The orario for the month gave 4.56, and how could the
time of a train be changed without public notice?
Changed it was,
insisted the waiter; it had happened a few days ago, and they had
only heard of it at the hotel this very morning. Angry and
uncomfortable, I got my clothes on, and drove to the station, where
I found that a sudden change in the time-table, without any regard
for persons relying upon the official guide, was taken as a matter
of course. In chilly darkness I bade farewell to Taranto.
At a little after six, when palest dawn was shimmering on the sea, I
found myself at Metaponto, with no possibility of doing anything for
a couple of hours. Metaponto is a railway station, that and nothing
more, and, as a station also calls itself a hotel, I straightway
asked for a room, and there dozed until sunshine improved my humour
and stirred my appetite. The guidebook had assured me of two things:
that a vehicle could be had here for surveying the district, and
that, under cover behind the station, one would find a little
collection of antiquities unearthed hereabout. On inquiry, I found
that no vehicle, and no animal capable of being ridden, existed at
Metaponto; also that the little museum had been transferred to
Naples. It did not pay to keep the horse, they told me; a stranger
asked for it only "once in a hundred years." However, a lad was
forthcoming who would guide me to the ruins.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 43 of 152
Words from 11188 to 11450
of 40398
