As A Jeu D'esprit The Book Might Pass; But It Is
Deadly Serious.
Single men will always be found to perpetrate
monstrosities of literature; the marvel is that an entire generation of
writers should have worked themselves into a state of mind which
solemnly approved of such freaks.
Every one has heard of the strange position of this hoary island-citadel
(a metropolis, already, in neolithic days). It is of oval shape, the
broad sides washed by the Ionian Sea and an oyster-producing lagoon;
bridges connect it at one extremi-y with the arsenal or new town, and at
the other with the so-called commercial quarter. It is as if some
precious gem were set, in a ring, between two others of minor worth. Or,
to vary the simile, this acropolis, with its close-packed alleys, is the
throbbing heart of Taranto; the arsenal quarter - its head; and that
other one - well, its stomach; quite an insignificant stomach as compared
with the head and corroborative, in so far, of the views of
Metch-nikoff, who holds that this hitherto commendable organ ought now
to be reduced in size, if not abolished altogether. . . .
From out of this window I gaze upon the purple lagoon flecked with
warships and sailing-boats; and beyond it, upon the venerable land of
Japygia, the heel of Italy, that rises in heliotrope-tinted undulations
towards the Adriatic watershed. At night-time an exquisite perfume of
flowers and ripe corn comes wafted into my room over the still waters,
and when the sun rises, white settlements begin to sparkle among its
olives and vineyards.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 100 of 488
Words from 26375 to 26643
of 131203
