A Glimpse Of Milan

( Originally Published Early 1900's )

ITALIAN railroads are sadly out of date. The first-class compartments are not so good as the second class in Germany, and the trains are nearly always late and so overcrowded it is possible now and then to hear a little plain American swearing, when some tourist has been pushed into a compartment with no vacant seat. All this is explained by the fact that the franchise expires soon, and the road will spend no money on improvements until a future contract is settled.

Not a pound of luggage is allowed on the tickets, and after paying ten dollars extra for an ordinary trunk on a twenty-four hour trip, women regret live ever ate the apple that we had to dress, and foreign travel in the fig-leaf days must have been considerably cheaper. One should pack a camel as is done for a trip in the desert with one's personal effects, a rocking chair and Yaryan heating plant, and other little things that add to one's comfort during a winter in Italy, for there it is cold on one side of a street and hot at the same time on the other; summer all year round when the sun shines, and always winter in the shade. Consequently one must keep turning like a roasting peanut to keep an average temperature. Perhaps before long some one will invent a Laocoon hot-water bag for the benefit of sightseers in cold galleries, where the tubes can coil all round one at once like the serpents on the famous statue in the Vatican, and then warmth could be added to the body as well as to the enthusiasm.

Milan has lately made more progress than any other town in Italy. It is now a fine, modern city, with immense commercial and manufacturing interests, not the least being the silk industry, for there are now over two hundred silk firms in active business.

Our word "milliner" comes from the fact that in early times, at the great annual fairs throughout Europe, the traders from Milan used to appear with silks, ribbons, hats, and other little fancy things so dear to the heart of women, and gradually any one dealing in these things took the name of this people.

The Cathedral is one of the largest and surely one of the most beautiful of the world's churches. It holds forty thousand people comfortably, and its stained-glass windows are the largest ever made, but it is the carving on the exterior that excites the most admiration, for every pinnacle is tipped with an exquisite statue. There are over four thousand, and they stand in all the niches, one after the uther, as modestly as if each one had not been the work of years—each figure perfect in itself but adding its part to complete the great whole. From 1383 it has been building and is not yet done. Napoleon, after conquering Italy, gave new enthusiasm to the work, and it is noticeable all through the country the changes he made when it came under his sceptre, for his name is left like a trade-mark on every project he undertook, and one of the statues on the Cathedral represents him in classic dress.

Milan is especially noted for its fine sculpture; students find here an ideal place for study, and the studios are without number. In the Brera Art Gallery is Raphael's celebrated picture, "The Nuptials of the Virgin," and the great bronze statue by Canova is the pride of the collection. In the Palazzo Borromeo are many art treasures, but Milan's most valued painting is Leonardo da Vinci's "Last Supper" in the refectory of the old church of Santa Maria del Grazie. It is now very indistinct and much disfigured, but still shows how wonderful it must have been when fresh from the hand of the great master. It depicts the startled expression of the Apostles' faces as the Lord announces: "One of you shall betray Me."

Out in front of the Cathedral is a magnificent monument in bronze to Victor Emmanuel, representing the conqueror on horseback, so life-like it deserves all the praise it receives. On the other side is the Galleria Victor Emmanuel, an arcade of vast proportions and rich designs containing fine shops, cafes, etc., through which all Milan promenades. The Palazzo Reale, or Royal Palace, stands close by, but it is only on rare occa-sions occupied by

the King and Queen, who spend most of their time in Rome, and the Archiepiscopal Palace, in the same neighborhood, is of mammoth size and of equal interest. Among the treasured relics of Milan were the bones of the Three Wise Men, who came from the East to see the child Jesus, but when Frederick Barbarossa conquered and destroyed Milan he sent them to his beloved German city of Cologne, where they stayed until 1904, when Milan asked to have them restored to their original tomb in the church of St. Eustorgio. All of Italy is more or less of a boneyard, and one is shown enough bones of the Apostles to make a hundred disciples instead of twelve—but perhaps there was more to men then than in our day.

The ferocious-looking Castello that the Dukes of Sforza built as a bulwark against their enemies, is now half ruin, half museum, and still covers so much ground and looks so gloomy and tragic it must have been, even in its days of splendor, a dismal home for the lovely Visconti beauties. Doubtlessly they would have found the Public Gardens more to their liking, for they make today the finest park in all Italy, and a very showy pleasure ground for fashion's parade. The poor and sick are also well provided for in Milan, and the Ospedale Maggiore is one of the largest and best equipped hospitals in existence.

Here too is the far-famed Opera House of La Scala, that has a record of more great singers' triumphs than any other house in the world. There are over a hundred musicians in the orchestr, and with its six proud tiers of boxes and seats for thirty-six hundred people, a performance at La Scala makes an evening never to be forgotten.

Verdi, the composer, as a boy, was refused admittance to the Conservatory in Milan on the ground of his giving no promise of being a good enough musician. Just before the great master died here in 1901, he founded a "Home of Rest" for poor musicians, remembering well the time his first wife died from lack of food, on the eve of his triumph with "I1 Trovatore." Seeing his tomb here one knows his famous song, "I Sigh to Rest Me," was heard beyond the grave. His effects are now being gathered together to form the nucleus of a Verdi Museum.

An electric car goes out in an hour to Monza, in whose old Cathedral, from the thirteenth century, the German rulers of Italy were crowned. The Empress Theodolinda began it in 590 and her quaint old crown and cross are still preserved in the treasury, but the wonderful thing to see in the Cathedral is the iron crown of Lombardy. It contains inside a little iron hand made from a nail that pierced the Lord's body on the cross and was brought from Pales-tine by St. Helena, the mother of Constantine, and consequently is considered the very holiest of holies.

Before it is shown one pays the verger a dollar, and then after an anxious waiting all the candles in the chapel are lighted; another wait and in comes a priest in scarlet robes and lace, attended by a boy carrying the incense, and after a prayer he opens a little door under the great cross on the altar. This flies open to reveal an iron safe to be unlocked by seven different keys! Then more prayers and incense followed by an intense silence and out comes a little yellow cushion on which is the most precious crown in the world. Charlemagne wore it in 800, A. D., and Napoleon, who had' such a vat iety of crowns in his collection, obtained it for his coronation here in 1805. It is of gold engraved with flowers and inlaid with tiny blue and green vines, while the old rubies, amethysts, and sapphires are encrusted in various designs. It is not dazzlingly beautiful or brilliant, but it is that holy nail in the inner rim that makes the iron crown of Lombardy worth more than any other richly jeweled one.