We passed palaces galore in Genoa, but we had only time to glance in, except at the Fieschi, where we lunched, and later were shown the rooms where the famous conspiracy took place. I don't know what the conspiracy was, but the guide-book speaks of it as "the famous conspiracy," so everybody but me will know just which one is meant. It probably concerned the Ghibellines and the Guelphs, and had strangling in it and poison--three kinds, slow, medium, and swift--these features being usually identified with the early Italian school.
The dim, mysterious streets of Genoa interested us--many of the houses frescoed outside--and the old city gates, dating back to the crusade; also some English signs, one of which said:
I am in favor of these people learning English, but not too well. The picturesque standard of those signs is about right.
Our new passengers were crowding aboard the ship when we returned. They were a polyglot assortment, English, German, French, Hungarian--a happy-looking lot, certainly, and eager for the housing and comfort of the ship. But one dear old soul, a German music-master--any one could tell that at first glance--was in no hurry for the cabin. He had been looking forward to that trip. Perhaps this was his first sight of the sea and shipping and all the things he had wanted so long. He came to where I was looking over the rail, his head bare, his white hair blowing in the wind. He looked at me anxiously.
I confessed that I still had a small broken assortment of German on hand, such as it was. He pointed excitedly to a vessel lying near us--a ship with an undecipherable name in the Greek character.
"Greek," he said, "it is Greek--a vessel from Greece!"
He was deeply moved. To him that vessel--a rather poor, grimy affair--with its name in the characters of Homer and Æschylus was a thing to make his blood leap and his eyes grow moist, because to him it meant the marvel and story of a land made visible--the first breath of realization of what before had just been a golden dream. I had been thinking of those things, too. We did not mind the cold, and stood looking down at the Greek vessel while we sailed away.
But a change has come over the spirit of our ship. It is a good ship still, with a goodly company--only it is not the same. We lost some worthy people in Genoa and we took on this European invasion. It is educational, and here in the smoking-room I could pick up all the languages I need so much if I were willing to listen and had an ear for such things. I could pick up customs, too. It is after dinner, and the smoking-room is crowded with mingled races of both sexes, who have come in for their coffee and their cigarettes, their gossip and their games. Over there in one corner is a French group--Parisian, without doubt--the women are certainly that, otherwise they could not chatter and handle their cigarettes in that dainty way--and they are going-on and waving their hands and turning their eyes to heaven in the interest and ecstasy of their enjoyment. Games do not interest them--they are in themselves sufficient diversion to one another.