over head and shoulders, loose and pendent white
linen sleeves, and black woolen boddices tightly laced, calico or woolen
skirts, and dark blue woolen aprons with broad bands of yellow or red;
while the men wore blue knee-breeches, brown woolen stockings, and blue
jackets, with here and there a short scarlet waistcoat, and all with
black conical felt hats, sometimes ornamented with a flower--noting all
this, our artists knew it was Sunday or a festival. It was both.

The main street was very narrow--the houses so close together that a
donkey loaded with brush-wood could hardly scrape through--and so steep
that he had hard work to get a foot-hold on the smooth, worn stones
serving to pave it. The buildings were all of that sombre gray stone so
picturesque in paintings, and so pleasant for the eye to rest on, yet
withal suggesting no brilliant ideas of cleanliness or even neatness.
The houses were rarely over two stories in hight, the majority only one
story, and but very few of them boasted glazed window-frames,
board-shutters letting in light or keeping out rain. Two twists through
the narrow streets, or rather alleys, a right-angled turn, a wheel to
the left, then straight forward thirty steps, and lo! they were in the
inn, alias _locanda_, of Gaetano. As soon as rooms could be given them,
our artists, spite of its being daylight, took a long nap, induced by
traveling all night without sleep.

About noon the landlord, Gaetano, aroused them with the fact that dinner
was ready. They made a hearty meal, the landlord being careful to wish
them 'good appetite' before they commenced. When it was over, and they
were about to rise and go forth to discover if there was a cafe in the
town, the waiter-girl appeared with two large dishes, on one of which
were green peas in the pod, and on the other goat's-milk cheese.

'I know what the cheese is for,' said Caper, 'but it seems to me an odd
way, to send in peas for the guests to shell for them.'

'Perhaps,' said Dexter, 'as they've no opera-house here, it's one of
their amusements.'

'Can you tell me,' asked Rocjean of the stout waiter-girl, 'what we are
to do with those peas?'

'Eh? Why, Signor, they are the fruit. You eat them.'

'Pods and all?'

'Certainly; they are very sweet and tender.'

'No, thank you. You can take them away. Will you send the _padrone_
here?'

In came the landlord, and then and there a bargain was struck. For forty
cents a day, he agreed to giv