t. The most notable
thing I saw in Bologna was an awning of sheeting or calico spread over
the centre of the main street on a level with the roofs of the houses
for a distance of half a mile or so. I should distrust its standing a
strong gust, but if it would, the idea is worth borrowing.

After a night-ride over the Apennines from Florence, and a detention of
twenty-one hours at Bologna, I did hope that our next start would be
"for good"--that there would be no more halt till we reached Padua. But
I did not yet adequately appreciate Italian management. A Yankee
stage-coach running but once a day between two such cities as Bologna
and Ferrara would start at daylight and so connect at the latter place
as to set down its passengers beside the Railroad in Padua (86 to 90
miles of the best possible staging from Bologna) in the evening of the
same day. We left Bologna at 10 A. M., drove to Ferrara, arrived
there a little past 2; and then came a halt of _four hours_--till six
P. M. when the stage started for a night-trip to Padua--none
running during the day. But a Yankee stage would have one man for
manager, driver, &c., who would very likely be the owner also of the
horses and a partner in the line; we started from a grand office with
two book-keepers and a platoon of lackeys and baggage-smashers, with a
"guard" on the box, and two "postillions" riding respectively the nigh
horses of the two teams, there being always three horses at the pole and
sometimes three on the lead also, at others only two. We had half a
dozen passengers to Ferrara; for the rest of the way, I had this
extensive traveling establishment to myself. I do not think the average
number of passengers on a corresponding route in our country could be so
few as twenty. Such are some of the points of difference between America
and Italy.

We crossed the Po an hour after leaving Ferrara, and here passed out of
the Papal into the unequivocally Austrian territory--the Kingdom of
Venice and Lombardy. There were of course soldiers on each side (though
all of a piece), police officers, a Passport scrutiny and a fresh look
into my carpet-bags, mainly (I understand) for Tobacco! When any
tide-waiter finds more of that about me than the chronic ill breeding of
traveling smokers compels me to carry in my clothes, he is welcome to
confiscate all I possess. But they found nothing here to cavil at, and I
passed on.

There is no town where we crossed the Po, only a small