'It must be so,' answered the priest, 'unless it's a sign of a lottery office, or a caution against blasphemy up and down the pavement. Those are the only signs we have in the country, except the government salt and cigar shops.' ... He took a snuff-box from a pocket in his sleeve, and with a bow offered a pinch to Mr. Caper. This accepted, they bid each other profoundly farewell. 'There goes a brick!' remarked the traveler. Arrived at the entrance-door to the tower of the Capitoline Hill, James Caper first felt in one pocket for a silver piece and in the other for a match-box, and finding them both there, rang the bell, and then mounted to the top of the tower. Lighting a _zigarro scelto_ or papal cigar, he leaned on both elbows on the parapet, and gazed long and fixedly over the seven-hilled city. 'And this,' soliloquized he, _is_ Rome. Many a day have I been kept in school without my dinner because I was not able to parse thee idly by, _Roma_--Rome--noun of the first declension, feminine gender, that a quarter of a century ago caused me punishment, I have thee now literally under foot, and (knocking his cigar) throw ashes on thy head. 'My mission in this great city is not that of a picture-peddler or art student. I come to investigate the eating, drinking, sleeping arrangements of the Eternal City--its wine more than its vinegar, its pretty girls more than its galleries, its _cafés_ more than its churches. I see from here that I have a fine field to work in. Down there, clambering over the fallen ruins of the Palace of the Cæsars, is a donkey. Could one have a finer opportunity to see in this a moral and twist a tail? From those fallen stones, Memory-glorious old architect--rears a fabric wondrously beautiful; peoples it with eidolons white and purple-robed, and gleaming jewel-gemmed; or, iron armed, glistening with flashing light from polished steel--heroes and slaves, conquerors and conquered; my blood no longer flows to the slow, jerking measure of a nineteenth-century piece of mechanism, but freely, fully, and completely. Hurrah, my blood is up! dark, liquid eyes; black, flowing locks; strange, pleasing perfumes are around me. There is a rush as of a strong south wind through a myriad of floating banners, and I am borne onward through triumphal arches, past pillared temples, under the walls of shining palaces, into the Coliseum.... 'Pray, and can you tell me--if that pile of d----d old rubbish--down there, you know--is the Forum--for I do not--see it in Murray--though I'm sure--I have looked very clearly--and Murray you know--has everything down in him--that a traveler.... 'A commercial traveler?' ... interrupted Mr. Caper, speaking slowly, and looking coolly into the eyes of the blackguard Bagman.... 'The ruins you see there are those of the Forum. Good morning.' MODERN ART.