The Owl Tower

"Any man might be a poet, as well as Byron, with such wine and such
a theme," rejoined the sculptor. "But shall we climb your tower The
thunder-storm gathering yonder among the hills will be a spectacle worth
witnessing."

"Come, then," said the Count, adding, with a sigh, "it has a weary
staircase, and dismal chambers, and it is very lonesome at the summit!"

"Like a man's life, when he has climbed to eminence," remarked the
sculptor; "or, let us rather say, with its difficult steps, and the dark
prison cells you speak of, your tower resembles the spiritual experience
of many a sinful soul, which, nevertheless, may struggle upward into the
pure air and light of Heaven at last!"

Donatello sighed again, and led the way up into the tower.

Mounting the broad staircase that ascended from the entrance hall,
they traversed the great wilderness of a house, through some obscure
passages, and came to a low, ancient doorway. It admitted them to a
narrow turret stair which zigzagged upward, lighted in its progress by
loopholes and iron-barred windows. Reaching the top of the first flight,
the Count threw open a door of worm-eaten oak, and disclosed a chamber
that occupied the whole area of the tower. It was most pitiably forlorn
of aspect, with a brick-paved floor, bare holes through the massive
walls, grated with iron, instead of windows, and for furniture an
old stool, which increased the dreariness of the place tenfold, by
suggesting an idea of its having once been tenanted.