slowed, and brought forward a brass half-pounder, about a foot long,
which was charged and fired. In less than a minute after the report, the
sound of a deep, solemn bell boomed in the mist, dead ahead. Instantly
every head was uncovered, and the rustle of whispered prayers fluttered
over the deck, as the pilgrims bowed and crossed themselves. Nothing was
to be seen; but, stroke after stroke, the hollow sounds, muffled and
blurred in the opaque atmosphere, were pealed out by the guiding bell.
Presently a chime of smaller bells joined in a rapid accompaniment,
growing louder and clearer as we advanced. The effect was startling.
After voyaging for hours over the blank water, this sudden and solemn
welcome, sounded from some invisible tower, assumed a mystic and
marvellous character. Was it not rather the bells of a city ages ago
submerged, and now sending its ghostly summons up to the pilgrims
passing over its crystal grave?

Finally a tall mast, its height immensely magnified by the fog, could be
distinguished; then the dark hulk of a steamer, a white gleam of sand
through the fog, indistinct outlines of trees, a fisherman's hut, and a
landing-place. The bells still rang out from some high station near at
hand, but unseen. We landed as soon as the steamer had made fast, and
followed the direction of the sound. A few paces from the beach stood a
little chapel, open, and with a lamp burning before its brown Virgin and
Child. Here our passengers stopped, and made a brief prayer before going
on. Two or three beggars, whose tattered dresses of tow suggested the
idea of their having clothed themselves with the sails of shipwrecked
vessels, bowed before us so profoundly and reverently that we at first
feared they had mistaken us for the shrines. Following an avenue of
trees, up a gentle eminence, the tall white towers and green domes of a
stately church gradually detached themselves from the mist, and we found
ourselves at the portal of the monastery. A group of monks, in the usual