Longfellow'S Sonnet, "Three Friends of Mine."

This sonnet is a beautiful tribute of friendship to the memory of--

I. Cornelius Conway Felton, President of Harvard College, who was born at Newbury, Mass., Nov. 6, 1807, and died at Chester, Penn., Feb. 26, 1862. President Felton was a very old friend of the poet, and was one of the first classical scholars of his time.

II. Louis John Rudolph Agassiz, a noted naturalist. He was born in Motiers, Switzerland, May 28, 1807, and was educated at the universities of Zurich, Heidelberg, and Munich. When forty years old he came to the United States, and was made professor of zoology and geology in Harvard College. He died in Cambridge, Mass., Dec. 14, 1873.

III. Charles Sumner, an American statesman, born in Boston, Mass., Jan. 6, 1811. Slavery had no more bitter enemy than he, and during his whole public life he waged a continual warfare in the cause of freedom. He died in Washington, D.C., March 11, 1874.

135 THE ESCURIAL.

The Escurial is a famous edifice of New Castile, Spain, thirty miles north-west of Madrid. It is at once a palace, a church, a monastery, a museum, and a burial-place.

This solid pile of granite has been called the eighth wonder of the world, and at the time of its erection it surpassed every building of its kind in size and magnificence. It owes its origin, it is said, to a vow made by Philip II. during the battle of St. Quentin. On that occasion he implored the aid of St. Lawrence (on whose day the battle was fought, Aug. 10, 1557), and vowed, that, if victory were granted him, he would dedicate a monastery to the saint.

The Escurial is built in the form of a gridiron, in allusion to the instrument of St. Lawrence's martyrdom.

The building is seven hundred and forty-four feet by five hundred and eighty feet, divided into long courts which indicate the interstices of the gridiron-bars.

The towers at the corners of the Escurial represent the feet of the gridiron, which is supposed to be lying upside down: and from the centre of one of the sides a range of buildings abuts, representing the handle; these form the royal residences.

The Escurial was commenced in 1563, and finished in 1584, and was intended to serve as a palace, a monastery, and a mausoleum: the latter, called the Pantheon, is a magnificently decorated octagonal-shaped chamber, thirty-six feet in diameter, and thirty-eight feet high. In the eight sides of it are numerous black marble sarcophagi, in which only kings, or the mothers of kings, are buried.

The Escurial contains fourteen thousand doors, and eleven thousand windows, and cost six million ducats.

Its library contains thirty thousand printed books, and forty-three hundred manuscripts.

In 1872 the Escurial was struck by lightning, and partly burned.

The Escurial is saved from going to ruin by grants of public money which are occasionally made.