emely unequal in size: the span of the largest is about a hundred and
sixty feet. The mass, the irregularity, the strength of these piles, the
dark river hurrying below, give the spot a grimness not often found on the
sunny side of the Alps. The castle has been altered by many successive
hands of course, for the history of Verona, like that of most Italian
principalities, is the old story of the house out of which one devil was
driven by seven worse ones: to Eccelino succeeded the Delle Scale, soon to
become as bad as he, and be driven forth by the Visconti of Milan, who in
their turn were expelled by the envious, despotic Venetians; and each as
they came and went added and took away something of the beauty and might
of the town.

[Illustration: VERONA, FROM THE GIARDINO GIUSTI.]

But there is a gayer side to Verona than any which we have yet recalled.
It was here that we first made acquaintance with many lively humors of
Italian street-life which we had not met with in the more northern cities.
Here we first noticed the eternal cooking in the open air, the roasting,
frying, frizzling which are for ever going on, the people stopping at
every few yards to eat macaroni, chestnuts, and Goodness knows what other
nameless messes, until we began to wonder whether anything were cooked and
eaten at home. Here too I saw the drollest and most charming bit of
harlequinade between a rascal boy and an old woman carrying a heavy vessel
of water. He popped out from under an archway and struck her a light tap
on the shoulder with a bit of hollow cane: she turned round, but he had
flown through an open window. On she trudged, and out he came as lightly
as he had gone, and following her on tiptoe tickled the back of her neck
with his wand: round she turned again, but he was gone too quickly for my
eyes this time. She set down her ewer and stared in every direction,
muttering curses: he came running swiftly down an alley, seized the ewer,
and with every respectful demonstration of relieving her of the burden
darted off with it in another direction. She hobbled after him, raining
maledictions: back he came with a pantomime of courteous surprise--What!
she did not wish to be assisted?--and set the vessel on a high ledge,
whence she had much ado to lift it down. As she did so, splash! half the
water was spilled: then her tormentor went through a dumb show of sympathy
and sorrow until the crone seemed like to burst with fury. At last he
broke