vast masses of variegated blossom across the tall windows.

As leaning on Mike's arm I slowly ascended the steps of the terrace, I was
more than ever struck with the silence and death-like stillness around;
except the gentle plash of the fountain, all was at rest; the very plants
seemed to sleep in the yellow moonlight, and not a trace of any living
thing was there.

The massive door lay open as we entered the spacious hall flagged with
marble and surrounded with armorial bearings. We advanced farther and came
to a broad and handsome stair, which led us to a long gallery, from which
a suit of rooms opened, looking towards the front part of the building.
Wherever we went, the furniture appeared perfectly untouched; nothing was
removed; the very chairs were grouped around the windows and the tables;
books, as if suddenly dropped from their readers' hands, were scattered
upon the sofas and the ottomans; and in one small apartment, whose blue
satin walls and damask drapery bespoke a boudoir, a rich mantilla of
black velvet and a silk glove were thrown upon a chair. It was clear the
desertion had been most recent, and everything indicated that no time had
been given to the fugitives to prepare for flight. What a sad picture of
war was there! To think of those whose home was endeared to them by all
the refinements of cultivated life and all the associations of years of
happiness sent out upon the wide world wanderers and houseless, while
their hearth, sacred by every tie that binds us to our kindred, was to
be desecrated by the ruthless and savage hands of a ruffian soldiery. I
thought of them,--perhaps at that very hour their thoughts were clinging
round the old walls, remembering each well-beloved spot, while they took
their lonely path through mountain and through valley,--and felt ashamed
and abashed at my own intrusion there. While thus my revery ran on, I
had not perceived that Mike, whose views were very practical upon all