orgiven, and to store up and remember only
the charming hours of the journeys and the times when I was not
unworthy to be with you and share a companionship which to me stands
first after Livy's. It is justifiable to do this; for why should I
let my small infirmities of disposition live and grovel among my
mental pictures of the eternal sublimities of the Alps?

Livy can't accept or endure the fact that you are gone. But you
are, and we cannot get around it. So take our love with you, and
bear it also over the sea to Harmony, and God bless you both.

MARK.

CXIX. ITALIAN DAYS

The Clemens party wandered down into Italy--to the lakes, Venice,
Florence, Rome--loitering through the galleries, gathering here and
there beautiful furnishings--pictures, marbles, and the like--for the
Hartford home.

In Venice they bought an old careen bed, a massive regal affair with
serpentine columns surmounted by singularly graceful cupids, and with
other cupids sporting on the headboard: the work of some artist who had
been dust three centuries maybe, for this bed had come out of an old
Venetian palace, dismantled and abandoned. It was a furniture with a
long story, and the years would add mightily to its memories. It would
become a stately institution in the Clemens household. The cupids on
the posts were removable, and one of the highest privileges of childhood
would be to occupy that bed and have down one of the cupids to play
with. It was necessary to be ill to acquire that privilege--not
violently and dangerously ill, but interestingly so--ill enough to be
propped up with pillows and have one's meals served on a tray, with
dolls and picture-books handy, and among them a beautiful rosewood cupid
who had kept dimpled and dainty for so many, many years.

They spent three weeks in Venice: a dreamlike experience, especially for
the children, who were on the water most of the time, and became fast
friends with their gondolier, who taught them some Italian words; then
a week in Florence and a fortnight in Rome.

--[From the note-book:

"BAY--When the waiter brought my breakfast this morning I spoke to him
in Italian.

"MAMA--What did you say?

"B.--I said, 'Polly-vo fransay.'

"M.--What does it mean? "B.--I don't know. What does it mean, Susy?

"S.--It means, 'Polly wants a cracker.'"]

Clemens discovered that in twelve years his attitude had changed
so