be no violation of etiquette in so doing. A woman begged of us in
the Pantheon, and accused my wife of impiety for not giving her an
alms. . . . . People of very decent appearance are often unexpectedly
converted into beggars as you approach them; but in general they take a
"No" at once.


February 9th.--For three or four days it has been cloudy and rainy, which
is the greater pity, as this should be the gayest and merriest part of
the Carnival. I go out but little,--yesterday only as far as Pakenham's
and Hooker's bank in the Piazza de' Spagna, where I read Galignani and
the American papers. At last, after seeing in England more of my
fellow-compatriots than ever before, I really am disjoined from my
country.

To-day I walked out along the Pincian Hill. . . . . As the clouds still
threatened rain, I deemed it my safest course to go to St. Peter's for
refuge. Heavy and dull as the day was, the effect of this great world of
a church was still brilliant in the interior, as if it had a sunshine of
its own, as well as its own temperature; and, by and by, the sunshine of
the outward world came through the windows, hundreds of feet aloft, and
fell upon the beautiful inlaid pavement. . . . . Against a pillar, on one
side of the nave, is a mosaic copy of Raphael's Transfiguration, fitly
framed within a great arch of gorgeous marble; and, no doubt, the
indestructible mosaic has preserved it far more completely than the
fading and darkening tints in which the artist painted it. At any rate,
it seemed to me the one glorious picture that I have ever seen. The
pillar nearest the great entrance, on the left of the nave, supports the
monument to the Stuart family, where two winged figures, with inverted
torches, stand on either side of a marble door, which is closed forever.