nine anatomy, recall Canova's humble origin and his first attempt at
modelling. For the sculptor began life as a waiter in a 'canova di
vino,' or wine shop, whence his name; and it was when a high dignitary
stopped to breakfast at the little wayside inn that the lad modelled a
lion in butter to grace the primitive table. The thing attracted the
rich traveller's attention, and the boy's fortune was made. The Pope is
impressive, the Death is gentle and tender, the Religion, with her crown
of gilded spikes for rays, and her clumsy cross, is a vision of bad
taste, and the sleepy lions, when separated from what has been written
about them, excite no interest. Yet somehow, from a distance, the
monument gets harmony out of its surroundings.

[Illustration: TOMB OF CLEMENT THE THIRTEENTH]

One of the best tombs in the basilica is that of Sixtus the Fourth, the
first pope of the Rovere family, in the Chapel of the Sacrament. The
bronze figure, lying low on a sarcophagus placed out on upon the floor,
has a quiet manly dignity about it which one cannot forget. But in the
same tomb lies a greater man of the same name, Julius the Second, for
whom Michelangelo made his 'Moses' in the Church of San Pietro in
Vincoli--a man who did more than any other, perhaps, to make the great
basilica what it is, and who, by a chain of mistakes, got no tomb of his
own. He who solemnly laid the foundations of the present church, and
lived to see the four main piers completed, with their arches, has only
a little slab in the pavement to recall his memory. The protector and
friend of Bramante, of Michelangelo and of Raphael,--of the great
architect, the great sculptor and the great painter,--has not so much as
the least work of any of the three to mark his place of rest. Perhaps he
needed nothing but his name.

After all, his bones have been allowed to rest in peace, which is more
than can be said of all that have been buried within the area of the
church. Urban the Sixth had no such good fortune. He so much surprised
the cardinals, as soon as they had elected him, by his vigorous moral
reforms that they hastily retired to Anagni and elected an antipope of
milder manners and less sensitive conscience. He lived to triumph over
his enemies. In Piacenza he was besieged by King Charles of Naples. He
excommunicated him, tortured seven cardinals whom he caught in the
conspiracy and put five of them to death; overcame and slew Charles,
refused him burial an