the old
capitals, some of which are still untouched. The solution lies in the
ladder. And Ruskin, as regards his later writings, may be called the
ladder critic. The poet Longfellow, arriving in Verona during one of his
Italian journeys, learned that Ruskin was also there, and not finding
him at the hotel, went out in search of his friend. After a while he
came upon him at the Tombs of the Scaligers. Here high in the air, at
the top of a long ladder, with a servant keeping watch below, was a
small figure. It was Ruskin, who, nose to nose with them, was making a
careful drawing of some of the delicate terminal ornaments of those
splendid Gothic structures. One does not object to the careful drawings
any more than to the descriptions of the little faces at Venice. They
are good in their way. But one wishes to put upon record the suggestion
that architectural beauty as viewed from a ladder, inch by inch, is not
the only aspect of that beauty; nor is it, for a large number of us, the
most important aspect. A man who is somewhat deaf, if talking about a
symphony, will naturally dwell upon the strains which he has heard--that
is, the louder portions; but he ought not therefore to assume that the
softer notes are insignificant.

THE DERVISHES

On the 31st of January, 1890, we took part in a horse-race. It was a
long race of great violence, and the horses engaged in it were
disgracefully thin and weak. "Very Mohammedan--that," some one comments.
The race was Mohammedan from one point of view, for it was connected
with the dervishes, Mohammedans of fanatical creed. The dervishes,
however, remained in their monasteries--with their fanaticism; the race
was made by Christians, who, crowded into rattling carriages, flew in a
body from the square of Sultan Hassan through the long, winding lanes
that lead towards Old Cairo at a speed which endangered everybody's
life, with wheels grating against each other, coachmen standing up and
yelling like demons, whiplashes curling round the ribs of the wretched,
ill-fed, galloping horses, and natives darting into their houses on each
side to save themselves from death, as the furious procession, in clouds
of dust, rushed by. The cause of this sudden madness is found in the
fact that the two best-known orders of these Mohammedan monks (one calls
them monks for want of a better name; they have some resemblance to
monks, and some to Freemasons) go through their rites once a week only,
and upo