Memories of that fortnight at Orvieto remain, when so much is forgotten. The fine cathedral, the lovely Fra Angelico and Signorelli paintings, the Etruscan tombs, the view of the Valley of the Tiber and the Umbrian Mountains, the well of St. Patrizio, with its winding stairway cut from the rock for water-carrying donkeys, my mother’s delight in my renewed health, and Crawford’s extraordinary personality coloring everything with the roseate glow of his joie de vivre.
“To-night, I will make you, my aunt, a dish whose like you have never tasted!” he exclaimed one evening, when the macaroni was scorched, no lettuce was to be had, and it looked as if we must go to bed fasting. He called for white bread, olive oil, salt, pepper, and vinegar and compounded what he called “a bread salad.”
“Impossible to have anything better! Good wine, good oil, good company; what more do you want?” he cried in triumph, as we praised his dish. We adjourned to the terrace of the poor little inn.
“We only lack music,” some one suggested.
“I will sing you the song taught me by Amerigo, the old contadino, whose vines I helped prune this morning.”
Crawford put a new string on his guitar, tuned the instrument, and sang one of those touching songs of “the people” that are more melodious and more dramatic in Italy than in any other country.
“Sor Colonello, me dia il congedo, per andar ne mia ca’, per andar ne mia ca’,
Per veder la mia amorosa che in letto se ne sta!”
Later, by his novels, Crawford was to teach the English reading world to love the simple Italian ways. He taught me so much of Italy that I am glad to find, from an old letter, that he learned something that was worth while from me,—the American point of view. I was frankly horrified at the lack of purpose in his life. This handsome, gifted, brilliant man of twenty-four seemed perfectly content to live at home, idle, and supported by his mother.
Crawford’s mother, for years “a leader” of the Anglo-American colony, was much beloved.
“Madama Terry is the most simpatica American I know!” I once heard Rudolpho Lanciani, the archeologist exclaim. Most people agreed with him. Her popularity was deserved, for her kindness was unfailing,