one lake that genius has forever hallowed! Up, sluggard! Place your knapsack on your back; but stow it not with unnecessary gear, for you have still further to go, and your rod also must be your companion, if you mean to penetrate the region beyond. Money? Little money suffices him who travels on foot, who can bring his own fare to the shepherd's bothy where he is to sleep, and who sleeps there better and sounder than the tourist who rolls from station to station in his barouche, grumbling because the hotels are overcrowded, and miserable about the airing of his sheets. Money? You would laugh if you heard me mention. the sum which has sufficed for my expenditure during a long summer month; for the pedestrian, humble though he be, has his own especial privileges, and not the least of these is that he is exempted from all extortion. Donald-God bless him! - has a knack of putting on the prices; and when an English family comes posting up to the door of his inn, clamorously demanding every sort of accommodation which a metropolitan hotel could afford, grumbling at the lack of attendance, sneering at the quality of the food, and turning the whole establishment upside down for their own selfish gratification, he not unreasonably determines that the extra trouble shall be paid for in that gold which rarely crosses his fingers except during the short season when tourists and sportsmen abound. But Donald, who is descended from the M'Gregor, does not make spoil of the poor. The sketcher or the angler who come to his door, with the sweat upon their brow and the dust of the highway or the pollen of the heather on their feet, meet with a hearty welcome; and though the room in which their meals are served is but low in the roof, and the floor strewn with sand, and the attic wherein they lie is garnished with two beds and a shake-down, yet are the viands. wholesome, the sheets clean, and the tariff so undeniably moderate that even parsimony cannot complain. So up in the morning early, so soon as the first beams of the sun slant into the chamber-down to the loch or river, and with a headlong plunge scrape acquaintance with the pebbles at the bottom; then rising with a hearty gasp, strike out for the islet or the further bank, to the astonishment of the otter, who, thief that he is, is skulking back to his hole below the old saugh-tree, from a midnight foray up the burns. Huzza! The mallard, dozing among the reeds, has taken fright, and tucking up his legs under his round fat rump, flies quacking to a remoter marsh.

"By the pricking of my thumbs,

Something wicked this way comes,"

and lo! Dugald the keeper, on his way to the hill, is arrested by the aquatic phenomenon, and half believes that he is witnessing the frolics of an Urisk! Then make your toilet on the greensward, swing your knapsack over your shoulders, and cover ten good miles of road before you halt before breakfast with more than the appetite of an ogre.

In this way I made the circuit of well-nigh the whole of the Scottish Highlands, penetrating as far as Cape Wrath and the wild district of Edderachylis, nor leaving unvisited the grand scenery of Loch Corruisk, and the stormy peaks of Skye; and more than one delightful week did I spend each summer, exploring Gameshope, or the Linns of Talla, where the Covenanters of old held their gathering; or clambering up the steep ascent by the Grey Mare's Tail to lonely and lovely Loch Skene, or casting for trout in the silver waters of St. Mary's.

M

MASSIMO TAPARELLI D'AZEGLIO

(1798–1866)

ASSIMO TAPARELLI, Marquis d'Azeglio, like his greater colleague and sometime rival in the Sardinian Ministry, Cavour, wielded a graceful and forcible pen, and might have won no slight distinction in the peaceful paths of literature and art as well, had he not been before everything else a patriot. Of ancient and noble Piedmontese stock, he was born at Turin in October, 1798. In his fifteenth year the youth accompanied his father to Rome, where the latter had been appointed ambassador, and thus early he was inspired with the passion for painting and music which never left him. In accordance with the paternal wish he entered on a military career, but soon abandoned the service to devote himself to art. But after a residence of eight years (1821-29) in the papal capital, having acquired both skill and fame as a landscape painter, D'Azeglio began to direct his thoughts to letters and politics.

After the death of his father in 1830 he settled in Milan, where he formed the acquaintance of the poet and novelist Alessandro Manzoni, whose daughter he married, and under whose influence he became deeply interested in literature, especially in its relation to the political events of those stirring times. The agitation against Austrian domination was especially marked in the north of Italy,

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where Manzoni had made himself prominent; and so it came to pass that Massimo d'Azeglio plunged into literature with the ardent hope of stimulating the national sense of independence and unity.

In 1833 he published, not without misgivings, Ettore Fieramosca,' his first romance, in which he aimed to teach Italians how to fight for national honor. The work achieved an immediate and splendid success, and unquestionably served as a powerful aid to the awakening of Italy's ancient patriotism. It was followed in 1841 by 'Nicolo di Lapi,' a story conceived in similar vein, with somewhat greater pretensions to literary finish. D'Azeglio now became known as one of the foremost representatives of the moderate party, and exerted the potent influence of his voice as well as of his pen in diffusing liberal propaganda. In 1846 he published the bold pamphlet 'Gli Ultimi Casi di Romagna' (On the Recent Events in Romagna), in which he showed the danger and utter futility of ill-advised republican outbreaks, and the paramount necessity of adopting thereafter a wiser and more practical policy to gain the great end desired. Numerous trenchant political articles issued from his pen during the next two years. The year 1849 found him a member of the first Sardinian parliament, and in March of that year Victor Emmanuel called him to the presidency of the Council with the portfolio of Foreign Affairs. Obliged to give way three years later before the rising genius of Cavour, he served his country with distinction on several important diplomatic missions after the peace of Villafranca, and died in his native city on the 15th of January, 1866.

In 1867 appeared D'Azeglio's autobiography, "I Mici Ricordi,' translated into English by Count Maffei under title of 'My Recollections, which is undeniably the most interesting and thoroughly delightful product of his pen. "He was a 'character,>» said an English critic at the time: "a man of whims and oddities, of hobbies and crotchets. . . . This character of individuality, which impressed its stamp on his whole life, is charmingly revealed in every sentence of the memoirs which he has left behind him; so that, more than any of his previous writings, their mingled homeliness and wit and wisdom justify the epithet which I once before ventured to give him when I described him as 'the Giusti of Italian prose.>> As a polemic writer D'Azeglio was recognized as one of the chief forces in molding public opinion. If he had not been both patriot and statesman, this versatile genius, as before intimated, would not improbably have gained an enviable reputation in the realm of art; and although his few novels are- perhaps with justice - no longer remembered, they deeply stirred the hearts of his countrymen in their day, and to say the least are characterized by good sense, facility of execution, and a refined imaginative power.

THE

A HAPPY CHILDHOOD

From My Recollections >

HE distribution of our daily occupations was strictly laid down for Matilde and me in black and white, and these rules were not to be broken with impunity. We were thus accustomed to habits of order, and never to make anybody wait for our convenience; a fault which is one of the most troublesome that can be committed either by great people or small.

I remember one day that Matilde, having gone out with Teresa, came home when we had been at dinner some time. It was winter, and snow was falling. The two culprits sat down a little confused, and their soup was brought them in two plates, which had been kept hot; but can you guess where? On the balcony; so that the contents were not only below freezing-point, but actually had a thick covering of snow!

At dinner, of course my sister and I sat perfectly silent, waiting our turn, without right of petition or remonstrance. As to the other proprieties of behavior, such as neatness, and not being noisy or boisterous, we knew well that the slightest infraction would have entailed banishment for the rest of the day at least. Our great anxiety was to eclipse ourselves as much as possible; and I assure you that under this system we never fancied ourselves the central points of importance round which all the rest of the world was to revolve, an idea which, thanks to absurd indulgence and flattery, is often forcibly thrust, I may say, into poor little brains, which if left to themselves would never have lost their natural simplicity.

The lessons of 'Galateo' were not enforced at dinner only. Even at other times we were forbidden to raise our voices or interrupt the conversation of our elders, still more to quarrel with each other. If sometimes as we went to dinner I rushed forward before Matilde, my father would take me by the arm and make me come last, saying, "There is no need to be uncivil because she is your sister." The old generation in many parts of Italy have the habit of shouting and raising their voices as if their interlocutor were deaf, interrupting him as if he had no right to speak, and poking him in the ribs and otherwise, as if he could only be convinced by sensations of bodily pain. The regulations observed in my family were therefore by no means

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superfluous; and would to Heaven they were universally adopted as the law of the land!

On another occasion my excellent mother gave me a lesson of humility, which I shall never forget any more than the place where I received it.

In the open part of the Cascine, which was once used as a race-course, to the right of the space where the carriages stand, there is a walk alongside the wood. I was walking there one day with my mother, followed by an old servant, a countryman of Pylades; less heroic than the latter, but a very good fellow too. I forget why, but I raised a little cane I had in my hand, and I am afraid I struck him. My mother, before all the passers-by, obliged me to kneel down and beg his pardon. I can still see poor Giacolin taking off his hat with a face of utter bewilderment, quite unable to comprehend how it was that the Chevalier Massimo Taparelli d'Azeglio came to be at his feet.

An indifference to bodily pain was another of the precepts most carefully instilled by our father; and as usual, the lesson was made more impressive by example whenever an opportunity presented itself. If, for instance, we complained of any slight pain or accident, our father used to say, half in fun, half in earnest, "When a Piedmontese has both his arms and legs broken, and has received two sword-thrusts in the body, he may be allowed to say, but not till then, 'Really, I almost think I am not quite well.'"

The moral authority he had acquired over me was so great that in no case would I have disobeyed him, even had he ordered me to jump out of window.

I recollect that when my first tooth was drawn, I was in an agony of fright as we went to the dentist; but outwardly I was brave enough, and tried to seem as indifferent as possible. On another occasion my childish courage and also my father's firmness were put to a more serious test. He had hired a house called the Villa Billi, which stands about half a mile from San Domenico di Fiesole, on the right winding up toward the hill. Only two years ago I visited the place, and found the same family of peasants still there, and my two old playmates, Nando and Sandro, who had both become even greater fogies than myself, and we had a hearty chat together about bygone times. Whilst living at this villa, our father was accustomed to take us out for long walks, which were the subject of special