a kind of altar, but what .the subject is intended to represent
I am really at a loss to decide. A figure in the picture»
intended probably for St. Francis, the patron saint, seems to
be intent on trying in a balance the comparative weight of a
sinner and a saint. But the very accurate drawing from
which the annexed print was taken, and with which I have
been favoured by Mr. Daniel], will perhaps best explain
the subject. A dirty lamp suspended from the ceiling, and
just glimmering in the socket, served dimly to light up this
dismal den of skulls. The old monk who attended as shew-
man was very careful to impress us with the idea that they
were all relics of holy men who had died on the island ■, but
I suspect they must occasionally have robbed the churchyard
of a few lay-brethren, and perhaps now and then of a
heretic, (as strangers are interred in their burying ground,) in
order to accumulate such a prodigious number which, on a
rough computation, I should suppose to amount to at least
three thousand. The skull of one of the holy brotherhood
was pointed out as having a lock-jaw, which occasioned his
d e a th ; and, from the garrulity of our attendant, I have no
doubt we might have beard the history of many more equally
important, which, though thrown away upon us who had no
taste for craniology, would, in all probability, have been
highly interesting to Doctor Gall, the famous lecturer on
skulls in Vienna. On taking leave we deposited our mite
on the altar, as charity to the convent, which seems to be
the principal object in view of collecting and exhibiting this
memento mori of the monastic and mendicant order of St,
Francis.