Indeed, The Town Is
Strangely Quiet, Considering Its Size And Aspect Of Importance; One
Has To Search For A Restaurant, And I Doubt If More Than One Cafe
Exists.
At my hotel the dining-room was a public trattoria,
opening upon the street, but only two or three military men - the
eternal officers - made use of it, and I felt a less cheery social
atmosphere than at Taranto or at Catanzaro.
One recurring incident
did not tend to exhilarate. Sitting in view of a closed door, I saw
children's faces pressed against the glass, peering little faces,
which sought a favourable moment; suddenly the door would open, and
there sounded a thin voice, begging for un pezzo di pane - a bit
of bread. Whenever the waiter caught sight of these little
mendicants, he rushed out with simulated fury, and pursued them
along the pavement. I have no happy recollection of my Reggian
meals.
An interesting feature of the streets is the frequency of carved
inscriptions, commemorating citizens who died in their struggle for
liberty. Amid quiet by-ways, for instance, I discovered a tablet
with the name of a young soldier who fell at that spot, fighting
against the Bourbon, in 1860: "offerse per l'unita della patria sua
vita quadrilustre." The very insignificance of this young life
makes the fact more touching; one thinks of the unnumbered lives
sacrificed upon this soil, age after age, to the wild-beast instinct
of mankind, and how pathetic the attempt to preserve the memory of
one boy, so soon to become a meaningless name!
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