Italian cities . o thelife need only visit the little church outside thewalls, where Filippino painted her as pretty girl was not ambitious to figure in afresco, or pose for a saint, tricked out with halo andsymbol ? When did adoration ever come amiss ? orwhen was a bold glance and a fervently whispered hella really resented ? Meantime she who hoped some day to see her ownportrait as Saint Catherine or Barbara or Lucy, behindthe blazing altar-tapers, dimmed with the cloud offragrant smoke, enjoyed a somewhat grosser this town of tiny streets and thickset houses,whose in
Italian cities . o thelife need only visit the little church outside thewalls, where Filippino painted her as pretty girl was not ambitious to figure in afresco, or pose for a saint, tricked out with halo andsymbol ? When did adoration ever come amiss ? orwhen was a bold glance and a fervently whispered hella really resented ? Meantime she who hoped some day to see her ownportrait as Saint Catherine or Barbara or Lucy, behindthe blazing altar-tapers, dimmed with the cloud offragrant smoke, enjoyed a somewhat grosser this town of tiny streets and thickset houses,whose inhabitants had grown up together in closequarters, generation after generation ; where familyloves and hatreds were matters of heritage and tra-dition, and where each man was as well acquaintedwith his neighbors affairs as with his own, none ofthese young ladies were unknown to their admirers,who could estimate each fair ones dower to a florin. 178 FLORENCE SANTA MARIA NOVELLA GHIRLANDAJO HEAD OF A GIRL (FRAGMENT). THE FLORENTINE ARTIST On the heads and hands of these pretty girls thepassing goldsmith saw his own work in wreath andring, and when the whole parti-colored crowd swayedand bent like a field of wind-swept irises as a priestand a hurrying acolyte passed with the viaticum,even while muttering a prayer for the soul about topass away, he recognized with pride the silver pyxwhich had left his masters shop only a week it was hardly out of sight before the streetbegan to resound with ringing hoofs and clashingsteel, as a company bound on a mission to Siena,escorted by some thirty lances, clattered past; notso fast but that the workmen from Niccolo Caparrksforges could salute its gallant young captain, whosefine armor, decorated with masques and lions heads,was their own handiwork. As the soldiers jingledby, the high houses echoing their clangor tenfold,the sculptor modelling a Saint George for the armor-ers, looked long and wistfully after their leader,who rode w
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, bookpublishernewyo, bookyear1903
