16. Upon this Lulu stepped into the library, and, quickly returning, handed an open magazine to Mr. Agnew, who read aloud from it the following:

IV.-The Joy of Incompleteness.

1.

If all our lives were one broad glare
Of sunlight, clear, unclouded;
If all our path were smooth and fair,
By no soft gloom enshrouded;
If all life's flowers were fully blown
Without the sweet unfolding,
And happiness were rudely thrown

On hands too weak for holding-
Should we not miss the twilight hours,
The gentle haze and sadness?

Should we not long for storms and showers,
To break the constant gladness?

2.

If none were sick, and none were sad,

What service could we render?

I think if we were always glad,
We scarcely could be tender:

Did our beloved never need

Our patient ministration,

Earth would grow cold, and miss, indeed,

Its sweetest consolation:

If sorrow never claimed our heart,

And every wish were granted,
Patience would die, and hope depart―
Life would be disenchanted.

3.

And yet in heaven is no more night,

In heaven is no more sorrow!

Such unimagined new delight

Fresh grace from pain will borrow.
As the poor seed that under ground
Seeks its true life above it,
Not knowing what will there be found.
When sunbeams kiss and love it,
So we in darkness upward grow,
And look and long for heaven,
But cannot picture it below,
Till more of light be given.

J. Bessemeres.

CHAPTER XV.-AROUND THE WORLD.-No. 8.
FROM VENICE TO ATHENS.

I.-Loiterings in Venice.

1. When I closed my last letter, the spires of Venice were slowly rising into view over the tranquil waters of the Adriatic. Just after sunset we came to anchor in a good harbor, connected with which is the Grand Canal, lined with magnificent buildings. Half a dozen black boats, called gondolas, took our entire party from the steamer into the city.

2. Canals almost wholly take the place of strects in Venice; and, as it was evening when we landed, we had the pleasure of first seeing the city by moonlight—if it could be seen when rows of buildings hemmed us in on every side. As our gondoliers rowed swiftly along, right from the water's edge arose long lines of stately marble palaces, whose porticos and colonnades were adorned with statuary. Music came floating over the water, and gondolas were gliding hither and thither, suddenly disappearing under massive stone bridges connecting with side canals, or through gates and alleys leading to the mansions of the wealthy.

3. The description of Venice which Prof. Howard read to us in the evening, at our hotel, was strikingly true:"There is a glorious city in the sea:

The sea is in the broad, the narrow streets,
Ebbing and flowing; and the salt sea-weed
Clings to the marble of her palaces.

No track of men, no footsteps to and fro,
Lead to her gates! The path lies o'er the sea,
Invisible; and from the land we went,

As to a floating city-steering in,
And gliding up her streets as in a dream,
So smoothly-silently-by many a dome,
Mosque-like, and many a stately portico,
With statues ranged along an azure sky;—
By many a pile, in more than Eastern pride,
Of old the residence of merchant kings;
The fronts of some, though time had shattered them,
Still glowing with the richest hues of art,

As though the wealth within them had run o'er."

Rogers.

4. During our stay of three weeks we visited St. Mark's Place, which contains the famous St. Mark's Church, and the Palace of the Doges,—and saw, above the central doorway of the church, the Bronze Horses that were brought from Constantinople, and the famous Winged Lion of St. Mark, also in bronze; we gazed at the paintings of the great masters, and crossed and re-crossed the bridge of the Rialto a hundred times. When, each day, we had finished our sight-seeing, and returned to our hotel, you cannot imagine what a wealth of description-both in prose and in poetry-the Professor had in store for us.

5. Most of our party also made an excursion by rail to Pad'ua, twenty miles north-west of Venice, and thence onward through Northern Italy as far as Milan', which we visited, mainly, for the purpose of seeing its splendid marble cathedral, the building of which, although begun nearly five hundred years ago, is not yet completed.

6. The rich tracery of the great altar window of Melrose Abbey, thirty-six feet in height, is beautiful in the extreme; the cathedral of Bonn is noble in its heaven-aspiring proportions; but that of Milan combines the grand, the gorgeous, and the beautiful, as you may well believe from the engraving that I send you.

7. One evening, after our return from Milan, when we

were all assembled in our parlor at the hotel, and were talking of the paintings we had seen in Italy, Professor Howard called our special attention not only to the grandeur and magnificence of the paintings of Raphael and Titian and