Chesterfield, for his support in the

House of Peers.*

Such a Reader as his Grace of B- would skip over the technical information that this historical Monument was sculptured by Rusconi, and is supported by colossal Figures of Religion and Strengthhe might perhaps mumble through the various expressions, in brass and marble, of the fertile fancy of Monot, or Algardibut he would certainly drop asleep, should I attempt

• Chesterfield humorously describes his own ignorance of the subject, in the celebrated Letters to his booby Son, of whom he would so gladly have made a Statesman, or a Philosopher; but he was not du bois dont on en fait [the stuff of which such things are made.] It was Lord Macclesfield that framed the Bill, and supported it in a scien. tifical speech, that nobody understood-while Chesterfield displayed to such advantage, the astronomical phrases, he had got by heart, on the occasion, plentifully interlarded with amusing episodes, and rhetorical flourishes, that it was his speech convinced their Lordships, and rung through all Europe, as a masterpiece of Modern eloquence.

Hh

I attempt to distinguish the vigorous productions of Bernini, in the Statue of Longinus, and the Tomb of Urban, from the feeble efforts of his expiring genius in the crowded Cenotaph of the last Pope Alexander.

AN Unbeliever in the Christian System will learn with triumph, or contempt, the imaginary miracles that strike the eye at St. Peter's with the aggravation of contrast, amidst the real wonders of art, by which they are surrounded.

Here an antiquated picture of the Virgin-preserved from the rubbish of the Old Church, is hung, though but scantily,

scantily, with votive tablets, and ridi culous representations of hair-breadth escapes-There St. Peter and St. Paul -the promulgators of piety and peace, appear in the clouds-sword in hand, to defend Pope Leo from the incursions of Attila, King of the Huns.

Here Gregory the Great converts the consecrated Wafer into a shoulder of mutton, to the utter confusion of an Unbeliever in the real presence.-There some Female Martyr-in emulation of St. Denis, carries her own head in her hands, to place it upon an altar, for the veneration of the Faithful.

But at Rome miracles are familiar, and all these wonder-working Saints attract little attention, in comparison of a brazen

brazen Image of St. Peter, which was cast out of a broken Statue of Jupiter Capitolinus. It sits upon a marble pedestal-beneath a scarlet canopy-on the right hand of the altar-a lamp burns constantly before it-the accompaniment of the keys is not forgottenit puts out its great toe, with a magisterial air, and Men, Women, and Children, kiss it as they pass-bowing, and scraping, adoration!

A HUNDRED Clerks perform the offices of the Choir, in the various grades of Priesthood-from the Candle-Snuffer to the Canon, and the Cardinal Arch-Priest, all of whom are bound to live in a state

of

of celibacy, and have apartments in the

Vestry.

They assemble, twice a day, in full dress, for matins and vespers, when the pomp of instrumental music is accompanied by half a dozen Eunuchs, whose enchanting voices are sadly con-trasted by their pallid faces, and distorted limbs.

It is a singular fact, in the history of Superstition, that the Chapter of St. Peter's-in white and silver-glittering with illumination, and fuming with incensebeneath domes and canopies, fretted with gold, and beaming with scarlet, attracts but few Spectators, even among the church-going Populace of Rome.-While

'Crowds