My Hotel, judging from the position of the town as respects the river, was on the north side of the modern Place. There was, as far as I observed, no one staying in it but myself. At all events I was shown to what I took to be the best room in the house; it was large and lofty, and led me to suppose, that the house, which had an old fashioned air about it, dated from the time of the old mansions just referred to, and might be numbered among them. On the opposite side of the Place was a new-looking Hotel, which I did not see anyone enter, or leave. On the east side was a chapel—though that may not be the correct word—over the door of which was the inscription ‘Divo Rocho.’ I saw the congregation, that had attended Vespers, leaving it. They were all women. In the Place itself there were never wanting several little groups of people—these were all men—flâneurs—standing about, apparently for the accustomed purpose of seeing, and commenting on, perhaps of getting a little something out of, the arrivals and departures of travellers. But, this afternoon, there was not much of this kind to suggest either hope, or conversation; and so there was nothing to interrupt their combustion of the leaf that should be fragrant. In the centre of the older part of the town, in the small old Place, surrounded by the above-mentioned goodly old houses, fronted with colonnades, I found a tree of Liberty surmounted by the cap of Liberty. This took me rather by surprise. What can stir the mind of Bellinzona so deeply as to prompt such an erection? And why should these republicans be fussy about what they have, and with which there is no one to interfere? Or was it a demonstration of that portion of the townsfolk, who are for the regeneration of society, against the richer sort, who live in country houses? I cannot answer these questions I can only say that the tree had the appearance of age; and so possibly may have been set up during the excitement of ‘48, a wave of which may have reached, and transiently stirred, the stagnancy of Bellinzona.
August 9.—As I had much before me I was up at 4.30 A.M. On looking out of the window, to ascertain what kind of morning I had for the day that was to take me to Como, I saw a woman, on the opposite side of the street, seated in front of her house, busily plying her needle. It will be some time yet I thought before her little ones begin their day. When, an hour later, I left the Hotel, she was still there at work. I was reminded of Virgil’s touching picture of what I was looking on. I was sure that he had often looked upon, and read aright, such sights in the northern Italy of his day. He describes the picture as it might have been seen not at midsummer, but in winter, and, therefore, as within the house.
The middle course of night was run, when men
Wake from their first sleep; and the good housewife,
Whose distaff is her slender livelihood,
Gets her from bed, and stirs th’ ash-buried fire,
Robbing sweet rest for work; and at first dawn
Rouses her women to their long-tasked day:
For ’twere not life to her to live, if drawn
To shame her husband’s bed, or should in vain