Page:The American fugitive in Europe.djvu/264

256 exhibited—and, O, it was a grand one! We found ourselves, as it were, upon the summit of some high building in the centre of the French metropolis, and there, all brilliant with gas-lights, and favored by the shining moon, Paris lay spread far out beneath us, though the canvas on which the scene was painted was but half a dozen feet from where we gazed in wonder. The moon herself seemed actually in the heavens. Nay, bets were laid that she had risen since we entered. Nothing can surpass the uniformity of appearance which every spire, and house, and wood, and river—yea, which every shop-window, ornamented, presented. All seemed natural, from the twinkling of the stars above us, to the monkey of the organ-man in the market-place below. Reader, if ever thou hast occasion to go to London, leave it not till thou hast seen the Colosseum.

Mustering our forces to return together, the cry was raised "A man a-wanting!" It seems there is an apparatus constructed in an apartment leading from the balcony, by which parties may, with a great degree of suddenness, be raised or lowered from or to the music-room. Our friend, at all times anxious to make the most of a shilling, followed some parties into the "ascension-room," as it is called, and took his seat beside them, expecting that on the withdrawal of a curtain he should witness something which his companions would miss. A bell sounded, and suddenly our expectant found himself some twenty feet lower, and obliged to follow the example of his co-descendants still further,