well," sez I, "let's not look ahead too much." Sez I, "Look
there up the mountain side and see the different shades of green
foliage and see what pretty little houses that are sot there and see
that lovely little village down in the valley."

So I got his mind off. The costooms of the peasant wimmen are very
pretty, a black bodice over a white chemise with short full sleeves
and bright colored shirts, and hat trimmed with long gay ribbons.

The men wear short, black trousers, open jackets and gay sashes,
broad-brimmed white hats with long blue ribbons streamin' down. Josiah
sez to me admirin'ly, "How such a costoom would brighten up our
cornfield if I and Ury appeared in 'em."

Sez I, "Ury would git his sash and hat ribbons all twisted up in his
hoe handle the first thing."

"They might be looped up," sez Josiah, "with rosettes."

We read about travel bein' a great educator, and truly I believe that
no tourist ever had any more idees about graftin' foreign customs onto
everyday life at home than Josiah Allen did. Now at Lake Como where we
see washerwomen at their work. They stood in the water with their
skirts rolled up to their knees, but they still had on their white
chemisettes and black bodices laced over them and pretty white caps
trimmed with gay ribbins.

And Josiah sez, "What a happy day it would be for me and Ury if we
could see you and Philury dressed like that for the wash-tub; it would
brighten the gloom of Mondays considerable."

Well, they did look pretty and I d'no but they could wash the clothes
jest as clean after they got used to it, but I shouldn't encourage
Philury to dress up so wash-days.

And it wuz jest so when we see on Lake Como its swarm of pleasure
gondolas glidin' hither and yon with the dark-eyed Italian ladies in
bright colored costooms and black lace mantillys thrown over their
pretty heads and fastened with coral pins, and the gondoliers in gay
attire keepin' time to the oars with their melogious voices. Josiah
whispered to me:

"What a show it would make in Jonesville, Samantha, to see you and me
in a gondola on the mill-dam, I with long, pale blue ribbins tied
round my best beaver hat and you with Mother Allen's long, black lace
veil that fell onto you, thrown graceful over your head, and both of
us singin' 'Balermy' or 'Coronation.' How uneek it would be!"

"Yes," sez I, "it would be uneek, uneeker than will ever come to
pass."

"Well, I d'no," sez he, "Ury and me could