cliffs of crumbling soil, jumbled anyhow.

Man may, as Pinkerton (Sir Jonas Pinkerton) writes, be master of his
fate, but he has a precious poor servant. It is easier to command a
lapdog or a mule for a whole day than one's own fate for half-an-hour.

Nevertheless, though it was apparent that I should have to follow the
main road for a while, I determined to make at last to the right of
it, and to pass through a place called 'Old Lodi', for I reasoned
thus: 'Lodi is the famous town. How much more interesting must Old
Lodi be which is the mothertown of Lodi?' Also, Old Lodi brought me
back again on the straight line to Rome, and I foolishly thought it
might be possible to hear there of some straight path down the Lambro
(for that river still possessed me somewhat).

Therefore, after hours and hours of trudging miserably along the wide
highway in the wretched and searching rain, after splashing through
tortuous Melegnano, and not even stopping to wonder if it was the
place of the battle, after noting in despair the impossible Lambro, I
came, caring for nothing, to the place where a secondary road branches
off to the right over a level crossing and makes for Lodi Vecchio.

It was not nearly midday, but I had walked perhaps fifteen miles, and
had only rested once in a miserable Trattoria. In less than three
miles I came to that unkempt and lengthy village, founded upon dirt
and living in misery, and through the quiet, cold, persistent rain I
splashed up the main street. I passed wretched, shivering dogs and
mournful fowls that took a poor refuge against walls; passed a sad
horse that hung its head in the wet and stood waiting for a master,
till at last I reached the open square where the church stood, then I
knew that I had seen all Old Lodi had to offer me. So, going into an
eating-house, or inn, opposite the church, I found a girl and her
mother serving, and I saluted them, but there was no fire, and my
heart sank to the level of that room, which was, I am sure, no more
than fifty-four degrees.

Why should the less gracious part of a pilgrimage be specially
remembered? In life were remember joy best--that is what makes us sad
by contrast; pain somewhat, especially if it is acute; but dulness
never. And a book--which has it in its own power to choose and to
emphasize--has no business to record dulness. What did I at Lodi
Vecchio? I ate; I dried my clothes before a tepid stove in a kitchen.
I tried to make myself unde