Page:Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag, Volume 2.djvu/177

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ITALY.
159

cloth shirt, and a bit of wood from the pile on which they burnt him. I like relics of one man who really lived, worked, and suffered, better than armies of angels, or acres of gods and goddesses.

"Pleasant drives. Saw artists, Casa Guidi windows, and a model baby house with dolly's name on the door, and steps modelled by hands that have made famous statues. 'Papa's baby house' was best of all his works to me. A nice little earthquake and a trifle of snow to enhance the charms of this sweet spot.

"Visited Parker's grave, and was afflicted to find it in such an unlovely, crowded cemetery. It does not matter after all: his best monument is in the hearts that love him and the souls he fed. As I stood there a little brown bird hopped among the vines that covered the grave, pecked its breakfast from a dry seed-pod, perched on the head-stone with a grateful twitter, as grace after meat, and flew away, leaving me comforted by the little sermon it had preached."


"I don't wish to hurt your feelings, dear, but if this is Rome I must say it is a very nasty place,"