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What a

tectural autocrat was our sole object of interest. wonder it is! So grand', so solemn', so vast! And yet' so delicate', so airy', so graceful! A very world of solid weight'; and yet it seems, in the soft moonlight, only a fairy delusion of frost-work, that might vanish with a breath'! How sharply its pinnacled angles and its wilderness of spires were cut against the sky'; and how richly their shadows fell upon its snowy roof! It was a vision'! a miracle'! an anthem sung in stone, a poem wrought in marble'!

4. Howsoever you look at the great Cathedral, it is noble, it is beautiful! Wherever you stand in Milan, or within

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seven miles of Milan, it is visible-and when it is visible, no other object can claim your whole attention. Leave your eyes unfettered by your will but a single instant, and they will surely turn to seek it. It is the first thing you look for when you rise in the morning, and the last your lingering gaze rests upon at night. Surely it must be the most princely creation that ever brain of man conceived.

5. At nine o'clock in the morning we went and stood before this marble colossus. The central one of its five great doors is bordered with a bäs-relief of birds, and fruits, and beasts, and insects, which have been so ingeniously carved out of the marble that they seem like living creatures; and the figures are so numerous, and the designs so complex, that one might study it a week without exhausting its interest.

6. On the great steeple-surmounting the myriad of spires-inside of the spires-over the doors, the windowsin nooks and corners-every where that a niche or a perch can be found about the enormous building, from summit to base, there is a marble statue, and every statue is a study in itself! Raphael, Angelo, Canova-giants like these gave birth to the designs, and their own pupils carved them. Every face is eloquent with expression, and every attitude is full of grace. Away above, on the lofty roof, rank on rank of carved and fretted spires spring high in the air, and through their rich tracery one sees the sky beyond. In their midst the central steeple towers proudly up like the mainmast of some great Indiaman among a fleet of coasters.

7. We wished to go aloft. The sacristan showed us a marble stairway (of course it was marble, and of the purest and whitest-there is no other stone, no brick, no wood, among its building materials), and told us to go up one hundred and eighty-two steps, and stop till he came. It was not necessary to say stop-we should have done that any how. We were tired by the time we got there.

8. This was the roof. Here, springing from its broad marble flagstones were the long files of spires, looking very tall close at hand, but diminishing in the distance like the pipes of an organ. We could see, now, that the statue on the top of each was the size of a large man, though they all

looked like dolls from the street. We could see, also, that from the inside of each and every one of these hollow spires, from sixteen to thirty-one beautiful marble statues looked out upon the world below.

9. From the eaves to the comb of the roof stretched, in endless succession, great curved marble beams, like the fore and aft braces of a steam-boat; and along each beam, from end to end, stood up a row of richly-carved flowers and fruits-each separate and distinct in kind, and over fifteen thousand species represented. At a little distance these rows seem to close together like the ties of a railroad track; and then the mingling together of the buds and blossoms of this marble garden forms a picture of exceeding beauty.

10. We descended and entered. Within the church, long rows of fluted columns, like huge monuments, divided the building into broad aisles; and on the figured pavement fell many a soft blush from the painted windows above. I knew the church was very large, but I could not fully appreciate its great size until I noticed that the men standing far down by the altar looked like boys, and seemed to glide rather than walk.

11. We loitered about, gazing aloft at the monster windows all aglow with brilliantly colored scenes in the lives of the Savior and his followers. Some of these pictures are mosaics; and so artistically are their thousand particles of tinted glass or stone put together, that the work has all the smoothness and finish of a painting. We counted sixty panes of glass in one window, and each pane was adorned with one of these master achievements of genius and patience.

12. For the purpose of viewing the treasures of the church, we followed a priest into a large room filled with tall wooden presses like wardrobes. He threw them open, and behold! the cargoes of crude bullion of the assay offices of Nevada faded out of my memory. There were Virgins and bishops there, above their natural size, made of solid silver, each worth, by weight, from one hundred and sixty thousand to three hundred thousand dollars, and bearing gemmed books in their hands worth fifteen thousand: there were bäs-reliefs that weighed six hundred pounds, carved in solid silver;

crosiers and crosses, and candlesticks six and eight feet high, all of virgin gold, and brilliant with precious stones: and beside these were all manner of cups and vases, and other things, rich in proportion. It was an Alăd'din's palace! The treasures here, by simple weight, without counting workmanship, were valued at ten millions of dollars!

13. I like to revel in the dryest details of the great cathedral. The building is nearly five hundred feet long, by three hundred feet wide; and the principal steeple is in the neighborhood of four hundred feet high. It has more than seven thousand marble statues, and will have upward of three thousand more when it is finished. In addition, it has one thousand five hundred bäs-reliefs. It has one hundred and thirty-six spires-twenty-one more are to be added. Each spire is surmounted by a statue six and a half feet high. It is estimated that it will take a hundred and twenty years yet to finish the cathedral; and already the mere workmanship alone has cost considerably over a hundred millions of dollars. The building looks complete, but is far from being so. We saw a new statue put in its niche yesterday, alongside of one which had been standing these four hundred years.

14. There are four staircases leading up to the main steeple, each of which, with the four hundred and eight statues which adorn them, cost a hundred thousand dollars. Marco Campioni was the architect who designed this wonderful structure, more than five hundred years ago; and it took him forty-six years to work out the plan, and get it ready to hand over to the builders. The building was begun a little less than five hundred years ago; and the third generation hence will not see it completed.

a Mil'an, or Milan'. The best usage favors the former pronunciation. All the poets place the accent on the first syllable. Byron and Moore rhyme it with villain. See "Poetical Composition," page 328, Note.

b Bäs-relief (bä-re-leef'); also spelled and pronounced bass re lief': a species of sculpture, the figures of which do not stand out far from the ground.

etc.

Săc'ristan; a sexton, or other officer of the church, who has care of the utensils,

LESSON XII.

BARBARA FRIETCHIE.

A True Story. Narrative and Description.-JOHN G. WHITTIER. [JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER, a distinguished American poet and prose writer (often called the Quaker Poet), was born at Haverhill, Massachusetts, in 1808.]

1. Up from the meadows rich with corn',
Clear in the cool September morn',

The clustered spires of Frederick stand',
Green walled by the hills of Maryland'.
2. Round about them orchards sweep,
Apple and peach tree fruited deep,
Fair as a garden of the Lord

To the eyes of the famished rebel horde,

On that pleasant morn of the early fall,
When Lee marched over the mountain-wall,-

Over the mountains' winding down',
Horse and foot', into Frederick town'.

3. Forty flags' with their silver stars',
Forty flags' with their crimson bars',

Flapped in the morning wind': the sun
Of noon looked down, and saw not one.

4. Up rose old Barbara Frietchie then,
Bowed with her fourscore years and ten;

Bravest of all in Frederick town,

She took up the flag the men hauled down;

In her attic window the staff she set,
To show that one heart was loyal yet.

5. Up the street came the rebel tread,
Stonewall Jackson riding ahead:

Under his slouched hat, left and right,
He glanced :—the old flag met his sight.

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