Of
These I Will Speak At Length In The Next Chapter.
About half or
three-quarters of a mile higher up the road than the castle is
Mesocco itself.
CHAPTER XVIII - Mesocco, S. Bernardino, and S. Maria in Calanca
At the time of my first visit there was an inn kept by one
Desteffanis and his wife, where I stayed nearly a month, and was
made very comfortable. Last year, however, Jones and I found it
closed, but did very well at the Hotel Toscani. At the Hotel
Desteffanis there used to be a parrot which lived about loose and
had no cage, but did exactly what it liked. Its name was Lorrito.
It was a very human bird; I saw it eat some bread and milk from its
tin one day and then sidle along a pole to a place where there was
a towel hanging. It took a corner of the towel in its claw, wiped
its beak with it, and then sidled back again. It would sometimes
come and see me at breakfast; it got from a chair-back on to the
table by dropping its head and putting its round beak on to the
table first, making a third leg as it were of its head; it would
then waddle to the butter and begin helping itself. It was a great
respecter of persons and knew the landlord and landlady perfectly
well. It yawned just like a dog or a human being, and this not
from love of imitation but from being sleepy.
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