ks here, answered the rap of
the guide upon the nail-studded door opening from one of the courts, and
told us the old story. "The bed of the princes stood just there," she
said, pointing to one corner, where, by a curious coincidence, a little
bed was standing now. She answered the question in our eyes with, "My
boys sleep there." "But do you not fear that the murderers will come
back some night by this same winding way, and smother them?" How she
laughed! And, indeed, what had ghosts to do with such a cheery body!

Down through the "Traitors' Gate," with its spiked portcullis, we could
see the steps leading to the water. Through this gate prisoners were
brought from trial at Westminster. It is said that the Princess
Elizabeth was dragged up here when she refused to come of her own will,
knowing too well that they who entered here left hope behind. A little
later, with music and the waving of banners, and amid the shouts of the
people, she rode out of the great gates into the city, the Queen of
England.

THE HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT.

Though they have stood barely thirty years, already the soft gray
limestone begins to crumble away,--the elements, with a sense of the
fitness of things, striving to act the part of time, and bring them into
a likeness of the adjoining abbey. There is an exquisite beauty in the
thousand gilded points and pinnacles that pierce the fog, or shine
softly through the mist that veils the city. Ethereal, shadowy, unreal
they are, like the spires of a celestial city, or the far away towers
and turrets we see sometimes at sunset in the western sky.

Here, you know, are the chambers of the Houses of Lords and Commons,
with the attendant lobbies, libraries, committee-rooms, &c., and a
withdrawing-room for the use of the queen when she is graciously pleased
to open Parliament in person. The speaker of the House of Commons, as
well as some other officials, reside here--a novel idea to us, who could
hardly imagine the speaker of our House of Representatives taking up his
abode in the Capitol! Parliament was not in session, and we walked
through the various rooms at will, even to the robing-room of the noble
lords, where the peg upon which Lord Stanley hangs his hat was pointed
out; and very like other pegs it was. At one end of the chamber of the
House of Lords is the throne. It is a simple affair enough--a gilded
arm-chair on a little platform reached by two or three steps, and with
crimson hangings.