culation. The girl's hat was of broken straw, pulled over her eyes;
one of her shoes lacked a lace; her blue cotton dress was sun-bleached
and discoloured. The boy wore a ragged blazer, frayed flannel trousers,
and a very limp Panama hat, which he kept turning up, with
sweet-tempered patience, when it flopped over his eyes.

The girl sat down beside her brother. She had--they both had--a serene
air of being admirably content to do nothing during prolonged periods.
To sit by the harbour and talk, if the day were fine and the company
agreeable, was an excellent afternoon's occupation. The streets were
always entertaining, and the harbour particularly so, with the thronging
of those who go down to the sea in ships, and the gay greetings of
friends, and the cheerful shouting of mariners. Neapolitan loafers (and
really to loaf, in the highest sense of that agreeable word, one should
go to Naples) always like the harbour. The smell of the sea, too, is
pleasant on a hot September afternoon, especially to the unfastidious,
who do not cavil at its dilution with various other odours.

The talk between the brother and sister and the cheerful youth who was
giving himself a holiday from his shop was leisurely, of an easy
familiarity, seasoned with allusions and anecdotes that showed them to
share in common a 'set.' The girl's talk was partly professional, of the
music-hall stage, on which she made casual and irregular appearances. La
Corrini had been saying something to her.... In the report this was very
funny. The stout youth, whose name, one gathered, was Luli, roared with
laughter and spat many times. It was noticeable that the drawer of
pictures, though he, too, talked a great deal, did not spit at all: he
only stammered.

Presently they decided to have lunch, and went off, the three of them
together, Luli affectionately clinging to the journalist's arm. They
turned into a _trattoria_ in the Toledo. At one of the marble-topped and
not very elaborately cleaned tables a finely developed young woman ate
_spaghetti_ with admirable speed and dexterity, and drank red Posilipo.
The three, seeing her, hailed her with some effusion, and joined her at
her table. There ensued a very sociable and conversational repast, and
there was a great deal of noise, with the full-bodied and rather
strident tones of the young woman of the _spaghetti_, the resonant
laughter of Luli, and the stuttering, melancholy-toned and unceasing
flow of singularl