ay fancy
any human would when coming into the company of the beautiful angels of a
heavenly Paradise. Go reader, if you cannot visit Italy personally, and
see what the poets say about these people, and believe every word they can
say in favor of their charms.

Pisa.

From Florence I went to Pisa with the special object of seeing the famous
Leaning Tower (1174-1350). It is circular, having 15 pillars in the wall
of the first story and 30 in each of the six succeeding ones. On top of
these, is another one (the eighth) much smaller than the rest, and
probably built upon it after the tower had reached the amount of
inclination which it now has. The entire structure is 187 feet high, and
173 feet 9 inches in circumference (according to my own measurement). The
walls are from 5 to 7 feet thick. There is a peal of bells at the top, the
heaviest weighing 6 tons. Nothing is more evident than that this tower
assumed its leaning position by _accident_. It is probable that this
structure, which is the finest in Italy except Giotto's Campanile at
Florence, was originally designed to be a very high one, (perhaps 300
feet). It is likely that the foundation did not give way until at the
seventh story, and that after it came to a stand-still again, they capped
it off abruptly by the odd little story which we now see at the top of it.
The inclination amounts to about 13 feet. There is a circular pavement
around it about 10 feet wide, which has the same angle of inclination that
the tower itself has. It is sunk 3 feet into the ground on one side and 8
feet on the other side. Upon careful examination and measurement I
discovered that the diameter of the basin thus formed is to the height of
the tower, as the inclination of pavement constituting the floor of the
basin is to the amount of inclination of the tower.

Let it be remembered, that this tower is not an independent structure, but
that it stands near the east end of the Cathedral, as the elegant
campanile at Florence stands near the cathedral of that city.

The Cathedral.

The Cathedral (1063-1118) is 311 feet long, 106 feet wide, and the nave
109 feet high. The great bronze lamp which gave Galileo the hint of the
pendulum, still hangs in its nave.

The Baptistry (1153-1278) stands a little distance from the west end of
the Cathedral. It is about 120 feet in diameter and its dome is 180 feet
high. Peabody considers it "the most faultlessly and exquisitely
beautiful