e is a spirit in every limb which mere toil could not have given. It
must have been caught in those lofty moments.

"When each conception was a heavenly guest--a
ray of immortality--and stood
star-like, around, until they gathered to a god?"

We ran through a series of halls, roofed with golden stars on a deep
blue, midnight sky, and filled with porphyry vases, black marble gods,
and mummies. Some of the statues shone with the matchless polish they
had received from a Theban artisan before Athens was founded, and are,
apparently, as fresh and perfect as when looked upon by the vassals of
Sesostris. Notwithstanding their stiff, rough-hewn limbs, there were
some figures of great beauty, and they gave me a much higher idea of
Egyptian sculpture. In an adjoining hall, containing colossal busts of
the gods, is a vase forty-one feet in circumference, of one solid block
of red porphyry.

The "Transfiguration" is truly called the first picture in the world.
The same glow of inspiration which created the Belvidere, must have been
required to paint the Saviour's aerial form. The three figures hover
above the earth in a blaze of glory, seemingly independent of all
material laws. The terrified Apostles on the mount, and the wondering
group below, correspond in the grandeur of their expression to the awe
and majesty of the scene. The only blemish in the sublime perfection of
the picture is the introduction of the two small figures on the left
hand; who, by-the-bye, were Cardinals, inserted there by command. Some
travelers say the color is all lost, but I was agreeably surprised to
find it well preserved. It is, undoubtedly, somewhat imperfect in this
respect, as Raphael died before it was entirely finished; but "take it
all in all," you may search the world in vain to find its equal.

_January 1, 1846._--New Year's Day in the Eternal City! It will be
something to say in after years, that I have seen one year open in
_Rome_--that, while my distant friends were making up for the winter
without, with good cheer around the merry board, I have walked in
sunshine by the ruins of the Coliseum, watched the orange groves
gleaming with golden fruitage in the Farnese gardens, trodden the
daisied meadow around the sepulchre of Caius Cestius, and mused by the
graves of Shelley, Keats and Salvator Rosa! The Palace of the Cassars
looked even more mournful in the pale, slant sunshine, and the yellow
Tiber, as he flowed through the "