e, as
he used to, neither does he hold any public receptions. My French
companion who had come to Rome for the purpose of making a present of
several hundred dollars to the Pope, insisted on my accompanying him, as
he was allowed a private interview, but I could not avail myself of the
opportunity.

The galleries and museums of the palace are the richest in the world, in
Roman and Christian antiquities. Here are the paintings which have
rendered Raphael and Angelo immortal to fame. They are almost innumerable.
These masters translated the Bible into pictures, and here are the
originals of many of the cuts that adorn our finely illustrated family
Bibles. Michael Angelo painted 22 months (1508-11) at the ceiling of the
Sixtine Chapel. In the Loggie, Raphael represents God in the person of an
old man wearing a long gray beard and attired in the oriental costume.

Museums.

The principal museums in Rome are the Christian and the Gregorianum
Lateranense in the Lateran; the Etruscan, the Egyptian and the Museum of
Christian Antiquities in the Vatican; and the Capitoline Museum, on
Capitoline Hill. The vast stores of ancient art contained in these, brings
the beholder back again to the strange scenes of the distant past, as do
perhaps no other museums in the world. To do justice to these collections
would require many weeks, and a mere catalogue of their contents would
cover many pages. Among the most interesting apartments of the Capitoline
Museum, are the Room of the Dying Gladiator, the Room of the Philosophers,
the Room of the Busts of the Emperors, the Room of Venus, &c. Baedeker
guides the tourist through Rome by means of 312 pages of description in
fine print. It may be proper to observe here, that Murray leads the
visitor in the same way through London by means of a guide-book of 316
pages, and Galignani has 438 pages on Paris, exclusive of the tables of
contents.

In regard to the brilliant and magnificent churches of Italy, which, for
beauty, throw those of the rest of the world into the shade, I will here
add that their overawing grandeur assisted materially in making man a
humble and submissive being; and possibly taught him to take the first
steps from ancient barbarity toward civilization and refinement.

Several square miles of ancient Rome lying in ruins, is now unoccupied,
and many of the roads which intersect this desolate area are lined on both
sides by walls from 7 to 10 or 12 feet in height. The