"Just like that blessed mother of ours!" exclaimed Malcom. "There is never anybody in want near her about whom she is not sure to find out and to help! It will be just the same here as at home; Italians or Americans--all are alike to her. She will give up anything for herself in order to do for them."
"I am glad you know her so well," said his uncle, with a smile. "There is no danger that you can ever admire your mother too much."
"Oh!" exclaimed Barbara, as after a little walk they entered a square surrounded by massive buildings, with arcades, all white with the sunshine. "Look at that building! It is decorated with those dear little babies, all swathed, whose photographs we have so often seen in the Boston art stores. What is it? Where are we?"
"In the Piazza dell' Annunziata," replied Mr. Sumner, "and an interesting place it is. That building is the Foundling Hospital, a very ancient and famous institution. And the 'swathed babies' are the work of Andrea della Robbia."
"Poor little innocents! How tired they must be, wrapped up like mummies and stuck on the wall like specimen butterflies!" whispered Malcom in an aside to Bettina.
"Hush! hush!" laughed she. "Your uncle will hear you."
"This beautiful church just here on our right," continued Mr. Sumner, "is the church of the S.S. Annunziata or the most Holy Annunciation. It was founded in the middle of the thirteenth century by seven noble Florentines, who used to meet daily to sing _Ave Maria_ in a chapel situated where the Campanile of the Cathedral now stands. It has been somewhat modernized and is now the most fashionable church in Florence. It contains some very interesting paintings, which we will visit by and by."
"Every step we take in this beautiful city is full of interest, and how different from anything we can find at home!" exclaimed Bettina. "Look at the color of these buildings, and their exquisite arches! See the soft painting over the door of the church, and the sculptured bits everywhere! I begin, just a little, to see why Florence is called the _art city_."
"But only a little, yet," said Mr. Sumner, with a pleased look. "You are just on the threshold of the knowledge of this fair city. Not what she outwardly is, but what she contains, and what her children have wrought, constitute her wealth of art. Do you remember, Margery, what name the poet Shelley gives Florence in that beautiful poem you were reading yesterday?"