There
was a very bright star visible, I remember, and we saw the new moon, now
a third towards the full, for the first time this evening. The air was
cold and bracing.
But I am excessively sleepy, so will not describe our great dreary hotel,
where a blast howled in an interminable corridor all night. It did not
seem to have anything to do with the wind out of doors, but to be a blast
that had been casually shut in when the doors were closed behind the last
Grand Duke who came hither and departed, and ever since it has been kept
prisoner, and makes a melancholy wail along the corridor. The dreamy
stupidity of this conceit proves how sleepy I am.
SETTE VENE.
October 15th.--We left Radicofani long before sunrise, and I saw that
ceremony take place from the coupe of the vettura for the first time in a
long while. A sunset is the better sight of the two. I have always
suspected it, and have been strengthened in the idea whenever I have had
an opportunity of comparison. Our departure from Radicofani was most
dreary, except that we were very glad to get away; but, the cold
discomfort of dressing in a chill bedroom by candlelight, and our
uncertain wandering through the immense hotel with a dim taper in search
of the breakfast-room, and our poor breakfast of eggs, Italian bread, and
coffee,--all these things made me wish that people were created with
roots like trees, so they could not befool themselves with wandering
about.
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