round the Riccardi Palace in Florence, the day when he bought for a
lira the Romana homocidiorum. The world knows what was the outcome
of Browning's purchase, but it will probably never fathom the full
effect of mine. How do his lines run?"

"These
I picked the book from. Five compeers in flank
Stood left and right of it as tempting more--
A dog's-eared Spicilegium, the fond tale
O' the frail one of the Flower, by young Dumas,
Vulgarised Horace for the use of schools,
The Life, Death, Miracles of Saint Somebody,
Saint Somebody Else, his Miracles, Death and Life."

"Well, the choice which lay before me on one particular barrow was
fully as wide, or perhaps wider than that which met the poet's eye,
but after I had espied a little yellow paper-covered book with the
title La Cucina Partenopea, overo il Paradiso dei gastronomi, I
looked no farther. What infinite possibilities of pleasure might
lie hidden under such a name. I secured it, together with the
Story of Barlaam and Josaphat, for thirty-five centesimi, and
handed over the coins to the hungry-eyed old man in charge, who
regretted, I am sure, when he saw the eager look upon my face, that
he had not marked the books a lira at least. I should now be a
rich woman if I had spent all the money I have spent as profitably
as those seven sold. Besides being a master in the art of cookery,
the author was a moral philosopher as well; and he addresses his
reader in prefatory words which bespeak a profound knowledge of
life. He writes: 'Though the time of man here on earth is passed
in a never-ending turmoil, which must make him often curse the