st whisper breathed against the wall at a certain
point, being distinctly heard on the opposite side of the gallery, or
making the entire inner circle of the great dome. After a long, weary
ascent of very dirty and dark staircases, we reached the cupola, and
great London and its environs lay beneath us! Oh, what a wide and
wonderful view was that! It was almost overwhelming--and so bewildered
me at first, that I could not clearly make out any thing. But soon
that dizziness of astonishment passed away, and I began to recognize,
one after another, places and buildings that had grown familiar to me.
There was Hyde Park, looking at that distance like a plantation of
young trees; there was Buckingham Palace, the new palace of
Westminster, and the grand old Abbey. I could see the flash of the
fountains in Trafalgar Square, and trace the silver winding of the
Thames, through miles on miles of docks and warehouses, under dark
bridges, past darker prisons, far up into the green and smiling
country, and far down toward the blue and shining sea. There was the
Tower, which, though not a dark or dilapidated building, always has a
guilty, gloomy look,--after you know what it is. There was the
Monument, towering toward the sky, in memory of the great conflagration
in London, when, where those magnificent buildings now stand, were
piles and masses of fire--and great flames going up in red columns, to
heaven.

Brightly shone the sun on hundreds of spires and domes, cheerily
lighting up all that vast scene beneath us; the wide, elegant streets,
open squares and parks of the town, and the busy crowded streets and
narrow lanes of the city. The kindly rays fell just as warmly and
clearly into the dark and damp courts of the miserable parish of St.
Giles, as on to the noble terraces and into the palace gardens of
fashionable West End. Oh, the beautiful sunshine! God's manna of
light--falling for the poor as well as for the rich.

While standing on that lofty balcony, I could but faintly hear that
great noise of business and travel, which roars along London streets,
without ceasing day or night. It was like being at the summit of a
high rock, on the sea-shore, where the hoarse sound of the great waves
comes up to your ear, softened to a low, deep murmur.

"Old St. Paul's," upon the site of which this noble cathedral now
stands, was burned in the fire of 1660. Among the great men buried in
"Old St. Paul's," was Sir Philip Sidn