_The Author of "Dorothy Fox."_
[TO BE CONTINUED.]
A VILLEGGIATURA IN ASISI.
To most travellers a visit to Asisi is a flying visit. They drive over
from Perugia or up from the railway station, and if, besides San
Francesco and Santa Chiara, they see the cathedral and San Damiano,
they believe themselves to have exhausted the sights of the town. The
beautiful front of what was once a temple of Minerva can be seen in
passing through the piazza in which it stands: the departing visitors
glance back at the city from the plain, and--"Buona notte, Asisi!"
Yet this town, as well as most Italian _paesi_, would reward a more
lengthened stay, and, unlike many of them, a refined life is possible
here. A person at once studiously and economically inclined might do
much worse than commit himself to spend several months in the city of
St. Francis. We did so last year, on the same principle that made us in
childhood prefer the cherries that the birds had pecked, finding them
the sweetest. We had heard Asisi abused: it was out of the world, it
was desperately dull and there was nothing to eat. We therefore sent
and engaged an apartment for the summer, and our confidence was not
betrayed.
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