e is a
circus, which used to be specially devoted to public exhibitions during
the summer afternoons. At these representations, the most renowned
players were engaged by an _impresario_. The audience was generally
large, and the entrance-fee was one paul. Wonderful feats were sometimes
performed here; and on the wall are marked the heights of some
remarkable _volate_. The players were clothed in a thin, tight dress,
like _saltimbanchi_. One side wore a blue, and the other a red ribbon,
on the arm. The contests, generally, were fiercely disputed,--the
spectators betting heavily, and shouting, as good or bad strokes were
made. Sometimes a line was extended across the amphitheatre, from wall
to wall, over which it was necessary to strike the ball, a point being
lost in case it passed below. But this is a variation from the game as
ordinarily played, and can be ventured on only when the players are of
the first force. The games here, however, are now suspended; for the
French, since their occupation, have not only seized the post-office, to
convert it into a club-room, and the _piano nobile_ of some of the
richest palaces, to serve as barracks for their soldiers, but have also
driven the Romans from their amphitheatre, where _Pallone_ was played,
to make it into _ateliers de genie_. Still, one may see the game played
by ordinary players, towards the twilight of any summer day, in the
Piazza di Termini, or near the Tempio della Pace, or the Colosseo. The
boys from the studios and shops also play in the streets a sort of
mongrel game called _Pillotta_, beating a small ball back and forth,
with a round bat, shaped like a small _tamburello_ and covered with
parchment. But the real game, played by skilful players, may be seen
almost every summer night outside the Porta a Pinti, in Florence; and I
have also seen it admirably played under the fortress-wall at Siena, the
players being dressed entirely in white, with loose ruffled jackets,
breeches, long stockings, and shoes of undressed leather, and the
audience sitting round on the stone benches, or leaning over the lofty
wall, cheering on the game, while they ate the cherries or _zucca_-seeds
which were hawked about among them by itinerant peddlers. Here, towards
twilight, one could lounge away an hour pleasantly under the shadow of
the fortress, looking now at the game and now at the rolling country
beyond, where olives and long battalions of vines marched knee-deep
through the g