ling of
energy and activity in the midst of the ancient historic peace. Siena
is, I believe, built about the crater of an extinct volcano. The old
brick wall of the city was still extant, running up hill and down,
and confining the rusty heaps of houses within its belt. There were
projecting balconies, crumbling with age, and irregular arcades,
resembling tunnels hewn out of the solid rock. From the windows of
our sitting-room in the hotel we commanded the piazza, in front of the
Palazzo Tolomei, with a pillar in the midst of it, on which was a group
of Romulus and Remus suckled by the wolf, the tradition of the city
being that it was founded during the epoch of the Roman kings. My mother
made a sketch of this monument in her little sketch-book, and my father,
according to a common custom of his, sat for an hour at the window
one day and made a note of every person who passed through the little
square, thus getting an idea of the character of the local population
not otherwise obtainable. I can imagine that, were one born in Siena,
one might conceive an ardent affection for it; but, in spite of its
picturesqueness, it never touched my heart like Rome or Florence, or
even London or Paris. I left it without regret, but with specimens of
its fossils in my pockets.

It often happens with miracles that they occur in doubles or trebles, in
order, I suppose, to suggest to us that they may be simply instances
of an undiscovered law. Gaetano was a miracle, and he was followed by
Constantino, who, though of an altogether different human type, was
of no less sweet and shining a nature than the other. He was a grand,
noble, gentle creature, and my mother soon dubbed him "The Emperor,"
though it may be doubted whether the original emperor of that name was
as good a man as ours; he was certainly not nearly so good-looking. He
was only the driver of our _vettura_ from Siena to Rome, but there was
a princely munificence in his treatment of us that made us feel his
debtors in an indefinitely greater sum than that which technically
discharged our obligations. He was massive, quiescent, oxlike, with
great, slow-moving, black eyes. He had the air of extending to us the
hospitalities of Italy, and our journey assumed the character of a royal
progress. He was especially devoted to my small sister Rose, and often,
going up the hills, he would have her beside him on foot, one of his
great hands clasping hers, while with the other he wielded th