“What are you doing on board? Your ticket is only to Genoa.”
“Yes!” I stammered, “but I want to get to Marseilles and I haven’t the price.”
“No fault of ours, is it?” demanded the officer. “Your ticket reads Genoa. You will have to pay the price from Genoa to Nice.”
“Haven’t got the half of it,” I protested.
The mate stared at me a moment in silence and hurried away to attend to more pressing affairs. Whether he forgot my existence purposely or by accident, I know not; he was busy on the bridge until our arrival at Nice and, by dropping over the bow to the wharf as dusk fell, I dodged the vigilant eyes of both ship and custom officers and hurried away, once more in “la belle France.”
Italian peasants returning from the vineyards to the village
A factory of red roof-tiles near Naples. The girl works from daylight to dark for sixteen cents
I rose next morning with a one-franc piece in silver and a five-franc note, both in Italian currency. The silver passed as readily as a French coin and, fancying the paper would be as eagerly accepted, I did not trouble to change it into coin of the republic before setting out on the hundred and fifty mile tramp to Marseilles. The last sou of the silver piece had been spent when I arrived at Cannes in the evening. I turned in at an auberge of the famous spa and tendered an Italian note in payment for a lodging.