architectural frame of precious marble, as large as the portal of a door.
The apartment at the farther end of the hall is elevated above it, and is
attained by several marble steps, whence it must have been glorious in
former days to have looked down upon a gorgeous throng of princes,
cardinals, warriors, and ladies, in such rich attire as might be worn
when the palace was built. It is singular how much freshness and
brightness it still retains; and the only objects to mar the effect were
some ancient statues and busts, not very good in themselves, and now made
dreary of aspect by their corroded surfaces,--the result of long burial
under ground.

In the room at the entrance of the hall are two cabinets, each a wonder
in its way,--one being adorned with precious stones; the other with ivory
carvings of Michael Angelo's Last Judgment, and of the frescos of
Raphael's Loggie. The world has ceased to be so magnificent as it once
was. Men make no such marvels nowadays. The only defect that I remember
in this hall was in the marble steps that ascend to the elevated
apartment at the end of it; a large piece had been broken out of one of
them, leaving a rough irregular gap in the polished marble stair. It is
not easy to conceive what violence can have done this, without also doing
mischief to all the other splendor around it.


April 16th.--We went this morning to the Academy of St. Luke (the Fine
Arts Academy at Rome) in the Via Bonella, close by the Forum. We rang
the bell at the house door; and after a few moments it was unlocked or
unbolted by some unseen agency from above, no one making his appearance
to admit us. We ascended two or three flights of stairs, and entered a
hall, where was a young man, the custode, and two or three artists
engaged in copying some of the pictures. The collection not being vastly