We did not see Mr.Dickens's Tower and Goblin,--it was too late in the day,--but we saw a snowball fight between two bands of the military in the castle yard that was gay enough to make a goblin laugh.

And next day on to Arles, still snow,--snow and cutting blasts in the South of France, where everybody had promised us bird-songs and blossoms to console us for the dreary winter of Paris.

At Arles, indeed, I saw the little saxifrage blossoming on the steps of the Amphitheatre, and fruit-trees in flower amid the tombs.

Here for the first time I saw the great handwriting of the Romans in its proper medium of stone, and I was content.

It looked us grand and solid as I expected, as if life in those days was thought worth the having, the enjoying, and the using.