A Voyage of Consolation

a to Pisa. We had our own lunch basket, so no baneful anticipation of cutlets fried in olive oil marred the perfect satisfaction

oa all becalmed and smiling, with freakish little points and headlines, and here and there the white blossom of a sail. The Senator counted eighty tunnels-he wants that fact mentioned too-some of them so short that it was like shutting one's eyes for an instant on the olives and the sea. Nevertheless it was an idyllic journey, and at four

tting comfortably and equally on each side of it looking on. Momma and I both liked the idea of a river in town scenery, and thought it might be copied with advantage in America, it afforded such a good excuse for bridges. Pisa's three arched stone ones made a reason for settling there in themselves in our opinion. The Senator, howeve

g for us, but really, I have no doubt, getting an impression of the architecture as a whole. I could tell from Mrs. Portheris's attitude that she had acknowledged herself to be gratified. Strange to relate, her gratification did not disappear when she saw that these medi?val circumstances would inconsistently compel her to recognise very mo

d to interfere. "If it's all the same to you, Aunt Caroline," he said, "Mrs. Wick is quite as usual, though I think the Middle Agedness of this country is a little trying for her at this time of year. She's just a little upset this morning by

rtain tribes that they had no manners and their customs were abominable, and I, at a mute in

We should have been there now, only I knew we should never catch up to you if we didn't skip something. So I heard of

said I. "A

he widow it's 'Mr. Dod, you will take care of me, won't you?' or 'Come now, Mr. Dod, and tell me all about buffalo shooting

hink there

he regularly brightens up when I come along and say something cheerful-but

a," I interrupted thoughtfully. "But then

smell of constancy about a man. A fellow that's thrown over ought to be in about the same shape as a widowe

u must not speak to Mr. Mafferton of his first-attachment again

w. I even told him that American girl

American girls! It was excessively wrong of yo

e said, "a fellow in my fix, you know! Don't get excited. Ho

afferton say when you told

be madder than eve

ven't we been frie

ame rattle. Cut ou

l th

see the person I'm talking to, and besides the sun is on the other side. He

ined calmly. "That's lik

complication if I'd kicke

r. Mafferton occupied the middle distance. Mr. Mafferton stooped to add a poppy

ation is serious, Dicky. Look at those poppies! When an Englishman does that you may make up your mind to

, and the episcopal throne by Uervellesi in 1536 was the finest piece of tarsia work in the world, and the large bronze hanging lamp by Vincenzo Possento was the object which assisted Galileo to invent the oscillations of the pendulum. The Senator was much taken with the inlaid wooden stalls in the choir, the subjects were so lively. He and his Aunt Caroline nearly came to words over a monkey regarding its reflection in a looking glass, done with a realism wh

ow how to waste enough in those pre-elevator days. Look at the pictures and the bronzes and the

in our century. But you've got to remember that they hadn't any other way worth mentio

ma said that no doubt people built as well as they knew how at that time, but

hanging over that way all these centuries, just on the drop and nev

rbanely, "it was thus that the builders designed this great monu

se. Begun by Bonanus 1174. Bonanus saw what was going to happen and gave it up at the third storey. Then Benenato had his show, got it up to four, and quit, 1203. The next architect was-let me see-William of Innsbruck. He put on a couple more, and by that time it began to look dangerous. But nothing happe

o not usually make assertions," she said when poppa had finished, "without being convinced of

excuse me, A

s a feat of architecture," replied his Aunt Caroline fir

. Dod, with a frenzied wink at poppa, called his attention to the rid

said Mrs. Portheris, w

place was like-all marsh, with the sea right alongside; not four miles

d made great advances in the world of invention, but I did not expect to find

oat. I prepared for the worst, and the worst would undoubtedly have come if Dicky Dod had not su

theris as the Senator left us in p

om a safe distance, "out of the perpendicu