For the interior, my furniture is not quite upon the same scale, but I have a clean snow-white bed, a calico-covered sofa, chairs and tables enough, and pictures three deep from the wall to the floor.
For all this, and the liberty of the episcopal garden, I pay _three dollars a month_! A dollar more is charged for lamps, boots, and service, and a dark-eyed landlady of thirty-five mends my gloves, and pays me two visits a day--items not mentioned in the bill. Then for the feeding, an excellent breakfast of coffee and toast is brought me for six cents; and, without wine, one may dine heartily at a fashionable restaurant for twelve cents, and with wine, quite magnificently for twenty-five. Exclusive of postage and pleasures, this is all one is called upon to spend in Florence. Three hundred dollars a year would fairly and largely cover the expenses of a man living at this rate; and a man who would not be willing to live half as well for the sake of his art, does not deserve to see Italy. I have stated these unsentimental particulars, because it is a kind of information I believe much wanted. I should have come to Italy years ago if I had known as much, and I am sure there are young men in our country, dreaming of this paradise of art in half despair, who will thank me for it, and take up at once "the pilgrim's sandal-shoon and scollop-shell."
EXCURSION TO VENICE--AMERICAN ARTISTS--VALLEY OF FLORENCE-- MOUNTAINS OF CARRARA--TRAVELLING COMPANIONS--HIGHLAND TAVERN--MIST AND SUNSHINE--ITALIAN VALLEYS--VIEW OF THE ADRIATIC--BORDER OF ROMAGNA--SUBJECTS FOR THE PENCIL--HIGHLAND ITALIANS--ROMANTIC SCENERY--A PAINFUL OCCURRENCE--AN ITALIAN HUSBAND--A DUTCHMAN, HIS WIFE AND CHILDREN--BOLOGNE--THE PILGRIM--MODEL FOR A MAGDALEN.
I started for Venice yesterday, in company with Mr. Alexander and Mr. Cranch, two American artists. We had taken the vetturino for Bologna, and at daylight we were winding up the side of the amphitheatre of Appenines that bends over Florence, leaving Fiesolé rising sharply on our right. The mist was creeping up the mountain just in advance of us, retreating with a scarcely perceptible motion to the summits, like the lift of a heavy curtain; Florence, and its long, heavenly valley, full of white palaces sparkling in the sun, lay below us, more like a vision of a better world than a scene of human passion; away in the horizon the abrupt heads of the mountains of Carrara rose into the sky; and with the cool, fresh breeze of the hills, and the excitement of the pleasant excursion before us, we were three of as happy travellers probably as were to be met on any highway in this garden of the world.