I TOOK my note-book with me on the journey which brought me to Genoa, and pledged myself to make notes in it. And, indeed, I did really do something of the kind, though the result of my labors is by no means so voluminous as I would like it to be, now when the work of wishing there were more notes is so easy.
We spent but one day in Genoa, and I find such a marvellous succinct record of this in my book that I am tempted to give it here, after the fashion of that Historical Heavyweight who writes the Life of Frederick the Great. I buy a hat. We go to seek the Consul, and, after finding everything else for two hours, find him.
Genoa is the most magnificent city I ever saw ; and the new monument to Columbus about the weakest possible monument. We leave for Naples at twelve midnight. For this money we had also the society of an unoccupied waiter, who leaned against a marble column and looked on, with that gentle, halfcompassionate interest in our appetites which seems native to the tribe of waiters.
A slight dash of surprise is in this professional manner; and there is a faint smile on the solemn professional countenance, which is perhaps prompted by too intimate knowledge of the mysteries of the kitchen and the habits of the cook.
The man who passes his life among beef-steaks cannot be expected to love them, or to regard without wonder the avidity with which others devour them. I imagine that service in restaurants must beget simple and natural tastes in eating, and that the jaded men who minister there to our pampered appetites demand only for themselves. Turning from this thought to the purchase of my hat, I do not believe that literary art can interest the reader in that purely personal transaction, though I have no doubt that a great deal might be said about buying hats as a principle.
