None The Less, What Noble Names Have
Been Given To These Alleys - Names Calculated To Fire The Ardent
Imagination Of Young Albanian Students, And Prompt Them To Valorous And
Patriotic Deeds!
Here are the streets of "Odysseus," of "Salamis" and
"Marathon" and "Thermopylae," telling of the glory that was Greece;
"Via
Skanderbeg" and "Hypsilanti" awaken memories of more immediate renown;
"Corso Dante Alighieri" reminds them that their Italian hosts, too, have
done something in their day; the "Piazza Francesco Ferrer" causes their
ultra-liberal breasts to swell with mingled pride and indignation; while
the "Via dell' Industria" hints, not obscurely, at the great truth that
genius, without a capacity for taking pains, is an idle phrase. Such
appellations, without a doubt, are stimulating and glamorous. But if the
streets themselves have seen a scavenger's broom within the last
half-century, I am much mistaken. The goddess "Hygeia" dost not figure
among their names, nor yet that Byzantine Monarch whose infantile
exploit might be re-enacted in ripest maturity without attracting any
attention in San Demetrio. To the pure all things are pure.
The town is exclusively Albanian; the Roman Catholic church has fallen
into disrepair, and is now used as a shed for timber. But at the door of
the Albanian sanctuary I was fortunate enough to intercept a native
wedding, just as the procession was about to enter the portal. Despite
the fact that the bride was considered the ugliest girl in the place,
she had been duly "robbed" by her bold or possibly blind lover - her
features were providentially veiled beneath her nuptial flammeum, and
of her squat figure little could be discerned under the gorgeous
accoutrements of the occasion.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 271 of 488
Words from 72628 to 72909
of 131203
