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Old Calabria by Norman Douglas
page 161 of 451 (35%)

So one stumbles, inadvertently, upon problems of the day concerning
which our sages profess to know nothing. And yet I do perceive a certain
Writing upon the Wall setting forth, in clearest language, that 1 + 1 =
3; a legend which it behoves them not to expunge, but to expound. For it
refuses to be expunged; and we do not need a German lady to tell us how
much the "synthetic" sex, the hornless but not brainless sex, has done
for the life of the spirit while those other two were reclaiming the
waste places of earth, and procreating, and fighting--as befits their
horned anatomy.




XVI

REPOSING AT CASTROVILLARI


I remember asking my friend the Roman deputy of whom I have already
spoken, and whom I regard as a fountain of wisdom on matters Italian,
how it came about that the railway stations in his country were apt to
be so far distant from the towns they serve. Rocca Bernarda, I was
saying, lies 33 kilometres from its station; and even some of the
largest towns in the kingdom are inconveniently and unnecessarily remote
from the line.

"True," he replied. "Very true! Inconveniently . . . but perhaps not
unnecessarily. . . ." He nodded his head, as he often does, when
revolving some deep problem in his mind.
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