region of the clouds, and thought the world had turned to stone. Oh, 
 what bleakness and desolation not a tree or even shrub growing ! But 
 there was beauty there, and some flowers adorned even these rocks. 
 We are told of the blue-bells of Scotland, but we can tell from experience 
 
9 2 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 of the blue-bells of Switzerland ; about every inch of ground bears some 
 species of the nodding campanula. Here, in the crevices of the rocks, 
 in close pfoximity to snow, and provided by nature with a covering 
 of down, they hang their heads, and ring their bells, and delight the 
 weary wanderer. Then the stones and rocks were highly adorned with 
 moss and lichens, so that the eye seemed to look upon a carpeted floor, 
 whose groundwork was drab, but the figures always varying, always 
 bright. But there was a little distance that the fog was too thick, the 
 snow too cold, the water too deep, and the way too uncertain, to think 
 much about flowers, if they were to be seen. 
 
 As we stood by the side of the Dead Sea up there, we were reminded 
 that we might need a pillar of fire to guide us out of the cloud, for so 
 dense a fog had suddenly enveloped us that we could not see our way 
 but went blindly forward in what seemed to be the direction in which we 
 had been walking, when we stopped upon the border of other waters 
 rolling sluggishly along as if uncertain what course to take, stretched out 
 and covering a wide expanse of rock and stone. There was not much 
 time to deliberate, so we stepped into the floods, but they did not sepa- 
 rate, and we walked through the head waters of we know not what 
 stream or where it finds its outlet, whether in the Mediterranean Sea or 
 in the Northern Ocean, or far to the East or in the West. On the other 
 side we were no better off, but two remained standing on a high point of 
 rock, and the third went off as a sort of scout calling to each other out 
 of the mists. The one returned saying she had made a discovery which 
 perhaps might be of advantage to us a tall pole rising from a rock and 
 a short distance away a similar one. So we went from pole to pole, and 
 if we had gone in the opposite direction we should have come out at the 
 Haspice of the Grimsel, where we could have spent the night and seen 
 the sun rise high up among the clouds ; but we came out of the cloud, 
 which was our pressing desire just then, and as we descended to the vil- 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 93 
 
 lage below we frequently looked back at the cloud above and rejoiced 
 that the three had persevered and came down victorious, having been 
 seven thousand feet above the level of the sea. Two armies once upon 
 a time went up there to fight, and French and Austrian blood rolled 
 down into the valleys below. Strange that they should not forget their 
 feuds when they were so near to heaven. 
 
 Again we descended in zigzag course for about three hours and finally, 
 near a place of rest as we supposed, we dropped upon the grass and 
 waited awhile. After some enquiry for a hotel, we found this was a 
 village where travelers do not often come and we were almost as much of 
 a curiosity as if we had dropped out of the cloud, which was not far from 
 the case. One woman was found who could speak French, who, with 
 her four children, accompanied us a little distance and pointed out an inn 
 at Oberwald, four miles away. Judging from data and our own bodily 
 impressions, we had walked twenty-five miles that day. The next morn- 
 ing a few miles brought us to the Rhone Glacier. Tyndall looked down 
 from the Mayenwand upon the Rhone Glacier and writes : " I hardly 
 know a finer of its kind in the Alps. Forcing itself through the narrow 
 gorge which holds the ice cascade in its jaws and where it is greatly 
 riven and dislocated, it spreads out in the valley below in such a manner 
 as clearly to reveal to the mind's eye the nature of the forces to which it 
 is subjected. Longfellow's figure is quite correct ; the glacier resembles 
 a vast gauntlet of which the gorge represents the wrist ; while the lower 
 glacier, cleft by its fissures into finger-like ridges, is typified by the 
 hand." 
 
 " It is difficult to convey any just impression of the scene from the 
 summit of the Finsteraarhorn. The various shapes of the mountains, 
 some grand, some beautiful, bathed in yellow sunshine, or lying black 
 and riven under the forms of impervious cumuli ; the pure white peaks, 
 cornices, bosses and amphitheatres ; the blue ice rifts, the stratified snow- 
 
94 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 precipices, the glaciers issuing from the hollows of the eternal hills and 
 stretching like frozen serpents through the sinuous valleys ; the lower 
 cloud-field itself an empire of vaporous hills shining with dazzling 
 whiteness, while here and there grim summits, brown by nature and 
 black by contrast, pierce through it like volcanic islands through a shin- 
 ing sea ; Finsteraarhorn monarch of the Bernese Alps." 
 
 Why should the struggle between the blue (Rhone) and the grey 
 (Arve) be so long and so fierce when their source is similar and their end 
 the same ? It can only be accounted for by the difference in their course 
 and the impressions received from different surroundings. As we walked 
 with one to the very beginning, saw it issue from the rocks and take 
 their color as well as substance along with it through all its ways and 
 windings, so now have we traced the other to the point where it seems to 
 come from the blue above, and to take the sky in its onward route, 
 (although congealed in its first attempts). The Glacier du Rhone at its 
 base spreads over a large extent of surface, and the waters come, not 
 rushing and pouring from one spot, taking along everything that coires 
 in the way, but as if there was abundance of time and abundance of 
 room, slowly and surely entering upon the accomplishment of their task. 
 The Furca Pass winds backwards and forwards on the mountain several 
 times taking the traveler to the side of the glacier where he can scarce 
 make up his mind to continue his journey, but stands lost in wonder and 
 admiration, then away a long distance only to return and behold a more 
 sublime and wonderful spectacle in the frozen peaks and icy chasms 
 extending almost perpendicularly. But even the Rhone Glacier must be 
 left. We toil on up the steep and reach the Haspice at the summit of 
 the Furca Pass where we take our lunch eight thousand feet above the 
 level of the sea and prepare to go down into the valley of the Reuss. 
 The Three were not united this time for one of the number considered 
 it sufficient exercise to have climbed to the summit of the Furca Pass ; 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANfid. t)$ 
 
 so the two left their companion to proceed slowly on their way and make 
 observations in that elevated region, until the diligence starting two 
 hours later should overtake them and carry them down into the valley. 
 But things are wonderfully uncertain even at this high state of attain- 
 ment. 
 
 The morning's walk had been in pure, unclouded sunshine, but, the 
 height attained and the descent but just commenced, the clouds rolled 
 up from below, enveloping all things in their dusky folds, leaving but a 
 few yards before the travelers plain to be seen and easy to be followed. 
 So, for a time, they walked in clouds, no, ran, for the road invited brisk 
 steps, and as the entire view was obstructed and the flowers were hid by 
 their vapory covering, there was nothing to detain or hold them back. 
 As a consequence, the diligence lost two passengers that day, for the end 
 of the day's journey was nearly reached when night and the diligence 
 together overtook them, and Andermatt, which ends the best part of 
 the St. Gothard Pass, was reached and the St. Gothard Hotel was made 
 a resting place for the night in the valley of the Reuss. 
 
 Many of the valleys in our native land are beautiful hardly to be 
 surpassed in that respect, and the mind of the writer often reverts to 
 the central one of the Empire State where the Onondaga flows on to 
 the lake past scenes made familiar by daily walks during a score of years, 
 imagining familiar hilltops overlooking the valley, familiar dwelling places 
 where the homes and hearts are sure to be open when the wanderer 
 returns, and familiar and loved faces so many that we would not attempt 
 to number them. Another valley my native valley no lovelier one 
 will ever be found, for there the sunshine of happiness gilded the days of 
 youth, and although snowy peaks interposed their cold heads, rugged 
 mountain paths came into the march of middle life and yawning chasms 
 suddenly broke the path, yet away in the distant future the sun is still 
 shining and the valley is beautiful but not the valley of the Onondaga 
 
g6 tfNtTEi) STATES GIRLS. 
 
 or the valley of the Tioughnioga, but the valley of the Reuss was the 
 subject. Pardon the digression. 
 
 In the vicinity of Andermatt, somebody seems to have thought that 
 his Satanic majesty has held sway at some past time, or perhaps does at 
 present, for the bridge bears the name of Teufelsbrucke (Devil's Bridge). 
 Once within that region we were led to doubt whether it was in the past 
 that this dominion was acquired when the rocks were hurled in the wild- 
 est confusion and the stream poured madly through the narrow rifts, 
 or whether it was even then that the contest was going on, for the clouds 
 rolled up and over and around the spot, as if some of the scenes in 
 " Paradise Lost " were being re-enacted ; the wind almost lifted the gar- 
 ments off us, and we scarcely dared advance for fear of meeting the con- 
 tending hosts. This was the wildest of all spots yet seen. 
 
THE HOME OF TELL. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 GAIN the windings of the river were seen, as several of the 
 rivers of Switzerland have been, and by a gradual descent 
 in the midst of the same delightful scenery, we came down 
 out of the mountains where for two months the sunshine 
 had been constantly on our pathway, and where we loved 
 to linger still, but dared not lest the cold winds of autumn 
 should drive away the pleasant impressions already received. In the 
 loveliest days of the year, the hazy, musing, dreamy days of Indian sum- 
 mer, (for Indian summer is whenever these days come,) we entered the 
 land so famous in song and story the land of William Tell. William 
 Tell, the hero of Switzerland, he who occupies the first place in the 
 hearts of his countrymen, and who is still honored by every token of 
 remembrance although centuries have passed since he gave to Liberty 
 such a firm foothold in these lakes and mountains. During all these 
 centuries, 
 
 " True as the Alp to its own native flowers, 
 True as the torrent to its rocky bed, 
 Or clouds and winds to their appointed track, 
 The Switzer cleaves to his accustomed freedom, 
 Holds fast the rights and laws his father left him, 
 And spurns the tyrant's innovating sway." 
 
 Into Altorf, a curious little Swiss town near the birthplace of Tell, 
 where the houses were huddled close together after the fashion of the 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Statue of Tell at. Altorf. 2. The Vow of the Rutli. 3. Tell's Chapel. 
 13 
 
9 UNITED STATES 
 
 country, all standing right upon the street paved with uneven pointed 
 stones, (they seemed,) so that it was doing penance to walk upon them, 
 the trio entered with eyes extended to catch some sign of the hero of 
 past ages ; they peered at all the posts and glanced at the stones, looked 
 enquiringly at the steeples and reid the notices and guide-boards till in 
 the earnestness of the search they became the centre of attraction, and 
 were surrounded by numbers seemingly fearful lest their town was to be 
 carried off bodily by the intruders ; children and dogs barked till the 
 smaller one of the party became somewhat alarmed lest the carrying off 
 might be on the other side. But our motto is, " ever onward," and the 
 search was rewarded by the sight of a statue standing over the spot 
 where Gesler raised the hat, and where the apple was shot from the head 
 of the son by the unerring hand of the father. Near by is a tower 
 whose outside is covered with frescoes recording events in the life of 
 Tell. 
 
 Curiosity satisfied at that point, the march was continued to Fluelen, 
 at the extremity of the Bay of Url, whose waters were stirred by the 
 oars of the hero ; upon whose banks he leaped from the boat which was 
 carrying him to captivity ; and upon whose hillsides were made unfailing 
 shots from the bow that sent the arrow to the heart of the tyrant. And 
 we were permitted to look upon these places, so hallowed by association, 
 this scenery, unsurpassed in grandeur and beauty even in this grandest 
 of countries, and to walk nine miles at the foot of mountains from seven 
 to eight thousand feet high, all the way on the border of the loveliest 
 lake in Switzerland, the Lake of the Four Forest Cantons. 
 
 The Axenstrasse is nearly all the way cut in the solid rock, by the side 
 of the lake, and is hard and smooth as the floors of our houses ; it extends 
 from Fluelen to Brunnen. At our backs were the snow-clad mountain 
 peaks, hazy and blue at their base, but white and golden at their sum- 
 mits, giving all their colors to the waters below, while far away in the 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 99 
 
 distance, huddled in the curve of the lake, was the goal for which we were 
 striving, Brunnen, and Schwytz, four miles above on the mountain side. 
 Ever and anon we met droves of little dun Swiss cows, led by " Broon 
 Lesel," which so gracefully wore her collar to which was attached a mon- 
 strous bell, followed by a " graceful ring " of bells and cattle to match 
 them ; all these were preceded by a mountaineer playing upon his Alpine 
 horn, and following by another sending forth the Alpine cry. Who can 
 imagine, who can tell the pleasures of the walk ? And the Mecca of 
 Switzerland lay in that route ; yea, we visited it. At the foot of the great 
 Axin rises a little chapel visited by pilgrims from all parts of the world 
 - Tell's Chapel. It stands on the spot where the brave man, released 
 from his fetters to save the tyrant Gesler from a watery grave, having 
 seized his cross-bow, swung himself upon the plat, 
 
 "High springing with a bound, and sending back 
 The staggered boat from the whirl of waters." 
 
 An appreciative people raised this chapel in 1588, thirty-one years 
 after the death of the one to whom it was consecrated, all the parties, it 
 is said, having been his personal friends ; and every year, on a certain 
 day, a procession of boats laden with flowers, proceed slowly to this spot 
 and deck it with wreaths Nature's language of love. It opens upon 
 the lake and .bears upon its three sides ancient frescoes representing the 
 principal events in the life of the hero whose name it perpetuates. 
 
 The shores of this most beautiful lake have witnessed other scenes in 
 the history of Switzerland, dear to the freedom-loving Swiss as well as to 
 the patriots of all lands where Freedom has had a birth and still lives to 
 honor those who struggled to obtain it. At the extremity of the Axen- 
 strasse, and also of that part of the lake called Bay of Uri, (for the name 
 changes merely by a turn in the waters,) lies Brunnen, whose white 
 houses had been the guiding star to the travelers from across the waters. 
 This interesting little village faces Fluelen at the eastern extremity of 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Axenstrassc, 3. Monument of Schiller. 
 
IOO UNITED STATES GIRLS. 
 
 the Bay of Uri, and also Lucerne at the south end of Lake Lucerne, 
 and it occupies a position only second to that of the last named place. 
 Across the lake from Brunnen is the " Rutli of Schiller," where the 
 "Three Confederates" wrote their names high on the roll of fame so 
 high that nearly six hundred years have not erased them Walter Furst, 
 Werner Stauffacher and Arnold de Melchthal. In the name of the 
 three cantons which they represented, in the early morning hours and in 
 the presence of thirty of their brethren, they took upon themselves the 
 following vow : 
 
 " We swear to be one people of true brethren, 
 We swear that no extremity shall part us ; 
 We will be free, free, as our fathers left us, 
 Preferring death, in any shape, to slavery. 
 
 And we Three, 
 
 Firm, strenuous, without fear or guile, knit hearts 
 And hands in one, sp, warmed by our example, 
 May the three cantons, Uri, Schwytz and Unterwalden, 
 Join in like league, prepared like us to stand 
 Or fall together, one in life or death." 
 
 How well the precepts and example of these brave men have been 
 followed, even to the present moment, history will tell. 
 
LUCERNE. 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 TEP with us on board the Germania, (it ought to have 
 been the William Tell, but the time did not suit us,) and try 
 the power of steam on this lovely Lake of Lucerne. Al- 
 though the sun shone very warm upon us as we waited for 
 the boat, once upon her deck and the wind was strong 
 enough to overcome the heat of the sun, and we almost 
 shivered as we went from one side of the lake to the other, to give each 
 little town on its borders a call. In the broad noonday sun of an October 
 day we landed at Vitznau to ascend one more mountain in Switzerland. 
 
 With reluctance we gave consent to be forwarded by iron and steam, 
 and to heap up the raptures of this ascent instead of enjoying them 
 moderately, one at a time. One large, broad car was filled, not crowded, 
 and we started before an engine yes, before an engine, for we backed 
 up the steep mountain side. At first the curious engine, with its smoke- 
 pipe perpendicular to the axis of the earth, (never mind, geographers, 
 if .this is not strictly true,) took the attention, but soon our eyes were 
 drawn away from objects so gross and earthly, our view was enlarged, 
 and our thoughts were elevated. One slope after another was ascended, 
 one valley after another was laid out before us, and one lake after another 
 was added to the scene. Think of this landscape, with a soft, hazy, 
 dreamy atmosphere pervading everything and giving just enough uncer- 
 
l /G2 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 tainty to objects to allow free scope to the imagination. Little misty 
 clouds rolled together below us, and showed a silver outside instead 
 of lining. One hour and a half was too short a time to take in so much 
 beauty, but once at the summit of Rigi Kulm, six thousand feet above 
 the level of the sea, and the panorama was laid out in one grand whole. 
 Mount Holyoke gives a lovely view of the sister peaks of the Old Bay 
 State and the winding Connecticut in the valley below ; it is soul-inspir- 
 ing to stand by the grave of the Father of his Country and look up 
 through the valley of the Potomac, over the preparations both for peace 
 and for war, halls of legislation and armed forts ; Sterling Castle sends 
 the mind roaming back through ages past, and recalls the bloody scenes 
 enacted upon the thirteen battle-fields spread out to view, with the Forth 
 winding and doubling itself in folds as if resolved not to leave these 
 familiar regions; but Rigi! Rigi presents the greatest variety of 
 scenery, the most magnificent, the grandest. Almost without moving, we 
 could look upon thirteen lakes of all shapes and sizes, dotted with innu- 
 merable little villages, green valleys, and mountain peaks too many to 
 number or name, and all these encircled by the Alps bearing ever their 
 crown of snow. Fortune certainly does favor the brave, for there are 
 only a few days in the year when the beauty and grandeur of this scene 
 can be enjoyed to such advantage as they were on the 27th of September, 
 1873. Oh, for the brush of the artist or the pen of the poet to portray 
 the scene at the sunset hour ! The crowd from the one large hotel 
 which alone has the right to occupy this eminence were stationed for the 
 grand display. If we had only been Argus-eyed we could have seen the 
 beauties on all sides at a time, but, with constant turning, our poor weak 
 eyes served us well, with the help of the artificial ones. As the sun 
 approached the horizon, the clouds began to form in the depths below 
 and to roll up one after another till trees and houses, lakes and valleys, 
 
 ILLUSTRATION. Rigi. 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 1 03 
 
 hills and plains, were all submerged in one sea of cloud. The danger 
 of being swallowed up by these waves seemed much more imminent 
 than when upon the broad Atlantic. All around the far horizon were 
 the mountain peaks, so white and wavy, so dim and hazy,or so red and 
 fiery, that it was difficult to decide where earth ended and the regions 
 of an entirely different nature, above and below, began. All too soon 
 darkness covered the scene, and we went to our beds, as we had done 
 many times before, mourning that beauty is so brief, and happiness so 
 short. 
 
 At an early morning hour the Switzer's bugle call was heard in invita- 
 tion to go forth and view the sunrise. The recollection of the gorgeous 
 scene of the previous evening rendered a second call unnecessary, 
 although the appearance of many showed that the toilette was not as 
 carefully made as upon ordinary occasions. A large number of sleepy, 
 shivering sight-seers stood at the summit, ready to be inspired when the 
 proper moment arrived. But lo and behold ! the lord of day drove forth 
 his steeds under a canopy of clouds. What a blighting of hopes was 
 experienced that morning! for we had hardly yet learned that it cannot 
 be all sunshine and no clouds. But the clouds were soon dispersed, and 
 under the fairest of skies we descended the Rigi on our own footing, in 
 the shade and in the dew for it was not on the sunny side and the 
 Bay of Kussnacht was reached at the broad hour of noon, although an 
 early morning hour had been taken for a start. Here again we were 
 reminded that this was . the land of the freedom-loving Tell, the tyrant- 
 hating Tell ; these were the peaks that echoed and reechoed the brave 
 Switzer's call to take a stand for liberty and for right ; these were the 
 plains where the bow was bent which sent the arrow to the heart 
 of tyranny and destroyed it root and branch. On the spot where Gesler 
 was slain the walls of a little chapel rise to tell the tale in all coming 
 time. 
 
104 UNITED STATES 
 
 Must we say that dreaded word which writes itself on so many things 
 we love ? Must we leave the brightest skies and the bluest waters, and 
 clamber no more where the goat and the chamois make their home, and 
 where alone is found the hut of the shepherd who guards the flocks 
 during the short summer hours? Yes, it must be ! Ye Alps, farewell ! 
 The shores of the queen of lakes in Switzerland have been traversed 
 in the sunny September days, in the beautiful Autumn days, and in the 
 capital of the canton, Lucerne, we lay aside sachels and shawl-straps 
 and linger a little in this city of light to examine places interesting to 
 historian and geologist, as well as to all admirers of the beautiful and the 
 true. 
 
 Perhaps the first object which attracts the eye, as we approach the 
 city by the lake of the same name, is the picturesque watch-tower 
 standing in the midst of the river Reuss. It was formerly used as a 
 light-house, and gave the name to the city, Lucerna, (light-house.) but 
 within its walls the archives of the city are now kept. Parts of the old 
 walls are still to be seen, and some towers still stand, like the ghosts 
 of departed ages. Other reminiscences of the past are also to be seen, 
 and one can but feel that he is liable to fall into the power of the spirit 
 of darkness as he crosses the Reuss on the old covered bridge, on which 
 is represented the " Dance of Death." From whichever direction you 
 cross this bridge, so old that it seems falling under your feet, you are 
 confronted every few steps by the image of the grim skeleton whirling 
 his victims of every age and every station off into other realms. 
 
 Then who has not heard of the Lion of Lucerne ? Walking through 
 the busy street, the scene changes, and the traveler stands before 
 towering rocks as wild and grand as nature made them, with creeping 
 vines upon their naked sides and tall evergreens standing like sentinels 
 before them, and here, upon the rough rock, is the Dying Lion, modeled 
 by Thorwaldsen, in memory of the brave eight hundred (less six) who 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. IO5 
 
 died at Paris in 1792, defending the royal cause. This colossal lion, 
 twenty-eight by sixteen feet, is represented as holding the fleur de Us in 
 his paws and defending it with his last breath. The Swiss Guard will 
 certainly not be forgotten while the rocks stand. 
 
 Just at the side of this famous rock of Art is quite as interesting a 
 work of Nature the Glacier Garden. Here is a book laid open in 
 which is plainly written the record of ages past, of a time which printing 
 and history have been altogether incompetent to reach, and of which the 
 rocks alone give a true account. This little spot of ground, 112 feet in 
 breadth, brings together times the most remote a world teeming with 
 life and activity, another with scarce a sign even of vegetable life, and in 
 which there was no possibility of animal life. It puts desolation and 
 plenty side by side a winter that had no end, and an ever-varying 
 change of season in which spring-time and harvest each has its appro- 
 priate time. It is the past and the present, and, as its name signifies, a 
 union of dpposites. This Garden, in the midst of the city of Lucerne, 
 contains sixteen " Giant's Pots," the largest forty feet in diameter and as 
 many in depth, containing several round stones, some almost as high as 
 a man. In digging for a cellar in this locality the spade of a workman 
 entered one of these holes, rilled with soft dirt, and at the bottom the 
 circular stones were found. Upon examination the sixteen were brought 
 to light, and no building was reared on the spot, but the debris was 
 removed, the matter was taken into consideration, and a satisfactory 
 conclusion seems to have been gained, although there are some conflict- 
 ing opinions. The Giant's Pots, with the rounded blocks of granite and 
 limestone, are the signs of a time when glaciers covered the plain 
 of Switzerland to the height of several thousand feet. These ice- 
 streams flowed down from the heights of St. Gothard and brought with 
 them fragments of the rocks, and as they retreated deposited these frag- 
 ments in crescent-shaped hollows. 
 14 
 
106 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 We could but fancy ourselves standing in this same quarter of the 
 globe many (we do not attempt to say how many) years ago. Instead 
 of Lucerne with all its bright attractions, its busy streets and crowds 
 of men, its works of art and beauties of nature, our eyes look upon 
 scenes made familiar only within the past few months. Our hands seem 
 to grasp the friendly alpenstock, our feet to be covered with the socks 
 of wool, and we are upon the blue glacier, looking down, down into the 
 fearful cracks and numerous crevasses into which the little rills formed 
 by the melting ice flow. We see huge stones lodged within these 
 crevasses, as we have done many times of late, and now we see them set 
 in motion by the water, and by this constant circular motion grind out 
 the hollows in their rocky beds, and grind themselves smooth perfect 
 mills. Another work is going on, very slowly, at the same time. On 
 the lower surface of the glacier is a layer of sand, and if in this layer 
 there are large, sharp pieces of stone, they are pressed upon the rock in 
 the slow but sure movement of the glacier, and form canals such as we 
 see in several places in the Glacier Garden.. 
 
 But the dream is past and we are witnessing the result and not the 
 operation. A lane leads to a raised gallery, with cane seats, where we 
 can sit and overlook the Garden, the Lion monument, a little building 
 made in the form of the Bernese Oberland, in which is shown a relief of 
 Switzerland, and a glass case containing rare relics of the lacustrine 
 cities, those we found in our long walks and frequent halts upon the shores 
 of Lake Neuchatel. All this within so small a space ! We advise our 
 American friends to visit the Glacier Garden of Lucerne, and if they have 
 not as pleasant recollections of this bright, little seaport town, it will cer- 
 tainly be because they do not go there under such lovely skies, in the 
 days when all nature seems golden and all the world at peace. 
 
 Another lake Zug another little town nestled under the mountains, 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Glacier Garden. 2. Lion of Lucerne. 
 
mM 
 
 LE MONUMENT A LUCERNE; 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. TO? 
 
 or hills rather, for the eminences seem considerably diminished, with 
 its old cemetery, where is one remaining tower of the old wall ; and then 
 another walk over the hills and by the side of Lake Zurich, surrounded 
 with villages and vineyards. Passing a workshop, whence the sounds of 
 labor issued, sounds of music struck the ear, a familiar strain, 
 
 "Where are the friends that to us were so dear, 
 Long, long ago, long ago ? " 
 
 We stood still. Where ! yes, where ! The broad Atlantic lies be- 
 tween us, the lands of foreign countries intervene, months, of the past 
 and months of the future lift up barriers of time. Is there anything else 
 between us and our friends ? We are just as near to those who have 
 crossed the dark river of death as we were in our native land. " What 
 a world of separation." 
 
 We have all seen many unequal matches in our intercourse with the 
 world, but in Switzerland and Germany we saw a greater number 
 in a certain time than ever before. On the highway was a large loaded 
 wagon drawn by one horse and two of the genus bos, which gave unmis- 
 takable evidence that they supplied man with the usual accompaniment 
 of the bread of natural life one by the side of the horse, the other 
 going before. We have seen a man, and also a woman, drawing with an 
 ox, and many a time with a dog. A man was tugging up the mountain, 
 with his wife upon one side and his little daughter upon the other ; but 
 let it be to his credit said, that he bore the weight of the burden. We 
 fear many are as unequally yoked in America. 
 
 Zurich offered attractions to the travelers sufficient to detain them 
 within their borders over a bright Sabbath day. Another glimpse, almost 
 a parting glimpse, of the beautiful, silvery Alps (we stop to gaze upon 
 them wherever we can, for soon they will lift their heads no more for us,) 
 the church where Zwingli preached, and the bow of William Tell, and 
 then we hasten to the Falls of the Rhine. Full of curiosity to see this 
 far-famed river, shall we be disappointed ? 
 
108 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 To an American the word " falls " suggests our own Niagara, and no 
 other is like unto it, a feeling somewhat akin to disappointment is liable 
 to take possession of the sight-seer. If such should be our lot, we could 
 not blame the weather-god, for he is still propitious unto us, still be- 
 stows most benignant glances and wears ever a pleasant face. Here we 
 stand, upon the banks of the Rhine, just at the point where it flows over 
 the jagged, uneven rocks, and sends out on all sides and at all times, 
 flecks of foam soft and white as the snow of winter. Upon the opposite 
 bank, too, is a chateau, the castle on the Rhine, which of course we ex- 
 pected to see, and which adds much to the picturesqueness of the scene. 
 Within the walls of this castle is the place to descend to the foot of the 
 falls, where one realizes more fully the beauty of the scene. It is indeed 
 beautiful, but the falls are only about half the depth of Niagara, and the 
 grandeur and sublimity of the deep high banks, the overhanging rocks, 
 and the immense breadth of fall are wanting. 
 
 A walk of two miles on the banks of the Rhine brought us to Schaff- 
 hausen, a curious, very old city, which dates from the eighth century. 
 Here we made ready for a sail on the Rhine, read about the famous cas- 
 tles on its banks, one occupied by Queen Hortense and that son since 
 so well known in the annals of France, another a prison for the reform- 
 ers John Huss and Jerome of Prague, and embarked with the early 
 dawn. A heavy fog overspead the town, but that was not strange at so 
 early an hour. We sat upon the deck and waited for it to clear away. 
 On we went, growing somewhat impatient, for our time was precious ; 
 but that did not drive away the fog. The sun came up and gilded the 
 mists a little, but they were too powerful to be dispersed, so we sailed on 
 oh how gloomily ! Soon the fog was so dense that the authorities deemed 
 it advisable to warn any coming vessel that we were upon the track, so 
 every few minutes a shrill wistle was sent forth, which did not quiet our 
 nerves in the least. Disappointment had a firm hold upon us, and we 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. ICQ 
 
 sailed into the harbor at Constance none the wiser for having been upon 
 the Rhine. The most tantalizing thing in the whole matter was that we 
 had been upon the land but a very short time when the sky and air were 
 bright and clear and beautiful. 
 
 When we landed at Constance, and with sachels and shawl-straps walked 
 confidently toward a hotel whose doors we were sure stood open for us, 
 of a sudden our ears were saluted with sounds that were altogether for- 
 eign, and we hastened forward paying no attention to them. Again they 
 were heard and louder than before ; yes, and from two different sources, 
 and gendarme number one followed by gendarme number two, rushed 
 out from a little office and followed after the sachels and shawl-straps and 
 the United States girls carrying them ; as if they thought Uncle Sam 
 was being smuggled into their dominions and would cause commotion 
 among the crowned heads, When we found that we were pursued we 
 turned calmly around and delivered up the offending articles, saying 
 " American." Charmed word ! In a moment smiles wreathed the faces 
 of the grim gendarmes and by motions they sent us on our way. We 
 soon found that we were in the land we read about in the history of the 
 Reformation, and Constance was interesting because the ashes of John 
 Huss are mingled with its soil. Here one hundred years before the time 
 of Luther, was this John the Baptist of the Reformation summoned to 
 appear and cohdemned to be burnt alive, which sentence was executed 
 after being imprisoned eighty-seven days. Just without the city an 
 immense rock stands upon the spot, and the delicate Swiss violets waft 
 the perfume of his holy life heavenward. 
 
 A dull sail on Lake Constance under leaden skies and a day's ride in 
 German land in a drizzling rain, and we stopped at midnight where 
 Luther came so prominently into notice more than three hundred years 
 ago, went into the old church Saint Oolerie, which still stands a monu- 
 ment to the brave reformer, and then continued our way. Convinced 
 
HO UNITED STATES GIRLS. 
 
 that we had finished our traveling, for a time at least, not a day too 
 soon, we gladly arrived at Munich, repeating the words of the poet, 
 
 " Wave, Munich ! all thy banners wave ! 
 
 and upon the banks of " Iser rolling rapidly " we took up our quarters to 
 live in Germany as the Germans live. 
 
MUNICH. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 S we entered the precincts of this city after the warmer 
 summer days had passed, even after that second summer 
 whose days are so uncertain that we know but little of their 
 beginning or their end, we could not expect balmy, pleasant 
 weather, and if we had should have been disappointed. 
 Rain and fog and gray and cold and bright followed each 
 other so persistently that we were led to examine the records of the 
 weather for years that are past " 17 clear days, 127 cloudy, 221 alter- 
 nate weather " we must have fallen upon the latter, although they tell 
 us there have been more bright days than ordinarily, and it has probably 
 been like our own autumn days after all. 
 
 This city lies upon very level ground, supposed to have been a sea- 
 basin, so far from the Bavarian Alps that only an occasional glimpse can 
 be obtained, and that a sure, forerunner of unpleasant weather. Munich 
 lies upon both sides of the river. We find upon examination as to the 
 origin of a city in this particular locality, that the land was owned by 
 Monks, and that the first settlement was called " Forum ad Monachos ;" 
 this was more than seven centuries ago, but Munich was not a capital 
 until a hundred years later. Ludwig the Severe was the first ruler, and 
 in the very midst of this large city still stands what was at that time 
 considered a very beautiful palace, built by the prince. It is closely sur- 
 rounded by modern buildings of an entirely different style, and yet it 
 
112 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 looks as though it would stand for centuries to come, if assailed only by 
 the hand of time. It is said to belong to the period of Duke Ludwig 
 the Severe. It bears on its walls the date of its erection and also the 
 name Alter Hof 's (old castle). It was an object of great interest to us 
 as it doubtless is to others. 
 
 Next to this castle in age are the towers of the old walls, erected 
 before the close of the same century. The principal one is the Iser 
 Thor, a fortified gate, consisting of three massive military towers. It is 
 adorned with frescoes representing the battle of Ampfing, fought with 
 the Austrians in 1322, and the escutcheons of the families who engaged 
 in this conflict are painted around the summit. After the battle, Ludwig 
 entered the town through this gate in triumph. There is talk at present 
 of removing this old landmark from the place it has so long occupied, 
 because it is a barrier to business and free circulation through the streets. 
 How can the people consent to have so picturesque a monument of past 
 ages taken from their sight forever ? Must everything yield to the rush 
 of business? Ludwig obtained the imperial crown of Germany in 1314, 
 and reigned more than half a century, and when he was killed in a bear 
 hunt, his remains were placed in the old Frauenkirche, although he had 
 been excommunicated. When a new church arose on the same spot, a 
 new monument of black marble was given to Ludwig, which is a promi- 
 nent object in the principal church of Munich, the new Frauenkirche or 
 Dome. 
 
 The entire house of Wittelsbach (the royal family of Bavaria) have 
 been distinguished for their love for Art and Science, and they have 
 caused to be reared many buildings which are still an honor to them- 
 selves and their city, and they have called to their court many men 
 whom the nation and the world delight to honor ; therefore Munich has 
 long been not only the capital of Bavaria, but also the capital of the 
 Fine Arts in South Germany, and her public buildings and parks show 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 
 
 the statues of her heroes and celebrated men all along from the time 
 of Albrecht V., of the sixteenth century, who collected the first cabinet 
 of art. Four Maximilians have been of this family, and the fourth 
 of this name assumed the dignity of King of Bavaria under the title 
 of Maximilian I. His son succeeded, in 1825, and was called Ludwig I., 
 the founder of new Munich. Under his administration the city, with its 
 narrow, angular streets, suddenly became extended and airy and light. 
 Immense palaces and buildings arose on all sides. As we descend one 
 of the principal streets, Brenner-Strasse, we come to the Konig's Platz 
 (King's Place) where are three buildings constructed by the influence 
 of Ludwig I., which take us back to Grecian antiquity. These three 
 buildings, the Propylaeon, the Glyptothek, and the Exhibition Building, 
 represent the three styles of Grecian architecture. 
 
 Ludwig placed his son Otto on the throne of Greece to deliver that 
 land from the Turks, and to keep the matter constantly before the Ger- 
 mans he reared these three buildings in their midst. Without knowing 
 aught of this fact, we felt as though we stood upon the soil of ancient 
 Athens. The Propylaeon stands over the street like a triumphal arch, 
 and foot passengers go between the twenty-eight massive columns in the 
 centre, while carriages pass upon either side. The Glyptothek, intended 
 for the reception of antique sculpture, is one story high, and instead 
 of windows has niches in which are placed, on one side, the statues 
 of the protectors of ancient art, and on the other two those of the middle 
 ages and the present time. We will not attempt to tell of the wonderful 
 collections within its fourteen rooms, collections made almost entirely 
 under the influence of Ludwig. 
 
 But the principal proofs of his industry and skill are seen in the Old 
 and the New Pinakothek, the former for the paintings of ancient mas- 
 ters, and the latter for modern paintings. All the different schools are 
 here represented in the fourteen hundred pictures. One entire room is 
 15 
 
114 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 filled with the works of Rubens the largest collection of his paintings. 
 The original "Beggar Boys" of Murillo is here, although copies are 
 found everywhere. The work of the hands of Michael Angelo, Raphael, 
 Titian, Tintoretto, Paul Veronese, and all others of renown, as well as 
 some whose names are not known, are upon the walls. The New Pina- 
 kothek is a very strange looking building, with no windows, being 
 lighted from above, and its outer walls covered with frescoes, as its inner 
 are with paintings of modern artists, many of whom are at present living 
 within this city. Nine hundred artists are among its residents. 
 
 These five wonderful buildings are only the beginning of the great labor 
 which Ludwig performed. The Wittelsbacher palace rose as a residence 
 for the heirs presumptive to the crown of Bavaria ; two large wings were 
 added to the royal palace ; also the Ruhmeshalle (Hall of Fame,) designed 
 for the busts of persons from all countries who have distinguished them- 
 selves by the work of hand or brain, of which ninety of life size are 
 already in their places, within this hall of horseshoe shape. But this 
 stands the largest casting in the world, the colossal statue of Bavaria, 
 modeled by Schwanthaler, whose bust occupies its niche in the hall near 
 by, and whose statues are everywhere to be seen in Munich. We went 
 into the head of the famous Bavaria, but did not come out of her locks, 
 as it is said twenty-six persons did on the day of her erection ; but we 
 sat upon the sofas up there, and looked through her eyes at the Bavarian 
 mountains and the country round about. The metal of this statue, of 
 which twelve hundred and eighty-four hundred-weight were used, was 
 from cannon captured in war. The Bavarian lion stands at her side. A 
 great deal more of such noble work might be mentioned as performed by 
 this king during the twenty-three years of his reign. But the end was 
 not so noble ; for some misconduct he was obliged to abdicate the throne 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Statue of Bavaria by Schwanthaler. 2. New Pinakothek Art Gallery. 
 3. Cemetery. 
 
* Pin*kothk. 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 1 15 
 
 in favor of his son Maximilian II., and Ludwig occupied the palace he 
 had caused to be reared for his heirs to the crown, before they had worn 
 it instead of afterwards. Maximilian II. reared for himself a noble mon- 
 ument in the " Bavaresches National Museum." He said of it in his 
 speech at the inauguration : " It is an honor and example to my people," 
 words engraven upon the frontispiece of the building. After Max II. 
 came Ludwig II. and time alone will tell whether he will make for him- 
 self such a record as did the first of the same name, his grandfather. 
 
 The in-comings and out-goings of the " Independent Three," from their 
 quarters on Schwanthaler strasse (very near the atelier and museum of 
 Ludwig von Schwanthaler who did so much for Munich before forty- 
 eight years of age when he died,) have been many. It would not be 
 strange if they had caught some of the spirit of art everywhere so man- 
 ifest, and they certainly will take across the ocean very pleasant recollec- 
 tions of artists, only two of whom they will take the liberty to mention. At 
 the studio of Prof. Kaulbach we were delighted with the man at his work. 
 More than seventy years of age, he still used the pencil and brush most 
 gracefully, most successfully ; and he bade fair to adorn many more 
 palaces and museums, as well as private parlors, with the work of his 
 hands, and also to adorn public and private places with a refined and gen- 
 tlemanly presence. We shall remember long his pleasant face, his genial 
 words, and his German Michael the picture on which he was engaged 
 at the time, representing the proud victories of the Germans over their 
 neighbors the French, by the well-known features of Napoleon III., and 
 his form lying prostrate under the steed of King William of Prussia. A 
 few months after, in the sunny lands which we had sought, we learned 
 with sorrow that he had laid down the brush and would paint no more, 
 for cholera, the dread disease, had struck him with the chill of death. 
 
 For a two fold reason we love to mention a second artist, Paul Weber, 
 who became the teacher of one of the three, and enabled her to carry 
 
Il6 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 back to her native land beautiful views of Germany, and, by frequent in- 
 vitation, he opened his home to the three without home and impressed 
 upon their minds indelible pictures of a pleasant family in the Father- 
 land. 
 
 Almost seven weeks in Miinchen, the capital pf Bavaria, each of our 
 number having her hours for one of the three separate branches of study 
 painting, music, and language and the remaining hours for a common 
 purpose, we varied the time by study and amusement We visited paint- 
 ing galleries too numerous to mention. In the public library, which is 
 second only to that of Paris, and which contains 800,000 volumes, we 
 saw Luther's Bible containing his and Melancthon's portraits, and the 
 gospels written in gold and silver vellum, of the ninth century, beside 
 many other interesting relics. We saw one custom carried out in this city 
 which we never heard of elsewhere. As soon as Death claims a victim, 
 the body is removed to a common receptacle, where it is prepared for the 
 tomb, and lies exposed to the common gaze for a couple of days, in large 
 rooms with glass fronts. With strange feelings we walked before these 
 rooms for the dead, and saw all ages waiting for burial ; there were sev- 
 eral babes with sweet innocence on the face, there was childhood with the 
 labor of life cut short, there was middle age with the furrows of care, and 
 old age with the marks of distress or peace, according as Time had been 
 cruel or kind ; but all were covered with beautiful flowers, and the impres- 
 sion of disease and death as far removed as possible. We could but be 
 glad we lived in a land where we could keep our loved till the earth 
 covered them, and then look above for their home in the skies. 
 
 It did not seem to be the season of the year to learn to love lager beer, 
 and besides it might be conducive to cholera for those unaccustomed to 
 it, so the trio allowed others to carry the stone mugs filled to the brim 
 and foaming with the loved beverage, and they took instead the coffee, 
 almost equally loved by this people. Everybody knows that the coffee- 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 1 1/ 
 
 houses are an important institution in Deutschland, but they can hardly 
 realize how important till they have dwelt there for a time. They are 
 the resorts of all classes and ranks and professions, at all times of the 
 day and night ; they are everywhere to be seen, inviting the hungry, 
 calling the thirsty, tempting the laborer, and offering food and drink to 
 all as economically as they could prepare them by their own fires. We 
 are told that many laboring men and women set no table at home, but go 
 always to the public cafes and restaurants, and that many of the servant 
 girls receive daily their six kreutzers (four cents) with which they get 
 their evening bread (abendsbrod) and beer or coffee. We see on the 
 streets men and women working together, doing the same kind of labor, 
 and upon inquiry as to the children, we learn that they are taken in the 
 morning to a Retreat, where they receive care through the day and a 
 dish of soup at noon, for a few kreutzers. It is very interesting to 
 observe the way the people get their daily bread, and the great variety 
 there is of this article of food. No one prepares it at home, but every 
 one can be accommodated and supplied with what suits his individual 
 taste. At certain hours of the day almost everybody is carrying in their 
 hand or in a basket bread as- though it were a baby. There is every 
 shade of color and every quality of the material used. There is milk 
 bread, egg bread, little horns, little snakes, braids, all-souls' bread, seamed 
 bread, emperor seamed bread, caraway, coriander and salt seamed bread, 
 (all these kinds very white ; ) then there is mason's bread, Romish bread, 
 little black loaves and long black loaves, (the ones we see in the army so 
 much ; ) these and many other varieties are made of flour ; there is 
 besides a dried-pear bread, made of dried fruits and nuts chopped and 
 baked ; and, to end with, Johannes bread, which is not bread at all, but 
 beans, pods and all, sweet and nutritious. And every variety of this 
 bread is good, very good, just as good as if made at their own firesides. 
 There is certainly no trouble in finding enough to eat in Munich, if one 
 
Jl8 UNITED STATES GIRLS. 
 
 avails himself of what is offered, and that too without making use of the 
 national dishes, which are so seasoned and compounded that it takes 
 time to learn to eat them. 
 
 Toward the end of November the threatening skies and cutting winds 
 of Munich warned us out in search of warmer skies and milder breezes ; 
 so, on a genuine Autumn day, we again took up the line of march. 
 Storm and rain, unaccommodating though they usually are, gave a fare- 
 well view of familiar peaks and towers, (Frauenkirche, Pinacothek and 
 Glyptothek, Bavaria with the lion at her side and the uplifted wreath in 
 her hand,) by taking a semicircle about the city, and we said good-bye 
 to the Queen of Art. 
 
INNSPRUCK. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 N the boundary line between Bavaria and Tyrol (Germany 
 and Austria) was an extensive fortification, which conclu- 
 sively showed that these countries intend to be separate 
 divisions, and are prepared for war as well as peace. Bag- 
 gage was ordered up for examination, but the sachels and 
 shawl-straps again walked through unobserved and unexam- 
 ined, and that night we slept in the capital of Tyrol. The first beams 
 of the morning sun bade us prepare for a lovely day, and with alacrity we 
 obeyed. As soon as possible we were in the streets of Innspruck. 
 Many times before during this trip of ours had we greeted snow-clad 
 peaks in the distant horizon, lighted up by the morning sun, but never 
 had we seen a city entirely encircled by them a wall of snow and rock 
 reaching apparently to the dome of heaven, in reality from six to ten 
 thousand feet in height. A lace-work of silvery snow ornamented all 
 these peaks, which contrasted most beautifully with the bright blue 
 of the sky above and the sombre brown of the rocks below. The sun 
 rose majestically over the scene and was clearly reflected in the waters 
 of the Inn and the Sill, coming together just beyond the outskirts of the 
 city. 
 
 Art, too, has assisted in making this place interesting. In the old 
 Hof kirche, a church of the Franciscans, is one of the most splendid 
 
120 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 monuments in Europe the tomb of Maximilian I. It occupies the 
 centre of the church, is surmounted by a bronze statue of life size, and 
 has twenty-four marble reliefs on the four sides representing the principal 
 events in the life of this emperor. Twenty-four grim skeletons in armor 
 stand in file on both sides like spectres of the past. Within this same 
 church is the bust of Andreas Hofer, the William Tell of Tyrol, who 
 met an end so unworthy of his bravery and patriotism. This monument 
 perpetuates the memory of the Tyrolese patriot, but the bridge over the 
 Inn, where the invading Bavarians were repulsed, and the Isal Berg, 
 where the French were also driven back, are still more enduring monu- 
 ments, and the hearts of his countrymen bear loving records which the 
 hand of time can not efface nor the advancing ages crumble away. 
 
 One of the sunniest days of the year was that spent at Innspruck, 
 and the pale new moon again looked upon us as we stood high above the 
 city and came slowly down again from the mountain's side. 
 
 Thanksgiving Day in America where were the wandering Three ? 
 Not in the circles where they were wont to be ; not in the homes where 
 they love to be. Did friends speak kindly of the absent ones ? wish 
 they could taste the dishes so fondly relished in other days, and hope 
 that next Thanksgiving they would occupy their accustomed seats ? 
 Going over the Brenner Pass ! Well wrapped in cloak and shawl, we 
 entered the car, where was spoken German, French, Italian, and the 
 English which the Three carried on entirely between themselves. It 
 seemed somewhat like a new edition of Babel. The only artificial heat 
 received was from long flat pipes filled with hot water and placed upon 
 the floor for the feet, which we found very serviceable. We started under 
 clouds too, for the sunshine of the previous day did not extend quite far 
 enough ; but we did not forget to be thankful for the sunny skies of every 
 land, from northern Scotia to the borders of Italy. 
 
 The first few moments took us through a tunnel out upon the borders 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 121 
 
 of the Sill, which we followed for hours, up, up, to its very source, 
 through tunnel after tunnel ; for although we were going over the 
 mountain pass, we could not go over all the peaks in the route. When 
 we started the snow fringed the mountains above, but soon it covered 
 the earth all about us, and everything seemed held in the icy hands 
 of Winter. So complete was the change that we almost imagined some 
 fairy's wand had waved over the scene, and all had been turned to silver. 
 Threads of silver hung from the dark rocks, umbrellas of silver were 
 spread over the sombre evergreens, silver carpets covered the ground, 
 and silver clouds overspread the heavens. 
 
 With surprise we saw great numbers of houses everywhere, by the 
 side of the railroad, on the highway, which during the entire route, lay 
 in sight sometimes just with it upon a narrow space hewn in the perpen- 
 dicular rock, on the mountain side, where it seemed that no foot could 
 scale, and stranger than all, immense castles looked down from many a 
 peak and seemed to bid defiance to invading hosts. We looked for cas- 
 tles on the Rhine, but saw them on the Brenner Pass. It was often 
 difficult, however, to distinguish the pinnacles and peaks, the turrets and 
 towers made by the hand of man, from those reared by the Master Archi- 
 tect ; both make the traveler feel that he is passing beneath strongholds 
 which time and force can hardly suffice to destroy, especially when the 
 brave hearts of the Tyrolese, men and women too, are devoted wholly to 
 the defence of the green mountains of the Tyrol. We passed near the 
 spot where Andreas Hofer, with his small band of Bavarians, rolled the 
 huge rocks upon the invading army, and rid their country of the foreign 
 foe. Brenner, the highest point on this route, is 4,604 feet, the highest 
 railroad in the world ; and here the Eisenach issues from a little spring 
 and commences its course toward the sunny plains of Italy, while on the 
 other side of the street the Sill leaps over the rocks and hastens on to 
 Austrian shores. Before we were fully aware that the descent had com- 
 16 
 
122 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 menced, the winter of a day had passed and gone, the snow, where was 
 it ? Transient and passing away like a dream. But the spring was yet 
 too young to put on her robe of green, she must bide her time in the 
 nakedness of winter and store up strength for the seedtime and harvest, 
 which will surely come. Bare and brown the trees extended their arms 
 to. the sun in the numerous chestnut groves; the mulberries, making 
 ready for the food of the silkworm, that they may labor the coming sum- 
 mer for the lords and ladies of all lands ; and the vines, climbing, cling- 
 ing everywhere, and with all their little mouths sucking the sap to supply 
 the luscious grape for the wine-press of man. Still the snow peaks were 
 lowering in all directions, and every few minutes we stood at the window 
 and gazed upon them, yes, bade them an affectionate farewell for fear 
 they would be things of the past when we looked again. 
 
 At Botzen we waited for the light of another day to usher us into the 
 realms of fair Italia, and were fully compensated. Great would have 
 been the disappointment if the skies had not been propitious unto us. A 
 brighter sun could scarcely shine upon travelers the last of November. 
 Everything appeared to the best advantage ; the red porphyry cliffs were 
 brilliant, the old castle occupied by Dante in 1318, was illuminated by 
 sunshine, even the marks of desolation made by the landslide which 
 destroyed a city centuries ago, leaving only the stones to tell the tale, 
 and the pen of the poet in Dante's Inferno these were brought out in 
 terrible distinctness. 
 
 As we came to the borders of the sunny land, the artificial heat was 
 removed from the cars, the cold winds were left in the mountains, the 
 skies threatened no more to send down snow and hail we had found 
 what we sought and went on our way rejoicing. Here a new difficulty 
 arose ; several times we addressed a fellow-passenger or conductor upon 
 some important item, and in reply received only soft, musical, flowery 
 sounds, sweet to the ear but unsatisfactory to the sense. English, French, 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 123 
 
 German, all elicited the same reply. Italian must be examined, so with 
 Badikers Conversationbuch we walk the streets of Italy, and by the way 
 we would like to inform our many young friends that the study of the 
 old dead languages, which they sometimes consider such a useless bore, 
 is a sure, solid foundation for those with which they will come in contact 
 on the European continent, and on the American also. Passing a fruit 
 stand one day we observed a kind of fruit which was new to us ; our 
 look of enquiry was answered by " Apfelgranita." The course of reason- 
 ing was this : the German word " apfel " means apple, the Latin pomus 
 means the same, making the substitution, the fruit must be " pome- 
 granite," so we ate the angular crimson-seeded apple, as we have done 
 many others since. Latin helped us out of that difficulty as it continues 
 to do very frequently. 
 
 At the gates of Verona, and still the Alps stand by us, somewhat dim 
 to be sure, but there nevertheless, white, picturesque, grand, majestic. 
 Oh ! what a pleasure they have been unto us, and their image, we trust, 
 is engraved indelibly upon memory's page, and we shall turn to it often 
 in coming days, and in imagination cross the glaciers, scale the peaks, 
 tread the passes, and sleep in the green valleys of those beautiful moun- 
 tains. 
 
 Now we are in the region of wars, ancient and modern, as the strong 
 walls of the city we approach, would clearly prove. Fragments of walls 
 we have seen in many places, but a city entirely encircled by them, in 
 good repair, guarded and garrisoned, and ready for service, not until we 
 reached Verona, in the northern part of Italy. The iron horse is not 
 allowed within these walls ; so, seated in the omnibus, we passed through 
 the heavy gate, and a man in uniform took the liberty to put his head 
 almost in at the window and cast a scrutinizing glance at Uncle Sam's 
 three daughters. We felt almost that we were suspected, watched, and 
 we certainly had a stifled feeling ; the walls were too close, and in fancy 
 
124 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 we lived through some of the terrible sieges which the city, so near the 
 dividing line between the two countries, has experienced. We heard the 
 cannon thundering at the gates, and we shivered with fear as we imag- 
 ined ourselves shut in by warlike hosts. But we were soon assured that 
 peace reigned, and in security we walked the streets of this very old city, 
 crossed and recrossed the Adige, and looked with intense interest upon 
 the labor of centuries so long passed away. 
 
 First of all the old, old amphitheatre, so old that history fails to record 
 with certainty its origin, claimed attention. With wonder and curiosity 
 we walked around this interesting work of the ancient Romans, which in 
 size ranks next the Colosseum, and which has withstood the shocks of 
 time even better than the structure of the same kind at Rome. But it 
 could not withstand the shocks of the earthquake ; its huge walls were 
 shaken so that only four of the twenty-two arches rise in their places to 
 show what they were. We went to the topmost one of the forty rows of 
 seats, and tried to imagine the twenty-five thousand descendants of Rom- 
 ulus rejoicing over the contests of men and beasts. Had we not fallen 
 asleep over Livy, or Virgil, or Cicero as we prepared the lessons for 
 Cortland Academy, and should we not soon find that the arena was what 
 it had been so many years a story and a dream ? But day after day it 
 continued to raise its blackened walls on the Piazza del Bra, and to face 
 the old gate which has been standing sixteen hundred years, and which 
 presents a double arch-way over the broad Corso Victor Emanuel ; so the 
 past and the present join hands in this land of the East. 
 
 When we extended our walks through the narrow streets and came 
 suddenly upon the Piazza, del Erbe, we could not with certainty say upon 
 what times we had fallen, past or present, ancient or modern, barbarous 
 or civilized, the abode of the living or the dead ; here were indications of 
 all times and of all kinds most elegant palaces of marble blackened by 
 age, but ornamented by art, statues of Catallus, Cornelius Nepos, Pliny 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 12$ 
 
 the elder, and others of the loved sons of Verona, frescoes upon the outer 
 walls, the column which once was proud enough to bear the famous Libra 
 of St. Mark, the statue of Verona over the fountain, the tribune in the 
 center from which criminals once received their sentence, and beside 
 all these, cabbages, potatoes, apples, oranges, pomegranates, in short, a 
 modern market place in the ancient forum of the Republic all the way 
 from the sublime to the ridiculous. And close at hand in the public 
 streets, above the heads of the living, were the sarcophagi of the illus- 
 trious dead, the princely monuments of a family of princes the Scaligeri. 
 
 Verona claims the honor of being the birth-place of one of the three 
 celebrated painters of this vicinity whose works adorn church and palace 
 everywhere in this land Paul Cagliari, better known as Paul Veronese. 
 
 Again, as fast as steam will bear us, we go toward the shores of the 
 sea. Time, too, is hurrying us away, and as the mountains rise in the 
 distance, dim and shadowy, still suggestive of untold grandeur, fast going 
 out of sight, so the days and the months of 1873 glide into the past, and 
 soon their memory only will light up the journey of life. 
 
VENICE. 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 LL brides are lovely, and all queens are beautiful, but where 
 shall the words be found with which to describe the Bride of 
 the Sea, the Queen of the Adriatic ! The orator should be 
 golden-mouthed, the writer should dip his pen in sunset hues, 
 the reader should look with the eyes of bright fancy even 
 then Venice would not appear in a robe which is not her own. 
 The presentation took place in the last days of the year, when hearts 
 were softened by passing time, minds were brightened by imagination's 
 touch, the senses were enkindled by the fires of memory, and the whole 
 being was alive to beauty and art. It was just at the sunset hour that 
 we entered the realms of fair Venice. Never did gossamer and pearl 
 more fittingly adorn bridal tresses ; never did diamond glitter with more 
 brilliant lustre in the bridal veil ; never was the face of youth and beauty 
 more brightly illuminated at. the bridal altar, than the Italian skies on 
 that eve of the declining year, by the rays of the setting sun. The colors 
 of the rainbow encircled the horizon, shading from crimson through gold 
 and green, and the bow was set with many a gem of light, such as earth 
 fails to produce. All the brilliancy of color and light was repeated and 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. General view of the Islands with the Grand Canal passing between them 
 at the left. 2. Cathedral of St. Mark. 3. Square of St. Mark's, the column bearing the Lion of 
 St. Mark and the Statue of St. Theodore ; Palace of the Doges at the right 5 Palace of Victor 
 Emanuel at the left ; Clock Tower in front. The Campanile Bell-Tower. 
 
, >: :!* 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. I2/ 
 
 multiplied over and over again in the face of the waters, and the rays 
 glimmered and danced and glided along as if hunting up each drop of the 
 sea. There was not one cloud over this bright scene, and the feeling of 
 the heart was, " See Venice and live." 
 
 Escorted by a polite French conductor, the sachels and shawl-straps 
 were introduced to a German gondolier and the Three went out upon the 
 streets of Venice. We made our entree at the witching hour of twilight, 
 and our first experience in a gondola was under a full, bright moon. 
 Seated in this black carriage upon the waters, we passed swiftly along, 
 feeling that we were attending our own funeral, so weird and ghost-like 
 everything seemed ; on the borders of the Grand Canal the palaces of the 
 past looked grim in their grandeur, around the walls on the lesser streams, 
 the man in the moon played bo-peep until we were sure we were being 
 spirited away ; and rubbing along between walls so high and gloomy, that 
 we felt as if looking out of a deep well, we were convinced that we were 
 being taken to that Bridge of Sighs, so fatally crossed in the days of yore. 
 But this was only a moonlight view of the strangest of cities. 
 
 In and out, under and around, through and between, in all sorts of 
 places, we entered finally a broad, open harbor, where the dreams of 
 Venice were all realized. How could the human imagination draw a 
 fairer picture ? On every side out of the water the palaces of Princes, 
 the spires of cathedrals, the domes of churches, the museums of art rose 
 in the misty moonlight, and the Lion of St. Mark guarded them all. We 
 anchored before an inviting home for wanderers, were welcomed by a 
 genial German face, and slept as soundly as though we were not upon 
 the borders of the uncertain deep. 
 
 The morning dawned as the day had waned, roseate and golden, and 
 like charity, increased its own wealth by dispensing its gifts to everything 
 around. Will our friends, one and all, accompany us on a tour of explo- 
 ration, and observation a tour of two weeks and a half in length ? No 
 
128 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 shorter time will suffice ; so every morning be prepared to commence 
 almost with the sun, and stop not until his course is done. We started 
 from an appropriately named hotel (Aurora) which faces the open sea, 
 and the broad sun, too, rejoicing three of its inmates, at least, with bright 
 light and pure air. You know full well that the domains of Venetia rise 
 out of the Adriatic, not all together, but in one hundred and seventeen dis- 
 tinct parts, and that her lord, the sea, encircles them with loving embrace, 
 which for centuries has not relaxed or grown cold. It is necessary for us 
 thus early to make the acquaintance of our queen's consort, for we shall 
 want many favors at his hands, and shall often avail ourselves of the skill 
 and knowledge of his servants in visiting points of interest. Our first view, 
 on this first morning, is of this same old sea, holding in his hands the 
 wealth of his bride, and the flags of all nations wave proudly above him. 
 We go out upon the street and walk over the broad pavement of the Riva 
 del Schiavoin, crossing three of the three hundred and sixpontes, over three 
 of the one hundred and forty-six canals, all of which will become familiar 
 to us. Here begins our acquaintance with Venetian life, superficial per- 
 haps, and common, but such as we meet everywhere in these streets. 
 People of all countries come face to face with us. The dress of all nations 
 is displayed here, and the accents of all lands break upon the ear one 
 more familiar than all the rest often brings the Three to a halt on their 
 march and sends an enduring glance out after the one whose tongue de- 
 clares him of kindred birth. 
 
 But we have now come to a point where we must stand still and gaze 
 gaze and admire admire and wonder. It is not strange that this 
 people say : " One Venice, one Sun, and one Piazza San Marco." The 
 state entrance from the sea, where Cardinals and Doges and Kings are 
 landed and many common people too is between two granite col- 
 umns, one bearing the Lion of St. Mark, the other the statue of St. 
 Theodore, the former patron saint of the city ; and this is the entrance 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 1 29 
 
 also to that famous piazza which ranks so high not only in the opinion of 
 the Venetians but also in the judgment of all who look upon it. Nearly 
 six hundred by three hundred feet in extent, paved with stones as smooth 
 as our floors, surrounded by sumptuous palaces, ancient and modern, 
 adorned with the work of all ages, in marble and painting, who can esti- 
 mate the beauty and life and interest that center here ? In the arcades 
 which encircle it upon three sides, are the beautiful productions of this 
 country in glass-work, corals, jewelry, and everything ornamental and 
 gorgeous ; on the fourth that palace so famous in the history of Venice, 
 the Palace of the Doges, and the cathedral of St. Mark, equally renowned 
 for its age, and grandeur, and relics, and for its famous horses, which 
 have traveled from Rome to Constantinople, to Venice, to Paris, then 
 back again to Venice. High above all this towers the Campanile, which 
 Napoleon I. ascended on horseback when he conquered Venice. 
 
 And everywhere in this bright scene are the gentle, graceful doves, 
 hovering, fluttering, alighting, their plumage variegated in the rays of 
 the sun, purple, crimson and green, the pure white beneath their wings 
 showing only when they soar aloft, reminding one of angels in beautiful 
 disguise ; when the whole flock, almost innumerable, take a sudden 
 fright and all together rise in the regions of air, we seem to look up into 
 starry regions, but they soon become falling stars, and settle again in our 
 midst, again putting on the robes of earth. These doves are the prop- 
 erty of the city, protected by its laws and fed on its bounty ; and every 
 day at two o'clock their dinner bell is rung and a sumptuous repast is 
 served at the hands of one appointed for the task, assisted by numerous 
 little boys and girls, provided with their soldi of corn. They are consid- 
 ered as guardians of the city, their presence giving promise that it will 
 not be swallowed up by the sea, and they are said to join in the religious 
 observances by flying daily three times around the city in token of the 
 Trinity. 
 17 
 
I3O UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 As we have walked through the Piazza San Marco one after another of 
 these December days, in the midst of the scenes we have described, the 
 sun shining with a clear bright light, the band playing lively Italian airs, 
 the people sitting at the tables in the open place sipping their coffee, and 
 the flower girls presenting their bouquets, we could but ask, how is it at 
 Syracuse ? Pardon us for being thus tantilizers, in drawing comparisons, 
 but for one winter, at least, give us Venice. 
 
 We are not going to take much time and space to tell about the Church 
 of St. Mark, with its forty thousand square feet of mosaics, some of them 
 dating from the eleventh century ; its six hundred columns, many of 
 them bearing capitals brought from the church at Jerusalem ; its two spi- 
 ral translucent columns of alabaster from the temple of Solomon ; the 
 stone on which Christ stood when he preached to the inhabitants of 
 Tyre ; the one on which John the Baptist was beheaded ; the relics of 
 St. Mark, said to have been stolen from Alexandria and brought to Ven- 
 ice ; we are not going to tell of these, nor of the floor of white and 
 colored marble, agate, porphyry, iapis-lazuli and malachite beautifully 
 arranged, but so disturbed by the tread of feet and lapse of ages, that 
 one feels as though walking on uneven ground ; nor scarcely a word 
 about the lack of windows and the consequent gloomy appearance of 
 this church, for it is the famous cathedral of St. Mark. 
 
 We shall not say much about a structure perhaps equally interesting 
 to readers and sight-seers, the Palace of the Doges, whose majestic and 
 magnificent walls of red and white marble once seen can never be for- 
 gotten the Hall of the Upper Council, one of the finest rooms in 
 Europe, a suitable place of meeting for those whose names were written 
 in the Golden Book of the Republic ; the Hall of Scrutiny, for the forty- 
 two noblemen who appointed the Doge ; the Hall of Inquisition, whose 
 ten chairs still occupy their places, stiff and stern, though their occupants 
 have long since passed to their reward ; and the Hall of the " Fearful 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. I3 1 
 
 Three," around which dark memories hover that send shivering sighs 
 through the form of the beholder, in vain sympathy for those who, 
 centuries ago, appeared before this cruel tribunal. Just one word about 
 the Doge's letter-box, the Lion's Mouth, which gaped so many centuries 
 to receive its victims and send them with certainty over that fatal bridge 
 whose end was death. It is there yet, open, but harmless ; it bites not, 
 for the teeth are gone. We crossed that bridge from the palace to the 
 prison, looked into the rayless rooms where the condemned slept without 
 a bed, saw the horrid preparations for disposing of the victims who stood 
 in the way of ruler or accuser, and went back rejoicing that our home 
 was in free America, our government an independent republic. This 
 Ducal Palace and this Bridge of Sighs have been the theme of many a 
 poet and novelist, and Byron and Dickens describe them in language all 
 chaste and glowing. 
 
 Do not think that one day's sun is all that is necessary for that Piazza 
 St. Mark, which is one of the finest promenades in the world ; that 
 Cathedral of St. Mark, which was consecrated in the year mi, but 
 which has been adorned and beautified through all the intervening cen- 
 turies, until it is filled and weighed down with the works of art and 
 genius, the precious productions of Mother Nature and the wonders 
 of the world ; that Palace of the Doges, which Dickens says is more 
 beautiful in its old age than all the buildings of the earth in the prime 
 and fulness of their youth ; the palace of the reigning King of United 
 Italy, Victor Emanuel, which he keeps in readiness but never occupies 
 the palace of the present face to face with the palace of the past ; the 
 Campanile, the highest monument in Venice, which is ascended by an 
 inclined plane, having one step at each angle as you go around and 
 around up to the summit, and there look out upon one of the finest 
 views in the world distant, snow-capped mountain peaks, blue and 
 misty realms on the face of the deep, and a city which belongs to both 
 
132 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 land and sea ; the three standard poles which bore the flags oi the con- 
 quered countries, Cyprus, Candia and Morea, when Venice was in her 
 glory, the queen of many realms, but which now support the flags of the 
 Italian nation ; no ! day after day we pass through this glorious place, 
 and every day adds to its glory, until our eyes are dazzled and our senses 
 bewildered. 
 
 " A vision rises out of the earth, and all the great square seems to 
 have opened from it in a kind of awe, that we may see it far away ; a 
 multitude of pillars and white domes, clustered into a long low pyramid 
 of colored light ; a treasure-heap, it seems, partly of gold and partly 
 of opal and mother-of-pearl, hollowed beneath into five great vaulted 
 porches, ceiled with fair mosaic, and beset with sculpture of alabaster, 
 clear as amber and delicate as ivory. And round the walls of the porches 
 there are set pillars of variegated stones, jasper, and porphyry, and deep- 
 green serpentine spotted with flakes of snow, and marbles that half refuse 
 and half yield to the sunshine, Cleopatra-like, ' their bluest veins to kiss ' 
 the shadow as it steals back from them revealing line after line 
 of azure undulation as a receding tide leaves the waved sand a confu- 
 sion of delight, amidst which the breasts of the Greek horses are seen 
 blazing in their breadth of golden strength, and the St. Mark's Lion, 
 lifted on a blue field covered with stars, until at last, as if in ecstacy, the 
 crests of the arches break into a marble foam and toss themselves far 
 into the blue sky in flashes and wreaths of sculptured spray, as if the 
 breakers on the Lido shore had been frost-bound before they fell, and 
 the sea-nymphs had inlaid them with coral and amethyst. The St. 
 Mark's porches are full of doves, that nestle among the marble foliage 
 and mingle the soft iridescence of their living plumes, changing at every 
 motion, with the tints, hardly less lovely, that have stood unchanged for 
 seven hundred years." 
 
 Dr. Fish says : "The story of the doves is that at the siege of Can- 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 133 
 
 dia, in the thirteenth century, Admiral Dandolo had intelligence brought 
 to him by carrier-pigeons which helped him to take the island, and that 
 he used the same swift-winged heralds to send the news to Venice. 
 From that day to this they have been protected, and thus they have 
 been the pets of Venice for six hundred years." 
 
 We have traversed but a very small part of this city on the water, 
 which extends about two miles from east to west, and three-quarters of a 
 mile from north to south, having gone very little beyond this central 
 point ; but we will now extend our perambulations and walk through the 
 Merceria, where the ladies go " shopping," the Broadway of this city, (it 
 is hardly broad enough for three people to walk side by side in many 
 places.) After turns and encounters numberless with the many going in 
 an opposite direction, we come to the famous Rialto bridge which extends 
 over the Grand Canal. Here we shall pause and consider the locality. 
 The word Rialto (Riva Alto) means High Shore, and it was the name 
 given to the central island, the oldest part of Venice. Near by we see 
 the oldest church in Venice, founded in 421, and we look with curiosity 
 upon the porch of Greek marble, which is about all that is left of the 
 original building. From the Rialto bridge we look up and down the 
 Grand Canal, the thoroughfare of the city, upon the blue sky, but a small 
 part of which we have been able to see on our walk, and upon the busy 
 scenes of commerce which continue to be enacted here as they were in 
 the days of old. We remember that Shakspeare speaks of the merchants 
 of the Rialto, but it was not to the bridge but the island that he alluded. 
 
 The Canalazzo, or Grand Canal, is from thirty to sixty yards wide, like 
 the letter S, and nearly two miles long, the largest part on the north- 
 east. The Grand Rialto is a high arch, with one central and two side 
 flights of stairs, separated by a row of twelve shops on each side. 
 
 Byron says, 
 
 " Didst ever see a gondola ? For fear 
 
 You should not I'll describe it you exactly ; 
 
134 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 'Tis a long covered boat that 'B common here, 
 Carved at the prow, built lightly but compactly. 
 
 Rowed by two rowers, each called gondolier, 
 It glides along the water looking blackly, 
 
 Just like a coffin clapped in a canoe, 
 
 Where none can make out what you say or do. 
 
 " And up and down the long canals they go, 
 
 And under the Rialto shoot along, 
 By night and day. all paces, swift or slow ; 
 
 And round the theatres, a sable throng, 
 They wait in their dusky livery of woe ; 
 
 But not to them do woful things belong, 
 For sometimes they contain a deal of fun, 
 Like mourning coaches when the funeral 's done." 
 
 Through the one hundred and forty-nine canals, under the three hun- 
 dred and six arched bridges of marble, the gondolas glide, and the cries, 
 "Stall!" (to the right) and "Premi!" (to the left) come like songs to 
 the ear, to warn those approaching of the danger of collision. We are 
 upon the briny waters of the deep, that come and go with the tides 
 of ocean through the narrow passages walled in by palaces, the difference 
 between the lowest and highest tides being six feet three inches, and the 
 average difference from two to three feet. 
 
 One of the peculiar institutions of this peculiar city is the water- 
 carrier, who, with two brass buckets across her shoulder, (from which a 
 little ragged urchin might steal a drink,) goes to the open square and 
 fills them from the artesian wells with water brought from under the sea. 
 
 We did not forget the Bridge of Sighs, (Ponte del Sospiri,) which 
 Byron tells us in " Childe Harold " was " a corridor divided by partitions 
 into two narrow halls, one for political prisoners, the other for common 
 criminals. Two tiers of dungeons, ten in each, the only furniture a pillow 
 of stone, two feet long, fifteen inches wide, four inches high. The pris- 
 oner, when taken out to die, was conducted across the gallery to the 
 other side, and then being led back into the other compartment of the 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. The Rialto Bridge over the Grand Canal. 2. Bridge of Sighs. 3. Water 
 carriers. 
 
PONTE DI RIAL TO 
 
 POJS'TE DEI SOSP1R1 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 135 
 
 bridge, was strangled. The portal is now walled up, but the passage is 
 called the Bridge of Sighs. Scarcely a ray of light glimmers into the 
 narrow gallery which leads to the cells, and the places of confinement 
 are totally dark. A small hole in the wall admitted the damp air of the 
 passages, and served for the introduction of the prisoner's food. The 
 cells are about five paces in length, two and a half in width, and seven 
 in height." With candle in hand we followed the guide through all 
 these dismal scenes, and we felt that the name was rightly given. 
 
 So we went day after day in different directions, until we had passed 
 over the limits of the city, and visited very many of its ninety churches, 
 remembering especially the ones which contained the tombs of the three 
 most celebrated Venetian painters Titian, Tintoretto and Paul Vero- 
 nese. This city and this country is full of their works, and the land still 
 rings with their praises. The tomb of Titian is decorated with a beau- 
 tiful bas relief of his finest painting, the Assumption, and in the Hall 
 of Fine Arts we see his first painting at fourteen years of age, his best 
 at middle life, and his last at ninety-nine. Surely time and strength 
 were given unto genius, and the three wrought a glorious work. In the 
 same church with the tomb of Titian is the curious one of the sculptor 
 Canova, modeled by himself, a procession of the Arts following one 
 of their number to the tomb, the Lion of St. Mark looking on with 
 sadness. 
 
 During all the eighteen days that we were in the realms of fair Venetia 
 continued sunshine brightened the face of our queen pure, unalloyed 
 sunshine, except in a single instance of a few hours, when the clouds 
 encircled her brow ; but they so soon passed away that they scarcely 
 made an impression. Only one thing marred the pleasantness of our 
 stay, and that was the constant applications on every hand for the admin- 
 istration of charity. The words we could not understand, but who could 
 mistake the looks and gestures ? No matter how exquisite the work 
 
136 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 of art we were contemplating, how grand the structure we looked upon, 
 how lovely the skies at the sunset hour, or how fervent the prayer within 
 the church walls, everything was interrupted by the meagre hand, the 
 pleading eyes and the wailing tones of all ages. It was terrible ; and 
 we must recommend the Queen of the Adriatic and the King of United 
 Italy to devise some means by which the land shall be rid of this dreadful 
 scourge of beggars. 
 
 Venice is amphibious a mermaid or sea-nymph. The lower part is 
 a fish, but above the form is human. Like Venus, it sprang up self-crea- 
 tive from the froth of the sea. The Veneti took refuge from Attila in 
 these islands of the sea and began to build a city after the Roman empire 
 had fallen. It was married to the sea every year, but the cunning Vene- 
 tians instead of wasting their treasures dropped the glittering bauble into 
 a net carefully spread for the purpose, in which it was fished up to be 
 used in the ceremonies of successive years. The ring was of gold and 
 gems as large as one of those huge door-knockers that in former days 
 gave dignity to the portals of great mansions. 
 
 There must always be something sad connected with our recollection 
 of every place ; so in Venice there was a picture which left its impress 
 upon our mind the parting of the Doge Marino Faliero with his heart- 
 broken wife when he went forth to be beheaded a traitor and in that 
 palace of pictures, in the midst of the 122 Doges, we remember the 
 frame that was without a Doge, only the bare board to look upon, not 
 even a name. 
 
 Three delightful weeks in Venesia's 117 islands (three large and one 
 hundred and fourteen small ones), and it seems that almost every inch of 
 Russ pavement in her 2,194 streets from six to twenty-five feet wide, of 
 her 297 squares, of her 387 bridges, and her entire circuit of seven miles, 
 all this, or nearly all, must have been wandered and wondered over by 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Horses of St. Mark. 2. Titian. 3. Tomb of Canova. 4. Tomb of Titian. 
 

ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 137 
 
 the Three. (The strangest sight we saw in that locality was one horse.) 
 We have said it was continued sunshine in Venice, and so it was ; but at 
 the parting hour, when grief always dims the bright luster of the eyes 
 we love, and sorrow clouds the brow of cherished friends, is it strange 
 that the face was darkened and the tears were just ready to flow ? We 
 could have wept ourselves as we bade farewell to " Beautiful Venice," the 
 Bride of the Sea, and steamed across the 2 1-2 miles of railroad whose 
 foundations seemed to be sliding into the deep. Once again we stood 
 upon terra firma. New faces and new scenes are all powerful in driving 
 sadness from the heart, when it is not deep-seated, and in a comfortable 
 frame of mind we arrived at the depot outsides of the walls of Padua. 
 
 There, before that triangular city, the mind seemed lost in the midst 
 of ages, going back even to the destruction of Troy, when Antinor, the 
 brother-in-law of Priam is said to have founded Patavium (Padua); coming 
 up through the darker days when barbarous hordes held sway under 
 Alaric and Attila, and on through the brighter age of Charlemagne, up 
 to the time when the princes of Carrara ruled and reigned therein. In- 
 tensely interesting was the oldest city in northern Italy interesting 
 with its narrow, crowded streets, its long lines of arcades, which leave 
 one almost in doubt whether he is walking within doors or without ; its 
 university so celebrated just at the dawn of literature after the sombre 
 Middle Ages, when scores of names were enrolled in the book of fame 
 by the side of Dante, Petrarch and Harvey ; its hundred churches San 
 Giustina, with the tombs of St. Matthew and St. Luke, and moreover, 
 the remains of three thousand martyrs down in the depths where a light 
 is kept constantly burning and where we were invited to cast our eye ; 
 St. Antonio, magnificent beyond description, with its eight ponderous 
 domes overhead and the great bronze crucifix of Donatello in its presby- 
 tery ; Eremitani, which contains all that is left of the princes of Carrara, 
 the lords of Padua, the tombs of two of their number ; the Piazza Vit- 
 18 
 
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 toria Emanuel, the only public promenade, with its encircling stream of 
 water and two rows of statues representing Padua's celebrated sons ; 
 Botanic Garden, the most ancient in Europe, and the house, bearing 
 record that it received Dante when he was exiled from Florence. Does 
 one doubt that all this and much more renders Padua interesting in the 
 extreme ? 
 
 But we visited Padua especially to look through the eyes of an artist 
 friend at a famous little chapel constructed and ornamented for princes 
 by the hand of one who then was young but afterwards became famous 
 and still lives in the hearts of appreciating admirers although centuries 
 have passed away Giotto. We found this chapel where we never 
 should have thought of looking for anything beautiful, surrounded by 
 other buildings and behind an old high gate, at which our guide rang for 
 admission. We tried to look with an artist's eye, but we shall not 
 attempt to use an artist's pen in description, but shall refer our friends 
 to Murray's account of this wonderful Giotto's chapel, and we shall go on 
 to places which are perhaps less interesting but easier to describe, only 
 saying that Dante was the artist's friend, and that he was with Giotto 
 during the work and probably suggested many points. The statues of 
 the two friends stand side by side in front of one of the halls of Padua. 
 
 After two days at Padua we resumed the line of travel, taking cars for 
 Bologna and passing the birthplace of Livy, the home and burial place 
 of Petrarch, also the very ancient town of Adria, which gave its name to 
 the Adriatic Sea, but which is now far from the harbors of those waters ; 
 and other places interesting for their associations in art and literature. 
 
 Having arrived at Bologna in the dark hours of a winter evening, 
 (Italian winter) the first care was for bodily rest and then in the morning 
 for Bologna sausages of course, followed by a survey of the town. An- 
 other old city is before us, which was founded by the Etruscans and 
 called Felsina, conquered by the Greeks and named Bononia, (old coins 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 139 
 
 bear the words " Bononia dreit,") united to the possessions of Hannibal, 
 and converted into a Roman colony, all many years before Christ. We 
 have said it was Italian winter time, and so it was ; for when we left our 
 hotel by the side of the depot and entered the walls, the mist and fog 
 shrouded everything, and gave it a very uncertain aspect, so that we could 
 well believe and realize that its foundations were laid deep in the ages of 
 the past, its walls were reared in days that were dark, and its towers 
 were in the mists of time. 
 
 But mist and fog did not prevent our walking in the boasted University, 
 almost the oldest in the world, where ten thousand students were at one 
 time assembled, where the anatomy of the human frame was first taught, 
 and galvanism was discovered by Galvani, and where numbers of our own 
 sex have occupied the professors' chairs, one of them so beautiful that she 
 must needs lecture behind curtains that she might not distract the sound 
 minds or turn the stern hearts of her listeners of the opposite sex. Won- 
 der of wonders ! beautiful and learned, and a woman ! 
 
 We were not hindered from visiting several of the one hundred and 
 ninety churches, a way which we soon learned by the attracting (not 
 attractive) cries of coachmen and guides. The most interesting one is 
 St. Petronius, which was intended to be the largest church in the world, 
 but lacks the honor, owing to its still unfinished condition, and which 
 contains the head of St. Petronius in a silver vase ; St. Dominius, founded 
 by that saint, who was also the founder of the Dominican order of monks, 
 and containing the tomb of the saint crowned by a statue of the same 
 from the hands of Michael Angelo, and beautified by an exquisite little 
 angel of white marble, wrought by the chisel of this master sculptor, 
 (this church also contains the tomb of Guido Reni) ; and St. Stefano 
 most curious of all, a pile of seven different churches constructed at dif- 
 ferent periods on the site of the ancient temple of Isis, built on different 
 levels and fitted up according to the time of their erection ; among these, 
 
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 the round church of St. Petronius containing the body of that saint with- 
 out his head, is modeled after the Holy Sepulcher ; the second contains 
 a model of the vase in which Peter washed his hands and the cock which 
 crowed three times, and in the crypt is a pillar which is just the height 
 of Christ. 
 
 The fogs did not obscure the brilliancy of the pictures in the Academy 
 of Fine Arts, where were displayed many of the productions of the artists 
 whose home has been in this city, but whose fame has spread through all 
 cities the Caracci, Francia and Guido Reni. One of the latter was 
 specially interesting, as it brought to mind a tale which is told concern- 
 ing it, which is somewhat after this sort : The master was painting the 
 crucifixion with his model before him bound to the cross, and in the 
 frenzy of the moment the knife was sent to the heart of the victim, that 
 the death agony might be faithfully portrayed on the brow of Christ. The 
 artist fled after the task was done, leaving his work to find him out, which 
 it did after a few days ; for years Guido Reni was an exile, but his fame 
 procured his pardon, and Bologna and the world honor the artist, although 
 a murderer. 
 
 Neither fog, nor mist, nor cloud prevented our ascending the leaning 
 tower of Asinelli, immortalized by Dante's likening a well-known prince 
 in the infernal regions to this tower with its leaning summit enveloped in 
 clouds. Around and around within this dark wall of brick, with no par- 
 ticular order to the arrangement or length of the 447 steps, having no 
 inner wall like most of the high places we ascend, only a railing which is 
 enough to prevent the climber from going down into the dark open space, 
 preceded by a boy who lighted a match every few steps to illuminate a 
 little, up we go to the very summit and out into the open air for a view 
 of the city. But here the fog and the mist are all powerful to blind our 
 eyes, and not an object can we trace except the roofs so close to our 
 feet that were we on a level with them we could touch them with our very 
 hands. There comes to mind the familiar lines, 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 14! 
 
 " Hearts are broken, hearts are turned 
 With castles in the air," 
 
 and we think how many times in life we have been lured to some eminence 
 by brilliant castles in the air, but have turned back with hearts almost 
 crushed with sad disappointment. Time will tell us how the leaning 
 tower of Bologna compares with the one of which more frequent mention 
 is made, in the land of Pisa, whither we are journeying. 
 
FLORENCE. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 E turn our course toward the " Fairest city on earth," the 
 "Athens of modern Italy." Who does not know what city 
 is thus honored with appellations of great promise to the 
 traveler ? Florence, fair flower of the garden of Italia ! On 
 Christmas day, 1873, we entered her limits. Truly she is fair, 
 for this land of age and tumults ; fair for this country where the blossoms 
 of peace are so frequently trodden under foot by the mailed heel of the 
 warrior ; fair, indeed, for any land or age or time. The first form which 
 the eye can distinguish is that dome of domes, the largest in the world, 
 towering high over the entire city, and admitting the rays of light upon 
 the tombs of two of its architects Giotto and Brunelleschi. 
 We can easily trace the " Golden Arno as it shoots away 
 
 Thro' Florence's heart, beneath the bridges four ; 
 Bent bridges, seeming to strain off like bows, 
 
 And tremble while the arrowy undertide 
 Shoots on, and cleaves the marble as it goes, 
 
 And strikes up palace walls on either side." 
 
 The Arno, silver stream of interest that it is, flows the entire length, 
 enriching its fair possessor with its liquid wealth, calling to mind the most 
 powerful picture we met in our travels, called " Bathing in the Arno." 
 A number of soldiers were enjoying the luxury of a bath, when, alarmed 
 by the approach of the enemy, the fright and the hurry and the con- 
 fusion which were apparent in the faces and positions of the nude bodies 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 143 
 
 will always be suggested by the river Arno. Six bridges cross its waters, 
 over the oldest of which six centuries have glided as the currents have 
 glided beneath its arches, and neither time nor floods have availed to re- 
 move its foundations as they have those of the remaining three con- 
 structed in the same manner. 
 
 There are two suspension bridges of modern date. One of the bridges, 
 the Ponte alia Carraja, was broken down in a fire in 1314, and from the 
 terrible struggles of the drowning in the floods, Dante conceived his 
 idea of the Inferno (which, by the way, was read with great interest by 
 the Three while in the city of Florence). But the most curious and most 
 interesting of these bridges is the Ponte Veechio (Old Bridge) or Jeweler's 
 Bridge. It is lined by shops of jewelers and goldsmiths and other workers 
 in metal ; above these shops is a gallery connecting the Uffizi Gallery 
 and the Pitti Palace, which, although inferior in extent to those of the 
 Vatican and the Louvre, are probably the richest galleries of art in 
 the world. This has been called " most melodramatic of passages." In 
 following us through these galleries and halls our friends must sharpen 
 their imaginations to the keenest point and then expect to fall far short 
 of the beautiful reality which our eyes looked upon in the three long cor- 
 ridors, two 430 feet each, one 97 feet, and in the side cabinets and halls 
 numbering 22, where the ceilings were frescoed, and there were ancient 
 busts of eminent men, sarcophagi, statues and bronzes, medals, inscrip- 
 tions, antiquities, vases and paintings, portraits of 300 painters executed 
 by themselves, and a most splendid cabinet of gems. 
 
 We commenced in the Pitti Palace (the production of Lucca Pitti who 
 strove to outbuild his enemy Strozzi) and many times we lost ourselves 
 in these ages of the past, for we were in the halls of Mars, Saturn and 
 Jupiter, and Appolla, Venus, the Iliad, and we were in the presence of 
 the spirits of the past whose productions make this city a place of resort 
 for artists from all parts of the world. Here was the Venus de Medici, 
 
144 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 " chef d 'oeuvre of art, the beau ideal of beauty, the wonder of the world ;" 
 it was found in Adrain's villa at Tivoli, and generally attributed to Praxi- 
 tiles 2,200 years ago, but according to the inscription on the base is the 
 work of .Cleomene, an Athenian. Here too was the Venus of Canova 
 with a light drapery thrown around her, which instead of concealing 
 heightens her charms ; and the Venus of the Bath, very properly occupy- 
 ing une petite chambre all by herself, except as the living curious step in 
 to gaze and admire where everything is pure and white and delicate (it is 
 no place for false modesty). The Madonnas were all about us Raphael's 
 Madonna of the Chair, which is found in almost all parlors of our Amer- 
 ican homes, and the manifold madonnas of nearly every artist of note, for 
 each one had several, but Correggio's kneeling madonna was sweetest of 
 them all, to our unartistic eyes, in the motherly pride and joy over her 
 baby boy. From the walls looked down the Beggar Boys of Murillo, with 
 eyes which almost brought the soldi from our pockets, the Four Philoso- 
 phers of Rubens, and the Three Fates of Michael Angelo, so intent upon 
 their work that we felt our thread of life slowly and surely drawn out and 
 spun, and almost expected to see it clipped short by the scissors of the 
 stern sister. 
 
 Not the least interesting among the curiosities of these galleries were 
 the pen and ink sketches of the celebrated artists, composed of a selec- 
 tion from the 33,000 belonging to the gallery, the most remarkable being 
 thirty-seven original drawings from the hand of the master artist Raphael. 
 There were specimens too of the work called pictra dura, a mosaic which 
 instead of being wrought and shaded with painted glass, is wrought in a 
 tablet of slate and marble with precious stones of the natural color, 
 the only manufacture of the kind in the world. One table employed 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Ponte Veechio, Old Bridge, over the Arno. 2. Dante, Tasso, Petriarco 
 and Aristo, crowned with laurel. 3. Corregio's Madonna. 5. Savanarola. Galileo. 6. Fresch 
 in Giotto's Chapel at Padua. 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 145 
 
 twelve persons eight years, and cost 20,000 crowns. We came out through 
 the fine portico of the Uffizi adorned with twenty-eight modern statues 
 of celebrated ancients Giotto, Dante, Petrarch, Americus Vespucius, 
 Michael Angelo, &c. 
 
 From the Piazza Santa Marie del Flora, rises that largest of domes, or 
 broadest at least, which served M. Angelo as a model for St. Peter, and 
 by its side stands the Campanile, rising " like a perplexed fine question 
 heavenward ;" the walls of this bell-tower are of black and red polished 
 marble, (those of the church are black and white) and are embellished 
 with more carving than most cities have within their limits ; it was de- 
 signed by Giotto in 1334. 
 
 Upon one of its six bells are the arms of the family so closely con- 
 nected with the history of this city the Medici ; another called the 
 Misercordia was so named because it was rung when the services of that 
 brotherhood, (which had an existence for 600 years) were needed. Close 
 at hand is the Baptistry, which was built in the seventh century from the 
 materials of an ancient pagan temple, an octagonal building which has 
 been made an object of wonder by the wonderful doors, which the won- 
 derful artist said were worthy to be the doors of paradise. We stood 
 before them many times and admired them beyond expression, and yet 
 we prefer to imagine that the entrance into paradise is through a brighter, 
 lighter gate at least. 
 
 On the same Piazza stand the statues of two of the architects of this 
 world-renowned cathedral Arnolfi and Brunelleschi. 
 
 Near by, a stone in the wall bears the words, " Sasso di Dante," mark- 
 ing the spot where the immortal poet sat and watched the work, and en- 
 couraged his friends while rearing the disputed dome. We felt like fol- 
 lowing the example of the little one of our party, sitting against this seat 
 in the wall to see if the spirit of the writer would not descend upon us. 
 
 Santa Croce, the Italian Pantheon, is interesting for the tombs of the 
 
146 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 great men who are buried here. Here lies the most illustrious of Flor- 
 entines and one of the most variously accomplished men that ever lived 
 Michael Angelo, the painter, sculptor, poet, architect and engineer. 
 Well may Sculpture, Architecture and Painting sit mourning over his 
 remains. He died at Rome in 1563, but was brought to his native place 
 and buried in the spot chosen by himself, so that when the doors are 
 open he might be in sight of the dome of the cathedral, the delight of his 
 life. Near by is the tomb of Galileo, the great astronomer, and also the 
 tomb of Dante, " father of Italian poetry and advocate of Italian liberty," 
 but his body is kept out of the reach of the city which so unjustly ban- 
 ished the Divine Poet. The ages are here brought together by works 
 of different kinds, from that of Cimabue, the old, old painter, and Giotto, 
 almost as ancient, to the struggle of the Italians for independence in 
 1848. (Two bronze tables bear the names of the Tuscans who died 
 defending their land.) Pius IX. laid the foundation stone of the marble 
 facade in 1857, and almost down to the present time (1865) Dante was 
 given his proper place and his statue erected to guard the resting-place 
 of Italy's noblemen. 
 
 But the finest of all the truly exquisite work in the beautiful city 
 of Florence is the Medicean Chapel. It was planned by one of the 
 Medici to receive the Holy Sepulchre, but as they failed to obtain pos- 
 session of the latter, they made use of the chapel for a family vault. It 
 contains most magnificent work in marbles and precious stones, and 
 if their palaces while living compared favorably with those they occupy 
 after death, we wonder not that one of them at least acquired the title 
 of Lorenzo the Magnificent. 
 
 In the centre of Florence is the Piazza della Signoria, which takes 
 precedence over all the other public squares for importance and antiquity, 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Cathedral Duomo. 2. Michael Angelo. 3. Cathedral Santa Croce. 4. 
 M. Augelo's Three .Fates. 5. Monument to Dante. 6. Tomb of Michael Angelo, 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 147 
 
 and the principal edifice is the Palazzo Vecchio, rightly named the Old 
 Palace, for it dates from the year 1298. It resembles a fortress rather 
 than a palace, and its peculiar tower becomes a familiar object, seen as it 
 is frofn every part of the city and surrounding country. The bell of this 
 palace was used to call the people to the public meetings ; the palace 
 itself was the seat of the Signoria of Florence. The Loggia is a sort 
 of arcade, built in 1355 as a place for the magistrates when they wished 
 to assemble the people. It is ornamented with several fine pieces 
 of sculpture. 
 
 The Piazza della Signoria is doubly interesting from the fact that it 
 was here that Savanarola, the Dominican monk, " stood among the ages, 
 orphan of the old, prophet of the new, like Noah among the worlds 
 of God ; " here he endured the terrible torture of the hoisting rope, and 
 gave his name to coming ages as a martyr for the church. We recall 
 the description of this celebrated man by Mrs. Stowe : "He was 
 of middle age, of elastic, well-knit figure, and a flexibility and grace 
 of motion which seemed to wake every nerve. The close-shaven crown 
 and the plain white Dominican robe gave a severe and statuesque sim- 
 plicity to the form of his figure. His low, broad forehead, prominent 
 Roman nose, well-cut yet fully outlined lips, and strong, finely moulded 
 jaw and chin, all spoke the old Roman vigor and energy, while the flex- 
 ible delicacy of all the muscles of his face and figure gave an inexpress- 
 ible fascination to his appearance. Every emotion and changing thought 
 seemed to flutter and tremble over his countenance as the shadow 
 of leaves over sunny water. His eye had a wonderful dilating power, 
 and his voice possessed a surprising scale of delicate and melodious 
 inflections." 
 
 Florence is truly the flower of Italian cities neat, airy, and, most 
 wonderful of all, has but few beggars. The surroundings seem to elevate 
 all persons above the degradation which is so common in this country, 
 
148 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 and we could walk a few steps here without witnessing some disgusting 
 sight or hearing some distressing sound. The environs are enchanting. 
 Fancy us walking in a bright sun over one of the bridges, through the 
 old town, and out from one of the gates into the country. We confess 
 that we did shiver a little with the cold, or perhaps it was trembling with 
 fear lest Winter should overtake us in our flight even now, for we saw 
 some ice in the classic river and a good many snow-capped hills not very 
 far away ; but then, just at hand, as we walked toward the town where 
 Galileo made his observations while he had eyes to see the heavenly 
 bodies, were green bushes, bearing with the leaves both the flower and 
 fruit. We said, " Surely Winter cannot come where Nature develops in 
 this way," and Winter did not come. We saw the snow only on the hill- 
 tops, as we had seen it all the past Summer. On New Year's Day the 
 scene was brighter still. Two miles' walk by the side of the Arno to 
 the Cascine the most beautiful walk and drive in the world, they say. 
 Oh, how lovely ! Streams of equipages, crowds of people everywhere in 
 the bright, warm sun. The heights of Fiesole we ascended, the city 
 which was old when Florence was young ; where the olive trees lined 
 the walls rising one above the other, and the old palaces stood as they 
 have done so many, many years ; and where, once upon a time, Milton, 
 afterwards the blind poet who saw Paradise Lost with the eyes of the 
 inner man, met Galileo, the blind astronomer, who saw the earth revolve 
 although the world was blind to the fact. What a meeting, and what a 
 place to meet in ! They were truly examples of the blind leading the 
 blind, and after more than three centuries the world has at length 
 learned to regard them aright, and to-day thinks more of the finger 
 of Galileo, preserved in spirits and shown among the treasures of the 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Podcsta Palace. 2. Bell-tower of the Dtiomo. 3. Strozzi Palace. 
 4. Stairway. 5. Baptistery. 6. Palazzo Vecchio (Old Palace). 7. Loggia. 8. Bronze doors 
 of Baptistery. 9. Riccardi Palace. 
 

 Loggia dei Lanzi 
 
 Palazzo Riccardi 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 149 
 
 city, than it did, in the days when he advanced unwelcome truths, of the 
 noble body with its undying mind. 
 
 Florence combines much that is old with the beautiful and artistic, and 
 we left her, saying : " Joy, Florence, that thou art so great ; that over 
 land and sea thou beatest thy wings." 
 
 From Florence to Pisa in two and a half hours, where the Leaning 
 Tower never ceases to be an attraction, thence to Leghorn (where we 
 called upon numerous straw-braiders but brought away little leghorn,) 
 out through a long canal to the steamer in the Mediterranean, to try the 
 waters which are so often called treacherous. We cannot say they have 
 been justly so called for we slept an entire night, sailed peacefully along 
 the borders of Italy, (so far away however that only mountain peaks 
 appeared in sight) enjoyed a day of quiet and calm upon the blue waters, 
 again slept and our eyes opened upon the City of Naples. 
 
NAPLES. 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 OW we are to tell you of that " Fragment of heaven to 
 earth vouchsafed," and more than ever we long for the poet's 
 pen and the artist's brush, for words can hardly bring this land- 
 scape before you as the flowing musical lines of verse or the 
 soft mellow tints in the painter's hand. We fear you will 
 not see this grand panorama of land and sea, water and sky, 
 bay and mountain, strait and plain, ship and fort, all bathed in melting 
 light ; nor imagine the far-away aspect, the dreamy haze, the distant 
 liquid light. Do you see this noble Bay of Naples presenting its quiet 
 waters to the storm-tossed ships of the Mediterranean, holding many 
 miniature bays in its graceful curves, offering an asylum to the fleeing 
 and the pursued on the islands which rise up like the gourd in a night 
 and bidding defiance to invading foe by raising its forts on peak and 
 point and manning its castles with sinew and strength one grand curve 
 of thirty-five miles, beautifully, gracefully divided into lesser curves ! 
 And where does this city begin or end, either in time or in space ! 
 Stretching back from all these small harbors which form the one great 
 harbor, up to the summits which smile in perpetual summer, from point 
 to point in almost continuous line the dwellings of man rise to view and 
 the earth teems with life. 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Bay of Naples with Vesuvius in the distance. 2. Grotto of Posilippo 
 near the summit of which is the Tomb of Virgil. 3. A Naples load, 4, Lava bed. 5. Naples 
 costume and employment. 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 151 
 
 With what suddenness the heavenly view vanishes from sight and how 
 quickly a gross and disgusting and earthly one takes its place ! For 
 nearly three thousand years this city has been rising, extending and 
 growing, varied with occasional times of falling, lessening and diminish- 
 ing, changing its point of interest from one locality to another, taking 
 one name after another according to the whim of the conqueror, marking 
 all the eras of time by its buildings and its ruins. Only one city in our 
 United States is its equal in population, and perhaps not one in the 
 world is equal in the filth and squalor of its inhabitants. Imagine 
 your rag-bags walking from their corners with their contents displayed 
 in the most glaring manner, your " Dinah and kitchens ". set out upon 
 the streets, and all the culinary operations performed in the sight of the 
 world frying, boiling, roasting, baking the public thoroughfare a 
 pantry and a dining-room from early dawn until the hour of midnight, 
 we could not take oath that it is not the sole resting place of multitudes 
 who swarm there constantly. The little furry animal which bears most 
 of the burdens of this country, whose hair as a general thing turns in the 
 wrong direction if it is not all worn off his skin, and whose ears are by 
 far the most prominent feature this small animal provokes incessant 
 cracks of the whip, and grunts which can only be likened to the sound 
 one naturally makes when deprived of a tooth. Then the bugs how 
 can man or beast live here when the winter days are over, for the creep- 
 ing creatures are very active in these coldest days of the year ? Another 
 annoyance, yes, two of them, is everywhere met in these thronged streets 
 the persistency of cab-drivers in trying to make everybody think that 
 it is their duty to patronize the voitures, and the other one which we 
 have previously mentioned asking for alms. We have been almost 
 near enough to Victor Emanuel to present our petition in person that he 
 shall give the beggars a separate street in which to walk, but we let the 
 opportunity pass, so we must see the sights of this busy, interesting 
 
152 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 ancient city with the sound of wailing in our ears and the scenes of woe 
 before our eyes. 
 
 To readers of classical literature Caesar, Virgil, Cicero, Horace and 
 Lrvy on one of these mornings, when air and earth and sky all present 
 a gilded radiance, which is transmitted to every visible object, making 
 them seem " so near and yet so far," we go forth in the warm sunlight, to 
 the sea, whose surges beat upon soil trod by heroes of old, and let our 
 thoughts go out upon the sea of Time to the shades of the departed, 
 calling up their names to people these realms if but for a passing moment. 
 Musing, pondering, dreaming, we saunter through the streets of Neapo- 
 lis, (new city) founded by the Greeks nearly three thousand years ago, 
 and reach the portion whose foundations we may well say were laid quite 
 three thousand years ago, so nearly that this number of years marks its 
 age Paleopelis, (old city) which lies from hence to the summit of 
 Posilippo. 
 
 First and foremost among the shadowy spirits whose presence we 
 invoked, is that of the Mantuan bard, who wrote his own epitaph in the 
 following words : " Mantua me genuit, Calabri rapuere, tenet mine Par- 
 thenope. Cecini pascua, rura, duces" If Virgil could make the hero of 
 his poem descend into the infernal regions while he yet dwelt in the 
 mortal frame, might not the poet come back to us when clothed with 
 immortality ? On these heights he once dwelt ; here he wrote " Oh 
 Muse, relate to me the causes," and here was that wonderful body laid ; 
 wonderful because it assisted the master-mind to work nineteen years 
 before the Christian era, when the spirit soared into upper realms to try 
 the realities of the other world. Are any of you curious to know where 
 the dust of the immortal Virgil lies ? In the part of Naples once called 
 Parthenope, Paleopolis, Posilippo, on the side of the steep eminence Piz- 
 zafalcone, by many steps winding around among the habitations of the 
 living and the dead in such a manner that a guide is absolutely necessary 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 153 
 
 to find the spot ; under a clothes-line hung with linen made yellow by 
 washing ; followed closely by beggars of all ages anxious to do something 
 for which they may demand a few centissimi at least ; until an iron gate 
 is reached, and an old man, almost too feeble to hold his place before the 
 eager assistants tugs at the bell with trembling hands, and when the gate 
 is opened he enters with the favored Three as the one who has obtained 
 admission, while the .rest remain without. Curious old burying place, 
 Roman coltimbarian, where the few graves are guarded to keep their places 
 in the rocks. Down stone steps to a little storm-chamber, fifteen feet 
 square, with three windows and a vaulted ceiling, a small tablet rises to 
 the memory of him whose JEneid is by far his most enduring monument. 
 We pluck a branch of delicate evergreen, which perhaps was planted by 
 Petrarch, perhaps not, but which certainly grew by the tomb of Virgil. 
 Paying our entrance fee and our guide, (who demands a little more for 
 being a " bono man ") the woman who admitted us, and the old man who 
 had haunted our footsteps, we left the burial place of the poet we so 
 much admired in our school days, and shall continue to admire as long 
 as sense is granted unto us. 
 
 From the tomb of Virgil we retrace our steps, and at the base 
 of Posilippo find ourselves confronting a tall, dark opening in the moun- 
 tain, which is quite in keeping with the spectral excursion we have 
 entered upon. Bare gray rocks stare upon us as we enter the Grotto 
 which superstition says was constructed by the wiles of the poet whose 
 body lies within the rocks above it. With something of a shiver we 
 step within the vaulted entrance, ninety feet in height, and with brisk 
 steps begin the passage through the mountain. A dim light hangs upon 
 the wall every few yards, and away in the distance we can discover a 
 little of the light of heaven. This true light dispels the darkness of the 
 scene, and we walk the half-mile assured that the Emperor Augustus 
 caused this wonderful work to be performed, and that during all these 
 20 
 
154 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 eighteen centuries it has been a short way of reaching the villages on 
 the other side of the mountain. 
 
 Again we are in the midst of crowded streets. Buildings that look as 
 if they might have stood since the year one, and children that are almost 
 naked enough to be angels, but without any appearance of wings, and 
 with many signs which mark them as fallen angels, if angels they could 
 be called. A lovely walk of four and one-half miles, on roads as hard 
 and smooth as marble, between dark evergreens which, in our geopraphies, 
 used to look like giant umbrellas, and which have not lost that appear- 
 ance now that we look upon them rising from their native soil. Again 
 the road skirts the seashore. This is the coast which the poems of Ho- 
 mer and Virgil invest .with living interest; these are the realms where 
 civilization first gained a footing on Italian soil ; and here is the spot 
 where emperors reared their villas and spent their days in luxury. But 
 where are the princes and the palaces now ? They tell us that the rocks 
 stand upon a fiery foundation ; that the earth swallows up the labor 
 of multitudes and lifts mountains from the uncertain sea ; and we con- 
 template these rocks with awe and wonder. Their naked sides seem to 
 bear inscriptions made by the hand of Time, which would certainly solve 
 the mystery if we only had the wisdom to decipher the hieroglyphics. 
 The light of day is almost gone as we enter the gate of an old, old city, 
 and walk through crowds which look as though they would like to devour 
 us were it not for the warning voice of the guide at our side. Gladly we 
 enter the one hotel, and soundly sleep the sleep of the honest, although 
 our dreams may have been somewhat disturbed by the visions of the 
 day and by the beating of the blue sea upon the walls of our building, 
 creating fancies that were not all dreams of one who, although a prisoner, 
 was greater than we, and who says, in the book of books, " And after 
 one day the south wind blew, and we came the next day to Puteoli." This, 
 then, was the place where Paul landed ; the name only is changed a little. 
 Is it strange, after eighteen hundred years ? 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 155 
 
 Morning dawned upon Pozzuoli as rosy as though the day had not 
 come and gone so many millions of times, and again we pursued the 
 phantoms of the past. With a little guide who spoke in an unknown 
 tongue, (mayhap a Mercury sent to escort the Three,) we walked in the 
 steps of the eloquent and the learned, and saw what remains of the 
 orator and scholar the villa of Cicero. In imagination we heard him 
 rehearse his orations to the waters of the deep, and fancied that they 
 borrowed dignity and sublimity from the rolling waves. Soon Monte 
 Nuovo appeared in sight the mountain which was born in a single 
 night ; and so black and grim it rose over the scene that we felt that old 
 Hercules, with shaggy brow, had stationed himself here to guard the 
 narrow strip of land on which, it is said, he drove the bulls of Geryon 
 across the swamp the Via Herculea. We scarcely dared intrude upon 
 his dominions, but we crossed with safety and came down to the borders 
 of Lake Avernus. Down deep below the towering mountains, the sum- 
 mit of whose precipitous banks is shaded by the umbrageous pines, lies 
 the fabled entrance to the infernal regions. The craters are sullen and 
 black, and the neighboring ravines look as though they might harbor the 
 ghostly Cimmerii which Homer mentions in his Odyssey ; but we are 
 not to be deterred from walking around the borders of the lake. Down 
 in the depths we see ghastly forms extended ; birds rise above the 
 waters, but soon sink into the abyss below ; surely this is what we used 
 to read of the dismal Lake of Avernus ! Here, too, is the very spot 
 where the Sibyl led ^Cneas into the realms below. We approach the 
 entrance to the cave of the Sibyl, but further we will not venture. Once 
 again upon the borders of the lake, with the warm, bright sun shining 
 upon our pathway, we examine more closely the state of affairs. Forms, 
 not so ghastly, sit upon the stones and croak in the sunligh^; birds rise 
 over the water and settle again, because they can live upon the sea as 
 well as upon the land ; even the fair blossoms of Spring seem not to 
 
156 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 loiter in their coming, for the taraxacum (not densleonis, however) lifts its 
 yellow head and looks very familiarly at us, one of the campanulas meekly 
 rings its bell before us, and several of the labiates open their lips as 
 if they could give us words of greeting ; the ground everywhere is car- 
 peted with the delicate candytuft, which grows without care or cultivation, 
 and the variety of papilionacce which is always pleasant to the eye 
 because it promises something sweet to the taste when the fruit in the 
 pod shall become sufficiently mature, raises its blossoms temptingly and 
 brings the water to our lips as we think of the time when we shall sit at 
 the table and eat the green peas at the Fourth of July dinner with the 
 loved ones at home. Thus were we reasoning to ourselves, when all of a 
 sudden a loud, harsh bark sounded close to our ears, followed by one and 
 another till we clenched our fists with very fright, and fully believed that 
 this was the genuine Lake Avernus, and that the three-headed dog 
 Cerberus, which guards the dark regions, had been let loose upon our 
 track. Would he devour us ? But our brave little guide rushed back 
 with stick in hand, and at the same time a voice was heard, and when we 
 dared to turn our heads, two monstrous hounds, as black as the regions 
 they seemed to come from, were creeping back to their master's feet. 
 
 We will not extend our walk to the famous Bay of Baiae, which the 
 odes of Horace have immortalized, although the ancient temples of 
 Minerva, Venus and Diana are seen in their fallen grandeur, and the 
 celebrated hot baths of the infamous Nero are still at a boiling tempera- 
 ture, while the cruel Emperor has been cold these many centuries ; nor 
 to Cape Misino, prominent in sea and sky, although this was the point 
 where Caesar, Pompey and Mark Antony met to divide the Roman 
 empire, and the point also where the fleet of Pliny was anchored when 
 he met his cruel fate from the fires of Vesuvius ; nor to Ormar, the 
 Elysian Fields of Virgil, where he consulted the oracle before descending 
 into Hades in search of his father's spirit, although it was here that the 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 157 
 
 great Scipio breathed his last ; but we will return by the spot where 
 stand the foundations of the villa of Agrippina, in which she was 
 destroyed by her unnatural son, Nero, back to Pozzuoli to visit the 
 amphitheatre, noted in history, where Nero and Diocletian entered so 
 prominently into the scenes enacted during their licentious lives, and 
 which has lain hundreds of years buried in the lava of the neighboring 
 volcano buried in the oblivion which its ignominy deserves ; to visit 
 also the Temple of Jupiter Serapis, grand in its ruins as it was famous 
 in its magnificence. 
 
 And now we will return to delightful Naples, passing the island, 
 Nisida, where Brutus fled after the destruction of Caesar, and where he 
 bade farewell to his beloved Portia when he departed for the battle 
 of Philippi, all the way by the beautiful bay, lined with multitudes, 
 and loaded with fruit and fish and vegetables. 
 
 In early days our imagination ran riot when we touched upon the 
 topic of the Sea Horse, and we fancied him an immense creature, with 
 head of horse and tail of fish, and furnished, too, with the wings of a 
 bird, so that while his home was in the sea, he would not scorn a contest 
 with the dwellers on land or the denizens of the air, and nothing would 
 be free from the ravages of the monster. As we walked by the Bay 
 of Naples we were enabled to decide how true a picture fancy had 
 painted for us ; for a ragged little Italian boy presented several speci- 
 mens of the veritable Sea Horse for the foreigners to purchase. We 
 gladly availed ourselves of the opportunity, and put into our sachel the 
 little creature, about two inches in length, whose photograph we give 
 our friends, together with the description of a naturalist : 
 
 " The Sea Horse, when taken fresh from his native home, though 
 almost laughably grotesque, is a very pretty creature. Its general color 
 is ashen gray ; at first glance, an exceedingly sober suit. But if exam- 
 ined more closely, it will be found thickly studded with tiny spangles 
 
158 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 of metallic silver. Add to this the rich armature of daintily carved 
 plates, like a coat of mail, its body always partly erect, and, bent forward, 
 it looks like the steed of a knight-errant in quest of adventure. Those 
 pretty, golden, yet queer little eyes, chameleon-like, independent of each 
 other, intently gaze two ways at once. Its dorsal fin is, in nature, an 
 exquisite fan, in form, size and ornament worthy the hand of Queen 
 Mab. As we look at his equine appearance, and think of his monkey 
 faculty, (using his caudal extremity,) and his opossum traits, and that 
 queer blending of innocent oddity with patriarchal dignity, we have to 
 accept the old fisherman's proverb, ' There is nothing on the land that is 
 not in the sea.' ' 
 
 The fairest, most lovely of all the days in the year, the Indian Summer 
 days in America, give only a faint idea of Naples, even in these mid- winter 
 days. The first view from our window upon sea and sky told us that the 
 weather-god was propitious, and we hastily prepared for the proposed 
 ascent. At about the centre of this vast city a carriage took up the wan- 
 dering Three and bore them along by the side of the sea, one mile after 
 another, out through an ancient gate ; still on through the busy, crowded 
 streets, between old houses overflowing with poverty and rags : on, on, 
 with no cessation of buildings and people, for four miles and a half, when 
 we stopped before the office for guides and horses to ascend Vesuvius. 
 
 Arrangements were soon completed, and the Three went into the 
 streets of Resina, (the name had changed twice, although we could not 
 see why it was not all Naples). Two mounted, but the third still on her 
 own footing, two men to attend to the horses, a guide for the party and 
 two others who probably knew why they went, but we did not, constituted 
 the company. Out through narrow lanes, between high stone walls, in 
 places rather unfavorable for observation, in patience we threaded our 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. General View of Pompeii. 2. Frescoed Wall. 3, Sea Horse. 4. Fresco, 
 "Cave Canem." 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 159 
 
 way, for we should soon be above them all. In time, we came to the lava 
 beds of different years, spread out to view in the colors almost of the rain- 
 bow, although perhaps not quite so bright, wrought into forms which re- 
 minded us of the waves of the ocean when a brisk gale played among the 
 waters. What a power had accomplished this wonderful work, removing 
 all traces of everything else, burning out root and branch of nature and 
 art, and taking possession of the entire land. In about two hours the 
 party had reached the point where all must go upon some footing other 
 than that of a quadruped, and it became a question whether it should be 
 a more or less independent one. The writer will only speak for herself 
 and charge ; they went up the cone behind their guide, having no 
 strap fastened to a man before, no hands upon the back by a man behind, 
 no broad shoulders to bear their weight the independent Two this time. 
 One hour and a quarter among the almost perpendicular lava rocks and 
 sand, but the climb was accomplished, the height was gained and the re- 
 ward, too. But a little before we reached the highest point, we found 
 ourselves upon smoking ground, upon ground so hot we could scarcely 
 bear the hand upon it. Was it possible we were standing so near those 
 restless fires, those treacherous fires which lure but to destroy? The 
 guide said the crater had once been there ; who knew where it would be 
 next ? A little farther and a year's wanderings were rewarded, the labor 
 of many years was remunerated. We sat down and wrote at the head 
 of a letter " Summit of Vesuvius." 
 
 On the pulverized lava, nearly black in color and sufficiently warm to 
 sit upon, the breath of satisfaction escaped our lips while we rested from 
 our walk, at an angle of forty-five degrees, and cast about us the glance 
 of observation. About a yard distant on one hand, eggs were standing 
 before a little hole in the ground, getting ready for our repast ; (they 
 brought to mind something we used to hear when children, of a fabled 
 spot where chickens, ready roasted, went about with forks in their backs, 
 
l6o UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 crying " Eat me, eat me ; ") about as far away, on the other hand, the 
 gigantic mouth of the fire-god was gaping, his black, sulphurous breath 
 casting a cloud over the head of Vesuvius, and making us feel that we 
 were quite as near to the entrance of the infernal regions, as was ALneas 
 on the banks of the neighboring lake of Avernus. 
 
 Eggs, beautifully cooked, were eaten, and the tour of inspection com- 
 menced. Close to the edge not too close we peered into the realms 
 below ; very uncertain were the objects we could distinguish, but imag- 
 ination worked powerfully, aided by momentary glimpses when the smoke 
 cleared a little, and we surely saw, on the cragged, uneven rocks, the yel- 
 low sulphur deposited in forms to vie with the corals of the deep : yellow, 
 white, green, red, every color was there in the rocks, but the fire was too 
 far away for our eyes to see in that we were disappointed, although a 
 flame was very easily produced by putting the end of a stick into the 
 crevice where our eggs were cooked. An attempt was made to encircle 
 this yawning mouth of the crater, to measure it with paces all unaccus- 
 tomed to treading over volcanic formations, but the fumes of sulphur were 
 overpowering. 
 
 " On all sides are gigantic serpent convolutions of black lava, their im- 
 mense fold rolled into every conceivable contortion, as if, in their fiery 
 agonies, they had struggled and wreathed and knotted together, and then 
 grown old and black with the imperishable signs of those terrific convul- 
 sions upon them ; they were flecked and streaked and dyed with the 
 violet and pink and purple of the evening sky. Arsenic, sulphur and 
 many a sharp and bitter salt were in everything. The sulphurous cliffs 
 were dyed in many a brilliant shade of brown and orange by the admix- 
 ture of various ores, but their brightness seemed strange and unnatural, 
 and the dizzying whirls of vapor, now enveloping the whole scene in 
 gloom, now lifting in this spot, now in that, seemed to magnify the dis- 
 mal pit to an indefinite size." 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. l6l 
 
 We turned back, and soon began the descent, thankful that we had 
 .looked into the depths of Vesuvius, but more thankful that our home is 
 not upon soil which trembles with the earthquake's shock or is liable to 
 eruptions of red hot lava. The descent was quickly accomplished in a 
 straight-forward direction with long strides ; there was no danger of fall- 
 ing as there would be under ordinary circumstances, for every step 
 planted the walker firmly in the sand, and what it hUd taken one and a 
 quarters hours to do, was undone in one quarter of an hour. 
 
 At three o'clock, P. M., the riders were remounted and the return com- 
 menced. A splendid carriage road was followed and the view during the 
 entire route was extremely fine. The sun sank into the sea seeming 
 almost to have doubled its size and grandeur, and the new moon ap- 
 peared, the ninth in number of the thirteen which we expected to wax 
 and wane while we were wanderers in a foreign land. Nine hours had 
 been spent, and a carriage took us back to Naples in the dark, weary 
 enough to make our couches feel soft and good, and rest for a day some- 
 what desirable, especially to the riders on horseback. 
 
 At the gates of the Dead City of the Past, the shadow of the Des- 
 troyer looms up as black and as ominous as when, two thousand years ago, 
 in the bustle and business of life, this people unconsciously prepared 
 their own burial place. In this early spring-time, when the earthy brown 
 is scarcely covered with garments of green, a peculiar feeling of gloom 
 pervades the entire scene, and we sleep nervously between the half res- 
 urrected city and the fiery mountain which holds weapons of death to 
 hurl at the unwary who slumber at its base, and we thankfully welcome 
 another glorious dawn which promises sunlight in the silent streets, where 
 we will spend a day studying, musing upon the last days of Pompeii. 
 
 Through one of the eight gates we enter within the walls, which, 
 although double, and with the intervening space filled with earth, were 
 yet not adequate to keep out the burning, destroying foe. Intent upon 
 
 21 
 
l62 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 our purpose, we proceed at once to the central point, the Forum, where 
 were wont to assemble all ages and ranks, all classes and professions, to 
 enact the busy scenes of life ; we come here to draw a contrast between 
 the past, which is partly fancied, and the present, which is entirely real, 
 the fictitious "Days" of Bulwer, and the living times of the writer, to 
 look with a double eye and sketch with opposite colors. Then, were 
 coming together along the six streets which converged at this point, 
 crowds of young -and old, rich and poor, busy and idle, to spend the day 
 in the open air, and perform the work of the time, or discuss the events 
 of the hour, all gesticulating, gesturing after the manner of the Italians, 
 and ajl unconscious of the terrible fate impending ; now, after a lapse of 
 two thousand years, to stand upon the excavated ruins of the proud 
 Pompeii, come three femince, from the shores which were unknown until 
 ages after this city was buried, across the broad ocean all unnavigated 
 until Italia's son braved the scorn of the people and the storms of the 
 deep to find the continent with its western wilds. Then, the money- 
 changers sat in their stalls counting their coin, which were of inestima- 
 ble value in their greedy eyes, but which soon would be no more than the 
 melting minerals beneath the seething streams of lava ; then, the mer- 
 chants displayed their bright goods in the shops and in the streets, the 
 itinerant cooks .sold their hot morsels to the hearty and the hungry, the 
 learned lawyers talked the Latin language, so soon to become a dead 
 tongue to them all. Now, a few wandering and wondering women and 
 men, with minds excited and eyes dilated, view the scene in astonish- 
 ment and talk in all tongues of volcanic eruptions and recent excavations. 
 Within the area of the Forum were twenty-two marble pedestals proud 
 to support the statues of the illustrious (Scipio's was prominent among 
 the number) ; and unfinished pediments were in the process of comple- 
 tion for equestrian statues which, alas ! were never to be elevated ; to-day 
 they all lie low, broken, blackened, buried, or raised only to grace the 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 163 
 
 walls of some neighboring museum. In those days near the Forum 
 stood temples to the gods and goddesses that the people worshipped with 
 feasts and rich offerings, and appeased in their wrath with libation and 
 blood, Venus, Mercury, Jupiter, Fortuna and Isis ; in these latter 
 days the temples are stripped, the altars are torn down, the priests are 
 silent and here religion is a myth. 
 
 A favorite place of resort for the Pompeians in those days of luxury 
 was the Thermae, fitted up in elegance ; they were commodious and capa- 
 cious, covering an entire square. But these baths were bathed in liquid 
 fire, and the bathers were buried in the burning ashes. 
 
 Just at this point of ramble among the ruins, the musings of the Three 
 were interrupted by the demands of appetite, and the question arose, 
 where would be a suitable place to satisfy these demands. Many doors 
 were open unto us, but we chose the house of the tragic poet, for we 
 knew " his suppers were the best in Pompeii," and he loved literature 
 and the fine arts, and gave his guests mental as well as bodily food. 
 Directly opposite the baths was the home of Glaucus, the poet, and we 
 crossed the street, which we should call narrow, certainly not wide enough 
 for other than velocipedes to meet ; the crossing was what moderns might 
 adopt with advantage to their ladies, if not to their carriages large, flat, 
 high stones, with little more than space for the wheel between, lifting the 
 walker out of the dirt and protecting her from contact with rider and 
 steed. The road was lowered the width of these stepping stones below 
 the pavement, and large square blocks of lava closely fitted together bear 
 marks of the wheels in their course and prints of the hoofs. The house 
 which we selected as the -one in which to dine was small but one of the 
 most elegant, and in other days they entered a narrow hall, where was a 
 fierce dog in mosaic, and the words " Cave canem" Nearly all the rooms 
 were rich in paintings of the brightest hues. Classical subjects were 
 illustrated, one of which was the admiration of all who looked upon it 
 
164 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 the parting of Achilles and Briseis. In the centre was a court where 
 blossomed the most brilliant flowers in marble vases, and there was a 
 fane dedicated to the Penates. Those who would know more of that 
 beautiful home, that brilliant host, that sumptuous repast, must read Bul- 
 wer's description or rely upon the powers of imagination. We entered 
 the doorway unrung and unannounced ; the dog was not there even in 
 mosaic, although other mosaics were found under the accumulated sand. 
 " Achilles and Briseis " had gone together to the museum at Naples, but 
 many others were still upon the walls, somewhat faded and soiled, to be 
 sure, but beautiful nevertheless. The household gods had all departed. 
 The Three sat down on the threshold with the walls about them, but no 
 roof overhead, and ate their cold bread and oranges, dwelling upon the 
 instability of earthly things. 
 
 Then through the long street of tombs once the tombs of the dead, 
 afterwards the tombs of the living, to the house of Diomed. Here wealth 
 was manifest in everything ; the cellars were stocked with wine to grow 
 old. The purse was filled with gold to save, and the key was in the 
 hands of the servant to keep foe from the treasures. But alas ! the wine 
 is too old in the casks, the hand that carried the purse is colder than the 
 gold, the key and the servant are useless ; the seventeen who had fled to 
 the cellar from the eruption of the volcano, made an impression so last- 
 ing upon the walls and the rocks, that after two thousand years we can 
 tell much concerning their fate. 
 
 Six hours we have walked in this city so suddenly quieted in its activity 
 and life, so long buried from the sight of the world, and we feel how wise 
 it is that we know not what our end will be, rjor in what day or hour it 
 will come. The Past is open and full of instruction in regard to the 
 deeds of the Present, but the Future must continue to be a sealed vol- 
 ume to all. 
 
 Our walk is not finished yet. Just across the fields of lava, fields 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 165 
 
 already commencing the labor of the year, still at the base of the dread 
 mountain we see the village of Castellamare rising from the ashes of Sta- 
 bia, which shared one and the same fate with Pompeii. This was the 
 spot where Pliny, leaving his fleet across the bay, came to witness the 
 phenomenon of a mountain on fire, but he was unable to flee himself, and 
 he died the victim of philosophical research and kindly love for his fellow 
 creatures. On, by the side of the sea, with the bold bare mountains at 
 our left, and the bright blue bay at our right, through a most picturesque 
 village cut in two by a deep, cragged defile running from the sea back 
 into the heart of the hills the Vicus Equinus of the ancients we 
 merely continue the course previously described and double the bright 
 pictures we looked upon then, over the famous route which everybody 
 takes to the beautiful plain of Sorrento, for miles through olive orchards 
 and orange groves, crossing the wildest ravines, whose depths are cov- 
 ered with lemon trees, the bright green beautifully sprinkled with the 
 yellow fruit ; and whose rocky sides are trained to nurture the vine and 
 fig tree ; through this scene of loveliness, nineteen miles from Naples 
 and just across the bay, the birth-place of Tasso is reached. It is not 
 strange that such eloquence and poetry have emanated from these regions. 
 Stand in the poet's birthplace and listen to the roll of the waves, the 
 whirl of the waters and the wail of the winds ; see the sudden squall on 
 this stormy sea chase the sunshine from shore to shore, raising the 
 feathery billows in pretended wrath till the breast of the deep seems cov- 
 ered with birds of snowy plumage ; then you will appreciate the lessons 
 the sea gives to her sons. Sorrento, the loveliest of the lovely, adds to 
 the little treasures of these sachels and shawl-straps some showy silken 
 scarfs and wood work, wrought in wonderful ways, and we add the name 
 of Sorrento to the list of delightful days spent in this terrestrial para- 
 dise. 
 
 But now we can vouch for the fickleness of the Mediterranean. With 
 
1 66 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 the pleasure of a walk around the beautiful Bay of Naples, (about thirty 
 of the fifty-three miles we had already passed,) we had connected the idea 
 of a visit to the island of Capri and its grotto, so gorgeously grand that 
 we might imagine that Tiberius, whose house was long amid its beauties, 
 had prepared the place for his infamous orgies. The rays of light reach 
 this cave in the sea only through the waters which rob them of all their 
 colors except the azure, hence its sides are a heavenly blue and it takes 
 the name of Azure Grotto. 
 
 The waves rolled high and beat upon the rocks, and the winds rolled 
 too around the jagged peaks so that not a mortal dared man a boat and 
 trust himself on the uneasy deep. In spite of the winds we went over 
 the ground where " Agnes of Sorrento " walked with her grandmother, 
 entering the orange groves and plucking the golden fruit which our hands 
 could easily reach, by the side of the pale green olive terracing the moun- 
 tain sides, over the deep defiles which the angry sea has cut for itself 
 four miles toward Massa where we might be nearer to Capri. Entering 
 the limits of this town more dead than Pompeii, we asked for a hotel. A 
 bright boy left his horse standing in the middle of the street and with a 
 cunning look over his shoulder kept saying, " Come along ; come along !" 
 We tried to talk with him but he only replied " Come along, come along!" 
 Passing through streets narrower than the closes of Edinboro, he knocked 
 loudly at a gate which after a time was opened and we were conducted 
 to the one room we conclude, where were a number of beds for the weary 
 to rest, but scarcely another article of furniture in sight. We concluded 
 to return to the Hotel Tasso, and the next day went back to the city born 
 of a sea nymph. A little longer with these idle inhabitants, a few more 
 days under these sunny skies, and hand in hand with youthful Spring, we 
 turn our course toward more northern regions. We trust the fair god- 
 dess will not desert us, but will strew our pathway with blossoms many, 
 and deck the garlands above our heads as we seek again the land of our 
 birth. 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 167 
 
 Adieu, fair Napoli ! May your skies be ever golden, your waters sparkle 
 in the bright sunlight, your mountains and Islands be cr6wned with roseate 
 hues, and may Vesuvius nurse the fires within his own burning breast, and 
 the earthquakes leave you undisturbed. Naples, farewell ! 
 
ROME. 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 NIGHT'S ride through the Campagna of Italy, and early 
 morning opened our eyes upon Rome. Rome! Rome! 
 Regal Rome ! Seven weeks within her walls and among 
 her seven hills weeks which had their days doubled, their 
 hours heaped up, their minutes multiplied, yea, their seconds 
 stretched out almost into centuries and the wandering 
 Three were so burdened, oppressed, weighed down by the accumulation 
 of time, the passing away of generations, the changes in form of govern- 
 ment, that their hands refused to do their bidding, the ink dried upon the 
 pen, the mind lost itself in the maze of thought, and letters were unwrit- 
 ten because there was so much to say. 
 
 Rome is not like any other city. It is the city of all cities ; it repre- 
 sents the time of all times ; it is in very truth the Eternal City. Up 
 and down her seven hills, round about her massive walls, along beside 
 the yellow Tiber, slowly under the famous arches, toiling up the crumbling 
 towers, delving deep in the buried ruins, gazing with wonder at the works 
 of art, was it strange that, like Rip Van Winkle, we knew not our- 
 selves ? 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Romulus and Remus nursing the wolf. 2. General view of Rome, enter- 
 ing at the Porta del Popolo (Gate of the People). 3. Obelisk brought from Egypt, in centre of 
 Piazza del Popolo. 4. The street called the Corso, passing between the Twin Churches, Via 
 Ripetta at the right, Via Babuina at the left. 5. The Capitol, a little beyoud the Corso, on 
 the Capitoline Hill, the Colosseum at the left. 6. The Tiber, passing through the city, with the 
 Castle of St. Angelo, the Piazza St. Peter, the Cathedral and Vatican on the right. 
 

 I^TSB&^^is^^fiifccr - ...v^t 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 169 
 
 We stand upon the Aventine, and again we live the early days of that 
 other life when all the world was forgotten, and, infatuated, we followed 
 the Dardanian chief, the " goddess-born ./Eneas," fleeing from conquered 
 Troy to where 
 
 " In the shady shelter of a wood, 
 And near the margin of a gentle flood, 
 He beheld a sow upon the ground, 
 With thirty sucking young encompassed round." 
 
 We see the Trojans leave the main and enter the wood, 
 
 " Which thick with shades and a brown horror stood," 
 
 and soon we see the hundred ambassadors, laden with presents, on their 
 way to King Latinus, who receives them within his portico of a hundred 
 columns, standing on this same Mount Aventinus, accepts the sceptre 
 of old Priam, and sends a gift of three hundred horses and a chariot for 
 the pious ^Eneas. Near the base of this mountain stood the fig tree 
 (ficus ruminalis) where 
 
 " By the wolf were laid the martial twins," 
 
 and at its summit, in after years, Remus stood while his brother Romulus 
 was stationed upon Palatinus to watch the flight of birds and take the 
 auguries to decide who should found the city about to be built. To-day 
 we cross this lowest of the seven hills, we pass from base to opposite 
 base, and what do you think we see ? A beautiful blue sky overhead, 
 but almost nothing else ; for the narrow, dusty streets are shut in by 
 smooth, high brick walls, which allow not a glimpse of the great green 
 vineyards behind them ; and were we taking auguries, the birds must fly 
 high or we should not read aright. We muse and dream, and say within 
 ourselves, Truly the world has changed within twenty-five hundred years. 
 Down toward the setting sun we turn our steps and seek the muddy 
 river, which has wound its way to the sea regardless of the flight of time 
 or deeds of men, to the point where the Pons Sublicius, oldest of the 
 bridges across the Tiber, was immortalized by the brave defense of Hora- 
 tius Codes, standing alone on its tottering timbers till all support was 
 
 22 
 
I7O UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 cut away, then with his heavy armor on he swam to the shore, leaving 
 the enemy looking wistfully across. This scene brings back an oration 
 to which we often listened with thrilling interest from a bright-eyed 
 youth of wondrous powers, and so it brings back Cortland Academy and 
 the village green, happy hours and pleasant scenes, childhood and home. 
 But the bridge which the brave Horatius " kept so well " has followed 
 him into the waves of the Tiber, and, like him, been swallowed up by the 
 waves of Time. No bridge and no Horatius Codes ! 
 
 To the north of the mountain we have described, (deserted and old, 
 still fertile and fresh,) rises another of the seven hills, the Capitoline, 
 with its saddle-backed ridge crowned with two peaks, Ara Coali and 
 Monte Caprino, and the intervening space known as Intermontane. Oh, 
 for words and time to tell what this mountain has borne and these peaks 
 have seen ! Strabo and Livy have told us that nature once adorned 
 these summits with trees, and that in the intervening space between 
 these two groves Romulus, the first king of Rome, opened an asylum 
 for those fleeing from justice, and brought together assassins and out- 
 casts from all lands, and so furnished citizens for his new city. Then 
 where could wives be found for such a set of men ? But the carrying 
 off of the Sabine women belongs to another part of Rome. Wives were 
 stolen, and the inhabitants increased and multiplied under the king whose 
 nurse was a wolf and whose subjects were monsters of wickedness. On 
 the eastern point of the Capitoline mount, called Ara Coeli, (Altar 
 of Heaven,) they reared a temple to Jupiter, which stood for centuries 
 and furnished a place of worship for these godless creatures to satisfy the 
 spark of conscience still burning within their breasts. It did something 
 else too it gave us the name of Capitol ; for in digging for the founda- 
 tions of this temple the head was found of a man named Tolus, (caput 
 Toli,) so the building was called Capitol, and the name has since been 
 given to head buildings in other lands. 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. I/I 
 
 But pause, my pen, and cease your scribbling ; for vain is the effort to 
 enumerate the smallest part of the daring deeds and wondrous works 
 of mighty men and numerous hosts all along down from Romulus to 
 Victor Emanuel. What crowns Mons Capitolinus to-day? Our eyes 
 open wide with wonder, our feet hasten on with alacrity, we approach 
 the spot where the ages are heaped in a mingled mass. High, high up 
 the six score steps, on the point toward the rising sun, appropriately 
 stands the Church of Ara Coeli, upon that Altar of Heaven which once 
 bore the heathen temple to Jupiter Capitolinus. Here, as was most fit, 
 in this church so high, near the spot where Rome took its rise, Gibbon 
 conceived the idea of describing the Decline and Fall of the Roman 
 Empire. 
 
 A few steps downward and we stand in the Piazza del Campidoglio and 
 face the Senatorial Palace which rises from the ancient Tabularium which 
 in its turn rises from something older beneath it, (this massive foundation 
 was once the receptacle of the archives of republican Rome, and com- 
 municated with the grand old Forum at its base, both of which have for 
 centuries lain under the soil). A palace at our right and a palace at our 
 left, both full of mementoes of the past which we could have spent the 
 weeks in examining. There sit in cold silence the marble images of many 
 who have added to the long history of this old city, famous and infamous, 
 cruel and kind, patrician and plebeian in impressive array, surrounded by 
 the fruits of their labors corroded and defaced by the hand of time. 
 
 Ye social readers of " The Marble Faun," under the guidance of Haw- 
 thorne and one of the " Independent Three," imagine yourselves in the 
 capitol at Rome. In the center of the first room we have entered after 
 ascending the stairs the Gladiator is still dying ; Juno, Apollo, the Antinous 
 and the Amazon all stand the same cold, unmoved observers of his agony, 
 and the Faun of Praxiteles smiles on the scene, sad as it is, the Faun, 
 combining in one and the same form marks of the human and the animal 
 
1/2 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 natures, the impress of mind and the pointed, leaf-shaped ears of the 
 lower animals the Marble Faun, which was for hundreds of years 
 buried under the ruins of the past, then raised again to be placed as a 
 gem of the sculptor's art in this modern museum on the old Capitoline 
 Hill, and to become the theme of a most beautifully told tale of a well- 
 known American writer. 
 
 We look from one of the windows of this famous Capitoline museum 
 down upon the buildings, some of which saw the dawn of Christianity, 
 over the arch of Septimus Severus, not so triumphal as in the days of its 
 erection ; the Roman Forum, name reiterated in all ages as the era of 
 Roman power, lying in the valley between the Capitoline and Palatine 
 mounts ; on to the Coliseum, the grandest of colossal ruins ; over all 
 this we looked as did the former imaginary personages in the story to 
 which we have alluded ; and we too were pressed down with weighty 
 reminiscences, our lives were swallowed up in the grand events transacted 
 within the small space coming within our vision. With one of the four, 
 we felt that the Gladiator is too long in the very act of death, and we left 
 him to walk with the four in their romantic wanderings through the city 
 of the Caesars, this capital of the world. Through one hall after another, 
 gazing upon antique sculpture of dead heroes and rulers, mythical gods 
 and goddesses, imaginary Fauns and Satyrs, warlike Minervas and lovely 
 Venuses, powerful Hercules and terrible Jupiters, until the eqilibrium of 
 our brain seemed very much disturbed, and we could easily imagine all 
 joining in a sylvan dance with the frisky Faun as their leader. 
 
 The brazen wolf which centuries ago gave the unnatural supply to the 
 deserted boys in the Roman Forum is religiously preserved for coming 
 generations to see, and still supplies models for pictures and casts which 
 are everywhere seen in the streets of Rome. In the center of the piazza, 
 the noble horse of Marcus Aurelius still prances and paws as he did in 
 the days when the prince of sculptors, Michael Angelo, said, " See, he 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 1/3 
 
 moves," and the first and seventh mile stone stand almost side by side up 
 here, so long has been the time since they measured the weary way on 
 the Via Appia to Paul going forth to death. Constantine and his son are 
 prominent here as they are in the annals of the church and crown, and 
 Castor and Pollux stand by the side of their colossal steeds and guard the 
 steps to this famous mount. Can you not see this one of the seven hills 
 with the ruins at its base, the relics on its face, and the church and cap- 
 itol crowning its summit ? 
 
 Perhaps our friends for the sake of variety would take a long stride 
 from the hill-tops of Rome to the valleys between, from the dead images 
 of the past to the living forms of the present, from the dome of the Cap- 
 itol to the Corso Victor Emanuel. They will surely feel that they have 
 leaped over the ages, over time and space, and have been suddenly trans- 
 ported into fairy realms. The windows are brilliant with shining pearls 
 and pictured mosaics, with varied marble and cunningly wrought bronze, 
 with portraits that speak and statues that breathe, with the colors of 
 the rainbow and the skill of inspiration. Balconies have been builded 
 from story to story, bordered with crimson and colors bright, crowded 
 with people far and near. The streets are dense with the crowds that 
 gaze, they are alive with the numbers that throng their midst, they are 
 wild with the tumult that comes from the many, they are fantastic with 
 the costumes that cover the multitudes, they are strange with the masks 
 that hide the true-face, they are comical with the mixture of nature and 
 race. For what has the world come together in Rome ? It is the grand 
 carnival time and now all labor, and care, and thought are given to the 
 winds and melted into air ; the old have become young again, the hideous 
 have become beautiful, the sirens have become dancing fauns, and the 
 tarantala is gaily performed to the music of tambourines. For days the 
 Corso is the scene of confusion and everybody is pelted with flowers and 
 confetti, and then the world goes back to its duties and the Three return 
 to their wandering ways. 
 
174 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 Most interesting of the forty-six Piazzas (public squares) of this an- 
 cient city is the "Piazza di San Pietro, which we cross the Ponte St. 
 Angelo to visit, and standing in front of the most magnificent modern 
 monument in the world, the Basilica di St. Pietro. We gaze upon this 
 grand elliptical amphitheatre surrounded by a semi-circular portico formed 
 of 284 columns in four rows, and this surmounted by 140 colossal statues. 
 In the centre stands the Egyptian obelisk, 72 feet high, which Caligula 
 brought to Rome and placed in the circus of Nero, for it is here that the 
 most despicable of despots sent his name in infamy down to coming gen- 
 erations by the massacre of the Christians. At each side of this church, 
 which is the largest in the world, are the equestrian statues of Constantine 
 and Charlemagne, which send the mind galloping back through the ages 
 of the past to the year 326, when Constantine commenced the construc- 
 tion of a basilica, and carried with his own hands twelve baskets of earth 
 in honor of the twelve apostles. After a thousand years this gave place 
 to the present grand structure, the wonder of the world. It occupied 
 178 years in building and 350 to perfect it ; cost $50,000,000, and covers 
 eight acres ; 54,000 persons can be accommodated 'at a time within its 
 walls. It contains 290 windows, 748 columns, 47 altars, and 380 statues. 
 Two of the master minds which the world has ever produced devoted 
 their best years to the construction of this building, and the genius and 
 skill of Raphael and Michael Angelo are seen in all its parts. On the 
 summit of the facade, 149 by 370 feet, are the statues of Christ and the 
 twelve apostles. We enter one of the five doors which give access to 
 the vestibule and stand and wonder and gaze through the long central 
 nave 89 feet broad, 152 feet high, to the tribune 607 feet away in the 
 distance ; past the eight fluted Corinthian pilasters, each a house of 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Piazza of St. Peter with its obelisk in the center. 2. Cathedral of St. 
 Peter and the Vatican. 3. Interior of St. Peter. 4. Statue of St. Peter. 5. Sistine Chapel in 
 the Vatican, with M. Angelo's Last Judgment. 6. Statue of Laocoon. 
 
liit.-ri.o . l,-l);i ItiiKilirti 
 di 8. Piotro. 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 175 
 
 itself ; past the eight chapels each a church of itself where divine service 
 is performed, and you know it not until you are close upon it ; past the 
 bronze statue of St. Peter, black as Jupiter Tonans, whom it is said by 
 some to represent, and whose great toe is polished by the kisses of the 
 faithful ; past the beautiful bronze canopy supported by four spiral col- 
 umns under which is the high altar where the pope only celebrates mass 
 (and still beneath is said to be the tomb of St. Peter, although many 
 think there is no evidence that he ever saw the city of Rome) ; still far- 
 ther along we come under the beautiful dome designed by Michael 
 Angelo which lets the broad light of heaven in upon the four evangelists 
 so high above us that the pen in the hands of one, although seven feet 
 in length, seems of but common size. But we came in with the curious 
 to ascend to the dome of this cathedral. Many had gone before us for 
 the doors were open from eight to eleven, and probably hundreds came 
 after us as we learned at the end. The minutes went by and yet we 
 kept stepping up stair after stair, ascending flight after flight arranged in 
 every conceivable way, on and still on to the heights above. We never 
 before attempted to walk through the mazes of a labyrinth but now we 
 had entered upon a route which seemed endless. " The roof seems of 
 itself a little city covered towers, cottages, cisterns, plains and hills, 
 slopes and precipices." One of our number gave out again and stopped 
 midway between earth and the cross-crowned summit, while the two 
 passed on together for the highest point. The space through which we 
 walked grew narrow and the constantly increasing numbers crowded 
 compactly together, each pushing and striving to enter before his neigh- 
 bor ; the tall burly men almost crushed the American Coon climbing to 
 heights where coons seldom go. At last, with the sixteen who alone 
 could enter the bronze ball at the same time, we passed through, the door 
 which was closed and fastened by the guard ; again we mounted an 
 almost perpendicular flight of stairs, where the last flight rose entirely 
 
I 
 176 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 perpendicular, a ladder in fact, which we ascended, and while our backs 
 pressed against the opposite wall our faces almost touched the wall in 
 front. Where were we ? In the dome of St. Peter with only the cross 
 above us of the 146 feet from the pavement below. Sixteen crouching 
 figures, for we could by no means stand erect, moving around in a brass 
 ball, stopping every step or two to put an eye to the minute openings 
 which looked out upon the country of the Tiber, and down into the old 
 streets where men looked like specks in the sands of time ; peering out 
 toward the sea sixteen miles away, our vision of yEnas and the Trojans 
 suddenly vanished, dissipated by a harsh voice bidding us descend and 
 give place to others. About four hours (it occupied) to go to the sum- 
 mit of St. Peter, and it was a laborious work but one which we have 
 never regretted. 
 
 From the Basilica de San Pietro in Vaticano to the Palazzo del Vati- 
 cano it is but a few steps, and we ascend the Scala Regia, with the 
 equestrian statue of Constantine guarding the base and the less lifeless 
 guards moving up and down in picturesque Swiss costume, the dress 
 adopted in the time of Michael Angelo and worn to the present day. 
 The date of the building of this largest palace in the world, (1300 by 
 1000 feet,) this home of the Popes, is said to be unknown ; but it existed 
 in the time of Charlemagne, for he occupied it when he visited Rome, in 
 the year 800, to be crowned by Leo III. Modesty bids us bow our 
 heads and speak few words as we walk day after day through the halls 
 
 and galleries and museums of this famous edifice, where we seem to tread 
 
 
 
 on holy ground and breathe an atmosphere almost divine. Through the 
 Sistine Chapel so called from Sixtus IV., who ordered its erection 
 ornamented with the finest works of Michael Angelo ; the paintings on 
 the ceiling, which occupied him twenty-two months, representing the 
 Creation, the Fall of Man and the Deluge ; his most celebrated painting, 
 the Last Judgment, covers the entire end of the chapel, thirteen feet in 
 

ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 177 
 
 breadth, and occupied his fruitful mind and skillful hand almost seven 
 entire years ; while the paintings on the side walls represent the life 
 ,of Mary and the life of Christ. Through the Loggia of Raphael, termi- 
 nating the royal staircase, and consisting of three tiers of most beautiful 
 porticoes surrounding an open court, where " Raphael's Bible " is laid 
 before the beholder in fifty-two pictures on the vaults of the arches, 
 representing facts from the Old Testament ; the one over the entrance, 
 of the Eternal Father, was executed by Raphael's own hand, the remain- 
 der w^re designed by him and executed by his pupils. Through the 
 gallery of pictures, where, among the choice collection, is the Transfig- 
 uration on Mount Tabor, wet with the colors of the artist when, only 
 thirty-two years of age, the Angel of Death transported him to regions 
 where, we trust, he paints with heavenly dyes, fit production of the 
 illustrious master to lead the funeral procession to his tomb in the Pan- 
 theon, and to occupy henceforth its position at the head of all paintings, 
 fresh throughout the ages. Through the Stanze of Raphael, consisting 
 of four halls which, it is said, have not their equal in the world in extent, 
 composition, color, and general execution ; one, called the Hall of Con- 
 stantine, representing incidents in the life of that emperor his baptism, 
 the appearance of the fiery cross, and his victory over Maxentius. 
 Through the various museums, where everything old and curious is seen, 
 with the Torso Belvidere, fragment of a statue of Hercules, and the 
 celebrated group of Laocoon, a statue dug up with the seventy thousand 
 about Rome which come from the ages of the past, taking us back to the 
 days of Virgil, when we read that the serpents, " ardentes oculos suffecti 
 sanguini et igni" destroyed Laocoon and his two sons, days when the 
 wooden horse was brought into Troy ; a statue which is a remnant 
 of Greek sculpture, carried to Paris in 1797 by Napoleon, and returned 
 when his reign was finished. 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Raphael. 2. The Transfiguration. 3. The Sistine Madonna. 4. St. Cece- 
 lia in Ecstacies. 
 23 
 
178 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 We would linger long, but must needs break away, for we have seen 
 but a small part of the Eternal City. We might go out through a sub- 
 terranean passage by which the Pope escaped when Rome was sacked in 
 the sixteenth century, and took refuge in the castle which we find at the 
 other extremity. This castle or fort, which has many times seen bloody- 
 service, was raised for an entirely different purpose and one far more 
 peaceful as a tomb for the Emperor Hadrian- and his family and suc- 
 cessors. It is said to have been covered with marble and adorned with 
 colossal groups of men and horses, the statue of Hadrian crowning the 
 whole. But War regards not the sacred resting-place of the dead nor 
 the beautiful creations of the artist or sculptor, and in 537, when the 
 Goths besieged the Greeks here, the beautiful statues were hurled down 
 upon the besiegers and trampled under fo.ot of man and beast. Now it 
 is a castle instead of a mausoleum, and bears the name of St. Angelo, 
 from the bronze statue of St. Michael, the archangel, which rises from 
 the summit. Walking through this interesting fort down into the 
 dismal dungeon where Beatrice Cenci (Beatreechy Chenchy the Ital- 
 ians call her,) wept away the weary weeks, we understood why one 
 sad face looks down upon us everywhere in Rome. We seemed to 
 see the sad face of this maiden so young, as it was painted by 
 the artist within her prison walls in the Castle of St. Angelo the evening 
 before her execution the sorrowful face which looks out from so many 
 of the windows of Rome, with great beseeching eyes of brown that tell 
 their tale of weeping and of woe ; that face which is radiant in its turban 
 of white, and which haunts the observer from palace to garret ; the same 
 face, the original of which, fresh from the artist's hand, looked upon us 
 from the walls of the Barberini Palace, now like a spectre seemed to look 
 down from the grim walls of the old nameless palace and repeat its story 
 of patricide (almost justifiable) and execution upon the block. 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Castle of St. Angelo. 2. Beatrice Cenci. 3. Hilda's Tower. 4. Foun- 
 tain of Trevi. 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 
 
 As we entered the large, bare room where, our guide informed us, her 
 trial was conducted, we saw at the farther extremity a half-opened door 
 and a face peering intently upon us. We walked quietly and spoke low 
 as we were led in that direction, but what was our astonishment to find 
 it was only a portrait on the wall the portrait of Beatrice's Judge, who, 
 listening breathlessly to the testimony of the witnesses, was sketched by 
 the artist, and lives with the prisoner and painter Beatrice Cenci and 
 Guido Reni. We walked between the statues of the twelve Apostles 
 out over the bridge of many a century, the Ponte St. Angelo. 
 
 One sunny. day in February we three walked forth to see we knew 
 not what, only something to wonder at. Of a sudden we stopped. Was 
 it ? Yes, it must be Hilda's Tower ! " Square, massive, lofty, battle- 
 mented," with the Virgin's shrine and the image before which the light 
 has been burning many centuries. Hawthorne could not pause in his 
 story to tell you the legend connected with this shrine ; we give you 
 merely the outlines. In the days when Rome was younger and her 
 palaces were newer, the lord and lady who dwelt in elegance here left 
 their babe, which was as dear as all babies are to the hearts which beat 
 for them, in the care of a faithful servant. The watchful nurse placed 
 the babe on the floor and stepped in, as was natural, to sympathize with 
 one of kindred employment. When the visit was ended the child was 
 gone where! oh, where ! The frantic woman sought everywhere, and 
 finally learned that a mischievous monkey had undertaken the care of the 
 forsaken little one, and had borne it to the highest point of this palatial 
 residence. Crazy with fear, she prostrated herself and made vows which 
 moved the heart of the Virgin to save the beloved child. The delighted 
 parents raised this shrine, and this is the light which Hilda is represented 
 as tending so faithfully, and this the dovecote where the American artist 
 girl dwelt among the doves. 
 
 As we stood there in the dirty streets, and looked wishfully up to the; 
 
l8O UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 rays so high, a vision flitted past, in form like a dove, pure and white as 
 an angel. We can never tell whether it was imagination, or one of Hilda's 
 doves come down to greet the three sisters from the American shores. 
 Through the portal of this palace, over the hard, dirty stone pavement, 
 through the dingy, dark halls, and up the stone steps rising story after 
 story, where in different ages prince and peasant, beggar and artist have 
 turned their course, went the wandering Three to call at the door of the 
 Dovecote, where the copyist entered on her mission to the Virgin's shrine ; 
 and within which, drawing upon her memory, she copied so correctly 
 the mournful, beautiful Beatrice Cenci from the original of the renowned 
 Guido Reni. Beatrice Cenci is one of the characters too numerous to 
 mention, whose names are indelibly written in the records of history 
 Roman history and Hilda the Dove will henceforth hold a place among 
 the fictitious characters which have so particularly interested all readers 
 in the true and living ones. 
 
 The moon rode through the cloudless sky, casting shadows in the 
 Eternal City, creating images, in the sparkling fountains, looking shyly 
 round the corners where centuries have gone into darkness, peeping over 
 the massive buildings reared by the hand of ancient lords, and through 
 the dim halls of once georgeous palaces, lighting up the tall obelisk that 
 once stood upon the Nile, and making the hieroglyphics tell wondrous 
 tales, pouring into the Golden House, which Nero raised for his statues 
 and paintings and frescoes and mosaics, and most of all his cruel self, and 
 into the baths which Titus built over the wealth of his notorious pred- 
 ecessor ; glancing at the fallen columns which once stood in the crowded 
 Forums, but now lie broken in the dust below ; climbing to the heights of 
 the abode of the Caesars, and picturing with golden fingers the royal mag- 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Capitoline Mount with the equestrian statue of Marcus Aurelius in the cen- 
 ter of the Piazza Campidoglia, Church of Ara Coeli at the right, the Capitol at the left ; Castor 
 and Pollux by the side of their steeds guarding the steps. 2. The Coliseum by Moonlight. 3. 
 Arch of Constantino and Arch of Titus. 4. Roman Forum. 5. Back of the Capitol. 
 
'- 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. l8l 
 
 m 
 
 nificence in, this home of tt\e Emperors, yea, looking back to the home of 
 the kings who ruled and reigned in this city of fabulous origin on the 
 peak of the Palatine, and gleamirig upon the walls of that wonder of the 
 world the Coliseum. 
 
 Coming' from the hall of a Roman house which needs not the light of 
 waxen tapers, the Three went forth with their company doubled and 
 walked through the streets as did the artists and sculptors on their moon- 
 light ramble, coming out too upon the same piazza, where the waters have 
 played in their virgin purity ever since the Aqua Virgo was pointed out 
 1 a thirsty soldier by a maiden of charms, fourteen miles from the busy 
 city, and brought underground more than a score of years before the 
 Christian era to adorn this spot in the midst of active life. For nineteen 
 hundred years Neptune has stood above these waters on a stupendous 
 shell and Tritons have guided his sea-horses, while health and fertility 
 have dispensed blessings in the flowing water of the fountain of Trevi. 
 We stood upon the borders of this fountain, with the music of the waters 
 sounding in our ears, and the play of the moonlight before our eyes, and 
 again fancy took possession of us, and we sailed over the waters of this 
 miniature lake with sea-nymphs at our side and the Faun upon the shore. 
 We were not ready to drink of this fountain, but the eve before we left 
 Rome, we stood upon the borders and quaffed the water that will ensure 
 our return. 
 
 On we went to the Forum of Trajan, which excels all the other forums in 
 magnificence of marble and splendor of sculpture, where stands the grand 
 column with its records in stone of the deeds of the emperor among the 
 Dacians, and where lies on the verge of the space hollowed out, the gray, 
 granite column so vast in its fallen grandeur that we can scarcely imagine 
 the force that could have raised it or the ruin of its fall. Being in an 
 altogether mythical mood, we called, "Trajan ! Trajan !" and fancied his 
 spirit coming down in the moonlight and standing with Peter on the sum- 
 
1 82 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 mit of the column, and we left him to look over the change which cen- 
 turies had wrought, while we passed on by the ruins of three temples to 
 as many gods and goddesses, on to the Coliseum. 
 
 The Coliseum by moonlight. The great black ruin is none too large 
 to bear the inscriptions of death and destruction, of toil and torture, of 
 woe and wretchedness none too vast to give the names and numbers of 
 men and hearts whose blood was here shed for the gratification of the 
 populace none too black to tell the story ; and the moonlight was 
 none too bright to bring out the weird ghosts of the eighty thousand who 
 sat on these seats with Vespasian at their head and grinned with savage 
 delight at the horrible scenes enacted below. Nature has tried to hide 
 this monument so monstrous, has sprinkled it with sands that lie thick 
 upon its breast, but man will not permit that it shall be buried with for- 
 getfulness ; he digs away the accumulated dirt, delves to the foundation, 
 and we looked upon the sad story written in letters of light. The Col- 
 iseum by moonlight ! Who would not cross the broad Atlantic to look 
 upon its massive walls ? 
 
 "A ruin yet what ruin ! from its mass 
 
 Walls, palaces, half cities have beeu reared ; 
 Yet oft the enormous skeleton ye pass, 
 
 And marvel where the spoil could have appeared. 
 Hath it indeed been plundered or but cleared ? 
 
 It will not bear the brightness of the day. 
 
 Which streams too much on all years, man, have reft away. 
 
 But when the rising moon begins to climb 
 
 Its topmost arch, and gently pauses there ; 
 When the stars twinkle through the loops of time, 
 
 And the low night breeze waves along the air, 
 The garland forest, which the gray walls wear, 
 
 Like laurels on the bald first Caesar's head ; 
 When the light shines serene but doth not glare, 
 
 Then in this magic circle raise the dead, 
 
 Heroes have trod this spot, 'tis on their dust ye tread." 
 
 May the hand of memory not be treacherous in delineation that we 
 may always have this picture before us. 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 183 
 
 Out from the arches of the old amphitheatre upon the old Roman 
 pavement on whose broad flat stones Cicero marked the dignity of his 
 orations, and Horace measured the rhythm of his verse, perhaps upon 
 the very one colored by the blood of the pure Virginia who was sacrificed 
 by her father to be saved from slavery, along the Via Sacra, where the 
 sacrifices of Romulus were offered, by the site of temples in their ruined 
 grandeur, under the triumphal arch erected to Titus when he had con- 
 quered Jerusalem and brought the Jews here as captives, by those columns 
 looking weird in the broad sunlight and in the dim moonlight spectral 
 and ghastly, we walked over the space which is narrow in steps but broad 
 beyond measure in important events, the space where history has ex- 
 hausted herself and lain down to rest between the hills so celebrated, the 
 Palatine and the Capitoline, the space most famous in ancient Rome the 
 Roman Forum. Here trod the man who was once nursed by a wolf, 
 here lived the man who laid the foundation of Rome's greatness ; and 
 Rome to-day feeds and nourishes, in a cage by her public buildings, the 
 wolf, as the preserver of her founder. 
 
 Another day when the first pink blossoms had appeared on the almond 
 tree, we walked through the garden gate that keeps the curious from the 
 Tarpeian Rock without the payment of a few soldis, and stood upon the 
 spot which was always a place of great interest ; it was here that the 
 woman was covered with shields because the soldiers bore them in their 
 left hands, and that was what they had promised to her if she would open 
 the gate of the city unto them, (she meant their rings and bracelets.) 
 False men ! We bent over the parapet and imagined the sensation of 
 being hurled to the base the traitors of old and the Capuchin of the 
 Forum by the Faun. 
 
 Many times we entered the Church of the Capuchins, standing a little 
 off the Piazza Barberini, and a monk with the brown frock and cowl drew 
 the curtain from before Guido's Archangel, and we remembered the criti- 
 
184 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 cisms of the heroine of our tale that the Archangel is too feminine and 
 fair and gentle. We went with this monk to the basement, through 
 four chapels opening one into the other, all decorated in a most uncom- 
 mon manner with the different bones of the human body, put together 
 in ways to represent flowers, and trees, and bouquets in baskets, and 
 wreaths and various things which are ordinarily pleasant to look upon, 
 but here ghastly and terrible. In the little space of ground within each 
 chapel is soil brought from Jerusalem, in which twelve can be buried at 
 a time, and when a monk of this order dies, the one who has lain longest 
 in the holy ground is taken up to give place to his brother, and his bones 
 are taken to ornament the walls. In several instances the body is in 
 such a state of preservation that it is placed entire in some nook or cor- 
 ner, and there grins ever at the living and the dead. Four thousand 
 bodies have lain in this holy earth ; but no more will lie there, for Victor 
 Emanuel has forbidden to bury within the city. Within this church, in 
 the dim light, we fancied the dead monk lying in brown frock and cowl 
 with beads and crucifix hanging from his girdle, just as he had been 
 thrown from the Tarpeian Rock, and the mournful burial chant sounded 
 in our ears, and we shivered with the heroes of " Marble Faun," who 
 looked upon the work which their hands had wrought. 
 
 The Bambino is one of the sights of Rome and we will describe it in 
 the words of another : " The Bambino is a wooden figure made to repre- 
 sent the infant Jesus. We are assured that it was made from a tree of 
 the Mount of Olives and carved by St. Luke. It is carefully preserved 
 in a casket of wood. Its dress is of the finest fabrics trimmed with lace 
 and covered with jewels. Better in the eyes of the faithful than hydro- 
 pathy, homeopathy, or allopathy is Bambinopathy. In times of dire dis- 
 tress it is taken from its chapel in the church Ara Coeli and carried to 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Capuchin Monk. 2. Burial place of the Capuchins. 3. Beggar Boy. 
 4. Bambino. 
 

 
 -o J 
 

ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 185 
 
 visit the sick, who either die or get well. Michael Angelo's Moses is the 
 piece of statuary which if marble could speak would tell us tales of inter- 
 est, but it looks coldly and quietly upon all transactions within the church 
 St. Pietro in Vinculis. 
 
 On a lovely bright day, one of the first of February, having finished 
 one of those penitential pilgrimages our author tells us about, over the 
 little lava stones, pointed all so as to give an uneasy feeling to the walk- 
 er's feet, we passed through the Porto del Popolo, in company with the 
 so-called Faun, to visit the suburban Villa Borghese. A few feet from the 
 old, old walls, a few paces from the grim old gate, (interesting, however, 
 because we knew that the greatest-of architects made the design,) the syl- 
 van spirit takes possession of us, and we gaily dance along the graveled 
 walks under the graceful boughs of the ilex-trees, bowing and bending 
 and extending their branches until they form a continued green covering 
 above our heads ; by the prim poplars and the shady cypress ; over the 
 starry and pink-petaled daisies, the pretty purple anemones, and the 
 golden-yellow blossoms which nearly carpet the ground. Is it strange 
 that in the midst of this sylvan scene we fancied the Faun with his furry 
 ears, and the Nymph with his sunny smile, dancing in delight through 
 the glassy glades ; and, when the delightful day drew to an end and we 
 went back to the walls of ancient Rome, is it strange that we felt we 
 had spent a day in romance and in fable ? 
 
 Again, when February was just bidding adieu to her consort Spring, 
 the visit was repeated to this same Borghese Villa this same sylvan 
 grove and returning with hands laden with bright blossoms, we took a 
 stroll on the Pincian. Up from the Piazza del Popolo, from the very foot 
 of that old red obelisk, which is one of the eleven these roaming Romans 
 have brought from the Nile and left but eight to cast their long shadows 
 there ; up by the smooth, hard road, which makes many acute angles in 
 its course, to the proud peak of the Pincian ; up to that point which over- 
 24 
 
1 86 UNITED STATES GIRLS; 
 
 looks that bit of the oldest, old wall, (hardly the one that Remus leapt 
 over, however, for methinks it is rather too high for that,) the Muro 
 Torto ; and, standing with faces toward the dim, distant Soracti, looking 
 over the Campagna lying without the walls, a visionary Faun walked 
 through the Flaminian Gate, soon followed by those other fictitious char- 
 acters so closely connected with our tale. We went slowly beside the 
 parapet, winding our way among the crowds of people speaking in almost 
 every language but Italian, in the midst of carriages bearing many who 
 like ourselves came from the far Western wilds, by the side of amuse- 
 ments which recalled the gay Champs Elyse"es and brought together all 
 ages and ranks ; we looked upon Rome, the Rome of all time. We saw 
 St. Peter's, the church of the world, over which the spirit of Michael 
 Angelo seems to hover ; we saw the round Pantheon with the relics of 
 Raphael, whose single eye looks constantly heavenward ; we saw we 
 saw we saw all this city which has stood so long that it has become its 
 own sepulchre, which has covered and dug up its own bones, which has 
 burned and resurrected its offspring. We looked upon the evening sun- 
 set, we listened to the vesper bells, and from the summit of the oft 
 ascended steps, from the Piazza di Spagna, we went down the Via Sis- 
 tina, and near the Fountain of the Triton refreshed tired nature with 
 food and drink requisite for the occasion. 
 
NORTHERN ITALY. 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 'OME has become a vision of the past, gone with her walls 
 and her hills and her ruins and her Tiber into the store- 
 house of memory, with Naples and her dreamy bay, with 
 Venice and her funereal gondolas, with all Italy and her 
 sunny views. In the light of the twinkling stars we drank 
 our au revoir from the waters of Trevi, and slept one more 
 night in the city where seven weeks had passed as a day. Then began 
 our course from Italy to England, from Rome to London, from the Tiber 
 to the Thames, from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic, and with fair 
 Spring everywhere greeting us, we were homeward bound. 
 
 A day's ride of but little interest, through a country which looked as 
 though it had delivered up its wealth in ages long gone by, or was wait- 
 ing for the presence of our goddess to restore the powers which Winter 
 had benumbed, brought us to Pisa, where, we need not tell our friends, 
 the celebrated Tower has leaned for more than six hundred years and 
 been a source of attraction to thousands visiting the land. Of course 
 we went to its very summit, up the stairs which wind about its eight 
 stories, and there sat down to contemplate the scene. Although our 
 point of observation overhung the base to the extent of fifteen feet, yet 
 we felt no fear, for the centre of gravity lay ten feet within the base, and 
 we looked upon the sun, as it went out of sight, in perfect composure, 
 and rejoiced that its brilliant setting portended a fine day for our ride 
 over the Appenines. 
 
1 88 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 It was even so, the finest of days, and seven o'clock saw us at the 
 depot for the short ride to the Gulf of Spezia, where we took the more 
 desirable carriage, throwing back its top to let us look upon the grand 
 mountain scenery, and drawn by four noble steeds. Over the Appenines ! 
 In Italy especially, the bays are beautiful, the lakes are lovely, and the 
 cities are curious ; but on the morning of which we write the country 
 was charming and the mountains magnificent. The wand of Spring had 
 produced a magical effect, and a halo of freshness encircled the earth, a 
 golden haze floated in the air. The little village of Spezia looked like 
 an Aladdin's palace on the borders of the bright water, gilded with the 
 lustre of the sun's rays, and it is not strange that the Romans called it 
 the Portus Lunae (Gate of the Moon) ; indeed, we fancied we were 
 accompanying the identical Old Man whose features are so often traced 
 by the romantic in the fair orb of Luna, for the route was so enchant- 
 ing ; the modest little marguerites nestled along the roadside and the 
 golden anemones were showered upon us, while little feet kept pace with 
 the rolling wheels and little hands were extended into our very midst, 
 pleading that it was better for us to give than to receive. The peaks 
 appeared in rapid succession, but just as rapidly disappeared, and it was 
 all one beautiful, changing panorama. Our guide did not for one moment 
 desert us, although she was not so profuse in the variety she presented 
 the entire route, and on the neighboring summits we could see that 
 Winter had not yet yielded the sceptre to the queen following so closely 
 upon his footsteps. All along our winding way occasional glimpses 
 of the sparkling sea contrasted beautifully with the bare brown rocks 
 and the sombre evergreens and the purple heather, and our trip across 
 the Appenines, with our number increased by the addition of two to our 
 party, will ever be prominent in our " sunny memories of foreign lands." 
 
 The mountains crossed, the sea-shore reached, and then commenced 
 such a roaring, and screeching, and diving into darkness, that we could 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 189 
 
 imagine we were playing hide-and-seek with the imps of the infernal 
 realms. It was, however, only the cars passing in and out from the 
 many tunnels on the road to Genoa. 
 
 From the home of Columbus to Milan and Lake Como the lake so 
 famous, so justly famous ; the lake whose beauties the artist has deline- 
 ated with the tints of the rainbow and the shades of the sunset, which 
 the poet has portrayed in sweet-sounding rhyme and soft- rolling verse, 
 but whose beauties are best seen from the hand of the Master Artist and 
 in the book of Nature. Our place of sojourn was at Bellaggio, where 
 the two arms come up from Lucca and from Como, unite in one body, 
 and flow on in one round of loveliness, 
 
 It was at the broad hour of noon that the Three went forth from the 
 little, close Italian town, leaving behind the workers in olive-wood, and 
 going up higher to sit under the vine and olive, there to feast the body 
 and please the mind, to delight the eye and rejoice the soul. Picnics are 
 always pleasant affairs, and we remember many in the year of wandering 
 and some in the years before we crossed the sea, but none with more 
 pleasure than the one taken on the heights of Bel Monte the first day 
 of April, 1874. The sky was our covering, of a blue so fair and yet so 
 deep that it seemed to reach to the very portal of heaven, and the fleecy 
 clouds, so soft and white, sailed swiftly on toward the haven of rest. 
 The mountains in the dim distance lifted their snowy summits so ethe- 
 rially and so uncertainly that it was impossible to say where earth was 
 finished and heaven begun, and the peaks in the near horizon rolled 
 along like the billows of ocean, bearing upon their breasts the moving 
 shadows of the clouds. The hand of the early springtime was upon 
 everything about us ; tenderest green decked the brown branches, varied 
 with the pink of the prunella and peach, and the shrubs were so delicate 
 that we scarcely knew whether they bore leaves or flowers, while the 
 golden anemones shone in the grass by the side of the meek and modest 
 
 
190 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 daisies. On our right and on our left, down through the vines and olives, 
 all this loveliness was repeated over and over again in the waters of the 
 two lakes as they rolled around the green point with its far-seeing palace, 
 and joyfully leaped on to receive together the sunny skies and silvery 
 clouds, the snow-capped mountains and vine-clad hills. Who would not 
 have enjoyed the picnic on Lake Como ? 
 
 A sail of two and a half hours, a flying trip on the railroad, and 
 we halt at Milan, and at early sunrise visit the Cathedral. " Strange, 
 pure, immaculate mountain of airy unearthly loveliness the most striking 
 emblem of God's mingled vastness and sweetness that ever it was given 
 to human heart to desire or hands to execute. If there be among the 
 many mansions of our Father above, among the houses not made with 
 hands, aught purer and fairer, it must be the work of those grand spirits 
 who inspired and presided over the erection of this celestial miracle of 
 beauty thousands of glorified saints standing on a thousand airy points 
 of brilliant whiteness ever solemnly adoring. It had the etherial trans- 
 lucence of wintry frost-work. The beautiful plains of Lombardy lie be- 
 neath like a map, and the northern horizon line is glittering with the 
 entire sweep of the Alps like a solemn senate of archangels with diamond 
 mail and glittering crowns. Mount Blanc, Monte Rosa with its counte- 
 nance of light, the Jungfrau, and all the weird brothers of the Oberland, 
 rise one after another to the delighted gaze and the range of the Tyrol 
 melts far off into the blue of the sky. On another side the Apennines, 
 with their picturesque outlines and cloud-spotted sides, complete the en- 
 closure. All around is the unbroken phalanx of mountains. And this 
 temple, with its thousand saintly statues standing in attitudes of ecstacy 
 and prayer, seems like a worthy altar and shrine for the beautiful plain 
 which the mountains enclose ; it seems to give all northern Italy to God. 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Tower of Pisa. 2. Leaning Tower of Bologna, (see page 140.) 3. 
 Milan Cathedral. 4. Leonardo da Vinci. 5. Last Supper. 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. IQI 
 
 One can fancy there a band of white-robed kings and priests forever 
 ministering in that great temple of which the Alps and the Apennines 
 are the walls and the Cathedral the heart and centre. Never were Na- 
 ture and Art so majestically married by Religion in so worthy a % temple." 
 So says Mrs. Stowe, and ^we say, of all the beautiful things our eyes 
 looked upon in foreign lands, nothing could surpass the summit of Milan 
 Cathedral. 
 
 At Milan, too, is that most beautiful production of the hand of man 
 the Last Supper painted on the wall of a room where one would scarce 
 look for aught of this kind. In the refectory of a convent, which has 
 even been used as a stable, is the original of the painting which estab- 
 lished the reputation of Leonardo da Vinci. " He was occupied two 
 years in painting this picture. The knowledge of character displayed in 
 the heads of the different Apostles is even more wonderful than the skill- 
 ful arrangement of the figures and the amazing beauty of the workman- 
 ship. The space occupied by the picture is a wall twenty-eight feet in 
 length, the figures being larger than life. Leonardo has contrived to 
 break the formality of the line of heads without any apparent artifice, and 
 without disturbing the general simplicity and order, and has imparted 
 to a solemn scene sufficient movement and variety of action without 
 detracting from its dignity and pathos ; he has kept the expression of 
 each head true to its traditional character, without exaggeration, without 
 effort. The intellectual elevation, the fineness of nature, the benign 
 God-like dignity, suffused with the profoundest sorrow in Christ, sur- 
 passes all conceived as possible in art." " Sacred legendary Art." 
 
HOMEWARD BOUND. 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 ORE than four months before, we entered Italy on 
 Thanksgiving Day, and coming over the peaks where 
 Winter had already spread her white carpet, we left the 
 snowy regions and dwelt in one long, continual springtime. 
 On one of the first days of April we took our places in the 
 cars, with hearts full of thanksgiving that we had wandered 
 in the lands where the pious -/Eneas, and Romulus and Remus, and 
 scores of others whose names are written in the book of fame, wandered 
 before us. We came over the mountains, but we went under the moun- 
 tains not, however, until we had gone up so high that we greatly feared 
 Spring would retreat and leave us in the icy hands from which we had 
 been striving all these months to escape. We passed through tunnels 
 innumerable, and finally, in the midst of fast-falling snow-flakes, entered 
 that longest one which the world yet knows, and passed over seven and 
 a half miles where the sun never shines thirty-five minutes under the 
 ground. 
 
 In France we saw the light again, and here too the snow was falling 
 upon Mont Cenis ; but we steamed on, and one day more brought us to 
 the beautiful city of Paris. 
 
 A few hours ride from this justly-famed city, our car "Pour les 
 Dames" was entered by four French dames of the type we have 
 always imagined those of the terrible days of the French Revolution of 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 
 
 the days so graphically described in the Tale of Two Cities, when the 
 " Sharp maiden La Guillotine " received so many victories from the hands 
 of the rough French women. These women did not wear the tri-colored 
 cockade, but that which was somewhat akin to it the high-colored 
 turban ; and as Madame Defarge was always knitting during the Reign 
 of Terror, they were busily plying their needles in the bustle and jar of 
 travel ; they lost nothing, however, that was passing about them. Two 
 other women were occupying the car, each with a child ; first they cate- 
 chised the little French girl and learned all the circumstances of the past 
 and present, then commenced with the American girl, who scarcely knew 
 how to answer their questions. After they had asked for a song in the 
 English language, it was but meet and proper that they should sing the 
 Marseillaise in the accent and style of the true French citizeness ; but at 
 the suggestion they seemed to shrink and not to realize that the watch- 
 words of the French Republic " Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite"" were 
 the rule and order of the day. After some consultation, however, one of 
 their number sang, in low tones, the grand old air which has so incited 
 "Aux armes, ciloyens" So we heard the Marseillaise sung by a French 
 woman in her own patrie. Six weeks among the people, whose native 
 tongue takes the traveler throughout Europe, six weeks in their schools 
 and their churches, in their shops and their homes, six weeks with the 
 daily gazette in our hands to inform us of the transactions in the capital 
 city. 
 
 One item of news on the first days of May was the following : " Les 
 premieres cerises de Vanuee vrennint de faire leur apparition a Paris" 
 Cherries ! ,ierry is excellent for the teeth in our native land, why not 
 in the land across the Atlantic ? Again, " / mai, grandes eaux a Ver- 
 sailles" Preparations were immediately made to attend the grand play 
 of waters at the Palace of Versailles, and on the morning designated we 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Palace of Versailles, Forest and Fountains. 
 25 
 
194 tJNITEt) STATES GlfctS 
 
 could not afford the time for the exercise of pedestrianism, so we took a 
 somewhat novel mode of patronizing steam and the iron road. On the 
 top of the cars, where it was somewhat airy, but from which was obtained 
 a magnificent view of the surrounding country, we rode twelve miles to 
 visit Versailles. Versailles ! the hunting ground of the Louis, sixty miles 
 in circumference, the home of monarchs for an entire century, the palace 
 where the guards of Marie Antoinette were massacred, and the room 
 where she was sleeping when the mob burst upon her, the Grand and 
 Petit Trianons where the Louis kept their madames in luxury and ease, 
 the most interesting combination of nature and art, the great forest trees 
 varied with statues and fountains. (Oh ! who can describe them ?) Paris 
 is the capital of France, but it is at Versailles that the Assembly meets in 
 modern days and administers rule to the young republic " Vive la Re- 
 pub Clique ! " 
 
 On the 1 4th of May, 1874, we said our final adietix au Paris at the 
 mid-day hour, crossed the Marne (truly meandering) eight times, came 
 in close proximity to the residences of the familiar French writers Bos- 
 suet, La Fontaine, and Rousseau, saw the place where Attila was de- 
 feated in 431, and after a ride of twenty hours reached the Argentora- 
 tum of ancient history the city which the Romans took from the Celts 
 before the time of Christ Strasburg, which for the last centuries has 
 been so much in doubt as to whether they should acknowledge Germany 
 the Vaterland, and drink lager beer, singing, " Fest steht ^^nd treu die 
 Wacht die Wacht am Rkeim" or " Enfants de la Patrie France',' should 
 march to the music of the Marseillaise sipping the sweet wines. The 
 tallest church spire which the world can claim meets the eye of the trav- 
 eler long before he enters this contested city, and unrolls its beautiful lace 
 work from base to pinnacle. (This spire is 468 feet high, only 24 feet 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Cathedral and the Storks. 2. Old Palace. 3. Clock. 4. Statue of Gut- 
 teuberg, Inventor of Printing. 5. Inventor of the Clock. 6. Reformers. 
 
tfmrfrltrttmn.ll 
 
 tfin>lr111rfcr 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. IQ5 
 
 less than the tallest Egyptian pyramid.) It is not strange that some of 
 the random shots from French or German cannon should have disturbed 
 somewhat the well-wrought patterns, but it is much more strange that it 
 should stand a cathedral still in spite of siege with shot and shell. We 
 shall attempt to enlarge upon only one of the many points of this inter- 
 esting structure the astronomical clock, the wonder of the world, 
 invented in 1573. At the base of this clock stands a globe representing 
 the motions of our planetary system. The earth moves around the plane 
 of its orbit in 24 hours, Saturn in 30 years, Jupiter in 12, Mars in 2, the 
 Sun, Mercury and Venus in I, and the Moon in one month. In the mid- 
 dle frame is an artrolabe showing the daily positions of each planet in the 
 signs of the zodiac. There is the skull of a dead man and statues of two 
 boys, one of whom turns the hour-glass when the clock has struck ; the 
 other puts forth the rod in his hand at each stroke of the clock. There 
 are statues of Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter. Youth, Old Age 
 and Death strike the quarters, passing around in procession with meas- 
 ured pace every hour and standing between the quarters with face or back 
 in view, the going and the coming, the past and the future. But at the 
 mid-day hour the room is crowded to witness the procession of the twelve 
 apostles which daily walk around at the very summit, each bowing low as 
 he comes in front of the Saviour to receive his benediction, while the 
 cock claps his wings and crows clearly three times before Peter denies 
 his Lord. 
 
 Everywhere a pleasant picture was presented to view of feathered 
 families watching over the city oft-disturbed, as the goose saved the 
 Roman capital from the invasion of savage hordes, only that was in the 
 night time, and it is under the eye of bright old Sol that the storks take 
 their stand as sentinels of Strasburg. May their nests be undisturbed 
 and their families unbroken by the shrill war trumpet and the leaden 
 bullet of death, but may the spirit of Gutenburg hover over the scene 
 and carry forward the invention he gave to the world printing. 
 
UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 One mile away Father Rhine takes his waters joyfully on toward the 
 castles and invites us again to seek what before became to us " Chateaux 
 en Espagne? (castles in the air.) But we turn a deaf ear for we have 
 heard of Heidelberg Castle, (which, " next to the Alhambra of Grenada, is 
 the most magnificent ruin of the middle ages,") and Heidelberg University, 
 and we spend a Sabbath on the banks of the Neckar, in the region so re- 
 plete with incidents of the Reformation, we enter that famous church 
 where Jerome of Prague, the friend of Huss, fastened his theses ; and a 
 more wonderful church still which accommodates Catholics and Protest- 
 ants under one and the same roof, the Church of the Holy Ghost, where 
 we read on the walls " Eine feste Burg ist unser Gott" and just before the 
 door we saw the faces of the well-known reformers, Luther, Huss, Jerome 
 of Prague, etc. Above the picturesque Neckar to the castle, around 
 Heidelberg Tun, the largest cask in the world, capable of containing 800 
 hogsheads but which was 'never filled but once, and we came back to rest 
 in our room at the hotel, when a glance from the window showed an exhi- 
 bition so truly unique that we were anxious to see it a dog dance. In a 
 rumbling cart rode eight or ten varieties of the canine race, from the wee 
 poodle to the grim old mastiff, all sitting like majors on the seats pre- 
 pared for them ; and when they were placed upon the ground and their 
 captain, with two legs instead of four, made music and called off for them 
 to dance, they did better than some we have seen in parlors, and we 
 are sure that the German dogs are accomplished in this line at least. 
 
 Through Worms, where we had a little quarrel with the conductor, 
 just to remember the city where Luther was summoned to appear before 
 the Diet, (not where he dieted on worms, as a certain little girl under- 
 stood it,) we arrive at Mayence, where we take a rapid retrospect of the 
 glimpses we have had of the river on whose banks we stand, ready to 
 " try the realities of a sail on the Rhine. No one can say that the Three 
 
 ^ILLUSTRATION. (Jathedral of Strasburg. 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 
 
 did not stand at its very source when they walked in the cloud over the 
 Pass of St. Gothard, where the cold waters rolled from their icy bed and 
 bathed their feet as they wandered almost lost in the mist and fog ; at 
 Schaff hausen its waters dashed over the rocks, and we sailed with them, 
 all befogged, on to Lake Constance, not a castle taking form to our 
 searching eyes ; but at a time when March winds and April showers 
 and May flowers all formed part of a glorious Spring day, we were 
 launched upon the waters which romance and reality have alike invested 
 with interest, and sailed along the banks where fable and fact have striven 
 to outdo each other in incident and act. 
 
 Bulwer says : " What the Tiber is to the classic, the Rhine is to the 
 chivalric age. The steep rock and the gray, dismantled tower, the mas- 
 sive and rude picturesque of the feudal days, constitute the great feature 
 of the scene ; you might almost fancy, as you are sailing along, that you 
 are gliding back down the river of Time, the monuments of the pomp 
 and power of old rising, one after another, upon its shores." 
 
 It was a suitable starting-place, where the ruins of the ramparts 
 of Drusus Germanicus and remnants of the fortifications of Augustus 
 Caesar mingled with the modern martial appearance of this strong Ger- 
 man fortress ; and with the " Legends " in our hands and the castellated 
 banks before our eyes, we were at a loss as to whether we were creatures 
 of to-day or roaming spirits of other days Oh, what castles we saw 
 and what castles we built that day on the Rhine ! castles among the 
 rivers and castles among the clouds, castles that time has crumbled and 
 left more beautiful as the centuries rolled by, and castles that the winds 
 of heaven have scattered and gathered together the were and the to be ; 
 but " King Rhine " ruled over them all, and we were his most devoted 
 subjects. That these beauties might linger and not vanish like castles 
 in the air, we landed at fair Bingen, so touchingly bewailed by " a soldier 
 of the legion " who " lay dying in Algiers," and we wandered for hours 
 
IQ8 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 in the Drusus castle, where the Caesars looked down from the green 
 walls upon us, and we looked down into the dungeons where kings have 
 been captives ; also by the Mouse Tower, rising from a picturesque 
 island, where the mice followed Bishop Hatto and devoured his body, 
 which incident Southey has versified as a warning to those who are 
 unkind to the poor. We viewed the Ehrenfels, hanging upon the rock 
 on the opposite bank, and the Niederwald, so high that eagles and rob- 
 bers alone would make it a home, and we slept in their shadow, the 
 moon adding her soft tale to the many already told. 
 
 Another day was filled with visions fair the peaks where firm and 
 true stands the Watch on the Rhine, and where the beautiful syren sings 
 her sweet song and lures the unwary to destruction. 
 
 " High, and dark, and massive, swell the towers and rock of Ehren- 
 breitstein, a type of that great chivalric spirit the honor that the rock 
 arrogates for its name, which demands so many sacrifices of blood and 
 tears, but which ever creates in the restless heart of man a far deeper 
 interest than the more peaceful scenes of life by which it is contrasted." 
 Ehrenbreitstein commands the Rhine and the Moselle, and just opposite, 
 at Coblentz, (" Confluentia,") is the church where the grandsons of 
 Charlemagne met to divide the countries of Germany, France and Italy. 
 We went back to the time, too, when Caesar crossed the Rhine, seven- 
 teen centuries ago. Back amidst the sloping mountains the famous 
 battle between paganism and Christianity was fought and the cross 
 appeared to Constantine, and wars innumerable have been carried on 
 upon these banks. Lastly the Siebengebirge (Seven Mountains) rose in 
 grandeur and bade us adieu as we sailed under 
 
 "The castled crag of Drachenfels." 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Bingen with Ehrenbreitstein on the left and Rheinstein on the right. 2. 
 Van Dyck and Rubens. 3. Cathedral at Cologne. 4. Cathedral at Aix-la-Chapelle where Char- 
 lemagne is buried. 5. Royal Family of England. 6. Kenilworth Castle in the 16th century 
 and in the 19th. 
 
Tti ATLANTIC. 
 
 The glories of the Rhine are passed, and we marvel and dream till we 
 reach Cologne. Cologne ! City best known to the world in general by 
 the fragrant liquid, eau de Cologne, which constitutes so important an 
 item in the boudoir of the beau and belle, (much of which, however, 
 never comes further than from the walls of their own apothecary shop,) 
 city which owes its origin to Marcus Agrippa, the Roman who first 
 placed a camp on one of the surrounding hills, and its name to Agrip- 
 pina, the mother of the infamous Nero, who was born in the camp of her 
 father, Germanicus, and the place was called Colonia Agrippina, whence 
 Cologne. This city appropriates its part of the legends of the Rhine, as 
 the Church of St. Ursula with its bones of eleven thousand virgins mur- 
 dered by Attila, and the Cathedral with its monument to the three Magi 
 who came from the East to worship Christ, would show. Here is one 
 of the masterpieces of Rubens, the Crucifixion of the Apostle with his 
 head downwards, in the church where is still shown the font in which he 
 was baptized. 
 
 Now farewell to the waters of the Rhine, for we go by rail to Aix-la- 
 Chapelle, so closely connected with the name of Charlemagne. The 
 cathedral here was commenced in 796, under Charlemagne, who lies in 
 the centre of the octagon beneath the dome, so that the sun at mid-day 
 falls directly upon his tomb. We were told that in the year 1000 his 
 grave was opened and the chair in which he was buried sitting now 
 stands in the Town Hall with other relics and mementoes of the great 
 Charles. Here ended the career of one who swayed gracefully the rod 
 of empire, and lay down in the midst of the monuments he had reared 
 to sleep the last long sleep that knows no waking. From Rome to Aix- 
 la-Chapelle his name and his statues are frequently met, and here we 
 leave him in his last home. Truly every place, as well as person, has its 
 own peculiarities, and the one we observed in the German Aachen (Aix) 
 was that all marriage ceremonies are performed in the Rathhaus or Town 
 
266 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 Hall, and on the occasion of our visit to that locality nine waiting couples 
 were watching the minute-hand to see when the hour of twelve would 
 arrive ! 
 
 At Brussels, the Belgian capital, begin the beautiful carvings in wood 
 which adorn the cathedrals. Godfrey of Bouillon, celebrated chief of the 
 First Crusade, rides as life-like in the Royal Square as if leading his fol- 
 lowers in the glorious cause ; and Egmont and Horn stand in front of the 
 house where they spent the night before their execution. 
 
 Ten miles from Brussels is the field of Waterloo, where in four days 
 of the year 1815 more than one hundred thousand men gave their lives 
 to decide the fate of Europe and send Napoleon the Great to the island 
 of St. Helena. 
 
 It is enough to say of Antwerp that it is the commercial capital 
 of Belgium, on the Scheldt, and the birthplace of Rubens and Van Dyck. 
 The Cathedral of Notre Dame contains the Elevation to and the Descent 
 from the Cross, beside many other of the finest paintings of Rubens. 
 In the Church of St. James is his Holy Family, in which he copied the 
 members of his family, and here too is his own tomb. Rubens and Van 
 Dyck are highly honored in their native city, and their statues are 
 prominent in the most public place. A curious lesson is taught by one 
 of the paintings. In the Museum at Antwerp, the " Fallen Angels " was 
 the production of a leading artist, who had decided that none but an 
 artist should claim his daughter's hand. Unfortunately she was loved 
 and sought by one who was only a blacksmith, and he learned the 
 irrevocable decision of the father of the young lady. Nothing daunted, 
 however, he abandoned his original trade and took up the brush. After 
 months of indefatigable study, he visited the artist's studio, and seeing 
 this painting just completed, he represented an enormous bee crawling 
 on the thigh of one of the angels, so perfect that one shudders and 
 almost feels the sting, and so perfect that Flors received Matsys as his 
 
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 2OI 
 
 son-in-law. We need not always keep the same position in life, if we 
 have only energy and perseverance enough to exercise the talents given 
 unto us. 
 
 At Ghent the two went in haste to the cathedral to see the finest 
 carving in wood the world affords. The tree of life supports the pulpit, 
 and Time, a venerable old man, sits at the foot, attempting to raise a 
 veil and look upon Truth, who approaches with a book in which are the 
 words, " Arise, thou that sleepest, and Christ shall give thee light." We 
 were sufficiently rewarded for our walk and hurry, and again were in the 
 cars for Mechlin and Bruges. 
 
 One more night on the continent, beneath the Belfry of Bruges, and 
 what beautiful chimes rang the night away ! Every quarter of an hour 
 a sweet serenade for the wandering Three United States Girls, and the 
 chimes of memory often waft us back and we hear them again, the 
 Chimes of Bruges. 
 
 From Ostend to Dover across the channel, and we are in the land 
 where our native tongue is spoken, just one year older than the day we 
 sailed from New York harbor. On the anniversary of that day we sit 
 within the walls of Westminster Abbey, that antique pile where the suns 
 of empire rise and set, listening to the soft chanting of the choir and the 
 solemn notes of the organ as the sun sends its last brilliant ray in upon 
 the tombs of the great and the noble, and lights up the pillars and the 
 carving, the oak and the marble of this royal burial-place in a grand and 
 striking manner. While we listen and gaze a noble array of churches 
 rises before our mind's eye. Far back on Roman soil rises that mother 
 of Catholic churches, St. Peter's, the largest in Europe and the world, 
 (with one exception). Everywhere in this most noble structure appear 
 the marks of the master-painter and sculptor Raphael and Michael An- 
 gelo, and as their genius towered above that of all other men so the labor 
 of their hands rises high over all. Three hundred other churches cluster 
 26 
 
2O2 UNITED STATES GIRLS 
 
 about the largest one and render Rome a prominent place although so 
 far away. Next rises that dome which served as a model for St. Peter's 
 and which exceeds it in size. The Duomo of Florence, the dome which 
 admits the light of heaven upon the tombs of its architects, surrounding 
 them with a bright halo as fame illuminates the names of Giotto and 
 Brunelleschi. There we see the picturesque front where stand the horses 
 so well known, the horses of St. Mark, and we remember well how the 
 thousand years have left the marks of time and age on the dark walls 
 within, while the external appearance is that of lightness and grace and 
 beauty. The doves play around her head and the gondolas ply at her 
 feet and Venice may well be proud of St. Mark. Miles away rises the 
 most beautiful cathedral of Milan, its thousand marble pinnacles tower- 
 ing heavenward like the peaks of the Alps in the far distance. Notre 
 Dame lifts her square towers from the island in the Seine and shows the 
 spot where kings and emperors have had their day, but where no crowned 
 head now rules. Republic of France ! Near the banks of the Rhine 
 the spire of Strasburg shows its lace-work summit the tallest of spires 
 over that most wonderful clock which marks the passage of time in many 
 curious ways. Then Cologne lifts its unfinished dome over the city where 
 Rubens was born, and over (they say) the tombs of the three wise men 
 who came from the far east to worship Christ. We recognize from Aix- 
 la-Chapelle the octagonal spire which admits the rays of the sun upon 
 the tomb of Charlemagne in the city which gave him birth and which 
 took its name from the same interesting work commenced by him in the 
 eighth century. Brussels, Antwerp, Ghent, and Bruges, all mark this 
 picture painted from memory with their cathedrals most beautifully orna- 
 mented with carvings in wood and containing the most precious works 
 of Rubens and Van Dyck. From all these churches we seem to hear one 
 continual chant and to see one round of service performed by priests and 
 people in a foreign tongue, and we come back to the land of our fore- 
 

ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 2O3 
 
 fathers to the language of our native land, and into the presence of the 
 illustrious dead, where one at least has found rest from his wanderings 
 since we worshipped before in Westminster Abbey Dr. Livingstone, 
 borne by savages from a savage land, to sleep at home in the midst of 
 his friends. Blessed rest ! Sweet sleep ! 
 
 Nine days in London, as busy as three millions can make it, and we 
 steam away one hundred miles to Stratford-upon-Avon, 
 
 " Where his first infant lays sweet Shakspeare sung, 
 Where the last accents faltered on his tongue," 
 
 and here, in the spot to which the genius of one man has given immor- 
 tality, we linger a day, in the rooms of his birth-place, crossing the fields 
 to Anne Hathaway's cottage, and looking upon his bust above the slab 
 which covers the ashes of one of whom the world has never known the 
 like. Westminster covets his precious dust, and it is said that once it 
 was nearly removed there; but the curse called down upon those 
 attempting his disinterment, by the pen of the great poet himself, with- 
 held them from accomplishing their designs. 
 
 True descendants of our English mothers, two of us went over the 
 English highways, between the sweet hedges of English hawthorn, 
 counting the minutes between the mile-stones till eight were passed in 
 the space of two hours. After a night at Leamington, a walk of five 
 miles brought us to Kenilworth, of which Scott has written: " Of this 
 lordly palace, where princes feasted and heroes fought, now in the bloody 
 earnest of storm and siege, and now in the games of chivalry, where 
 beauty dealt the prize which valor won, all is now desolate. The bed 
 of the lake is a rushy swamp, and the massy ruins of the castle only 
 serve to show what their splendor once was." 
 
 To Chester and Liverpool, and then to Glasgow, ready to take the 
 Anchor Line across the sea, and 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Home of Shakspeare at Stratford-on-Avon. 2. Monument of Shakspeare 
 3. Tomb of Bunyan in Bunhill Fields, London. 
 
2O4 UNITED STATES GIRLS. 
 
 The shades of night were falling fast, 
 As forth from Glasgow's shores we passed, 
 In a ship that bore on the afterpart 
 A name that will live in every heart 
 The California. 
 
 The time flew by on golden wing ; 
 We had sailed in tears, we were landing in song ; 
 Days were never so joyous or hours so short 
 As those that vanished between us and port, 
 On the California. 
 
 Ten days we were rocked on old Ocean's bosom, ten days we sailed 
 under a sunny sky, and out on the face of the broad deep we celebrated 
 the ninety-eighth birthday of our glorious, Union. We landed in safety 
 on the sixth of July, and felt that no one could more proudly cry the 
 
 watchwords they had in the beginning adopted than the 
 
 \ ' . 
 
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