"Mrs. Vyse and her son have gone to Rome," said Lucy, giving
the news that interested her least. "Do you know the Vyses?"
"Oh, not that way back. We can never have too much of the dear
Piazza Signoria."
"They're nice people, the Vyses. So clever--my idea of what's
really clever. Don't you long to be in Rome?"
"I die for it!"
The Piazza Signoria is too stony to be brilliant. It has no
grass, no flowers, no frescoes, no glittering walls of marble or
comforting patches of ruddy brick. By an odd chance--unless we
believe in a presiding genius of places--the statues that relieve
its severity suggest, not the innocence of childhood, nor the
glorious bewilderment of youth, but the conscious achievements of
maturity. Perseus and Judith, Hercules and Thusnelda, they have
done or suffered something, and though they are immortal,
immortality has come to them after experience, not before. Here,
not only in the solitude of Nature, might a hero meet a goddess,
or a heroine a god.
"Charlotte!" cried the girl suddenly.
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