ining-room for the better class of
travelers, who receive the same provisions as those below for double the
price, and the additional privilege of giving the waiter two baiocchi.
The sleeping apartments are in the fourth story, and are named according
to the fancy of a former landlord, in mottos above each door. Thus, on
arriving here, the Triester, with his wife and child, more fortunate
than our first parents, took refuge in "Paradise," while we Americans
were ushered into the "Chamber of Jove." We have occupied it ever since,
and find a paul (ten cents) apiece cheap enough for a good bed and a
window opening on the Pantheon.

Next to the Coliseum, the baths of Caracalla are the grandest remains of
Rome. The building is a thousand feet square, and its massive walls look
as if built by a race of giants. These Titan remains are covered with
green shrubbery, and long, trailing vines sweep over the cornice, and
wave down like tresses from architrave and arch. In some of its grand
halls the mosaic pavement is yet entire. The excavations are still
carried on; from the number of statues already found, this would seem to
have been one of the most gorgeous edifices of the olden time.

I have been now several days loitering and sketching among the ruins,
and I feel as if I could willingly wander for months beside these
mournful relics, and draw inspiration from the lofty yet melancholy lore
they teach. There is a spirit haunting them, real and undoubted. Every
shattered column, every broken arch and mouldering wall, but calls up
more vividly to mind the glory that has passed away. Each lonely pillar
stands as proudly as if it still helped to bear up the front of a
glorious temple, and the air seems scarcely to have ceased vibrating
with the clarions that heralded a conqueror's triumph.

"--the old majestic trees
Stand ghost-like in the Caesar's home,
As if their conscious roots were set
In the old graves of giant Rome,
And drew their sap all kingly yet!"

* * * * *

"There every mouldering stone beneath
Is broken from some mighty thought,
And sculptures in the dust still breathe
The fire with which their lines were wrought,
And sunder'd arch and plundered tomb
Still thunder back the echo--'_Rome!_'"

In Rome there is no need that the imagination be excited to call up
thrilling emotion or poetic reverie--they are forced on the mind by