"Holy Family." She did not look at it from a painter's point of view; she only looked at the young peasant woman who, with her garment still drawn aside from her full bosom, sat looking at her child sleeping on her lap, and holding his foot caressingly in her hand. It was an ugly little peasant boy, but in splendid condition; he was sound asleep and such a darling all the same. Joseph was looking at him across the mother's shoulder, but it was not an old Joseph, and Mary was no immaterial, heavenly bride; they were a strong, middle-aged working man and his young wife, and the child was the joy and pride of the two.
In the evening she wrote to Gert Gram a long, sad and tender letter bidding him farewell for ever.
On the following day she took a through ticket to Florence; after a sleepless night in the train she found herself sitting at the window at daybreak. Wild torrents spurted down the forest-clad mountain-sides. It grew lighter and lighter, and the towns became more and more Italian in character: rust-brown or golden-yellow tiles, loggias to the houses, green shutters against reddish stone walls, church fronts in baroque, stone bridges across the rivers, vineyards outside the towns, and grey castle ruins on the hilltops. At the stations all the signs were written in German and Italian.
She stood in the customs office looking at the first- and second-class passengers startled out of their sleep, and she felt quite happy without being able to account for it. She was back again in Italy. The customs officer smiled at her because she was so fair, and she smiled back; evidently he took her for the maid of one or other of the lady passengers.
The misty grey mountains ridges on either side had a bluish shade in the crevices, the ground looked rusty red, and the sun flamed white and hot.
But in Florence it was bitterly cold in the early days of November. Tired and frozen, she stayed in the city a fort-
