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Italian Journeys By: William Dean Howells (1837-1920) |
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By W.D. Howells 1867 and 1895
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CONTENTS. The Road to Rome from Venice:
I. Leaving Venice 9
II. From Padua to Ferrara 10
III. The Picturesque, the Improbable, and
the Pathetic in Ferrara 14
IV. Through Bologna to Genoa 43
V. Up and Down Genoa 52
VI. By Sea from Genoa to Naples 65
VII. Certain Things in Naples 75
VIII. A Day in Pompeii 89
IX. A Half hour at Herculaneum 106
X. Capri and Capriotes 116
XI. The Protestant Ragged Schools at Naples 136
XII. Between Rome and Naples 147
XIII. Roman Pearls 151 Forza Maggiore 178 At Padua 196 A Pilgrimage to Petrarch's House at Arquà 216 A Visit to the Cimbri 235 Minor Travels:
I. Pisa 251
II. The Ferrara Road 259
III. Trieste 264
IV. Bassano 274
V. Possagno, Canova's Birthplace 280
VI. Como 285 Stopping at Vicenza, Verona, and Parma 293 Ducal Mantua 321
THE ROAD TO ROME FROM VENICE. I. LEAVING VENICE. We did not know, when we started from home in Venice, on the 8th of
November, 1864, that we had taken the longest road to Rome. We thought
that of all the proverbial paths to the Eternal City that leading to
Padua, and thence through Ferrara and Bologna to Florence, and so
down the sea shore from Leghorn to Civita Vecchia, was the best, the
briefest, and the cheapest. Who could have dreamed that this path,
so wisely and carefully chosen, would lead us to Genoa, conduct us on
shipboard, toss us four dizzy days and nights, and set us down, void,
battered, and bewildered, in Naples? Luckily, "The moving accident is not my trade," for there are events of this journey (now happily at an end) which,
if I recounted them with unsparing sincerity, would forever deter the
reader from taking any road to Rome. Though, indeed, what is Rome, after all, when you come to it?
II. FROM PADUA TO FERRARA. As far as to Ferrara there was no sign of deviation from the direct
line in our road, and the company was well enough. We had a Swiss
family in the car with us to Padua, and they told us how they were
going home to their mountains from Russia, where they had spent
nineteen years of their lives. They were mother and father and only
daughter and the last, without ever having seen her ancestral country,
was so Swiss in her yet childish beauty, that she filled the morning
twilight with vague images of glacial height, blue lake, snug chalet,
and whatever else of picturesque there is in paint and print about
Switzerland. Of course, as the light grew brighter these images melted
away, and left only a little frost upon the window pane. The mother was restively anxious at nearing her country, and told us
every thing of its loveliness and happiness. Nineteen years of absence
had not robbed it of the poorest charm, and I hope that seeing it
again took nothing from it. We said how glad we should be if we were
as near America as she was to Switzerland. "America!" she screamed;
"you come from America! Dear God, the world is wide the world is
wide!" The thought was so paralyzing that it silenced the fat little
lady for a moment, and gave her husband time to express his sympathy
with us in our war, which he understood perfectly well. He trusted
that the revolution to perpetuate slavery must fail, and he hoped that
the war would soon end, for it made cotton very dear... Continue reading book >>
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