Page:Life in the Old World - Vol. II.djvu/421

Rh with a more than usually open, kind, and winning manner.

The Lunatic Asylum, at an hour's distance from Naples, is celebrated from the great merits of the gentleman who is at its head. In the benevolent institutions of Naples every thing seems to depend upon the fitness or unfitness of him who is at their head. Above him there is merely the king; the king resides at Gaeta and never thinks of any alterations. Well is it for these institutions when no alterations are needed.

But what shall I say of thee, thou “most precious home for”—something, I do not know what to call it, but which is called “the education of noble young ladies;”—but in what? and to what purpose?—I could not properly understand—the beautiful convent, which greatly resembles a palace, where lovely women, in golden yellow vails, enjoy life, somewhat in the manner of the gold-fish, which sun themselves in the marble basin of the court!? The convent stands in the Largo del Mercato, and the good nuns made us more than once observant that from the grated windows and the piazza of the roof, they could see every thing which went forward there. They were highly delighted with and not a little proud of a great number of pictures of Christ and the Virgin, which were worthy the admiration of the gold-fish. In the mean time both old and young, were so friendly, so cheerful in their appearance and manners—gold-colored vails thrown back, produced such a sunny effect—so agreeable in their mode of behavior, that it was impossible not to like them and not to feel one's self happy amongst them.