Зображення сторінки
PDF
ePub

reducing them to ashes; the only objection-though a very serious one-being the quantity of fuel that it would require. But perhaps future chemists may discover some better means of consuming or dissolving this troublesome mortality of ours.

We got into the carriage again, and, driving farther towards the city, came to the tomb of the Scipios, of the exterior of which I retain no very definite idea. It was close upon the Appian Way, however, though separated from it by a high fence, and accessible through a gateway, leading into a court. I think the tomb is wholly subterranean, and that the ground above it is covered with the buildings of a farm-house; but of this I cannot be certain, as we were led immediately into a dark, underground passage, by an elderly peasant of a cheerful and affable demeanour. As soon as he had brought us into the twilight of the tomb, he lighted a long wax taper for each of us, and led us, groping into blacker and blacker darkness. Even little R followed courageously in the procession, which looked very picturesque as we glanced backward or forward, and beheld a twinkling line of seven lights, glimmering faintly on our faces, and showing nothing beyond. The passages and niches of the tomb seem to have been hewn and hollowed out of the rock, not built by any art of masonry; but the walls were very dark, almost black, and our tapers so dim, that I could not gain a sufficient breadth of view to ascertain what kind of place it was. It was very dark indeed; the Mammoth Cave of Kentucky could not be darker. The rough-hewn roof was within touch, and sometimes we had to stoop to avoid hitting our heads; it was covered with damps, which collected and fell upon us in occasional drops. The passages, besides being narrow, were so irregular and crooked, that, after going a little way, it would have been impossible to return upon our steps without the help of the guide; and we appeared to be taking quite an extensive ramble underground, though, in reality, Ï suppose the tomb includes no great space. At several turns of our dismal way, the guide pointed to inscriptions in Roman capitals, commemorating various members of the Scipio family who were buried here; among them, a son of Scipio Africanus, who himself had his death and burial in a foreign land. All these inscriptions, however, are copies, the originals, which were really found here, having been removed to the Vatican. Whether any bones and ashes have been left, or whether any were found, I do not know. It is not, at all events, a particularly interesting spot, being such a shapeless blackness, and a

mere dark hole, requiring a stronger illumination than that of our tapers to distinguish it from any other cellar. I did, at one place, see a sort of frieze, rather roughly sculptured; and, as we returned towards the twilight of the entrance-passage, I discerned a large spider, who fled hastily away from our tapers -the solitary living inhabitant of the tomb of the Scipios.

NOTES.-Appian Way.-The great south road out of Rome. It was commenced by Appius Claudius, Cæcus (the blind) when Censor. It extended from Rome to Capua, and thence to Brundusium. Appius Claudius lived B.C. 300. Columbarium.-Literally, a dovecote or pigeonhouse, but used of various objects similar in appearance to a pigeon-house; here used of a sepulchral chamber. The Romans burned their dead, and afterwards collected what ashes of the bodies they could, and put them into an urn. This was placed in one of a number of niches, very like a pigeon-hole, into which the wall of the chamber was divided. The Caesars.-Specially used of the first twelve emperors of Rome, including Julius Cæsar. It subsequently, however, became a title given to all emperors. The German word Kaiser and the Russian Czar are derived from it, and show the greatness of Rome formerly. Mammoth Cave of Kentucky.-A great cave

in Kentucky, formed, like other caverns by the action of water. It is said to have been explored to a distance of ten miles. It contains a subterranean lake called the Dead Sea, which is about thirty feet deep, and has a navigable river flowing out of it. Fish and insects without eyes are found in the cave. Scipio Afri canus.-Publius Cornelius Scipio, surnamed Africanus, from his victories over the Carthaginians in Africa, was a great Roman general and consul. Born 235 B.C.; died about 180 B.C. Vatican.-A great palace in Rome, in which the Pope lives. It gets its name from being built on the Vatican hill, one of the eminences of ancient Rome. It is said to contain 7000 rooms, and has the finest collection of works of art, ancient and modern, in the world. The Vatican library, which is very famous, was founded in 1448 by Nicholas V. at the dawn of the Revival of Letters. It is very rich in MSS. as well as printed books.

ITALY.-Norman Macleod, D.D.

THE road from Nice to Genoa (the Corniche, as it is called) is of the same character with its continuation along the Riviera from Genoa to Pisa, or at least to beyond Spezzia, as far perhaps as Massa. We travelled the latter portion only by vetturino-that is, with a hired carriage driven with two horses, for about £2 per day. The journey occupied two and a half days, sleeping the first night at Sestri, and the second at Spezzia. It would be difficult to exaggerate the beauty of this excursion, which can hardly be matched perhaps in the world, except on the Neapolitan or Sicilian coast. The Apenninse here run, a few miles off, parallel to the Mediterranean, to which they connect themselves by long spurs or ridges which rise up into conical hills, wind round deep valleys, range themselves into high mountain passes with rock and precipice, open out at the sea into wide bays with beaches of pure sand, or end in bold headlands, like Porto Fino, which abruptly plunge themselves into deep water. Bnt who can describe the endless beauties of this scene, when every turn of the road reveals

some new grouping of marvellous beauty! To the right is the glorious ocean; is it green as emerald, blue as lapis-lazuli ? or do not the colours of the topaz and amethyst mingle with these? It is dotted with pure white sails, like sea-birds on its bosom, and loses itself in the horizon on the way to Egypt and Palestine. The road sometimes passed so near its margin that one gazed down into the crystal depths, and heard the laughter of the waves on the shore; the air was loaded with the perfume of orange-trees and the most subtle and delicate odours; everywhere, as far as the eye could see inland, were festooned vineyards, groves of olives, with figs, chestnuts, dark cypressesevery shade of green lighted up by flowers of every hue; everywhere, from sea to mountain, white cottages like specks of light relieving the foliage; villages perched on the sides and on the tops of the hills, nestling deep down or far up in the valleys, and each with its attendant church spire, all filling the air at evening with the echoing chimes of bells;-and then overhead the dome of the blue sky that no art can ever picture, and all day enjoying an atmosphere which glorified every object with its luminous splendour! Ding, ding, ding, rung the bells of our little horses, as we wheeled through this scene hour after hour, until, from expressing our wonder as every moment some new view burst upon us, we became weary of speech, and gazed in silent and absorbed admiration, until some object for a moment concealed the view, and then we drew our breath and gave vent to our common sense of the surpassing beauty around us.

THE BATTLE OF MONCONTOUR.-Macaulay. 1824.

Он, weep for Moncontour! Oh! weep for the hour
When the children of darkness and evil had power,
When the horsemen of Valois triumphantly trod
On the bosoms that bled for their rights and their God.

Oh, weep for Moncontour! Oh! weep for the slain,
Who for faith and for freedom lay slaughtered in vain;
Oh, weep for the living, who linger to bear
The renegade's shame, or the exile's despair.

One look, one last look, to our cots and our towers,
To the rows of our vines, and the beds of our flowers,
To the church where the bones of our fathers decayed,
Where we fondly had deemed that our own would be laid.

Alas! we must leave thee, dear desolate home,
To the spearmen of Uri, the shavelings of Rome,
To the serpent of Florence, the vulture of Spain,
To the pride of Anjou, and the guile of Lorraine.

Farewell to thy fountains, farewell to thy shades,
To the song of thy youths, and the dance of thy maids,
To the breath of thy gardens, the hum of thy bees,
And the long waving line of the blue Pyrenees.

Farewell, and for ever. The priest and the slave
May rule in the halls of the free and the brave.
Our hearths we abandon; our lands we resign
But, Father, we kneel to no altar but thine.

NOTES.-Moncontour.-Moncontour, the name of a plain in the department of Vienne, which is part of the ancient province of Poitou, in France. The Huguenots had been greatly discouraged in 1569 by their defeat at the battle of Jarnac, on the River Charente, southwest of Moncontour, on the 13th March. Their great leader, the Prince of Condé, had been killed in it. They had, however, retreated in good order, under Admiral Coligny, and were soon reassured by the King of Navarre coming to their camp with his son Henry, afterwards Henry IV., and the young Prince of Condé, and young Henry of Navarre was proclaimed their general-in-chief, under the guidance of Admiral Coligny. In the autumn (October 3) they were once more dispirited by the vigour of the Catholic army under the Duke of Anjou, and clamoured for battle to end their miseries either by death or victory. Coligny, therefore, unwillingly, halted, and the battle of Moncontour was fought, resulting in the defeat of the Huguenots with the loss of 10,000 men. The ballad is supposed to be recited by a Huguenot in lament over the calamity that had befallen his cause. Valois. The Duke of Anjou was brother of the King, Charles IX. (1560-1574), who was of the royal house of Valois. The Renegade's shame.-"Few persons of quality, especially of the French, were slain, because the chief heads fled betimes, for their own

safety." Davila's Historie of the Civil Wars
in France. London 1647.-Spearmen of Uri.—
A Roman Catholic canton of Switzerland.
"In each battalion (division of the army)
there were squadrons of Swisses." Da-
vila. The Shavelings of Rome.-Monks
and friars, for whom the king's army
were in reality fighting. Called shave-
lings from their tonsure, or shaved
crowns. The Serpent of Florence.-The
queen mother, Catherine de Medici,
daughter of Lorenzo de Medici, Duke of
Florence, and widow of Henry II., whom
she married in 1533. She now acted as
the virtual ruler of France, her son,
Charles IX., being a mere puppet in her
hands. It was she who, three years later,
planned the massacre of St. Bartholo-
mew, with the aid of the Guises. The
Vulture of Spain.-Philip II., son of
Charles V., whose whole life was spent in
maintaining war against the Protestants,
and in persecuting them to the death
whenever he could. The Guile of Lorraine.
-The House of Guise. The Duke of
Guise led one division of the Catholic
army at Moncontour. The Duke
D'Aumale, another of the Guises, held
a command in the second division.
The Guises were subtle and deter-
mined enemies of the Huguenots.
The blue Pyrenees.-Moncontour was far
to the north of the Pyrenees, but a
great many of the Huguenots came from
the south, which was, indeed, their
stronghold.

LESSONS ON SPECIFIC SUBJECTS.

CHEMISTRY.

NITROGEN AND CARBONIC ACID GAS.

1. NITROGEN GAS constitutes four-fifths, or 79 per cent. by volume,* of the air we breathe. It is found in all plants and animals, and also in coal and some other minerals. Saltpetre, which is the nitrate of potash, and the nitrate of soda, are natural combinations formed by it.

2. The name NITROGEN means the nitre producer, and was given from the presence of this gas in saltpetre. AzoTE is another name by which it is known, and was given from the fact that animals died when made to breathe nitrogen. This name comes from the two Greek words—A, without, and zoE, life. Animals do not, however, die in it from poisoning, as in the case of some other gases, but from suffocation. Nitrogen is not poisonous; it simply suffocates, as water does, from being unfit for breathing, and excluding the air.

3. Nitrogen enters into the composition of vegetable life everywhere, but there is very little of it in comparison with other substances. In 2,500 lbs. of hay there are 984 lbs. of carbon, and only 32 of nitrogen.

4. Though nitrogen forms four-fifths of the atmosphere, plants do not derive it directly from the air, but absorb it through their roots in the form of ammonia, which is a compound of nitrogen and hydrogen. This ammonia is received by plants in solution in water, which drinks it in from the air. Rain and brooks contain it, and by their agency it gets to the roots of vegetation everywhere.

5. Nitrogen also forms part of the bodies of men and the lower animals. It is, with its compounds, the flesh-forming element in their food, and is obtained either from plants, as in the case of animals like the horse; or from the flesh of other animals, as in that of a lion; or from both these sources, as in the case of man.

6. The constant abstraction of ammonia from the atmosphere by plants might be supposed gradually to disturb the proportions of nitrogen in it. This, however, does not happen, so large a quantity being reproduced and given back to the air by the decay and putrefaction of animal and vegetable substances, that the amount of it in the atmosphere is always the same.

7. Nitrogen is prepared in two ways. If nitric acid and raw butcher's meat be put into a retort, and heated, nitrogen is given off, but it is not very pure. A more convenient method is to take the oxygen from a portion of atmospheric air, and thus leave the nitrogen free. Oxygen, as you may remember, is only a fifth part of the air, while nitrogen is four-fifths.

* As distinguished from weight.

« НазадПродовжити »