splendid robes, adorn herself with sunny gems, and ape a princely state.

Her religion, deep and pure, did not teach her to refuse to blunt thus the

keen sting of regret; her youthful vivacity made her enter, heart and soul,

into these strange masquerades.

We had resolved to pass the ensuing winter at Milan, which, as being a

large and luxurious city, would afford us choice of homes. We had descended

the Alps, and left far behind their vast forests and mighty crags. We

entered smiling Italy. Mingled grass and corn grew in her plains, the

unpruned vines threw their luxuriant branches around the elms. The grapes,

overripe, had fallen on the ground, or hung purple, or burnished green,

among the red and yellow leaves. The ears of standing corn winnowed to

emptiness by the spendthrift winds; the fallen foliage of the trees, the

weed-grown brooks, the dusky olive, now spotted with its blackened fruit;

the chestnuts, to which the squirrel only was harvest-man; all plenty, and

yet, alas! all poverty, painted in wondrous hues and fantastic groupings

this land of beauty. In the towns, in the voiceless towns, we visited the

churches, adorned by pictures, master-pieces of art, or galleries of

statues--while in this genial clime the animals, in new found liberty,

rambled through the gorgeous palaces, and hardly feared our forgotten

aspect. The dove-coloured oxen turned their full eyes on us, and paced

slowly by; a startling throng of silly sheep, with pattering feet, would

start up in some chamber, formerly dedicated to the repose of beauty, and

rush, huddling past us, down the marble staircase into the street, and

again in at the first open door, taking unrebuked possession of hallowed

sanctuary, or kingly council-chamber. We no longer started at these

563

The Last Man