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Updated: April 30, 2025
After I had eaten in this old town I was preparing to make for Calestano and to cross the first high spur of the Apennines that separated me from it, when I saw, as I left the place, a very old church; and I stayed a moment and looked at carvings which were in no order, but put in pell-mell, evidently chosen from some older building.
Now they were as far off as childhood, and I saw them for the last time. All this I drew. Then finding a post directing me to a side road for Calestano, I followed it down and down into the valley beyond; and up the walls of this second valley as the evening fell I heard the noise of the water running, as the Taro had run, a net of torrents from the melting snows far off.
They examined the sketch-book critically, as behoved southerners who are mostly of an artistic bent: but they found no passport. Then I added, speaking distinctly, 'I can speak French and Latin. Have you a priest in Calestano, and does he know Latin? This was a fine touch. They winced, and parried it by saying that the Sindaco knew French.
Thus I loved the people of Calestano, especially for this strange adventure they had given me; and next day, having slept in a human room, I went at sunrise up the mountain sides beyond and above their town, and so climbed by a long cleft the second spur of the Apennines: the spur that separated me from the third river, the Parma.
For there was no track of any kind and no bridge, and Calestano stood opposite me, a purple cluster of houses in the dusk against the farther mountain side.
What awaited me in Calestano was ill favour, a prison, release, base flattery, and a very tardy meal. It is our duty to pity all men. It is our duty to pity those who are in prison. It is our duty to pity those who are not in prison. How much more is it the duty of a Christian man to pity the rich who cannot ever get into prison?
Certainly the bulk of it would be mule-paths or rough gullies how much I could not tell. The only way I could work it with my wretched map was to note the names of towns' or hamlets more or less on the line, and to pick my way from one to another. I wrote them down as follows: Fornovo, Calestano, Tizzano, Colagna the last at the foot of the final pass.
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