Well, say to him that I cannot sell my boat. Did I not make it myself, from an old fisherman's boat, with only a little help from Carlo, in his workshop on the canal of the chestnut trees? And of a truth I will not sell it to Nicolo. But I shall give it to him for his birthday gift, if in return he will carry old Grandmother Nanna every Sunday morning to early Mass, so that she will not miss it because I am no longer there.
I shall never want the boat again, because I am going to become a citizen of Florence.
It is true that we leave to-day for our automobile ride to Rome, but I shall come back again. That is what everyone does who has once been here.
Why did you not tell me about the Palazzo Vecchio with the wonderful statues in the Loggia? Did you think that because we have so much beauty in our old Venice I should care for none elsewhere?
And the pictures in the Pitti and the Uffizi palaces,—you should have warned me that I would wear my eyes out with much looking at them! And it is one thing to hear of Michael Angelo, and quite another to see his great works!
The American lady, Mrs. Sprague, with her guide-book, follows the English-speaking guide about, and continually interrupts him to ask, "At what page have we arrived now?"
But her daughter is different. She carries no guide-book. She has a boy's mind and asks questions about everything. She asked me about the tunnels through which my train came from Venice. Ah, those tunnels! There were twenty-two of them in sixteen miles, and the train whizzed in and out in the most exciting manner.
More I cannot say, but that I am perfectly happy! And I shall sign my name Benvenuto, because the American girl says I am welcome.
A thousand greetings to you, from your absent crab of a boy in Florence,
Rafael Valla.