368 MORE POT-POURRI 



arms, who held up their tiny hands to receive the touch, 

 and afterwards reverently kissed their own fingers. 



Strong peasant men were there, young and old. It 

 cannot be one of the least of the mysterious Florentine 

 bonds, this baptistery which brings back to the inhabi- 

 tants the recollection of every child that is born to them, 

 more especially as the infant mortality must be pro- 

 digious. 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 with- 

 out 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. 



