Before leaving the hill we went to look over the
parapet to the west, where stood, according to "Monte Beni," "the
grandest edifice ever built by man, painted against God's loveliest
sky." Quoit-players were no doubt rolling their disks upon the road
below us; and on the very first glance it almost always happened that
a springing, vaporous-looking quoit would appear without one's seeing
the man whose hand had sent it on its way. It was a refined pastime,
immortalized by the Discobolus, which, however, cannot give the charm
of the whirling quoit.
The entries in my mother's diary so abound in names and persons met
day by day, names both unknown to the world and familiar to it, that
it is hard to understand how there was time for sightseeing or
illness, or the reading which was kept up. The wife of a
distinguished sculptor in Rorffe afterwards said in a letter that this
year of 1859 was remarkably for its crowd of tourists, and added that
1860 proved very quiet. It does not sound quiet to hear that she had
just enjoyed a horseback ride with Mr. Browning; but Americans and
English certainly did have rich enjoyment in Italy in those days, and
grew exacting. The jottings of the diary stir the imagination quite
pleasantly, beginning January 16, 1859: "Mr. Browning called to visit
us. Delightful visit. I read Charlotte Bronte for the second
time.--Mrs. Story sent a note to my husband to invite him to tea [my
mother being housed with my sick sister] with Mr.
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