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mass did not impress me as particularly grand. There were
several male voices in the space where the music was being performed and they
sang principally solos while I remained, but I did not stay
until the end. It was my only opportunity to see the great
fresco of the last judgment by Michael Angelo which covers
the whole altar wall of the chapel. It had become somewhat
obscured by the darkening of the paint, and therefore could
not be well seen from where I was seated. The engraving of it
which I have examined since has given me a better idea
of the extent and grandeur of the work than was possible
under the conditions surrounding me then.
One morning when with Mr Jackson, after having breakfasted
with him, while passing through the piazza Navona, he took
us to a large building a little off from the square which was cele-
brated for its magnificent staircase. This we examined and
admired, and, finding that the American Minister, Major
Cass, a son of General Lewis Cass of Michigan, lived there,
Mr J insisted that I should leave a card upon him, Allston hav-
ing already been to a reception at his house. This I did, and
to my surprise, later in the day, I found the Minister's card await-
ing me at our hotel. There being no corner of side of it turned
down, it was understood that it had been sent, and not brought
in person. It was proper then after this prompt acknowledgement
on his part that I should pay a regular visit, and accordingly
in a few days Allston and myself went and were very pleas-
antly recieved in a handsomely furnished room in keeping with
the architectural beauty of the staircase. Major Cass
had much of the polish of a European diplomat and seemed
to be a finished gentleman. He had been in the Army and
was in the Mexican war. I asked him whether he had known
Mr John Butler who raised a company of cavalry in Philadelphia for that war
and was in command of it when he died there between Vera Cruz
and the capital. His reply was that he had known him well
and that he had died in his tent.
The building was an ancient one and situated in an unfash-
ionable quarter, but the splendor of its interior showed how
able the architects of Rome had become at an early day after
the commencement of the renaissance. One of the scenes of the
marriage of Cana of Veronese, the one in Dresden, represent a some
what similar stairway with variegated marble columns, and
the artist was thus enabled without going out of his way to put on can-
vas the accesories to his picture which were indispensable to the splendor which
he wished to represent. On the piazza Navona a market was being
held and I was much surprised at the quantity of frogs that
were for sale. The women vendors were busy skinning them and
detaching the legs from the body. The part of old Rome
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