at Taranto and elsewhere. It tones the individual to reposeful
sweetness; one by one, his anfractuosities are worn off; he becomes as a
pebble tossed in the waters, smooth, burnished, and (to outward
appearances) indistinguishable from his fellows.

But I do not care about the ordinary city folk. They have an air of
elaborate superciliousness which testifies to ages of systematic
half-culture. They seem to utter that hopeless word, _connu!_ And what,
as a matter of fact, do they know? They are only dreaming in their
little backwater, like the oysters of the lagoon, distrustful of
extraneous matter and oblivious of the movement in a world of men beyond
their shell. You hear next to nothing of "America," that fruitful source
of fresh notions; there is no emigration to speak of; the population is
not sufficiently energetic--they prefer to stay at home. Nor do they
care much about the politics of their own country: one sees less
newspapers here than in most Italian towns. "Our middle classes," said
my friend the Italian deputy of whom I have already spoken, "are like
our mules: to be endurable, they must be worked thirteen hours out of
the twelve." But these have no industries to keep them awake, no sports,
no ambitions; and this has gone on for long centuries, In Taranto it is
always afternoon. "The Tarentines," says Strabo, "have more holidays
than workdays in the year."

And never was city-population more completely cut off from the country;
never was wider gulf between peasant and townsman. There are charming
walks beyond the New Quarter--a level region, with olives and figs and
almonds and pomegranates standing knee-deep in ripe odorous wheat; but
the citizens might be living at Timbuctu for all they know of these
things. It rains little here; on the occasion of my last visit not a
drop had fallen _for fourteen months;_ and consequently the country