360 MORE POT-POURRI 



especially as the infant mortality must be prodigious. A 

 handsome mother and daughter knelt just before me on 

 the marble floor, types of to-day. The mother, old and 

 tired and hot, mumbled prayers, but not with devotion. 

 The cold hand of Time had laid hold on her. If the old 

 are religious it is mentally, not passionately, and it takes 

 the form of 'calm repose and peace divine.' The 

 daughter, handsome though not very young, with coal-. 

 black hair, said her prayers with closed eyelids and a 

 passionate pathos in her face, softening for a time her 

 somewhat masculine features a perfect example of life's 

 disappointments, not yet utterly without hope. 



Passing out into the glorious evening sunshine, we 

 went inside the large bare Duomo, beautiful to me from 

 its size, its majesty, its cool shades, illuminated by the 

 pouring in of the bright summer western sun, which 

 formed rays of light across the darkness. A full 

 choral Vesper was not yet quite ended, and the boys 

 threw back their heads and flung out their high notes 

 echoing into the dome. It was not very reverent or 

 beautiful, but it sounded well, as it mounted in wave upon 

 wave of sound into the echoing cavities of the great vault. 

 Many people think the inside of the Duomo ugly, and of 

 course one can see how it was the origin of much ugliness 

 that came afterwards ; but it has a grand beauty of its own, 

 and the jewelled glass is the exact sort of old glass I 

 admire most vague in design, but strong in colour, and 

 glowing with a richness beyond the finest enamel. 



Later in the evening we went on to a balcony on the 

 Lung' Arno, to see the fireworks let off from the opposite 

 hill of San Miniato. I had not seen good fireworks for 

 many years. They may be as good at the Crystal Palace, 

 and no doubt are, but never can the whole scene be any- 

 thing like as lovely as those fireworks on this night of San 

 Giovanni, with the background of the San Miniato hill, and 



