The Fortnightly Review: No. CCCCLXIII, New Series [‎657v] (205/239)

174
NOSTALGIA.
squashing and treading upon each other like flocks of stupid
sheep? And was this St. Peter’s? Regina had expected it
larger. That the Pincio? It was not beautiful. The Colosseum?
She had supposed it more sublime. Where were the grandeur
and magnificence ? She could discover neither; everything appeared
melancholy and hollow. She felt no astonishment at anything
except her own impressions, and found a dreary pleasure in the
thought that among all the provincials who came to Rome to be
overwhelmed, she alone saw things in their true light. Sometimes
she made exaggerated display of her own superiority; but self-
examination convinced her it was tainted by personal rancour, and
she felt sadder than ever. What was it she wanted ? What did she
expect? She felt sick of some deep wound. In vain she told herself
the winter would pass, she would soon leave this distasteful house
where everything seemed to freeze and suffocate her. Alas! her own
sweet home was never, never to be found again!
After hurried visits to monuments and museums, and a promise
of more leisurely re-inspection—promise made by all who fix their
dwelling in Rome, and seldom fulfilled under months and years—
Regina and Antonio began the (more interesting) round of apparta-
menti to be let.
Between the salary of the one and the dowry of the other
they counted on a fixed income of 3,000 lire. Antonio received a
small addition from the princess, who had, however, other advisers,
and only consulted him in certain affairs which brought her into
collision with the Treasury. The means of the young couple would
not therefore allow them more than a small “ apartment ” at fifty
or sixty lire a month. They began their search in Via Massimo
d Azegho, where a possibly suitable suite of rooms was to fall vacant
in January. Regina, oppressed with doubts, entered a lordly
entrance hall, from which led a principal staircase of fine marble
Ihe second stair was perfectly dark at the bottom, but got brighter
and brighter as it went up. Regina began to count its steps.
“Eleven, twenty-two, thirty-three, forty-four, fifty-five, sixty-
thiee you don t tell me there are more? ’’
She stopped, her heart beating violently. Antonio smiled
indulgently ; he took his little queen by the arm and helped her up;
the higher they went, the steeper the steps became.
^ Eighty-eight; ninety-nine. Goodness! more?’’
“ Courage! ’’
“ A hundred and ten ! ’’
By the grace of God they had arrived; but before the door was
opened, the trembling and panting wife had said bitterly to herself,
Is this where Regina is to live? Never! never^ ’’
The “ apartment ’’ was suitable and pretty; a real nest in the heart
of the city’s great forest of stone. Two windows looked out on a
garden, the rest on a court none too clean.
Regina declared at once that there was no air and no light, and in
fact that the ro-ms would not do at all.