pyramidal form. You pass a shrine, within its framework of marble
pillars and a pediment, and come next to Dante's monument, a modern work,
with likewise its sarcophagus, and some huge, cold images weeping and
sprawling over it, and an unimpressive statue of Dante sitting above.

Another shrine intervenes, and next you see the tomb of Alfieri, erected
to his memory by the Countess of Albany, who pays, out of a woman's love,
the honor which his country owed him. Her own monument is in one of the
chapels of the transept.

Passing the next shrine you see the tomb of Macchiavelli, which, I think,
was constructed not many years after his death. The rest of the
monuments, on this side of the church, commemorate people of less than
world-wide fame; and though the opposite side has likewise a monument
alternating with each shrine, I remember only the names of Raphael
Morghen and of Galileo. The tomb of the latter is over against that of
Michael Angelo, being the first large tomb on the left-hand wall as you
enter the church. It has the usual heavy sarcophagus, surmounted by a
bust of Galileo, in the habit of his time, and is, of course, duly
provided with mourners in the shape of Science or Astronomy, or some such
cold-hearted people. I wish every sculptor might be at once imprisoned
for life who shall hereafter chisel an allegoric figure; and as for those
who have sculptured them heretofore, let them be kept in purgatory till
the marble shall have crumbled away. It is especially absurd to assign
to this frozen sisterhood of the allegoric family the office of weeping
for the dead, inasmuch as they have incomparably less feeling than a lump
of ice, which might contrive to shed a tear if the sun shone on it. But
they seem to let themselves out, like the hired mourners of an English
funeral, for the very reason that, having no interest in the dead person,
nor any affections or emotions whatever, it costs them no wear and tear