Page:Life in the Old World - Vol. II.djvu/18

28 of Signora Teresa Ferucci, for the instruction of young ladies. This promises something! The ladies of the higher classes are also beginning, in a still more earnest manner than formerly, to look after their poor, ignorant sisters. But the Italian woman, has not, as yet, much of the gold of true cultivation to communicate.

Genoa, in her annexation to Piedmont, has also entered upon a path of citizenship-of-the-world which secures her future, and opens to her people a new period of greatness—that of humanity! The spirit of association—that fresh force of formation in constitutional states—is already in full activity in Piedmont, and collects the thinking portion of all classes for general popular undertakings in many directions, industrial, scientific, commercial. When this spirit begins to operate, life can never again stagnate, if only the noble gifts of life and cultivation are not confined merely to the few. The citizens of Genoa are now erecting a splendid monument to its great son, the discoverer of a world, Columbus. A good sign for Genoa!

I leave Genoa with regret. I would yet gladly ramble about for many days amidst its marble palaces and orange-terraces, and in its narrow lanes thronged with trafficking, striving, industrious people, noticing the handsome children, seeing the white pezottos fluttering in the wind, and glancing into the dark, fervent, Italian eyes; gladly would I yet be able to see for many a morning from my bed, the crimson of sunrise above the sea, and watch the evening inclose it in a ring of purple and gold,—hear the cheerful larum