Awful eyes! How did the painter make them? | no words in literature which give a sense (nothing The wonder of all these pagan frescos is the mystery gives the idea) of the stare of these gods, except of the eyes, still, beautiful, unhuman. You can- that magnificent line of Kingsley's, describing the not believe that it is wrong for those tranquil-eyed advance over the sea toward Andromeda of the men and women to do evil, they look so calm and so oblivious and unsympathizing Nereids. They floated unconscious in it all; and in the presence of the slowly up and their eyes celestials, as they bend upon you those eternal orbs,

in whose regard you are but a part of space, you feel Stared on her, silent and still, like the eyes in the that here art has achieved the unearthly. I know of

house of the idols."

He spares no

HE lasagnone is a loafer, as an Italian can none to break the ladies' hearts. be a loafer, without the admixture of condition-neither rank nor wealth is any defence ruffianism, which blemishes lost loafers of against him. I often wonder what is in that note he northern race. He may be quite worthless, and even continually shows to his friend. The confession of impertinent, but he cannot be a rowdy-that pleasing some broken heart, I think. When he has folded blossom on the nose of our fast, high-fed, thick- it and put it away, he chuckles, "Ah, cara!" and blooded civilization. In Venice he must not be sucks at his long, slender Virginia cigar. It is confounded with other loiterers at the café; not unlighted, for fire consumes cigars. I never see with the natty people who talk politics interminably him read the papers-neither the Italian papers nor over little cups of black coffee; not with those old the Parisian journals, though if he can get "Galighabitués, who sit forever under the Procuratie, their nani" he is glad, and he likes to pretend to a knowlhands folded upon the top of their sticks, and stare edge of English, uttering upon the occasion, with at the ladies who pass with a curious steadfastness great relish, such distinctively English words as and knowing skepticism of gaze, not pleasing in the "Yes" and "Not," and to the waiter, "A-little-firedim eyes of age; certainly, the last persons who bear if-you-please." He sits very late in the café, he any likeness to the lasagnone are the Germans, with touches his hat-his curly French hat to the comtheir honest, heavy faces comically anglicized by leg-pany as he goes out with a mild swagger, his cane of-mutton whiskers. The truth is, the lasagnone held lightly in his left hand, his coat cut snugly to does not flourish in the best café; he comes to perfection in cheaper resorts, for he is commonly not

rich.

show his hips, and genteely swaying with the motion of his body. He is a dandy, of course-all Italians are dandies--but his vanity is perfectly harmless, and his heart is not bad. He would go half an hour to put you in the direction of the Piazza. A little thing can make him happy-to stand in the pit at the opera, and gaze at the ladies in the lower boxes

It often happens that a glass of water, flavored with a little anisette, is the order over which he sits a whole evening. He knows the waiter intimately, and does not call him "Shop!" (Bottéga) as less familiar people do, but Gigi, or Beppi, as the waiter is pretty to attend the Marionette or the Malibran Theatre, sure to be named. "Behold!" he says, when the and imperil the peace of pretty seamstresses and conservant places his modest drink before him, "who is tadinas-to stand at the church doors and ogle the that loveliest blonde there?" Or to his fellow-lasag- fair saints as they pass out. Go, harmless lasagnone, none: "She regards me! I have broken her heart!" to thy lodging in some mysterious height, and break This is his sole business and mission, the cruel lasag-hearts if thou wilt. They are quickly mended.

By special permission of the author and of Houghton, Mifflin & Co.

GENERAL LEWIS WALLACE.

AUTHOR OF "BEN HUR."

HERE is an old adage which declares "without fame or fortune at forty, without fame or fortune always." This, however is not invariably true. Hawthorne became famous when he wrote "Scarlet Letter" at forty-six, Sir Walter Scott produced the first Waverly Novel after he was forty; and we find another exception in the case of the soldier author who is made the subject of this sketch. Perhaps no writer of modern times has gained so wide a reputation on so few books or began his literary career so late in life as the author of "The Fair God;' "Ben Hur" and "The Prince of India." It was not until the year 1873 that General Lewis Wallace at the age of forty-six became known to literature. Prior to this he had filled the double position of lawyer and soldier, and it was his observations and experiences in the Mexican War, no doubt, which inspired him to write "The Fair God," his first book, which was a story of the conquest of that country.

Lew. Wallace was born at Brookville, Indiana, in 1827. After receiving a common school education, he began the study of law; but on the breaking out of the Mexican War, he volunteered in the army as a lieutenant in an Indiana company. On his return from the war, in 1848, he took up the practice of his profession in his native state and also served in the legislature. Near the beginning of the Civil War he became colonel of a volunteer regiment. His military service was of such a character that he received special mention from General Grant for meritorious conduct and was made major-general in March, 1862. He was mustered out of service when the war closed in 1865 and resumed his practice of law at his old home in Crawfordsville. In 1873, as stated above, his first book, "The Fair God," was published; but it met with only moderate success. In 1878, General Wallace was made Territorial Governor of Utah and in 1880, “Ben Hur; a Tale of The Christ" appeared. The scene was laid in the East and displayed such a knowledge of the manners and customs of that country and people that General Garfield-that year elected President-considered its author a fitting person for the Turkish Ministry, and accordingly, in 1881, he was appointed to that position. It is said that when President Garfield gave General Wallace his appointment, he wrote the words "Ben Hur" across the corner of the document, and, as Wallace was coming away from his visit of acknowledgement at the White House, the President put his arm over his friend's shoulder and said, "I expect another book out of you. you. Your duties will not be too onerous to allow you to write it. Locate the scene in

Constantinople." This suggestion was, no doubt, General Wallace's reason for writing "The Prince of India," which was published in 1890 and is the last book issued by its author. He had in the mean time, however, published Boyhood of Christ" (1888).

"The

None of the other books of the author have been so popular or reached the great success attained by "Ben Hur," which has had the enormous sale of nearly one-half million copies without at any time being forced upon the market in the form of a cheap edition. It is remarkable also to state that the early circulation of "Ben Hur," while it was appreciated by a certain class, was too small to warrant the author in anticipating the fortune which he afterwards harvested from this book. Before General Wallace was made Minister to Turkey, the book-sellers bought it in quantities of two, three or a dozen at a time, and it was not until President Garfield had honored the author with this significent portfolio that the trade commenced to call for it in thousand lots.

would not, with quick instinct, have given Him its hand and whole artless trust, nor might any one have said He was not beautiful.

DESCRIPTION OF CHRIST.* (FROM BEN HUR." 1880.) HE head was open to the cloudless light, except as it was draped with long hair and slightly waved, and parted in the middle, and auburn in tint, with a tendency to reddish golden where most strongly touched by the sun. Under a broad, low forehead, under black well-arched brows, beamed eyes dark blue and large, and softened to exceeding tenderness by lashes of great length sometimes seen on children, but seldom, if ever, on men. As to the other features, it would have been difficult to decide whether they were Greek or Jewish. The delicacy of the nostrils and mouth was unusually to the latter type, and when it was taken into account with the gentleness of the eyes, the pallor of the complexion, the fine texture of the hair and the softness of the beard, which fell in waves over His throat to His breast, never a soldier but would have laughed at Him in encounter, never a woman who would not have confided in Him at sight, never a child that

t

The features, it should be further said, were ruled by a certain expression which, as the viewer chose, might with equal correctness have been called the effect of intelligence, love, pity or sorrow, though, in better speech, it was a blending of them all—a look easy to fancy as a mark of a sinless soul doomed to the sight and understanding of the utter sinfulness of those among whom it was passing; yet withal no one could have observed the face with a thought of weakness in the man; so, at least, would not they who know that the qualities mentioned-love, sorrow, pity-are the results of a consciousness of strength to bear suffering oftener than strength to do; such has been the might of martyrs and devotees and the myriads written down in saintly calendars; and such, indeed, was the air of this one.

HE Holy Father of Light and Life," the sometimes near together, sometimes wide apart, and speaker went on, after a pause referable to races diverse, yet in every instance remarkable for to his consummate knowledge of men, genius."

"has sent His Spirit down to the world, not once,

There was a murmur at this, but he gave it no

merely, or unto one people, but repeatedly, in ages time.

* Selections printed here are by special permission of the author. Harper Brothers, Publishers.

Taint of anger was there no longer on the soul of accents stooped,— the great Spaniard.

"Tula and the empire go with the sceptre." he murmured, and they were his last words.--his will. “Thy queens and their children shall be my wards. A wail from the women pronounced him dead.

*Copyright, Harper & Bros.

EDWARD EGGLESTON.

"THE HOOSIER SCHOOL-BOY."

ERDER says with truth that "one's whole life is but the interpretation of the oracles of his childhood," and those who are familiar with the writings of Edward Eggleston see in his pictures of country life in the Hoosier State the interpretation and illustration of his own life with its peculiar environment in "the great interior valley nearly a half-century ago. The writers who have interpreted for us and for future generations the life and the characteristic manners which prevailed in the days when our country was new and the forests were yielding to give place to growing cities and expanding farms have done a rare and peculiar service, and those sections which have found expression through the genius and gifts of novelist or poet are highly favored above all others.

Edward Eggleston has always counted it a piece of good-fortune to have been born in a small village of Southern Indiana, for he believes that the formative influences of such an environment, the intimate knowledge of simple human nature, the close acquaintance with nature in woods and field and stream, and the sincere and earnest tone of the religious atmosphere which he breathed all through his youth, are better elements of culture than a city life could have furnished.

He was born in 1837 in Vevay, Indiana, and his early life was spent amid the "noble scenery" on the banks of the Ohio River. His father died while he was a young boy, and he himself was too delicate to spend much time at school, so that he is a shining example of those who move up the inclined plane of self-culture and self-improvement.

As he himself has forcefully said, through his whole life two men have struggled within him for the ascendency, the religious devotee and the literary man. His early training was "after the straitest sect of his religion"—the fervid Methodism of fifty years ago, and he was almost morbidly scrupulous as a boy, not even allowing himself to read a novel, though from this early period he always felt in himself a future literary career, and the teacher who corrected his compositions naively said to him: "I have marked your composition very severely because you are destined to become an author."

At first the religious element in his nature decidedly held sway and he devoted himself to the ministry, mounting a horse and going forth with his saddle-bags as a circuit preacher in a circuit of ten preaching places. This was followed by a still harder experience in the border country of Minnesota, where in moccasins he