by
the corkscrew of ignorance; the operation is too painful. Caper, proud
of his country, and believing her in the front rank of nations, was
destined to learn, while in Rome and the Papal States, that America was
geographically unknown.

He consoled himself for this with the fact that geography is not taught
in the 'Elementary Schools' there;--and for the people there are no
others.

The following translation of a notice advertising for a schoolmaster,
copied from the walls of a palace where it was posted, shows the sum
total taught in the common schools:--

The duties of the Master are to teach Reading, Writing, the First
Four Rules of Arithmetic; to observe the duties prescribed in the
law '_Quod divina sapientia_;' and to be subject to the biennial
committee like other salaried officers of the department; as an
equivalent for which he shall enjoy (_godra_) an annual salary of
$60, payable in monthly shares.

(Signed)

IL GONFALONIERE ---- ----.

But what can you expect when one of the rulers of the land asserted to
Caper that he knew that 'pop-corn grew in America on the banks of the
Nile, after the water went down,--for it never rains in America'?

It was a handsome man, an advocate for Prince Doria, who, once traveling
in a _vetturo_ with Caper, asked him why he did not go to America by
land, since he knew that it was in the south of England; and gently
corrected a companion of his, who told Caper he had read and thought it
strange that all Americans lived in holes in the ground, by saying to
him that if such houses were agreeable to the _Signori Americani_ they
had every right to inhabit them.

The landlord of a hotel in a town about thirty miles from Rome asked
Caper if, when he returned to New York, he would not some morning call
and see his cousin--in Peru!

This same landlord once drew his knife on a man, when, accompanied by
Caper, he went to observe a saint's day in a neighboring town. The cause
of the quarrel was this--the landlord, having been asked by a man who
Caper was, told him he was an American. The man asserted that Americans
always wore long feathers in their hair, and that he did not see any on
Caper's head. The landlord, determined to stand by Caper, swore by all
the saints that they were under his hat. The man disbelieved it. Out
came the 'hardware' with that jarring cr-r-r-rick the blade makes when
the notched knife-back catches in the spring, but Ca