Oh! torture! Imagine the tediousness of a journey in Italy. Mamma and Dina do not know Italian. I refused to use my tongue; I can scarcely use my limbs. By dint of complaining because I was not with my aunt, and saying: "Who asked you to come with us? I ought to go with my aunt. Why do you come with me?" I obtained a passive obedience and an alacrity impossible to imagine.
Night found us in a car. I complained, wept softly, and said the most provoking things to my mother, like the brute I am.
At last, toward three o'clock, Monday, January 3d, ruins, columns, aqueducts began to appear on the dreary plain called the Roman Campagna, and we entered the station of Rome. I saw nothing, I heard nothing. I was utterly limp after these twenty-four hours without sleep.
We were taken to the Hôtel de Londres, Piazza di Spagna, and we occupied an apartment on the ground floor, with a yellow drawing-room that was very fresh and neat, I was tired and depressed, in the condition in which I needed some one to sustain me. And Mamma was crying. Oh, dear!
We must set to work very, very quickly to look about us. There is nothing I hate like changing.
New streets, strange faces, and no Mediterranean. Only the miserable Tiber. I am utterly wretched when I am in a new city. I shut myself up in my room to collect my scattered wits a little.
Tuesday, January 4th, 1876.
Yesterday Mamma wrote to B——, the brother of the empress's physician, and to-day he came to our house. He devotes himself to painting. After this visit, we went out. Oh! the ugly city, the impure air! What a deplorable mixture of ancient magnificence and modern filth!
We went through the Corso, the Via Gregoriana, the Forum of Hadrian, the Forum of Rome, we saw the gates of Septimus Severus, and Constantine, the Via Pia, the Coliseum, but everything is still vague, I don't recognise myself. The drive on the Pincio is charming, the band was playing, but there were not many people when we were there. Statues, statues everywhere. What would Rome be without statues? From the summit of the Pincio we looked at the dome of St. Peter and also the whole city. I am glad to find it is not over large, it will be easier to know.
On the drive we were amused to meet the S——'s, A——, and P—— of Rome. The sun did not appear, and the weather was dull and dreary.