At Piacenza, which was four or five hours' journey from the inn at
Stradella, we broke up our little company before the hotel door,
with divers manifestations of friendly feeling on all sides. The
old priest was taken with the cramp again, before he had got half-
way down the street; and the young priest laid the bundle of books
on a door-step, while he dutifully rubbed the old gentleman's legs.
The client of the Avvocato was waiting for him at the yard-gate,
and kissed him on each cheek, with such a resounding smack, that I
am afraid he had either a very bad case, or a scantily-furnished
purse. The Tuscan, with a cigar in his mouth, went loitering off,
carrying his hat in his hand that he might the better trail up the
ends of his dishevelled moustache. And the brave Courier, as he
and I strolled away to look about us, began immediately to
entertain me with the private histories and family affairs of the
whole party.
A brown, decayed, old town, Piacenza is. A deserted, solitary,
grass-grown place, with ruined ramparts; half filled-up trenches,
which afford a frowsy pasturage to the lean kine that wander about
them; and streets of stern houses, moodily frowning at the other
houses over the way.
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