Page:Life in the Old World - Vol. II.djvu/408

418 his hand, behind his back, and seems to say: “Were they indeed worth so much labor?”

Yes, indeed! What is the use of combating for merely earthly immortality?

I have heard from the learned Rabbi an old legend, taken, I believe, from the Jewish Talmud. “Anciently,” it says, “there was a city in which the air was so healthy and so full of the vigor of life that they who dwelt there never died. This was soon known, both far and wide, and people of birth and fortune hastened thither; and they lived there a long time. In a while, however, people saw them, one after another, stealing away, silently, that they might—be able to die.”

September 26th.—Wishing to visit some of the public institutions of Naples, I was informed that I must apply to the Minister of the Interior and of the Police, Bianchini, in order to do so. The Swiss banker, Mr. M., to whom I had a letter from Mr. Delarue of Genoa, and who had shown me much kindness, undertook, in the most polite manner, to convey my wishes to the Minister. The Minister replied that he wished to become personally acquainted with me. As I had heard Bianchini spoken of in Naples, as the only liberal and progressive man in the present ministry, it was very agreeable to me to make his acquaintance, and that also of his great work on political economy, Il Ben Vivere Sociale, which was celebrated for containing much excellent matter. Mr. M. drove me to his house in his carriage. It was still early in the day.

Entering a large room we found a great number of