When Mrs. Stowe came to France she noticed the ready enthusiasm of the French for all things beautiful, and she compared this with the Puritan distrust of beauty for its own sake which she had seen and felt in New England. She was, of course, not the only one who has felt this about our serious forefathers and their view of life. Now she had found a people that could be equally enthusiastic about a barrel of potatoes and the adorning of a room. She observes: “But did not He that made the appetite for food make also that for beauty? and while the former will perish with the body, is not the latter immortal?” By this we see how far the soul of Harriet Beecher has progressed since the days when she found her love of literature a snare in the way of her spiritual progress. Mrs. Stowe was delighted with Paris. She was released from care; she was unknown and unknowing. She employed herself in wandering about the shops, the streets and boulevards, seeing and hearing the life of Paris. She wished the children at home could see these Tuileries with their statues and fountains, these family groups under the trees, the men and women chatting, reading aloud or working muslin, the children driving hoops, playing ball, all chattering volubly. Afterwards she was able to give the children the opportunity to see all this when she brought the whole company to spend a winter in Paris to study French. But the relief from the necessity of seeing people, which would have been so great a pleasure to her if she had not been too tired for it, did not stay with her very long in France, nor in Switzerland whither they next went. Here also the fame of the author had gone before her. All knew the book; they stood in rows to see the author and to ask her to write another that should while away their long winter evenings as “Uncle Tom” had done. “Remember,” they said, “our winter nights here are very long!” At last they came to Italy. Here every day opened to her a new world of wonders. And when she reached Rome she cried out, “Rome is a world! Rome is an astonishment! Rome is an enchantress! Think of strolling leisurely through the Forum, of seeing the very stones that were laid in the time of the Republic, of rambling over the ruined Palace of the Cæsars, of walking under the Arch of Titus, of seeing the Dying Gladiator, and whole ranges of rooms filled with the wonders of art, all in one morning!... In the Palace of the Cæsars, where the very dust is a _mélange_ of exquisite marbles, I saw for the first time an acanthus growing, and picked my first leaf!”