en they look ill, cheerless,
burdened before their time; at Catanzaro they are as robust and lively
as heart could wish, and their voices ring delightfully upon the ear.
It is not only, I imagine, a result of the fine air they breathe; no
doubt they are exceptional among the poor children of the south in
getting enough to eat. The town has certain industries, especially the
manufacture of silk; one feels an atmosphere of well-being; mendicancy
is a rare thing.

Fruits abounded, and were very cheap; if one purchased from a stall the
difficulty was to carry away the abundance offered for one's smallest
coin. Excellent oranges cost about a penny the half-dozen. Any one who
is fond of the prickly fig should go to Catanzaro. I asked a man
sitting with a basket of them at a street corner to give me the worth
of a soldo (a half-penny); he began to fill my pocket, and when I cried
that it was enough, that I could carry no more, he held up one
particularly fine fruit, smiled as only an Italian can, and said, with
admirable politeness, "_Questo per complimento_!" I ought to have
shaken hands with him.

Even when I had grown accustomed to the place, its singular appearance
of incompleteness kept exciting my attention. I had never seen a town
so ragged at the edges. If there had recently been a great
conflagration and almost all the whole city were being rebuilt, it
would have looked much as it did at the time of my visit. To enter the
post-office one had to clamber over heaps of stone and plaster, to
stride over tumbled beams and jump across great puddles, entering at
last by shaky stairs a place which looked like the waiting-room of an
unfinished railway station. The style of building is peculiar, and
looks so temporary as to keep one constantly in mind of the threatening
earthquake. Most of the edifices, large and small, public and private,
are constructed of rubble set in cement, with an occasional big,
rough-squared stone to give an appearance of solidity, and perhaps a
few courses of bricks in the old Roman style. If the building is of
importance, this work is hidden beneath stucco; otherwise it remains
like the mere shell of a house, and is disfigured over all its surface
with great holes left by the scaffolding. Religion supplies something
of adornment; above many portals is a rudely painted Virgin and Child,
often, plainly enough, the effort of a hand accustomed to any tool
rather than that of the artist. On the dwelling