The ornamental framing of the several pictures has been executed by a master of decorative art, the late V. Galland. The borders are formed of garlands of flowers in a low scale of colour, which are divided at regular intervals by tablets bearing inscriptions and monograms. On the whole, the decoration of the Panthéon gives little encouragement to other nations who are desirous of covering large surfaces of wall in their public buildings. The art seems to be lost; for if the greatest of the French painters have, from one reason and another, failed to produce an harmonious scheme of decoration, who is likely to succeed? At best, the church presents a sort of _pot-pourri_. No schools are so dramatic as the French; and yet these wall paintings fail to impress us in the same way as do those, for example, of the Riccardi Palace, by Benozzo Gozzoli. It is probably the religious spirit which is wanting. We can draw better and paint better than the early Italian or Flemish artists--but the sentiment is lacking; and thus, whether we turn to Paris or München, to Berlin or London, we find the decoration of large buildings, and particularly of churches, more or less a failure. Perhaps the worst examples are the terribly dismal, cold, maudlin Nibelung series at München, compared to which the Panthéon is Raffaelesque. Had Puvis de Chavannes been allowed to do the whole church, the result would have been certainly more harmonious, and possibly more edifying; but though gaining in harmony, the frescoes might possibly have lost in variety. Sometimes too much of a good thing results in a wearisome monotony. Sculpture will also be represented later on by a group of the Revolution, by Falguière; and doubtless we shall have monuments to Victor Hugo, Rénan, and other _grands hommes_, from their grateful country. Let us hope the decoration may always be as Catholic as heretofore; for S. Louis, Clovis, Geneviève and Jeanne d'Arc form as much a part of the history of France as do Voltaire, Mirabeau, Danton, and Dumouriez. We may not care to sing the "Marseillaise" with Camille Desmoulins, and we may wish we could forget the fourteenth Louis and all the Napoléons; but it is as foolish to deny their influence upon the nation as to sponge out the fact recorded on a door-head that Louis-Napoleon joined the Louvre and the Tuileries. SAINT-GERMAIN L'AUXERROIS.