Too Expensive a Place

1895

Paul Lacroix, a French writer and bibliophile, was at one time seriously out of health and took refuge in Italy. Bronchitis had fastened itself upon him, and his pallor and general feebleness of appearance were so marked that he sometimes saw people point the finger at him in the street and say to each other in an undertone, "A consumptive!"

He had taken lodgings in Rome, when, one day, the proprietor of the house mounted the stairs, rapped at the door and came in. Lacroix was just then in a coughing paroxysm.

"Signor," began the householder, "who is responsible for you?"

"What do you mean?" asked the astonished Frenchman.

"If you should die, who would pay the expenses?"

"I hope not to die yet awhile," answered Lacroix. "Besides I am not very ambitious. A modest burial would suit me."

"But who will pay me?"

"Why, man, I pay you myself every week!"

"No, no. I am speaking of this bed, this armchair, this table, this carpet — everything in the chamber. Everything will have to be burned after the death of a consumptive."

"My dear sir," said Lacroix, "I am not rich enough to die in Rome. I will go to Naples."

The next day, indeed, he set out for southern Italy, but he lived for many years to tell the story of his banishment from the Holy City. — Youth's Companion.

Boats to Prevent Suicide

1906

For the saving of would-be suicides, the municipality of Rome has decided to employ police motor boats on the Tiber.


Decided Horse Committed Suicide

In a lawsuit at Aberdeen, Washington, over a horse whose death the owner attributed to a man who had hired it, the court decided the animal had committed suicide.


Suicide Statistics

Sundays from 9 to 12 at night is the favorite time for women to commit suicide. Taking all days into consideration, more men kill themselves than women in the proportion of seven to two.


"Anatomy of Melancholy"

Robert Burton published the "Anatomy of Melancholy" at 45. It was written to relieve the strain of mind bordering on insanity.

Treasures of the Sea

1903

The sea around the shores of Greece is full of treasures. A little time ago the divers were bringing up the statues lost when the ship which was taking them to Rome was wrecked over 2000 years ago. Now the relics of the battle of Navarino, which was fought in 1827, are being fished up, and a number of old bronze cannon, swords, guns and pistols have been recovered from the Turkish and Egyptian ships. — Tit-Bits.


Household Sermons

The best sermons that ever were written to make men good husbands were written to recipes. — New York Press.

Mrs. Minnie Crippen Writes of Interesting Experiences in Rome

Iowa, 1914

She and Miss Shurtieff of Chicago Pleasantly Located, but Weather Has Been Disagreeable — Speaks of Social Life, Churches and Points of Interest

An interesting letter received by Mrs. Myrtle I. Weishaar from Mrs. Minnie M. Crippen of Waterloo, who is touring Europe, was read at the meeting of the Woman's Improvement club this week with Mrs. C. C. Lindner. The letter, written at Rome, is as follows:

"It is on my conscience that I should be writing to you. By the time this reaches Waterloo Christmas and New Year's festivities will be past and the club will be meeting again in regular session. I was told when we came here that Rome had a winter — a rainy season. It was a long time coming this year, and it seems to have arrived. It rains every day and has become damp and unpleasant for getting about — so much so that I am not now getting out. Everyone has a cold. They tell us the this season is of short duration; that by February the winter is practically over. There is no freezing and the flower stands show an abundance of roses, carnations, violets and all sorts of beautiful blossoms. The fruit vendors are everywhere with their carts of oranges, chestnuts, apples, etc.

"Sunshine is needed in Italy just now, and it is not sunny Italy, at least at the present writing.

"This is about the beginning of 'the season' here. The first of next month the hotels put up their prices and until after Easter there will be very many tourists.

"It is more wintry elsewhere than here and by comparison this climate is pleasanter.

Social Affairs

"Alice (Miss Alice Shurtleff) is full of enthusiasm and has a big party on hand for Christmas eve. Young people from the school — painters, sculptors and archaeologists — are going to be entertained at Prof. Hendrickson's, and the girls are busy with decorations and getting ready for games. Then there is to be a Christmas dinner and a tree. Our home here is most delightful and home-like. We are so well satisfied that we have changed from where we first stayed. The hostesses are Italian ladies, very competent. One is an artist, another a teacher. All but one are signorina (maiden ladies). When you want to stay awhile in Rome I will give you this address. It has a peculiar arrangement of rooms. Most of these places are old palaces, you know, and not built for the purposes for which they are now used.

"I am writing on both sides of the paper to save weight. One often has funny experiences with postage here, and you cannot understand why. Often they will attach a penalty and make the fellow at the other end of the line pay it, when there really is not any too much weight. So I try to get my paper well covered.

Sociability Among Americans

"Prof. Carter is at the head of the American school of classics here in Rome, and they live at the Villa Aurelia, a most beautiful place. Mrs. Carter entertains most sumptuously and on New Year's eve there is to be a reception and dance, to which we are invited. The ladies all have their afternoons and as Alice is fond of making friends, we go quite often. There is a great deal of sociability among the Americans residing in Rome, and their homes seem very beautifully and artistically furnished. Many of them have those lovely Italian gardens, with balconies overbanking, and if on the sunny side of the building, and there they usually build them, they are always warm, so that after lunch they will serve their coffee or tea on the balcony, and with the creeping vines and tropical trees and foliage you are reminded of things that you have read, or dreamed about.

Audience With Pope

"Alice had a letter of introduction to the man at the head of the American school of priests and he arranged for us to have an audience with his holiness, Pope Pius X. So we proceeded to the Vatican at the appointed hour. The pontifical palace of the Vatican is composed of many united in one, built at different periods and designed by the most celebrated architects. It has three stories and possesses immense halls, vast courts, innumerable suites of rooms, unrivaled museums and galleries of sculptures and paintings. On the right of the entrance is posted the Swiss guards, who present a striking appearance clad in their picturesque uniforms, first designed by Michael Angelo. We passed the inner staircase, which leads to the court of St. Damascus, then to the royal staircase, a most majestic flight of steps leading to the royal hall. We were met there by more guards in costume, and received by a very grand looking man, dressed in crimson brocade velvet, who spoke English very well and was most cordial, telling us just what to do about our wraps and veils. You understand that for a visit to the pope you must wear a black veil draped over your head and be dressed in black, the gentlemen in full dress. There were some beautiful veils there that day. Then we were shown into a large, elegantly furnished and decorated room. There were quite a number there that morning, many sisters of charity of different orders, and visitors — tourists I judge. We were seated along the wall and I began studying the lovely frescoes and beautiful ceiling. Heavy crimson draperies were hung at the end of the room and I expected to see the pope pass from one of them into this room. The light was subdued and it was very impressive, but after awhile there was a stir and we were all shown through a number of more rooms, all elegant and gorgeous, with beautiful paintings and tapestries, the finest I ever expect to see, and into a suite of lovely rooms with beautiful Persian and Oriental carpets and rugs, like silken draperies, and lovely lace curtains letting in the full sunlight and seeming home-like and inviting.

Pope Clad in White

"There the pope met us dressed all in white, in fine harmony with his white hair and cap, and his mild and benevolent face. He received us kindly and gave us his blessing. Everyone knelt. There were three rooms filled with sisters. The cardinal that we hear of so often as never leaving the pope was there, and he certainly has an unusual personality. One could not help feeling the vigilance of his eyes. They seemed to see everywhere at once and he was so supple and graceful in his movements. The personal guards of the pope are so gorgeously attired as those of the king. In the post card that I send you you will see them just as they appeared. The very last one is one of the Swiss guards; the others are the body guards. The pope is the foremost one in white. He is walking in his garden. One is admitted to the garden by getting a permit, and one lovely day I asked for one and received it, so wandered all through the garden. I am glad I saw it before it rained so much for it was such a warm, nice day and the flowers and fruit were all so perfect. We live right in the piazza of one of the oldest churches, the Santa Maria Maggiore.

Relics Displayed

"The following relics kept in the church will be shown to the public on Christmas as is usual: Some pieces of stone from the stable in Bethlehem, where Jesus was born; the swaddling bands in which the infant was wrapped; some of the hay, which was spread in the manger; and, most important of all, six pieces of wood with which the manger was lined. There are the relics of the sacred culle, or cradle, brought from Bethlehem to Rome in the seventh century, and placed in this Basilica.

"At 6:40 a. m. the chapter of the Basilica goes in procession from the papal altar to the chapel of the sacristy, where the holy relics are on exhibition. (They are placed where they can be inspected only on Christmas eve.) The relics are then borne in procession through the church to the papal altar, to remain there on exhibition until 5 p. m. The music is very good at the service and the whole service is one of the finest in Rome.

"I suppose you know the whole story of the finding of Mona Lisa. It is now in Rome and on exhibition at the museum in the Villa Borghese. A number have been out to see it from this house. They say the crowds are such that you have to get into line. It will be here until the 27th. If I don't see it here, I will likely have the opportunity in Paris. I wish you a Happy New Year.
"Very sincerely,
"MINNIE M. CRIPPEN."

—Waterloo Evening Courier, Waterloo, Iowa, Jan. 17, 1914, p. 3.

Now a Museum, Where Keats and Shelley Lived in Rome

1909

Opened As Museum

House Where Keats and Shelley Lived in Rome

Flowers and Vines Make Enchanting Bower of Little Gallery Where One Can Fancy Two Famous Poets Chatted Together

Rome. — Early in April, in the presence of King Victor Emmanuel III, of Italy, the Keats-Shelley memorial house in Rome was opened and consecrated as a museum in memory of the two English poets who were friends. Henceforth this house, situated on the right hand side of the old Spanish stairs, in the Piazza di Spagna, will be a new resort for English-speaking tourists and lovers of these poets when in the Eternal city. The house has been bought by English and American lovers of poesy. It cost $60,000. It is a modest house, which in Keats' and Shelley's day was a pension, or boarding house.

There is a quiet seriousness about the premises, as if the shadow still lingered where young Keats breathed his last sigh. In the little entrance hang some old engravings, which give one an idea of the Piazza di Spagna before the Spanish stairs were built and after their construction. The house has been renovated. The central room has been transformed into a reading room. Around the walls run the book shelves made of dark walnut, the floor is covered by thick Turkish rugs. Sir Moses Ezekiel's bust of Shelley holds a prominent place in this room, as well as that made of Shelley by Severn. It is rather hard to put oneself in touch with the two poetic spirits who lived in this house, amid the babble of the tourists, and the questions with which they ply the civil Italian gentleman who acts as curator. I am quite sure he must be almost distracted after his morning's work, for the house is only open every day to the public from ten o'clock until one p. m. One of the little rooms leads out on the dearest little terrazionoo, which in these lovely spring days is a display of beautiful flowers and creeping vines. Here one can easily fancy Keats and Shelley resting and chatting together. In another room the book shelves hold 200 editions of Keats' and Shelley's works. Most of these being recent editions, they have little value except as evidence of the continuing fame of the poets — but is not that worth while to show In this way?

By far the most interesting room is the little bedchamber in which Keats died, with its two windows, one of which looks out over the Piazza di Spagna and the other on the picturesque stairs leading up to the Church delta Trinita de Monte. From that window one can gaze down on the loveliest flower market to the world all the year round, and watch the ever passing throng going up and down the Spanish steps. Many of the artists' models group themselves about, or drop off for their open air siestas in the most natural of poses.

In this small bedroom Keats died in the arms of his faithful friend, Severn The ceiling and the little fireplace have been left just as when Keats lived in the room. In this little sanctuary is the death mask of Keats, and a small lock of his chestnut brown hair. In a sealed vase is a little bone which Trelawney kept from the heart — "cer cordium" — when the flames reduced all that was once Percy Bysshe Shelley's frame to a handful of clean ashes.

This little house where the two poets stayed in Rome puts us in touch with them on different lines from their graves, in the beautiful little English cemetery, under the shadow of the pyramid of Calus Cestius, and the walls of old Rome. There are several autograph letters of Keats and Shelley carefully treasured in the little museum, as well as their songs set to music. It is pleasant to feel that these poetic friends — such lovers of Italy — lived and enjoyed all Italy had to offer them in the fullness of her wondrous beauty, art and history, and when life's fitful fever ended for them, they rest in her loving bosom.

The Water Supply of Rome

1874

In the course of a lecture on Roman antiquities, delivered at the Royal Institution, London, Mr. J. H. Parker said: The celebrated Aqua Marcia has recently been again brought into Rome, and is rapidly coming into use, being considered the finest drinking water in the world, always cool even in the hottest weather. On the river Anio itself, where a fine cascade falls over the rock, there is a deep rocky gorge; and here great engineering works were made in the time of Claudius and Nero.

A great wall, 12 feet thick, built of large blocks of stone, was erected across the river at the lower part of the gorge, forming a dam of 100 feet high and 12 feet thick, to enclose a portion, perhaps 100 yards long, between the dam and the natural cascade; the water was made to fall over the dam, which thus became the cascade; but at one end of it a specus was made below the level of the surface of the water, so that the water must always flow through that specus, and consequently through Rome, before any of it could fall over the cascade.

This magnificent and most useful piece of engineering continued in use for centuries. It was destroyed in the fourteenth century by an ignorant monk, who was annoyed by a temporary flood in the upper country, which overflowed the meadows near his monastery, and, to relieve that, he made a hole at the bottom of the great dam. The force of the water soon carried all before it, and caused a great flood over all the lower country, even to the Tiber, and did immense mischief — even the walls of Rome were injured.

Mr. Parker said that he had not time to describe the thermae, or great public baths, to supply which most of the aqueducts were made, but he could not conclude without mentioning that the opinion, commonly entertained, that the ancient Romans were ignorant of the fact that water will rise to its level, is entirely a popular delusion. At every half mile of the aqueducts, on their course from the foot of the hills to Rome, each aqueduct forms an angle, to break the force of the water, and at that angle a great reservoir is made, with a piscina or filtering place at one end. Each piscina consists of four vaulted chambers, two above and two below. The water enters into the top of the first upper chamber; it then falls through a hole in the vault into the first lower chamber, then passes through small holes in the intermediate wall into the second lower chamber, then rises again through a hole in the vault into the second upper chamber, and then follows its course at the same level as it originally entered, depositing its mud in the lower chamber as it passed. Each piscina is therefore made upon the principle of water finding its level.

They used the large stone specus, or aqueducts, instead of ordinary pipes, because they could not depend either upon their leaden pipes or their terra cotta pipes to resist the force of such a stream of water. Nothing but the concrete stone was strong enough. At the present time, the cast iron pipes of the new company are bursting every day in the streets of Rome to such an extent that the managers of the company fear that the expense will be ruinous to them. This seems to show that the old Romans were better engineers than we are.