“Where should this music be? i’ the air or i’ the earth? This is no mortal business, nor no sound That the earth owes. It swept by me upon the waters, Allaying both their fury and my passion With its sweet air.” Some of the city bells, in another chamber above, are of inconceivable size, one of them being 15,000 pounds in weight. Whilst we were in the room, two of the Mechlin “youths” came in to ring the peal, which always sounds before sunset; and although the one they selected was the third or fourth in point of size, and they set it in motion by means of a lever, worked with the foot, it occupied from seven to ten minutes before they succeeded in producing an oscillation so great as to make the tongue of the bell strike the sides. On the outside of the tower, at this height, is a dial for the clock; a circle, the same size of which, is designed in small stones upon the pavement of the square below, connected, I think, with a sun-dial; I paced it and found it upwards of forty feet in diameter, although its counterpart on the tower looks to be of the ordinary size, such is its extreme elevation. The guide who conducted us to the top, pointed out a balcony from which a watchman, who is always stationed aloft to look out for fires, fell, a short time ago; he was taken up below, as our informant said, “as soft as a pack of wool.” The tower and its bells are a distinct and separate erection from the church, although united to it, and belong to the corporation of the city--a remnant of the olden time, when every free city had its “belfry.” This corporation seems still to have absolute power within their bailiwick, and not to exercise it with due “discretion,” they prevented the passage of a canal, from Louvain through their streets, which would have been of most signal advantage to their trade; and, more recently, they stoutly and successfully resisted the government in bringing the central depôt of the railroads within the circuit of the city, instead of fixing it, as they have been compelled to do, at some distance beyond its boundary--a circumstance which they now sensibly regret.