[Footnote 159: It will be remembered that Mr. Boyd took a great interest in bells and bell ringing. The passage omitted below contains an extract from Murray's _Handbook_ with reference to the bells of Pisa.]
[Footnote 160: This bell was tolled on the occasion of an execution.]
_To Mrs. Jameson_ Palazzo Guidi, Via Maggio, Florence: August 7, 1847 [postmark].
You will be surprised perhaps, and perhaps not, dearest friend, to find that we are still at Florence. Florence 'holds us with a glittering eye;' there's a charm cast round us, and we can't get away. In the first place, your news of Recoaro came so late that, as you said yourself, we ought to have been there before your letter reached us. Nobody would encourage us to go north on any grounds, indeed, and if anybody speaks a word now in favour of Venice, straight comes somebody else speaking the direct contrary. Altogether, we took to making a plan of our own--a great, wild, delightful plan of plunging into the mountains and spending two or three months at the monastery of Vallombrosa, until the heat was passed, and dear Mr. Kenyon decided, and we could either settle for the winter at Florence or pass on to Rome. Could anything look more delightful than that? Well, we got a letter of recommendation to the abbot, and left our apartment, Via delle Belle Donne, a week before our three months were done, thoroughly burned out by the sun; set out at four in the morning, reached Pelago, and from thence travelled five miles along a 'via non rotabile' through the most romantic scenery. Oh, such mountains!--as if the whole world were alive with mountains--such ravines--black in spite of flashing waters in them--such woods and rocks--travelled in basket sledges drawn by four white oxen--Wilson and I and the luggage--and Robert riding step by step. We were four hours doing the five miles, so you may fancy what rough work it was. Whether I was most tired or charmed was a _tug_ between body and soul. The worst was that, there being a new abbot at the monastery--an austere man jealous of his sanctity and the approach of women--our letter, and Robert's eloquence to boot, did nothing for us, and we were ingloriously and ignominiously expelled at the end of five days. For three days we were welcome; for two more we kept our ground; but after _that_, out we were thrust, with baggage and expectations. Nothing could be much more provoking. And yet we came back very merrily for disappointed people to Florence, getting up at three in the morning, and rolling or sliding (as it might happen) down the precipitous path, and seeing round us a morning glory of mountains, clouds, and rising sun, such as we never can forget--back to Florence and our old lodgings, and an eatable breakfast of coffee and bread, and a confession one to another that if we had won the day instead of losing it, and spent our summer with the monks, we should have grown considerably _thinner_ by the victory. They make their bread, I rather imagine, with the sawdust of their fir trees, and, except oil and wine--yes, and plenty of beef (of _fleisch_, as your Germans say, of all kinds, indeed), which isn't precisely the fare to suit us--we were thrown for nourishment on the great sights around. Oh, but so beautiful were mountains and forests and waterfalls that I could have kept my ground happily for the two months--even though the only book I saw there was the chronicle of their San Gualberto. Is he not among your saints? Being routed fairly, and having breakfasted fully at our old apartment, Robert went out to find cool rooms, if possible, and make the best of our position, and now we are settled magnificently in this Palazzo Guidi on a first floor in an apartment which _looks_ quite beyond our means, and _would be_ except in the dead part of the season--a suite of spacious rooms opening on a little terrace and furnished elegantly--rather to suit our predecessor the Russian prince than ourselves--but cool and in a delightful situation, six paces from the Piazza Pitti, and with right of daily admission to the Boboli gardens. We pay what we paid in the Via Belle Donne. Isn't this prosperous? You would be surprised to see _me_, I think, I am so very well (and look so)--dispensed from being carried upstairs, and inclined to take a run, for a walk, every now and then. I scarcely recognise myself or my ways, or my own spirits, all is so different....