"It pities me much for this poor man: it will certainly go ill with him at the last."
What pilgrim of old times thought his pilgrimage really over until he gave either out of his plenty or nothing in alms? Two months later we too gave our mite, not to the church or to the poor, but to the Government; for we were then summoned before a police magistrate and fined ten francs for "furious riding on the Corso, and refusing to descend when ordered."
And so our pilgrimage ended.
APPENDIX.
VETTURINO versus TRICYCLE.
By JOSEPH PENNELL.
From "Outing."
Who has not journeyed through a country with his favorite author long before he makes the actual trip himself? and who, when he comes to see with his own eyes that at which he has hitherto looked through some one else's, does not find himself his best guide? Long before I came to Italy I had travelled along its highways and by-ways with many authors, more especially with Hawthorne in his "Italian Note-Book," and Mr. Howells in his "Italian Journeys" and "Venetian Life." When it was finally my good fortune to make the journey myself, I was at first lucky enough to have for a companion, not his books, but Mr. Howells himself; and I frankly confess I found him far more delightful and satisfactory in person than in print. A year later I started for the same country, this time encumbered with a wife and a tricycle. Mr. Howells could no longer be my cicerone: in the first place he was back in Boston,—I might add, as if in parenthesis, calling me "lucky dog" for being able to go so soon again over the well-known ground; and, in the second place, because the route I now intended to take is not described in his books. But it is in Hawthorne's "Note-Book," a volume which, as I have just said, I had frequently studied. But of course I forgot to put it in my knapsack, and so had not a chance to see it until I arrived in Rome. When I there looked into it, naturally in a more critical spirit—inspired by personal knowledge of the subject—than I ever had before, the first thing that struck me was the advantage I had had over my old master in travelling by tricycle instead of by diligence. From the little village of Passignano to Rome we had followed exactly the same road, and though we began our rides at its opposite ends, I could still easily compare the time we had made, and the comfort and convenience and pleasure we had enjoyed by the way. As this comparison may be interesting to many who intend some day to make the cycling tour of Italy, I will here briefly indicate Hawthorne's experience, principally as to time and roads, and then mine:—