If I had bought some of the blind
minstrel's almanacs and jest-books I might indeed apologize, but ballads
are another thing.
After we left the bookseller's, our little guide asked us if we would
like to see a church, and we said that we would, and he took us into a
white and gold interior, with altar splendors out of proportion to its
simplicity, all in the charge of a boy no older than himself, who was
presently joined by two other contemporaries. They followed us gravely
about, and we felt that it was an even thing between ourselves and the
church as objects of interest equally ignored by Baedeker. Then we
thought we would go home and proposed going by the Alameda.
That is a beautiful place, where one may walk a good deal, and drive,
rather less, but not sit down much unless indeed one likes being swarmed
upon by the beggars who have a just priority of the benches. There
seemed at first to be nobody walking in the Alameda except a gentleman
pacing to and from the handsome modern house at the first corner, which
our guide said was this cavalier's house.
