--We arranged to begin our journey at six. . . . . It was a
chill, lowering morning, and the rain blew a little in our faces before
we had gone far, but did not continue long. The country soon lost the
pleasant aspect which it wears immediately about Siena, and grew very
barren and dreary. Then it changed again for the better, the road
leading us through a fertility of vines and olives, after which the
dreary and barren hills came back again, and formed our prospect
throughout most of the day. We stopped for our dejeuner a la fourchette
at a little old town called San Quirico, which we entered through a
ruined gateway, the town being entirely surrounded by its ancient wall.
This wall is far more picturesque than that of Siena, being lofty and
built of stone, with a machicolation of arches running quite round its
top, like a cornice. It has little more than a single street, perhaps a
quarter of a mile long, narrow, paved with flag-stones in the Florentine
fashion, and lined with two rows of tall, rusty stone houses, without a
gap between them from end to end.
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