publicly acknowledged the Florentine rebellion in a speech? that the people carried you home in triumph? and that immediately before leaving you received private instructions from La Cica?"

"To your questions," ," said the Senator, with unabated dignity, "I will reply in brief: First, I am a free and independent citizen of the great and glorious American Republic. If I associated with Revolutionists in Florence, I did so because I am accustomed to choose my own society, and not to recognize any law or any master that can forbid my doing so. I deny, however, that I was in any way connected with plots, rebellions or conspiracies. Secondly, I was friendly with the Countess because I considered her a most remarkably fine woman, and because she showed a disposition to be friendly with me -a stranger in a strange land. Thirdly, I have no mission of any kind whatever. I am a traveler for selfimprovement. I have no business, political or commercial. So that my mission could not have been known. If people talked about me they talked nonsense. Fourthly, I confess I made a speech, but what of that? It's not the first time, by a long chalk. I don't know what you mean by acknowledging.' As a private citizen I congratulated them on their success, and would do so again. If a crowd calls on me for a speech, I'm there. The people of Florence dragged me home in a carriage. Well, I don't know why they did so. I can't help it if people will take possession of me and pull me about. Fifthly, and lastly, I had an interview with the Countess, had I? Well, is it wrong for a man to bid good-bye to a friend? I ask you, what upon earth do you mean by such a charge as that? Do you take me for a puling infant ? "

"On that occasion," said the Commandant, she taught you some mysterious words which were to be repeated among the Revolutionists here."

"Never did any thing of the kind. That's a complete full-blown fiction."

"I have the very words."

"That's impossible. You've got hold of the wrong man I see." "I will have them read," said the General solemnly.

And he beckoned to the Interpreter. Whereupon the Interpreter gravely took out a formidable roll of papers from his breast, and opened it. Every gesture was made as if his hand was heavy with the weight of crushing proof. At last a paper was produced. The

Interpreter took one look at the prisoner, then glanced triumphantly at the Consul, and said:

"It is a mysterious language with no apparent meaning, nor have I been able to find the key to it in any way. It is very skillfully made, for all the usual tests of cipher writing fail in this. The person who procured it did not get near enough till the latter part of the interview, so that he gained no explanation whatever from the conversation."

Read," said the Commandant. The Senator waited, wonder. ingly. The interpreter read:

“Ma ouillina sola ouda ste ensoce fremas dis ansit ansin assalf a oue tu affa lastinna belis."

Scarcely had the first words been uttered in the Italian voice of the reader than the Senator started as though a shot had struck him. His face flushed. Finally a broad grin spread itself over his countenance, and down his neck, and over his chest, and over his form, and into his boots, till at last his whole colossal frame shook with an earthquake of laughter.

-

The Commandant stared and looked uneasy. All looked at the Senator all with amazement. the General, the Interpreter, the Officials, the Guards, Buttons, Dick and the American Consul.

"Oh dear! Oh de-ar! Oh DEE-AR!" cried the Senator, in the intervals of his outrageous peals of laughter. “OH!” and a new peal followed.

What did all this mean? Was he crazy? Had misfortunes turned his brain?

But at last the Senator, who was always remarkable for his selfcontrol, recovered himself. He asked the Commandant if he might be permitted to explain.

"Certainly," said the Commandant, dolefully. He was afraid that the thing would take a ridiculous turn, and nothing is so terrible as that to an Austrian official.

"Will you allow me to look at the paper?" asked the Senator. "I will not injure it at all."

The Interpreter politely carried it to him as the Commandant nodded. The Senator beckoned to the Consul. They then walked up to the Commandant. All four looked at the paper.

"You see, gentlemen," said the Senator, drawing a lead pencil from his pocket, "the Florence correspondent has been too sharp.

I can explain all this at once. I was with the Countess, and we got talking of poetry. Now, I don't know any more about poetry than a horse."

"Well?"

“Well, she insisted on my making a quotation. I had to give in. The only one I could think of was a line or two from Watts." "Watts? Ah! I don't know him," said the interpreter. "He was a minister

"Ah!"

a parson."

"So I said it to her, and she repeated it. These friends of yours, General, have taken it down, but their spellin' is a little unusual," said the Senator, with a tremendous grin that threatened a new outburst.

"Look. Here is the true key which this gentleman tried so hard to find."

And taking his pencil the Senator wrote under the strange words the true meaning:

"My willing soul would stay

In such a frame as this,
And sit and sing herself away
To everlasting bliss."

The interpreter saw it all. He looked profoundly foolish. The whole thing was clear. The Senator's innocence was plain. He turned to explain to the Commandant. The Consul's face exhibited a variety of expressions, over which a broad grimace finally predominated, like sunshine over an April sky. In a few words the whole was made plain to the Commandant. He looked annoyed, glared angrily at the Interpreter, tossed the papers on the floor and rose to his feet.

"Give these gentlemen our apologies," said he to the Interpreter. "In times of trouble, when States have to be held subject to martial law, proceedings are abrupt. Their own good sense, will, I trust, enable them to appreciate the difficulty of our position."

James De Mille-Harper & Brothers.

Pictures of Swiss Scenery and of the City of Venice.

It was in Switzerland that I first felt how constantly to contem. plate sublime creation develops the poetic power. It was here that I first began to study nature. Those forests of black gigantic pines rising out of the deep snows; those tall white cataracts, leaping like headstrong youth into the world, and dashing from their precipices, as if allured by the beautiful delusion of their own rainbow mist; those mighty clouds sailing beneath my feet, or clinging to the bosoms of the dark green mountains, or boiling up like a spell from the invisible and unfathomable depths; the fell avalanche, fleet as a spirit of evil, terrific when its sound suddenly breaks upon the almighty silence, scarcely less terrible when we gaze upon its crumbling and pallid frame, varied only by the presence of one or two blasted firs; the head of a mountain loosening from its brother peak, rooting up, in the roar of its rapid rush, a whole forest of pines, and covering the earth for miles with elephantine masses; the supernatural extent of landscape that opens to us new worlds; the strong eagles, and the strange wild birds that suddenly cross you in your path, and stare, and shrieking fly-and all the soft sights of joy and loveliness that mingle with these sublime and savage spectacles, the rich pastures and the numerous flocks, and the golden bees and the wild flowers, and the carved and painted cottages, and the simple manners and the primeval grace—wherever I moved, I was in turn appalled or enchanted; but whatever I beheld, new images ever sprang up in my mind, and new feelings ever crowded on my fancy. If I were to assign the particular quality which conduces to that dreamy and voluptuous existence, which men of high imagination experience in Venice, I should describe it as the feeling of abstraction, which is remarkable in that city, and peculiar to it. Venice is the only city which can yield the magical delights of solitude. All is still and silent. No rude sound disturbs your reveries; fancy, therefore, is not put to flight. No rude sound distracts your selfconsciousness. This tenders existence intense. We feel everything. And we feel thus keenly in a city not only eminently beautiful, not only abounding in wonderful creations of art, but each step of which is hallowed ground, quick with associations, that in their more various nature, their nearer relation to ourselves, and perhaps their more picturesque character, exercise a greater influence over the imagination than the more antique story of Greece and Rome. We feel all

this in a city too, which, although her luster be indeed dimmed, can still count among her daughters maidens fairer than the orient pearls with which her warriors once loved to deck them. Poetry, Tradition, and Love, these are the Graces that have invested with an ever-charming cestus this Aphrodite of cities.

Disraeli.

Joan of Arc.

What is to be thought of her? What is to be thought of the poor shepherd-girl from the hills and forests of Lorraine, thatlike the Hebrew shepherd-boy from the hills and forests of Judea -rose suddenly out of the quiet, out of the safety, out of the religious inspiration, rooted in deep pastoral solitudes, to a station in the van of armies, and to the more perilous station at the right hand of kings? The Hebrew boy inaugurated his patriotic mission by an act, by a victorious act, such as no man could deny. But so did the girl of Lorraine, if we read her story as it was read by those who saw her nearest. Adverse armies bore witness to the boy as no pretender: but so they did to the gentle girl. Judged by the voices of all who saw them from a station of good-will, both were found true and loyal to any promises involved in their first acts. Enemies it was that made the difference between their subsequent fortunes. The boy rose- to a splendor and a noonday prosperity, both personal and public, that rang through the records of his people, and became a by-word amongst his posterity for a thousand years, until the sceptre was departing from Judah. The poor, forsaken girl, on the contrary, drank not herself from that cup of rest which she had secured for France. She never sang together with the songs that rose in her native Demremy, as echoes to the departing steps of invaders. She mingled not in the festal dances of Vaucouleurs which celebrated in rapture the redemption of France. No! for her voice was then silent. No! for her feet were dust. Pure, innocent, noble hearted girl! whom, from earliest youth, ever I believed in as full of truth and self-sacrifice, this was amongst the strongest pledges for thy side, that never once no, not for a moment of weakness-didst thou revel in the vision of coronets and honor from man. Coronets for thee! Oh, no! Honors, if they come when all is over, are for those that share thy blood. Daughter