Plain Frances Mowbray, and Other Tales (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1889 edition. Excerpt: ...of his nation, and proceeded to usher me up a trembling staircase into one of the before-mentioned apartments. It was a clean little room enough, with a cemented floor, four whitewashed walls, and a ceiling adorned with odd, twisted scrolls, each scroll ending with what would appear to have been intended for the semblance of a human figure. Could I have dinner in an hour? I next inquired. Certainly I could have dinner in an hour, or at any hour. The hotel was not at present full--rather the contrary. There was another guest, however, a young gentleman, who by a miracle had ordered his dinner for the same hour; the two signori should be served together. This point decided, I presently sauntered out again, and sat down upon one of the stone ledges which ran along both sides of the little piazza. Even without the assurance of my conversational friend of the station I could have guessed that a festa was in progress, it being difficult otherwise to account for the evident buzz of excitement, the endless squeaking of penny whistles and ringing of cracked bells, which had been going on without intermission from the moment I set foot in San Biagio. All the world, his wife, his sons and daughters, not to speak of his dogs, his goats, and his grandchildren, seemed to be promenading in the immediate vicinity of the perch I had selected. Below me the big town wall, shaggy with pellitories and sedums, dropped some thirty or forty feet into a tangle of olives and chestnuts, the latter still only in half leaf. I could see the bluish, halt-ripened spikes of barley pricking their way upwards between protecting lattices of yellow canes. Beyond, a few scattered houses showed pink or brown amongst the leaves. As far as I could make out, this part of the region was...