w fantastics who hold a memory of the ancient world dearer
than any mechanic triumph of to-day. If only one could believe that the
Arsenal signified substantial good to Italy! Too plainly it means
nothing but the exhaustion of her people in the service of a base ideal.

The confines of this new town being so vague, much trouble is given to
that noble institution, the _dazio_. Scattered far and wide in a dusty
wilderness, stand the little huts of the officers, vigilant on every
road or by-way to wring the wretched soldi from toilsome hands. As
became their service, I found these gentry anything but amiable; they
had commonly an air of _ennui_, and regarded a stranger with surly
suspicion.

When I was back again among the high new houses, my eye, wandering in
search of any smallest point of interest, fell on a fresh-painted
inscription:--

"ALLA MAGNA GRAECIA. STABILIMENTO
IDROELETTROPATICO."

was well meant. At the sign of "Magna Graecia" one is willing to accept
"hydroelectropathic" as a late echo of Hellenic speech.

CHAPTER V

DULCE GALAESI FLUMEN

Taranto has a very interesting Museum. I went there with an
introduction to the curator, who spared no trouble in pointing out to
me all that was best worth seeing. He and I were alone in the little
galleries; at a second or third visit I had the Museum to myself, save
for an attendant who seemed to regard a visitor as a pleasant novelty,
and bestirred himself for my comfort when I wanted to make sketches.
Nothing is charged for admission, yet no one enters. Presumably, all
the Tarentines who care for archaeology have already been here, and
strangers are few.

Upon the shelves are seen innumerable miniature busts, carved in some
kind of stone; thought to be simply portraits of private persons. One
peers into the faces of men, women, and children, vaguely conjecturing
their date, their circumstances; some of them may have dwelt in the old
time on this very spot of ground now covered by the Museum. Like other
people who grow too rich and comfortable, the citizens of Tarentum
loved mirth and mockery; their Greek theatre was remarkable for
irreverent farce, for parodies of the great drama of Athens. And here
is testimony to the fact: all manner of comic masks, of grotesque
visages; mouths distorted into impossible grins, eyes leering and
goggling, noses extravagant. I sketched a caricature of Medusa, the
anguished features and snaky locks travestied with