I reached that church by quite another way after many
postponements; for I thought I remembered all about it from my visit in
1864. But really nothing had remained to me save a sense of the
exceptional dignity of the church, and the sole fact that the roof of
its most noble nave is thickly plated with the first gold mined in South
America, which Ferdinand and Isabella gave that least estimable of the
popes, Alexander VI. Now I know that it is far richer than any gold
could make it in the treasures of history and legend, which fairly
encrust it in every part. Doubtless some portion of this wealth my
fellow-sightseers were striving to store up out of the guide-books which
they bore in their hands and from which they strained their eyes to the
memorable points as they slowly paced through the temple. Some were
reading one to another in bated voices, and I thought them ridiculous;
but perhaps they were wise, and rather he was ridiculous who marched by
them and contented himself with a general sense of the grandeur, the
splendor.
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