United States or Somalia ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
He was haunted with the idea that some circumstance, most important to be known, and perhaps easily discoverable, had hitherto been overlooked, and that, if he could lay hold of this one clew, it would guide him directly in the track of Hilda's footsteps. With this purpose in view, he went, every morning, to the Via Portoghese, and made it the starting-point of fresh investigations.
It is with a kindred sentiment, that we now follow the course of our story back through the Flaminian Gate, and, treading our way to the Via Portoghese, climb the staircase to the upper chamber of the tower where we last saw Hilda.
Betimes in the morning, therefore, Kenyon went back to the Via Portoghese, before the slant rays of the sun had descended halfway down the gray front of Hilda's tower.
When they reached the Via Portoghese, and approached Hilda's tower, the doves, who were waiting aloft, flung themselves upon the air, and came floating down about her head.
I passed by the tower in the Via Portoghese to-day, and observed that the nearest shop appears to be for the sale of cotton or linen cloth. . . . . The upper window of the tower was half open; of course, like all or almost all other Roman windows, it is divided vertically, and each half swings back on hinges. . . . . Last week a fritter-establishment was opened in our piazza.
In selecting local habitations for the creatures of his imagination, he strolled into the Via Portoghese, and there found the "Virgin's Shrine," which, with minor modifications, was to become the home of Hilda. I quote from his journal the description of the actual place as he saw it.
Thompson took me into the Via Portoghese, and showed me an old palace, above which rose not a very customary feature of the architecture of Rome a tall, battlemented tower. At one angle of the tower we saw a shrine of the Virgin, with a lamp, and all the appendages of those numerous shrines which we see at the street-corners, and in hundreds of places about the city.
Thompson took me into the Via Portoghese, and showed me an old palace, above which rose not a very customary feature of the architecture of Rome a tall, battlemented tower. At one angle of the tower we saw a shrine of the Virgin, with a lamp, and all the appendages of those numerous shrines which we see at the street-corners, and in hundreds of places about the city.
"The tower in the Via Portoghese," he says, "has battlements and machicolations, and the upper half of it is covered with gray, ancient-looking stucco. On the summit, at one corner, is the shrine of the Virgin, rising quite above the battlements, and with its lamp before it.
I passed by the tower in the Via Portoghese to-day, and observed that the nearest shop appears to be for the sale of cotton or linen cloth. . . . The upper window of the tower was half open; of course, like all or almost all other Roman windows, it is divided vertically, and each half swings back on hinges. . . . Last week a fritter-establishment was opened in our piazza.
Word Of The Day