CHAPTER XII
AN ANCIENT TOWN
"I feel sorrier even than I expected," said Irma, as their train drewout of the station at Rome. "No other city can be half as interesting."
"Just wait, my dear," replied Uncle Jim; "wherever you go in Italy youwill find more churches and pictures than you can properly grasp. Youare a pretty good sightseer, but in another month you will have hadenough."
"It isn't antiquities and pictures that I mind leaving," responded Irmasmiling; "but I was only beginning to realize how many pleasant peoplethere are in Rome."
"You and your aunt were certainly getting rather frivolous; teas andcalls and that kind of thing are a great waste of time in a city full ofchurches. Remember, to improve your mind is your chief object in comingabroad." Uncle Jim had assumed a mock-serious manner.
"To improve her health," interposed Aunt Caroline; "and I have writtenher mother that she has gained six pounds and has recovered her redcheeks."
"So you attribute this improvement to teas, and not to churches!"
"Our little bit of social life the past week or two has been good for usboth. Americans away from home often seem unexpectedly interesting, andwe have enjoyed hearing little things about the Roman winter that wemight not have heard if I had not met so many New York and Philadelphiaacquaintances. Then we have seen some of our artist friends at work intheir studios, and this has been entertaining."
"Don't forget the shops, Aunt Caroline. Even if I haven't had much moneyto spend I have enjoyed shopping, and I think I have done very well withRoman souvenirs. Sometimes I have wished I could spend just a littlemore, and yet I have done very well."
If Irma had been looking at Marion, she might have seen that he wasobserving her more closely than the pages of the book that earlier hadseemed to absorb him.
As they journeyed, Uncle Jim reminded Irma that they were travellingtoward the sources of the Tiber, and at one station he told her thathere she might go off to Perugia, the home of Perugino and Raphael.
"Orvieto," he added, "is a town set on a small mountain by itself, and Ihope you will like the funicular."
"By funicular!" cried Marion, in a tone of disgust; "that's the kind ofthing I particularly hate."
"You might go around by carriage. There is a winding road, as Iremember, but it takes much longer."
When they arrived at Orvieto, Marion, however, entered the strangelittle train that was to be pulled up the steep ascent by underneathcable.
"Look back at the view," urged Aunt Caroline, when they were almost atthe top. Turning her head Irma beheld a beautiful sight, the broadvalley lying far beneath and the distant hills. Then glancing towardMarion she saw that he was leaning upon the seat in front and steadyinghimself as if to brace himself against disaster.
"Sit up straight," called Uncle Jim, mischievously. "You cannotpossibly fall out, and if the car slips we shall all perish together."
Then Irma noticed that Marion bit his lip, as if angry, and made noeffort to look at the view.
A short drive from the end of the funicular brought them to anold-fashioned hotel.
"A little rest, a little _dejeuner_, and then the cathedral!" exclaimedAunt Caroline. "I can hardly wait to see it. That is the only thing thatbrings people to this queer little town."
"It is surely a queer little hotel, and we are the only Americans here,"thought Irma, observing the guests at the other tables, a stout,long-frocked priest, a uniformed officer, and two or three swarthyItalians, apparently prosperous business men.
Soon after _dejeuner_ they set out, and a turn or two brought them tothe piazza of the Duomo, or cathedral.
For a moment all stood silent, as the sun shining full on the facadeshowed them an enormous picture.
"Isn't it the most wonderful thing you ever saw?" cried Aunt Caroline,and Irma thought it too beautiful for words. For those who had plannedand those who had carried out the plans had managed to give to thelittle hill town a church that any city in the world might envy.Beautiful pictures in mosaic in rich tones and gold backgrounds occupythe upper part of the front. The marble pillars are exquisitely carved,and around the large rose window are marble statues of apostles andsaints, while fine bronze emblems also form part of the decorations.
"I would really rather not go inside," said Irma, when Uncle Jimproposed their seeing the interior. "I should like to sit here for anhour and simply look at this beautiful, enormous picture," and sheraised her eyes to the high, pointed gables of the cathedral, far, sofar above her.
While she was speaking Uncle Jim had crossed the street to a group ofboys gathered on the cathedral steps.
"Yes," he said, as he returned, "they are actually playing cards, andthey didn't show the slightest signs of guilt when I looked over theirshoulders."
"Just think of being so intimate with this cathedral that you could playgames on its steps without thinking of the front."
"And those bareheaded women repairing the pavement never glance at thechurch."
"Oh, Marion," protested Aunt Caroline, "don't give her a penny. Here aretwo more old women hobbling along, and if you give to one you will havethe whole hospital at your back. I am sure there is some kind of aninstitution there at the corner of the piazza."
Marion smiled good humoredly, and took his hand from his pocket, withoutproducing the bit of silver that the old woman evidently expected.
Two other old women came along, one leaning heavily on a crutch, theother with a heavy woollen shawl over her head in spite of the heat ofthe day.
"But just think what a fine time they could have with my half franc tospend."
"You will find some more worthy cause, if you need a cause on which towaste your money. There--there--go--go," cried Aunt Caroline to thethree old women, who had now come close up to her, mumbling and makingsigns of hunger.
"Come, Irma, inside the cathedral," and laying her hand on Irma's arm,Aunt Caroline crossed the street, while Uncle Jim and Marion followed:and if the truth be told, as soon as Aunt Caroline's back was turned,the very coin that had been burning Marion's pocket quickly transferreditself to the hand of the most importunate of the old women. This, atleast, was Irma's impression, as she looked around before entering thecathedral door, attracted by the rather peculiar striking of a clock.Looking in the direction of the sound she gave an exclamation ofsurprise that led Aunt Caroline to turn also. There on a building at thecorner stood a life size figure of a small man hitting a bell with ahammer, and thus informing the town of the hours and quarter hourswithout the need of a clock face.
The cool, white interior of the cathedral was a pleasant change from thehot piazza. The pillars were of marble, striped black and white like theoutside. The young people admired some of the old frescoes by FraAngelico and Signorelli, and watched the priest copying the head ofVirgil, one of several poets of the future life chosen to decorate onechapel. But when Aunt Caroline drew out her book to sketch somearchitectural details Irma sighed audibly.
Only Marion, however, heard and understood the sigh.
"Aunt Caroline," he said, "while you are drawing, Irma and I mightramble around the town. The streets are so narrow that there would be nofun driving, and you never care to walk in the sun."
"Certainly, children. Run off by yourselves. You needn't apologize fortiring of the society of your elders. As we have so little time here Iintend to devote myself to the cathedral inside and out. Only rememberwhat you see, and please don't get lost."
So Irma and Marion set off by themselves. Although they had beeninformed that the little Municipal Museum contained many interestingvases and ornaments found in the ancient Etruscan tombs so numerous inthis neighborhood, they decided to omit the museum.
"We saw so many of those things in the National Museum at Rome," sighedIrma, "and these cannot be any finer. Aren't you tired of museums? Theremust be much to see here, for Orvieto is such an old, old town."
"Yes," assented Marion, "and we might as well begin to set ourselvesagainst museums,
for Uncle Jim says that all the Italian towns, nomatter how small, are stuffed full of local pride, and have municipalmuseums, and even art galleries that they tax the poor people heavily tosupport. If no one should visit them then taxes would be lighter, andthe poor Italians would be happier, and not so many would be driven toemigrate to America."
While Irma laughed at the absurdity of his reasoning she also thoughtthat Marion was a very clever boy.
Then they wandered through the narrow streets of Orvieto, passing understone arches, looking in at various shops, where shoemakers or tinsmithsor tailors were working in rather primitive fashion. Irma photographedone or two old churches, and at last they came to a wall that seemed tohold the town from tumbling down the high hill. There they had a wideview across a lovely valley.
While they stood there, three or four well-dressed children surroundedthem, asking for money, and going through the usual form of speech, "Weare dying of hunger." Far from sympathizing, Marion and Irma onlylaughed as they drove the children away, and finally the children, too,burst into loud laughter as they retreated.
"I never imagined an Italian town as clean as this," said Irma, as theywalked over the big cobblestones of a sidewalkless thoroughfare. "Itlooks as if it had been swept and scrubbed, and yet I am sorry for thepeople so near the beautiful country, who yet must live in a closelybuilt town."
"Oh, many probably work in the fields below there, young as well as old.Though they don't need the protection of a fortified town, as they didin the Middle Ages, they still love to huddle together."
Before returning to the hotel, the two went to another edge of the town.A public garden covered the site of the old fortress, but from a ruin ofthe ancient castle they formed an idea of what it had been in its daysof usefulness.
"Give me your camera for a moment," cried Marion, as Irma leaned againstthe wall looking over the Valley of the Tiber, toward the Umbrian hills.
"Now, stand still, just as you are," and when she heard the click sheturned to thank Marion.
"You must be a thought reader. I was wishing I might have a picturetaken here to send home, but----"
"You weren't afraid to ask me?"
"Well--you might have thought I was vain--or something. It always seemsso silly to wish to have one's own picture taken. But this is forGertrude. She tried to make me promise to have one taken in every townwe visited."
"I really believe you'd rather please Gertrude than any one else. I amalmost sorry I took the photograph." Marion turned away half angrily,and Irma could not tell whether or not he was in earnest, as theyfollowed the custodian of the garden, who had been insisting that theymust see the _pozzo_, or old well.
When they had looked down into its gloomy depths of a couple of hundredfeet the man seemed rather disappointed that neither of them woulddescend part way.
"The remarkable thing about it is that the spiral staircase is so builtthat donkeys with buckets went down on one side, and came up on theother with water."
"But who cares about that now?" cried Irma impatiently.
As they turned away from the well, they saw a hotel omnibus approaching,and a moment later Aunt Caroline was calling to them.
"We were so afraid we might miss you. They insisted on bringing us downearly for the funicular, and here are your bags. But this is better thanbeing late, and it will give your uncle and me a chance to visit thefamous well." Whereat Irma and Marion exchanged smiles, though it didnot seem worth while to dissuade their elders from seeing one of the fewsights of the old town.
"It will be a quarter of an hour before the train starts for Siena, andthey ought to have some way of killing time."
"By the way," continued Marion, as they waited for the train, "you maybe glad to hear that you were right and I was wrong, the other day aboutmy purse."
"The one that was stolen?"
"Yes. I ought to have reported it, as you said. It contained a pieceof--well--something that I wouldn't have lost for anything. I only foundit out when I came to pack this morning. I had thought it was in itsbox. But when to-day I found the box empty, I remembered that I had itin my purse to take to a jeweler's to repair."
"Can't you report it now?"
"Oh, it's absolutely too late, now that we have left Rome."
At this moment the train came in.
Irma in Italy: A Travel Story Page 12