Not here can we feel ourselves immortal, where the very altars in these chapels of horrible consecration are heaps of human bones.
Yet let us give the cemetery the praise that it deserves.

There is no disagreeable scent, such as might have been expected from the decay of so many holy persons, in whatever odor of sanctity they may have taken their departure.

The same number of living monks would not smell half so unexceptionably.
Miriam went gloomily along the corridor, from one vaulted Golgotha to another, until in the farthest recess she beheld an open grave.
"Is that for him who lies yonder in the nave ?" she asked.
"Yes, signorina, this is to be the resting-place of Brother Antonio, who came to his death last night," answered the sacristan; "and in yonder niche, you see, sits a brother who was buried thirty years ago, and has risen to give him place." "It is not a satisfactory idea," observed Miriam, "that you poor friars cannot call even your graves permanently your own.

You must lie down in them, methinks, with a nervous anticipation of being disturbed, like weary men who know that they shall be summoned out of bed at midnight.
Is it not possible (if money were to be paid for the privilege) to leave Brother Antonio--if that be his name--in the occupancy of that narrow grave till the last trumpet sounds ?" "By no means, signorina; neither is it needful or desirable," answered the sacristan.

"A quarter of a century's sleep in the sweet earth of Jerusalem is better than a thousand years in any other soil.