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Not only did he charge thrice the reasonable sum for the meal I could not eat, but his bill for my driver's colazione contained such astonishing items that I had to question the lad as to what he had really consumed. It proved to be a very ugly case of extortion, and the tone of sullen menace with which my arguments were met did not help to smooth things.
Not even credit would they give, affirmed Costanza, who had been spending a great deal and was anxious to pay all her relations what was owed them and also to find out how her mistresses took it, for that day's meals. Soon it would be the hour of colazione, and how could there be colazione without meat, without fish, without eggs, without Mrs.
It is then heated, the cream raised and churned, and the pats of butter, daintily set on green leaves, delivered for a seven-o'clock breakfast. Finally la colazione is spread on our table by the window. A neat white cloth covers it, and we have gold-rimmed plates and cups of delicate china.
I noticed that, as one goes southward in Italy, the later do ordinary people dine; appetite comes slowly in this climate. Between colazione at midday and pranzo at eight, or even half-past, what an abysm of time! Of course, the Tarantine never reads; the only bookshop I could discover made a poorer display than even that at Cosenza it was not truly a bookseller's at all, but a fancy stationer's.
It was now dinner-time, . . . . and we had, in the first place, some fish from the pestiferous lake; not, I am sorry to say, the famous stewed eels which, Dante says, killed Pope Martin, but some trout. . . . . By the by, the meal was not dinner, but our midday colazione.
Colazione is Italian for a collection, a meeting, a seance, a sitting. Two or three persons having at different times intimated that if I would write an autobiography they would read it when they got leisure, I yield at last to this frenzied public demand and herewith tender my history. Ours is a noble house, and stretches a long way back into antiquity.
It was now dinner-time, . . . . and we had, in the first place, some fish from the pestiferous lake; not, I am sorry to say, the famous stewed eels which, Dante says, killed Pope Martin, but some trout. . . . By the by, the meal was not dinner, but our midday colazione.
All our ladies sleep after the colazione until the bathing hour. Do not you?" "Yes, we lie down. But to-day " "You must not break the habit. It is a necessity. My boat will be ready, and I must thank you for a delightful entertainment." His round eyes were fierce, but he commanded his voice. "A rive " "I will come with you to the house if you really will not stay a little longer."
But it was not to be; for at that moment the dull boom of the noon gun floated up out of far-off Florence, followed by the usual softened jangle of church-bells, Florentine and suburban, that bursts out in murmurous response; by labor-union law the COLAZIONE must stop; stop promptly, stop instantly, stop definitely, like the chosen and best of the breed of Hads.
"I know all about Peppina, Marchese," Hermione replied, quietly. "Truly? Ah!" His large round eyes were still fixedly staring at her. "Good-bye, Signora!" he said. "Thank you for a very charming colazione. And I shall look forward with all my heart to the evening you have kindly suggested." "I shall write directly I have arranged with Don Emilio." "Thank you! Thank you! A rivederci, Signora."
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