"Yes, and Italy has had it for twenty-five years," said the American girl. "But we are here," she added gayly, "to buy everything and to preserve it.--Oh! what an exquisite chapel.--Just look at it!--Now I'll bet you that those frescoes will finish their existence in Chicago or Marionville." As she spoke she pointed out to Pierre the mural paintings that decorated the chapel they entered at the moment. The little place where the cardinal-pirate had doubtless often officiated was embellished with a vast symbolical composition from floor to ceiling. It was the work of one of those unknown masters whose creations confront one at every step in Italy and which anywhere else would be celebrated. But there, as the soldiers in the famous charge say, they are too numerous! This particular painter, influenced by the marvellous frescoes with which Lorenzo Lotto had beautified the Suardi Chapel at Bergamo, had represented, above the altar, Christ standing up and holding out His hands. From the Saviour's finger-tips a vine shoot spread out, climbing up and up to the dome, covered with grapes. The tendrils wound round, making frames for the figures of five saints on one side, and on the other five female figures. Above the head of Christ the inscription, "Ego sum vitis, vos palmites," gave an evangelical significance to the fantastic decoration. The principal episodes in the legend of St. Laurence, the patron saint of the cathedral at Genoa, were painted on the walls and in the panels made by the pillars. These were: Decius slaying the Emperor Philip in his tent; the young sou of the dead Emperor confiding his father's treasures to Sixtus to be distributed among the poor; Sixtus being led to the scene of his martyrdom, followed by Laurence, crying, "Where art thou going, O father, without thy son? Where art thou going, O priest, without thy deacon?" Laurence receiving the treasures in his turn and confiding them to the poor widow; Laurence in prison converting the officer of the guard; Laurence in Sallust's gardens collecting together the poor, the halt, and the blind, saying at the same time to Decius, "Behold the treasures of the Church!" Laurence surrounded by flames upon a bed of fire!--The picturesqueness of the costumes, the fancy displayed in the architecture, the fruitful nature of the landscape, the breadth of the drawing, and the warmth of the coloring revealed the influence of the Venetian school, although attenuated and softened by the usury of time, which had effaced the too glaring brilliancy and toned down the too vivid warmth of the painting. It had taken on something of the faded tone of old tapestry.