Here, while we were shewing our passports, a Valet de Place introduced himself, without ceremony, as having had the honour to serve several Mi Lor's, to whom he was proud to have given the utmost satisfaction; and, without asking permission, he jumped up along side of the Coachman, and went with us to the Dogana, which has been fitted up within the Colonnade of an Ancient Temple.

By the assistance of our Cicerone, for he serves occasionally in both characters, we have procured very agreeable Lodgings, at the house of a Statuary, directly opposite the Church of San Carlo (an elegant edifice near the middle of the Corso) the principal inconveniencies of which we soon found to be universal at Rome: to wit, an open door-way, besieg

ed

ed by Idlers; and a public stair-case, stinking with filth.

As soon as we had dined, I set out to find St. Peter's; but, losing myself among crooked streets, narrow, and badly paved, I had recourse to my usual method in a strange place, of walking far enough out of town to see the situation of the principal objects-when I found myself diametrically wrong, and was obliged to cross the whole town to come at the Bridge and Castle of St. Angelo, from whence a narrow passage leads directly to the Papal Basilica.

The Cathedral of St. Peter-But St.

Peter's Church must not be crowded into the end of a letter.-I will begin upon a fresh sheet to-morrow.

LETTER X.

St. Peter's Church.

HE Cathedral of St. Peter-before

THE

whose encircling Porticoes, stupendous Frontispiece, and gigantic Dome, the proudest Temples of Antiquity diminish into comparative insignificance, is erected-in the shape of a cross-upon

the

very site of the Circus of Nero, which had been so often stained with the blood of Christian Martyrs-as if to signalise the triumph of Christianity, over the pride and cruelty of Heathen Rome.

The Hemisphere of the Dome is seen from all parts of the Campagna di Roma, towering

towering over the subjacent City, at the western extremity of the Suburb of Transtevere-a name that defines its situation, beyond the Tyber, which separates it alike (though not with the clear stream of the Ancients) from the seven hills of the Consular City, and the plain at their foot, into which Papal Rome has imperceptibly descended.

The turbid current is traversed, with equal enthusiasm, by the Pilgrim, and the Traveller; who, from the remotest Regions of the Globe, jostle each other upon the bridge of St. Angelo; and, scarcely noticing the Castle (itself an object of twofold superstition, as the Bulwark of the Church, and the Mausoleum of Adrian) press onward, through a dark

and

and narrow passage, that leads directly into the area of St. Peter's Square.

Dazzled with the sudden blaze of incredible magnificence, the astonished Spectator halts, instinctively, to contemplate the glorious Vision, of whose reality he can scarcely assure himself, yet fondly cherishes the seeming illusion.

A sweeping Forest of three hundred columns surrounds the Outer Court, with the swell of an amphitheatre; and the circling Colonnades are aptly inscribed with the metaphoric promise, There shall be a Tabernacle for a shadow from the heat, and for a covert from storm and from rain. They lead to ascending Corridors,