Page:Life in the Old World - Vol. II.djvu/126

136 grounds, to see the cattle grazing in the green meadows, where the lemon trees shone out with their fine fruit, and the narcissus was about to burst into bloom. The air was like that of a beautiful May-day in Sweden.

On the 9th, Madame de Martino drove me to the Museum of the old church San Giovanni di Lateran, where Cavaliere De Rossi, is now forming a separate Museo Christiana, of the valuable relics, together with the inscriptions which he discovered in the Catacombs. De Rossi met us in the gallery, in order to be our guide. He arranges here burial inscriptions and pictures, according to the various periods, when they were executed, and the place where they were found, so that this museum will supply an historical and geographical picture of the catacomb world.

The first pictures which are presented to our observation, are of the good shepherd who carries the lost sheep upon his shoulders. Then come pictures from the Old and New Testaments. The miracles of Christ with the bread, restoring sight to the blind, and raising of Lazarus, are often seen. It is not until the third century, that we see the crown of thorns, and pictures of the suffering Saviour. So much did the painters of Rome, fear to become “an offense to the Romans, and to the Greeks foolishness.”

It was interesting to observe the manner in which the industrious and patient antiquarian labors, at putting together the various burial inscriptions, which he has found scattered about and broken into small fragments.

Of my evenings past in society, I could particularly