OUR SENTIMENTAL GARDEN 



three, We had some very thrilling experiences in the shape 

 of Roman rascality during our first weeks of housekeeping 

 there. After the odd custom we had one woman servant 

 to three men / and, as the genus housemaid does not exist 

 at all in many parts of the Continent, we had extreme 

 difficulty in procuring a donna di faccenda. We had a 

 whole large house in the Via Gregoriana, and it was 

 imperative we should have something female to scrub its 

 bedrooms and bathrooms. Scrub ? It is not a word you 

 could get any Roman to understand the meaning of, much 

 less put into application/ but still we had to get some- 

 body to sweep the dust into the corner or under the rug, 

 and pass an occasional wet rag languidly round the rim of 

 a bath. Loki's Ma-Ma, being the Italian scholar of the 

 family, engaged the staff. She was enchanted with the 

 appearance of a splendid young girl from the Campagna, 

 with cheeks like ripe nectarines, and a coroneted black 

 head. Alert and brisk as a mountain kid, she seemed to 

 us. Alas ! who could have thought it ? The creature was 

 a bacchante ! She ordered in a cask of wine all for herself, 

 and then ran out the second evening and never came in 

 till the next morning. Having danced with Bacchus all 

 night, she was altogether unfit for any Christian habitation 

 in the morning. It may be all very well to sleep off the 

 red fumes on a thymy bank in a pagan world / but it's 

 not at all poetical or attractive at close quarters within 

 four walls ! A sordid, pitiful, revolting business ! And 

 the happy mountain kid, who proved after all to be only 

 a bad little gutter goat, had to be driven forth when 

 the legs that had caracoled so much were able to crawl 

 again. 

 126 



