where other figures stooped towards them, eager to torment them. Other
pillars, again, represented a struggling mass of figures devouring one
another; each of which only offered a trunk severed to the knees or to
the shoulders, the fierce heads whereof retained life enough to seize
and devour that which was near them. There were some who, half hanging
down, agonized themselves by attempting, with their upper limbs, to flay
the lower moiety of their bodies, which drooped from the columns, or
were attached to the pedestals; and others, who, in their fight with
each other, were dragged along by morsels of flesh,--grasping which,
they clung to each other with a countenance of unspeakable hate and
agony. Along, or rather in place of, the frieze, there were on either
side a range of unclean beings, wearing the human form, but of a
loathsome ugliness, busied in tearing human corpses to pieces--in
feasting upon their limbs and entrails. From the vault, instead of
bosses and pendants, hung the crushed and wounded forms of children; as
if to escape these eaters of man's flesh, they would throw themselves
downwards, and be dashed to pieces on the pavement..... The silence and
motionlessness of the whole added to its awfulness. I became so faint
with terror, that I stopped, and would fain have returned. But at that
moment I heard, from the depths of the gloom through which I had passed,
confused noises, like those of a multitude on its march. And the sounds
soon became more distinct, and the clamor fiercer, and the steps came
hurrying on tumultuously--at every new burst nearer, more violent, more
threatening. I thought that I was pursued by this disorderly crowd; and
I strove to advance, hurrying into the midst of those dismal sculptures.
Then it seemed as if those figures began to heave,--and to sweat
blood,--and their beady eyes to move in their sockets. At once I beheld
that they were all looking upon me, that they were all leaning towards
me,--some with frightful derision, others with furious aversion. Every
arm was raised against me, and they made as though they would crush me
with the quivering limbs they had torn one from the other."....

It is, indeed, a pity that the poor fellow gave himself the trouble to
go down into damp, unwholesome graves, for the purpose of fetching up
a few trumpery sheets of manuscript; and if the public has been rather
tired with their contents, and is disposed to ask why Mrs. Sand's
religious or