Page:Armatafragment00ersk.djvu/279

This page needs to be proofread.

( 51 )

¬so long- shut up, and besides we have a long way to go before night." We now passed through a noble suite of rooms, which were rich, and well proportioned, ornamented with the finest tapestry and the richest brocades; the lustres also were most splendid, and the pictures, which were in magnificent frames, seemed to be finely painted; but the portraits of another world were, of course, uninteresting. She pointed, however, with a very long stick, to many great statesmen, philosophers, orators, warriors, judges, and learned men, and with that appropriate cadence which we hear at Exeter 'Change, when we visit the wild beasts. Throughout the whole of this immense round which, without forgetting my friend's injunc- tion, occupied at least two hours, we did not see one man, or woman, or child, nor any one living creature of any kind whatsoever, except several bats, who seemed, by their ilutterings, to have been but seldom disturbed, and now and then a coterie of moths, but who were so busy at luncheon on the velvet cushions and e 2 curtains, ¬