Diary And Notes Of Horace Templeton, Esq. Volume II

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Lever Charles James. Diary And Notes Of Horace Templeton, Esq. Volume II

CHAPTER I

CHAPTER II. THE TYROL

CHAPTER III

CHAPTER IV. Villa Cimarosa, Logo di Como

CHAPTER V. La Villa Cimarosa, October

CHAPTER VI. Villa Cimarosa, Lake of Como

CHAPTER VII. La Spezzia

CHAPTER VIII. Lerici, Gulf of Spezzia

CHAPTER IX. Florence

CHAPTER X. SOME REVERIES ABOUT PLACES

CHAPTER XI. Villa Scalviati, near Florence

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Every traveller in the Tyrol must have remarked, that, wherever the way is difficult of access, or dangerous to traverse, some little shrine or statue is always to be seen, reminding him that a higher Power than his own watches over his safety, and suggesting the fitness of an appeal to Him who is “A very present help in time of trouble.”

Sometimes a rude painting upon a little board, nailed on a tree, communicates the escape and gratitude of a traveller; sometimes a still ruder fresco, on the very rock, tells where a wintry torrent had swept away a whole family, and calling on all pious Christians who pass that way to offer a prayer for the departed. There is an endless variety in these little “Votive Tablets,” which are never more touching than when their very rude poverty attests the simplest faith of a simple people. The Tyrolers are indeed such. Perhaps alone, of all the accessible parts of Europe, the Tyrol has preserved its primitive habits and tastes for centuries unchanged. Here and there, throughout the continent, to be sure, you will find some little “Dorf,” or village, whose old-world customs stand out in contrast to its neighbours; and where in their houses, dress, and bearing, the inhabitants seem unlike all else around them. Look more closely, however, and you will see that, although the grandmother is clothed in homespun, and wears her leathern pocket at her girdle, all studded with copper nails, that her grandaughter affects a printed cotton or a Swiss calico; and instead of the broad-brimmed and looped felt of the old “Bauer,” the new generation sport broad-cloth and beaver.

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“Now for it,” said he, at the close of a longer exposition of his intentions than was perhaps strictly necessary, “now for it, Starling! repeat after me – ‘Maria, Mutter Gottes, hülf uns!’”

The bird looked up in his face with an arch drollery that almost disconcerted the teacher. If a look could speak, that look said, as plainly as ever words could, —

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