m
what they were, that you seek in vain to find in Roman history any thing
but the barest outline of the origin of a people so graceful and
refined that the Roman citizen was a boot-black in comparison to one of
them. The Saracens flashed light and life, in later days, once more into
the Roman leaven. What a dirty, filthy page the whole Gothic middle-age
is at best! It lies like a huge body struck with apoplexy, and only
restored to its sensual life by the sharp lancet, bringing blood, of
these same infidels, these stinging Saracens. Go into the mountains back
of us, hunt up the costumes that still remain, and see where they all
come from--the East. Look at the crescent earrings and graceful twisted
gold-work, from--the East. All the commonest household ware, the
agricultural implements, the manner of cooking their food, and all that
is picturesque in life and religion--all from the East.'

'Strikes me,' quoth Caper, 'that this question of food touches my
weakest point; therefore, let us go and dine, and continue the lecture
at a more un-hungry period. But where is Bagswell?'

'He is seeking adventures, of course.'

'Oh! yes, I sec him down there among the billy-goats; let's go and pick
him up, and then for mine host of the Green Bough.'

Having found Bagswell, our trio at once marched to the Green Bough,
which they saw was filled to overflowing with country-people, eating and
drinking, sitting on rough benches, and stowing away food and wine as if
in expectation of being very soon shipwrecked on a desert island, where
there would be nothing but hard-shell clams and lemons to eat. The
landlord at once took the trio up-stairs, where, at a large table, were
half-a-dozen of his friends, all of the cleanly order of country-people,
stout, and having a well-to-do look that deprecated any thing like
famine. A young lady of twenty and two hundred, as Caper summed up her
age and weight, was evidently the cynosure of all eyes; two other
good-natured women, of a few more years and a very little less weight,
and three men, made up the table. Any amount of compliments, as usual,
passed between the first six and the last three comers, prefacing every
thing with desires that they would act without ceremony; but Caper and
Roejean were on a high horse, and they fairly pumped the spring of
Italian compliments so dry, that Bagswell could only make a squeaking
noise when he tried the handle. This verbifuge of our three artists put
thei