in the morning. In
the Via Babuino and the neighboring streets, which the sun has not yet
visited, the morning cold is a little sharp. _Matutina parum cautos jam
frigora mordent_. But the magnificent flight of the great stair--there
are properly eleven flights, divided by as many spacious and handsomely
balustraded landing-places, each flight consisting of twelve steps, and
all of white marble--with its southern exposure has almost the
temperature of a hothouse. There are two or three beggars basking in the
sunshine near the bottom of the steps. But our models do not consort
with these. Not only are they not beggars, but they belong to a
different caste and a different race. We leisurely saunter up the huge
stair, pausing at each landing-place to turn and enjoy the view over the
city, and the gradually rising luminous haze around the cupola of St.
Peter's, and the heights of Monte Mario clear against the brilliant blue
sky. It is not till we are at the topmost flight that we come upon the
objects of our ramble. There we fall in with a group of them, consisting
perhaps of three or four girls, as many children, a man in the prime of
life, and an aged patriarch. There is not the smallest possibility that
we should pass them unobserved. They are far too remarkable and too
unlike anything else around us. Even those who have no eye for the
specialties of type which characterize the human countenance will not
fail to be struck by the peculiarities of the costume of the group of
figures before us. At the first glance the eye is caught by the quantity
of bright color in their dresses. The older women wear the picturesque
white, flatly-folded linen cloth on their heads which is the usual dress
of the _contadine_ women in the neighborhood of Rome. The younger have
their hair ornamented with some huge filagree pin or other device of a
fashion which proclaims itself to the most unskilled eye as that of some
two or three hundred years ago. All have light bodices of bright blue or
red stuff laced in front, and short petticoats of some equally bright
color, not falling below the ankle. But the most singular portion of the
costume is the universally-worn apron. It consists of a piece of very
stout and coarsely-woven wool of the brightest blue, green or yellow,
about twenty inches broad by thirty-three in length, across which, near
the top and near the bottom, run two stripes, each about eight
inches wide, of hand-worked embroidery of the