CHAPTER V--TO PARMA, MODENA, AND BOLOGNA
I strolled away from Genoa on the 6th of November, bound for a good
many places (England among them), but first for Piacenza; for which
town I started in the coupe of a machine something like a
travelling caravan, in company with the brave Courier, and a lady
with a large dog, who howled dolefully, at intervals, all night.
It was very wet, and very cold; very dark, and very dismal; we
travelled at the rate of barely four miles an hour, and stopped
nowhere for refreshment. At ten o'clock next morning, we changed
coaches at Alessandria, where we were packed up in another coach
(the body whereof would have been small for a fly), in company with
a very old priest; a young Jesuit, his companion--who carried their
breviaries and other books, and who, in the exertion of getting
into the coach, had made a gash of pink leg between his black
stocking and his black knee-shorts, that reminded one of Hamlet in
Ophelia's closet, only it was visible on both legs--a provincial
Avvocato; and a gentleman with a red nose that had an uncommon and
singular sheen upon it, which I never observed in the human subject
before.
Pages:
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115