fond of pictures, much more so than the English.  The Americans are next to the French in ideality, notwithstanding their great practicality.  The common people of England are far behind those of America in their fondness for the beautiful—­at least I judge so from a pretty fair experience.  America as yet, to be sure, can show few works of art, but the vast number of enlightened Americans who continually visit Europe, and many for the purpose of seeing the grand and beautiful in art, tells the story.  The English upper-classes are undoubtedly well-educated in art, but not the other classes.  But I must not digress.

The second room we visited was the Salle des Bijoux, and was entirely occupied by vases, jewels, and rare and costly cups.  I was much pleased with an Arabian basin of splendid workmanship.  There were also articles of toilette given by the ancient republic of Venice to Marie de Medicis, one casket alone being worth many thousands of dollars.

The next apartment we entered contains copies of Raphael’s frescoes in the Vatican at Rome; but the next room interested me more, for it contains Grecian statuary and antiquities.  The southern part of Italy and Etruria, Herculaneum and Pompeii, are all represented in the collection.  One striking feature of this hall is, that the ceilings are covered with paintings of the best artists.  One represents Vesuvius receiving fire from Jupiter to consume Herculaneum and Pompeii; another, Cybele protecting the two cities from the fires of Vesuvius.

The Hall du Trone, which we next visited, contained a great variety of beautiful pictures.  One is a representation of the Genius of Glory supported by Virtue, with a scroll on which are written the names of the heroes of France—­the warriors, statesmen, and great writers.  There are in this apartment many exquisite vases, and among them four of Sevres porcelain, and one of Berlin porcelain, a present from the king of Prussia.  There are, also, two very fine Chinese side-boards and specimens of Chinese sculpture.

We next looked into the Musee Egyptian, which contains Egyptian curiosities, and the ceilings are painted, but, of course, by modern authors, as they are executed not upon canvas, but upon the hard ceiling.  One of the paintings represents Egypt as being saved by Joseph—­another, and one of the finest of the ceiling decorations in the Louvre, is by Horace Vernet.  It represents Julian II. giving orders to Michael Angelo, Raphael, and Bramante to construct St. Peters.

The Galerie Francaise is filled with paintings of the French school, but none of them are by living painters.  Many of them are unquestionably fine specimens of art, but as they were principally portraits of men more distinguished by their position than by any genius, I was not interested in the collection.