ave crept close to it, until many of them, old and gray, have
fairly grown to it, like barnacles to a ship; or it seemed as though
they had built their nests, like the rooks, under the moss-grown eaves.
The interior of the cathedral was singularly grand and open. As we threw
our shawls about us--a precaution never omitted--an old man shuffled out
from a dark corner to show the church, take our _francs_, and pull aside
the curtains from before the principal pictures, if so dignified a name
as curtain can be applied to the dusty, brown cambric that obstructed
our vision. Rubens's finest pictures are here, and indeed the city
abounds in all that is best of Flemish art,--most justly, since it was
the birthplace of its master. Rubens in the flesh we had seen at the
Louvre; the spiritual manifestation was reserved for Antwerp; and to
recall the city is to recall a series of visions of which one may not
speak lightly.

Across, from the cathedral, upon a wide wooden bench in the market-place
we sat a moment to consider our ways--the signal for the immediate
swooping down upon us of guides and carriages, and the result of which
was, our departure in a couple of dingy open vehicles to finish the
city. We crawled about the town like a diminutive funeral procession,
dismounting at the Church of St. Jacques to see the pictures, with which
it is filled. In one of the chapels was a young American artist, copying
Rubens's picture of "A Holy Family"--the one in which his two wives and
others of his family enact the part of Mary, Martha, St. Jerome, &c.
Behind the high altar is the tomb of Rubens, with an inscription of
sufficient length to extinguish an ordinary man. There was a museum,
too, in the city, rich in the works of Rubens and Vandyck, and the fine
park in the new part of the town, as well as the massive docks built by
the first Napoleon, were yet to be seen. The older members of the party
were in the first carriage, and received any amount of valuable
information, which was transmitted to us who followed in a succession of
shouts sounding as much like "fire!" as anything else, with all manner
of beckoning, and pointing, and wild throwing up of arms, that
undoubtedly gave vent to their feelings, but brought only confusion and
distraction to our minds. Not to be outdone, our driver began a series
of utterly unintelligible explanations, the only part of which we
understood in the least was, when pointing to the docks, he ejaculate