on the verge of the open space. . . . . The French soldiers, who keep
guard within it, as in other public places in Rome, have an excellent
opportunity to secure the welfare of their souls.


February 7th.--I cannot get fairly into the current of my journal since
we arrived, and already I perceive that the nice peculiarities of Roman
life are passing from my notice before I have recorded them. It is a
very great pity. During the past week I have plodded daily, for an hour
or two, through the narrow, stony streets, that look worse than the worst
backside lanes of any other city; indescribably ugly and disagreeable
they are, . . . . without sidewalks, but provided with a line of larger
square stones, set crosswise to each other, along which there is somewhat
less uneasy walking. . . . . Ever and anon, even in the meanest streets,
--though, generally speaking, one can hardly be called meaner than
another,--we pass a palace, extending far along the narrow way on a line
with the other houses, but distinguished by its architectural windows,
iron-barred on the basement story, and by its portal arch, through which
we have glimpses, sometimes of a dirty court-yard, or perhaps of a clean,
ornamented one, with trees, a colonnade, a fountain, and a statue in the
vista; though, more likely, it resembles the entrance to a stable, and
may, perhaps, really be one. The lower regions of palaces come to
strange uses in Rome. . . . . In the basement story of the Barberini
Palace a regiment of French soldiers (or soldiers of some kind [we find
them to be retainers of the Barberini family, not French]) seems to be
quartered, while no doubt princes have magnificent domiciles above. Be
it palace or whatever other dwelling, the inmates climb through rubbish
often to the comforts, such as they may be, that await them above. I
vainly try to get down upon paper the dreariness, the ugliness,
shabbiness, un-home-likeness of a Roman street. It is also to be said