. The spell of Italy. lley. It is quite certain one cannot live in Italywithout it. An hour later we stepped from the motley entice-ments of the streets of Naples into the silent hallsof the Museo Nazionale and yielded ourselves up toanother spell and a mighty one, still and grave andfull of awe. I had more than once visited the sculp-ture galleries of London and Paris, but nothing hadprepared me for the inexhaustible treasures andtrophies of the Naples Museo. In silence we moved slowly on between the ranksand rows of praetors and proconsuls, imperators andwarriors, graces and nymphs, gods and
. The spell of Italy. lley. It is quite certain one cannot live in Italywithout it. An hour later we stepped from the motley entice-ments of the streets of Naples into the silent hallsof the Museo Nazionale and yielded ourselves up toanother spell and a mighty one, still and grave andfull of awe. I had more than once visited the sculp-ture galleries of London and Paris, but nothing hadprepared me for the inexhaustible treasures andtrophies of the Naples Museo. In silence we moved slowly on between the ranksand rows of praetors and proconsuls, imperators andwarriors, graces and nymphs, gods and an august assembly and one to enhance forever the sum of human values! Dignity, repose, in-tellectual mastery, courage, passion, victory, theimmortal joy of immortals, above all beauty, andbeauty the noblest, confronted us at every crown and culmination I seemed to discern inthe bust of Homer. Look at that front of Jove, Filia, that brooding,threatening gloom of the seer and singer! His head. BUST OF HOMER, MUSEO NAZIONALE, NAPLES. Corals and the Immortal Gods 47 and eyes are like unto Zeus whose joy is in the thun-der ! Think of our recent raptures at Morabitos!What are corals now? Only strings of paltry beads, murmured Filiahumbly. I cant think why I cared so much forthem. I am coming here every day, if only for thesake of that Ganymede, and, oh, do let us stay awhole week in Naples! A week is not enough, I said and turned intothe Corridor of the Roman Emperors. Filia, hereyes on the page of her catalogue, was bent on makingher way to the Farnese Bull. As a consequence welost each other for twenty minutes, during whichI saw no person beyond a guard or two and an armyofficer in resplendent uniform, with twisted, upturnedmoustache and excessively brilliant eyes. A momentafter I came upon my daughter standing flushed withkeen joy of discovery, beside a small Pompeianstatue of green bronze. Did you ever know anything so beautiful?she cried. It is the Na
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, booksubjectitalydescriptionandt
