On one of those golden February mornings, when the pretty English girls tramp through the long grass of the Villa Borghese, gathering the perfumed violets into those modest little bouquets, that peep out from their setting of green leaves, like faith struggling with jealousy, Caper, Rocjean, and a good-natured German, named Von Bluhmen, made an excursion out in the Campagna.
They hired a one-horse vetturo in the piazza di Spagna, and packing in their sketching materials and a basket well filled with luncheon and bottles of red wine, started off, soon reaching the Saint Sebastian gate. Further on, they passed the tomb of Cecilia Metella, and saw streaming over the Campagna the Roman hunt-hounds, twenty couples, making straight tails after a red fox, while a score of well-mounted horsemen—here and there a red coat and white breeches—came riding furiously after. Along the road-side were handsome open carriages, filled with wit and beauty, talent and petticoats; and bright were the blue eyes, and red the healthy cheeks of the English girls, as they saw how well their countrymen and lovers led off the chase. Englishmen have good legs.
Continuing along the Appian way, either side of which was bordered by tombs crumbling to decay; some of them covered with nature's lace, the graceful ivy, others with only a pile of turf above them, others with shattered column and mutilated statue at their base—the occupants of the vetturo were silent. They saw before them the wide plain, shut in on the horizon by high mountains, with snow-covered peaks and sides, while they were living in the warmth of an American June morning; the breeze that swept over them was gentle and exhilarating; in the long grass waving by the way-side, they heard the shrill cries of the cicadas; while the clouds, driven along the wide reach of heaven, assuming fantastic forms, and in changing light and shadow mantling the distant mountains, gave our trio a rare chance to study cloud-effects to great advantage.
'I say, driver, what's your name?' asked Rocjean of the vetturino.
'Cæsar, padrone mio,' answered the man.
'Are you descended from the celebrated Julius?' asked Caper, laughing.
'Yes, sir, my grandfather's name was Julius.'
'"That every like is not the same, O Cæsar!
The heart of Brutus yearns to think upon,"
soliloquized Caper; and as by this time they had reached a place where both he and Rocjean thought a fine view of the ruined aqueduct might be taken, they ordered the driver to stop, and taking out their sketching materials, sent him back to Rome, telling him to come out for them about four o'clock, when they would be ready to return.