he _bottiglie_; and as it raises
money by touching them up with acid, why, the people have to stand it.
These _fogliette_ have round bodies and long, broad necks, on which you
notice a white mark made with the before-mentioned chemical preparation;
up to this mark the wine should come, but the attendant generally takes
thumb-toll, especially in the restaurants where foreigners go, for the
Roman citizen is not to be swindled, and will have his rights: the
single expression, 'I AM A ROMAN CITIZEN,' will at times save him at
least two _baiocchi_, with which he can buy a cigar. There was a time
when these words would have checked the severest decrees of the highest
magistrate: now when they fire off 'that gun,' the French soldiers stand
at its mouth, laugh, and say; '_Boom!_ you have no balls for your
cartridges!'

The wine finished, our two artists took up their line of march for the
object that had outlived so many millions on millions of human beings,
and at last reached it, discovering its abode afar off, by the crowd of
fair-and unfair, or red-haired Saxons, who were thronging up a staircase
of a house near the Ripetta, as if a steamboat were ringing her last
bell and the plank were being drawn in.

'And pray, can you tell me, Mister Buller, if it's a positive fact that
the man has been so long as they say, at work on the thing?'

'And ah! I haven't the slightest doubt of it, myself. I've been told
that he has worked on it, to be sure, for full thirty years; and I may
say I am delighted, that he has it done at last, and that it is to be
packed up and sent away to St. Petersburg next week. And how do you like
the Hotel Minerva? I think it's not a very dirty inn, but the waiters
are very demanding, and the fleas--'

'I beg you won't speak of them, it makes my blood run cold. Have you
seen the last copy of _Galignani_? The Americans, I am glad to see, have
had trouble with us, and I hope they will be properly punished. Do you
know the Duke of Bigghed is in town?'

'Really! and when did he come--and where is the Duchess? oh!--she's a
very amiable lady--but here's the picture!'

Ushered in, or preceded by this rattle-headed talk, Caper and Rocjean
stood at last before Ivanhof's celebrated painting--finished at last!
Thirty years' work, and the result?

A very unsatisfactory stream of water, a crowd of Orientals, and our
Saviour descending a hill.

The general impression left on the mind after seeing it, was like th