eBooks Base 2000

. . . choosing each a marble seat or
wooden bench in sunshine or shade as best suits him. In the afternoon,
especially within an hour or two of sunset, the gardens are much more
populous, and the seats, except when the sun falls full upon them, are
hard to come by. Ladies arrive in carriages, splendidly dressed;
children are abundant, much impeded in their frolics, and rendered stiff
and stately by the finery which they wear; English gentlemen and
Americans with their wives and families; the flower of the Roman
population, too, both male and female, mostly dressed with great nicety;
but a large intermixture of artists, shabbily picturesque; and other
persons, not of the first stamp. A French band, comprising a great many
brass instruments, by and by begins to play; and what with music,
sunshine, a delightful atmosphere, flowers, grass, well-kept pathways,
bordered with box-hedges, pines, cypresses, horse-chestnuts, flowering
shrubs, and all manner of cultivated beauty, the scene is a very lively
and agreeable one.


Pages:
259 260 261 262 263 264 265 266 267 268 269 270 271 272 273 274 275 276 277 278 279 280 281 282 283