But a closter look made us know that it wuz no one that we ever see. It wuz not the dear one who wuz in our hearts day and night, it wuz not our sweet Aronette and it wuz not Lucia. Poor father! doomed to hunt in vain for her as long as his tremblin' limbs could carry him to and fro under foreign skies and the sun and stars of his own land. Poor seekin' eyes, turnin' away at the very last from visions of green pastures and still waters to look once more down the sin-cursed streets of earth for his heart's treasure! Dying eyes, dim with a black shadow, blacker than the shadow of the Valley, cast from Agony and Sin, sold to the crazed multitude for its undoing by sane men for the silver of Judas. Love stronger than life, mightier than death, never to be rewarded here. But we read of a time of rewards for deeds done in the body. At whose dying beds will these black forms stand, whose shadows torment humanity, to claim their own and go out with them to their place they have prepared here for their soul's dwelling? Hard question, but one that will have to be answered. Robert Strong and Dorothy wanted to visit the Pantheon; specially the tomb of Victor Hugo. It is a great buildin' with a dome that put me some in mind of our own Capitol at Washington, D. C. It is adorned with paintings and statutes by the most eminent artists and sculptors, and the mighty shades of the past seem to walk through the solemn aisles with us, specially before the statute of Victor Hugo. I felt considerable well acquainted with him, havin' hearn Thomas J. read his books so much. And as I stood there I had a great number of emotions thinkin' what Victor had went through from his native land from first to last: abuse, persecutions, sent off and brung back, etc., and I thought of how his faithful "Toiler of the Sea" went through superhuman labors to end in disappintment at last. And Jean Valjean, the martyr, seemed to walk along in front of me patiently guardin' and tendin' little Cossette, who wuz to pierce his noble, steadfast heart with the sharpest thorn in the hull crown of thorns--ingratitude, onrequited affection, and neglect. And we stood before the Column Vendome and meditated on that great, queer creeter, Napoleon. Who but he would think of meltin' the cannons he had took in battle from his enemies and makin' a triumphal monument of 'em a hundred and forty feet high, with his own figger on top. CHAPTER XXVI Well, Miss Meechim wanted to see the Goblin tapestry, so we visited the Goblin manufactory. These tapestries are perfectly beautiful, fourteen thousand shades of wool are used in their construction. What would Sister Sylvester Bobbett say? She thought the colors in her new rag carpet went ahead of anything, and she didn't have more'n fourteen at the outside, besides black and but-nut color. But fourteen thousand colors--the idee!