y find it there. Scarcely a ray of
light glimmers into the narrow gallery which leads to the cells,
and the places of confinement themselves are totally dark. A
little hole in the wall admitted the damp air of the passages,
and served for the introduction of the prisoner's food. A
wooden pallet, about a foot or so from the ground, was the only
furniture. The conductors tell you a light was not allowed. The
cells are about five paces in length, two and a half in width,
and seven feet in height. They are directly beneath one another,
and respiration is somewhat difficult in the lower holes. Only
one prisoner was found when the Republicans descended into these
hideous recesses, and he is said to have been confined sixteen
years." When the prisoner's hour came he was taken out and
strangled in a cell upon the Bridge of Sighs!

And this was in Venice! The grand old Republic which was once the
greatest Power of Eastern Europe; the home of great artists and
architects, renowned the world over for arts and arms; the Venice
of "blind old Dandolo," who led her galleys to victory at the
ripe old age of eighty; the Venice of Doge Foscari, whose son
she tortured, imprisoned and murdered, and whose own paternal,
patriotic, great heart she broke; the Venice of gay gallants, and
noble, beautiful ladies; the Venice of mumming, masking, and the
carnival; the bright, beautiful Venice of Shakspeare, Otway, and
Byron; joyous, loving Venice; cruel, fatal Venice!

* * * * *

MODERN SATIRE.--A satire on everything is a satire on nothing;
it is mere absurdity. All contempt, all disrespect, implies
something respected, as a standard to which it is referred; just
as every valley implies a hill. The _persiflage_ of the French
and of fashionable worldlings, which turns into ridicule
the exceptions and yet abjures the rules, is like Trinculo's
government--its latter end forgets its beginning. Can there be a
more mortal, poisonous consumption and asphyxy of the mind than
this decline and extinction of all reverence?--_Jean Paul_.

_WINTER PICTURES FROM THE POETS._

Although English Poetry abounds with pictures of the seasons, its
Winter pictures are neither numerous, nor among its best. For
one good snow-piece we can readily find twenty delicate Spring
pictures--twinkling with morning dew, and odorous with the
perfume of early flowers. It would be easy to make a large
gallery of Summer pictures; and anot