* * * * * Biblioteca Ambrosiana.—This famous library was founded by Cardinal Federigo Borromeo, a cousin of San Carlo, and Archbishop of Milan in his turn from 1594 to 1631. He is the Cardinal Borromeo of Manzoni’s well-known romance, the _Promessi Sposi_. A man of great virtue, he was also a splendid patron of literature, science and art. The foundation of a library for the free use of his fellow-citizens and of all comers was a long-pondered scheme of the Cardinal, and for years he employed competent scholars to collect books and manuscripts in all countries, till he had amassed no less than fifteen thousand codices, many of exceeding rarity, and thirty thousand printed volumes. In 1603 the building was begun and in 1609 it was solemnly opened. Since then the treasures of the library have increased continually by gifts and legacies, and collections of pictures and prints, etc., have been added to it. The entrance to the Ambrosiana is in the Piazza della Rosa. In the vestibule an inscription records the Founder, and another threatens with excommunication anyone who should carry away a book. _Biblioteca._—In the Sala Antica some of the chief treasures of the Library are exposed to view. Here is shown a page of the precious _Codex Atlanticus_, a volume of miscellaneous writings and drawings, chiefly of engineering subjects, by Leonardo da Vinci, collected and bound together by Pompeo Leoni in the latter part of the sixteenth century. Here, too, are twelve letters written by Lucrezia Borgia to Pietro Bembo, and with them a lock of golden hair, her gift to him, according to a long established belief, which there is no ground for discrediting. The same case contains a MS. of the _Divina Commedia_—late fourteenth century—with damaged miniatures; a Cicero, with very lovely and delicate miniatures of the early Cinquecento; a MS. with a miniatured page—St. Barnabas baptizing the first Christians in Milan—in the realistic Lombard manner of the sixteenth century, several books of Hours, and some very beautiful fifteenth century bindings, Italian and French. The famous Borromeo Book of Hours, one of the gems of the Library, is not shown here now, and can only be seen by permission of the Librarian. It is a little fifteenth century volume, adorned with numerous miniatures of exquisite workmanship by Cristoforo de Predis, a native of Modena, and apparently by another hand, perhaps more than one. On one of the pages the Annunciation is depicted, and below are two kneeling figures, a knight and lady, conjectured to be portraits of Conte Giovanni and Contessa Cleofe Borromeo. Besides scenes from the New Testament there is a calendar in the book with miniatures descriptive of the occupations of each month. The work is very delicate and fine, distinctively North Italian, but not heavy like the Milanese. Another case contains ancient manuscripts—Hebrew, Greek, Arabic, Ethiopian; a page of a Gothic version