The streets were thronged with soldiers and people, and it was as much as his life was worth for the coachman to draw up in front of the door.
Mr. and Mrs. Field have almost completed their enormous palace out by Santa Maria Maggiore, but they have not, as they hoped, succeeded in making that part of Rome fashionable. They have bought land as far as the Colosseum; Nero's gold house, which stands in a finocchi patch, is theirs too. The tenement-houses near them continue to festoon the façades with the week's wash in every state of unrepair. There is no privacy about the Italians washing their dirty linen, though they do wash at home.
I seem to be introducing you to all Rome.
Mr. and Mme. Minghetti are old friends—that is, I have known her from 1866. Then she was Princess Camporeale, very handsome and captivating. She is just as attractive now and holds Rome in her hand. Her salon is the salon where all fashionable Rome flocks. She has arranged it in the most artistic manner. It is crowded with furniture, with cozy corners and flirtatious nooks between armoires and palm-trees. Valuable old pictures and tapestries decorate the walls. The salon is two stories high and has an ornamental little winding staircase on which an enormous stuffed peacock stands with outspread tail, as if guarding things below. On her Sunday afternoons one is sure to hear some good music. No one refuses, as it gives a person a certain prestige to be heard there.
Mr. Minghetti, possessing the order of the Annunciata (the highest decoration of Italy), is called "Le cousin du Roi." He is a great personage. He has been Prime Minister and still plays a very conspicuous part in politics. He has written many books on constitutional law. He is tall, handsome, and altogether delightful.
The Storys still live in the third heaven of the Barberini Palace, where on Fridays there is a steady procession of tea-thirsty English and Americans who toil upward.
The two sons are what Mr. Story calls "promising." Waldo (the elder) promises to rival his father as a sculptor. Julian promises to be a great painter. His picture of Cardinal Howard, all in red against a red background, is a fine study in color besides being an excellent likeness.
The Haseltines are flourishing like green bay-trees. Their beautiful apartment in the Altieri Palace, where his atelier is, is filled with his exquisite water-colors and paintings. Her brother, Mr. Marshall, is staying with them. He is very amusing. Last evening he held the table in a roar when he told of a recent experience.
At the Duchess Fiano's costume ball he had worn a costume of a Mignon-Henri-II. He described it to us. A light-blue satin jacket, and trunk-hose, slashed to exaggeration, with white satin puffs, a jaunty velvet cap with a long feather, and white satin shoes turned up at the ends.
Worth had made it and put a price on it almost equal to Marshall's income, and just because it had cost so much and he had received a good many compliments he thought it was his duty to have it and himself photographed as a memento of his reckless extravagance before the costume was consigned to oblivion. On the day of his appointment with the artist he was dressed and ready in his costume. As it was a rainy day, he provided himself with an umbrella and a pair of india-rubbers big enough to go over the gondola-like shoes. He also carried a stuffed falcon in his hand so that there should be no doubt as to what he was.