One of the pupils, about fourteen years old, interested me through his history. lie and his sister were found in Sachsenhausen, by a Frankfort merchant, in a horrible condition.  Their mother had died about two years and a half before, and during all that time their father had neglected them till they were near dead through privation and filth.  The boy was placed in this Institute, and the girl in that of the Orphans.  He soon began to show a talent for modelling figures, and for some time he has been taking lessons of the sculptor Launitz.  I saw a beautiful copy of a bas-relief of Thorwaldsen which he made, as well as an original, very interesting, from its illustration of his history.  It was in two parts; the first represented himself and his sister, kneeling in misery before a ruined family altar, by which an angel was standing, who took him by one hand, while with the other he pointed to his benefactor, standing near.  The other represented the two kneeling in gratitude before a restored altar, on which was the anchor of Hope.  From above streamed down a light, where two angels were rejoicing over their happiness.  For a boy of fourteen, deprived of one of the most valuable senses, and taken from such a horrible condition of life, it is a surprising work and gives brilliant hopes for his future.

We went lately into the Roemerberg, to see the Kaisersaal and the other rooms formerly used by the old Emperors of Germany, and their Senates.  The former is now in the process of restoration.  The ceiling is in the gorgeous illuminated style of the middle ages; along each side arc rows of niches for the portraits of the Emperors, which have been painted by the best artists in Berlin, Dresden, Vienna and Munich.  It is remarkable that the number of the old niches in the hall should exactly correspond with the number of the German Emperors, so that the portrait of the Emperor Francis of Austria, who was the last, will close the long rank coming down from Charlemagne.  The pictures, or at least such of them as are already finished, are kept in another room; they give one a good idea of the changing styles of royal costumes, from the steel shirt and helmet to the jewelled diadem and velvet robe.  I looked with interest on a painting of Frederic Barbarossa, by Leasing, and mused over the popular tradition that he sits with his paladins in a mountain cave under the Castle of Kyffhauser, ready to come forth and assist his Fatherland in the hour of need.  There was the sturdy form of Maximilian; the martial Conrad; and Ottos, Siegfrieds and Sigismunds in plenty—­many of whom moved a nation in their day, but are now dust and forgotten.