The party went down the stairs, Rollo and Minnie following them. The sacristan had two candles in his hands. As soon as he got to the bottom of the stairs, he passed along a narrow passage way between two rows of open coffins, placed close together side by side, and in each coffin was a dead man, his flesh dried to a mummy, his clothes all in tatters, and his face, though shrivelled and dried up, still preserving enough of the human expression to make the spectacle perfectly horrid. When Rollo and Minnie reached the place near enough to see what was there, the sacristan was moving his candles about over the coffins, one in each hand, so as to show the bodies plainly. At the first glance which Minnie obtained of this shocking sight, she uttered a scream, and ran up the stairs again as fast as she could go. Rollo followed her, but somewhat more slowly. When he came out into the church, he caught a glimpse of Minnie's dress, as she was just making her escape from the door. Rollo would have followed her, but he was afraid of losing his uncle George. When the party, at length, came up from their visit to the dead monks, they went to see the sacred staircase. Rollo went with them. The staircase seemed to be at the main entrance to the church: the party had gone round to a door in the side where they came in. The sacred stairs occupied the centre of the hall in which they were placed. There were on the sides two plain and common flights of stairs, for people to go up and down in the usual way. The sacred stairs in the centre could only be ascended and descended on the knees. The side stairs were separated from the central flight by a solid balustrade or wall, not very high, so that people who came to see the sacred steps could stand on the side steps and look over. The flight of sacred steps was very wide, and was built of a richly variegated marble, of brown, red, and yellow colors, intermingled together in the stone; and some of the stains were said to have been produced by the blood of Christ. Here and there, too, on the different steps of the staircase, were to be seen little brass plates let into the stone, beneath which were small caskets containing sacred relics of various kinds, such as small pieces of wood of the true cross, and fragments of the bones of saints and apostles. Neither Mr. George nor Rollo took much interest in this exhibition; and so, giving the sacristan a small piece of money, they went back to their carriage. As Rollo got into the carriage that he had come in, he saw that Minnie was seated in hers, and she nodded her head when Rollo's carriage moved away, to bid him good by.