f this
sanctuary, there have come here to work --- ---, mason --- ---,
carpenter, and --- --- plumber, all of Chiavazza, on the twenty-first day
of January 1886, full of cold (_pieni di freddo_).

"They write these two lines to record their visit. They pray the Blessed
Virgin that she will maintain them safe and sound from everything
equivocal that may befall them (_sempre sani e salvi da ogni equivoco li
possa accadere_). Oh, farewell! We reverently salute all the present
statues, and especially the Blessed Virgin, and the reader."

Through the _Universal Review_, I suppose, all its readers are to
consider themselves saluted; at any rate, these good fellows, in the
effusiveness of their hearts, actually wrote the above in pencil. I was
sorely tempted to steal it, but, after copying it, left it in the Chief
Priest's hands instead.

ART IN THE VALLEY OF SAAS {11}

Having been told by Mr. Fortescue, of the British Museum, that there were
some chapels at Saas-Fee which bore analogy to those at Varallo,
described in my book "Ex Voto," {12} I went to Saas during this last
summer, and venture now to lay my conclusions before the reader.

The chapels are fifteen in number, and lead up to a larger and singularly
graceful one, rather more than half-way between Saas and Saas-Fee. This
is commonly but wrongly called the chapel of St. Joseph, for it is
dedicated to the Virgin, and its situation is of such extreme beauty--the
great Fee glaciers showing through the open portico--that it is in itself
worth a pilgrimage. It is surrounded by noble larches and overhung by
rock; in front of the portico there is a small open space covered with
grass, and a huge larch, the stem of which is girt by a rude stone seat.
The portico itself contains seats for worshippers, and a pulpit from
which the preacher's voice can reach the many who must stand outside. The
walls of the inner chapel are hung with votive pictures, some of them
very quaint and pleasing, and not overweighted by those qualities that
are usually dubbed by the name of artistic merit. Innumerable wooden and
waxen representations of arms, legs, eyes, ears and babies tell of the
cures that have been effected during two centuries of devotion, and can
hardly fail to awaken a kindly sympathy with the long dead and forgotten
folks who placed them where they are.

The main interest, however, despite the extreme loveliness of the St.
Mary's Chapel, centres rather in t