It Was A Road So Much To Our Minds That
Nothing Was Further From Us Than The Notion That Our
Horse might not
like it so well; but, at the first distinct rise, he stopped and wheeled
round so abruptly,
After first pawing the air, that there could be no
doubt where the popular interest we had lately enjoyed in Frascati had
really originated. Probably our horse's distinguishing trait was known
to everybody in Frascati except his driver. He, at least, showed the
greatest surprise at the horse's behavior, as unprecedented in their
acquaintance, which he owned was brief, for he had bought him in Rome
only the week before. With successive retreats to level ground he put
him again and again at the incline, but as soon as the horse felt the
ground rising under his feet he lifted them from it and whirled round
for another retreat. All this we witnessed from an advantageotis point
at the roadside which we had taken up at his first show of reluctance;
and at last the driver suggested that we should leave it and go on to
the Villa Falconieri on foot. On our part, we suggested that he should
attempt some other villa which would not involve an objectionable climb.
He then proposed the Villa Mandragone, and the horse seemed to agree
with us. As we drove again through the clean, cold, stony streets, with
the rounded doorways for the wine-casks, we fancied something clearly
ironical in the general interest renewed by our return.
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