but cannot afford the town. His account of the former gives a genuine
impression of dreariness and monotony, for the villa is stuck on a
mountain edge, where the summer is scorching and the winter bleak, where
a "lean cypress" is the most conspicuous object in the foreground, and
hills "smoked over" with "faint grey olive trees" fill in the back;
where on hot days the silence is only broken by the shrill chirp of the
cicala, and the whining of bees around some adjacent firs. But the other
side of the picture, though sympathetically drawn, is a perfect parody
of what it is meant to convey. For the speaker's ideal "city" might be a
big village, with its primitive customs, and its life all concentrated
in the market-place or square; and it is precisely in the square that he
is ambitious to live. There the church-bells sound, and the diligence
rattles in, and the travelling doctor draws teeth or gives pills; there
the punch-show or the church procession displays itself, and the last
proclamation of duke or archbishop is posted up. It is never too hot,
because of the fountain always plashing in the centre; and the bright
white houses, and green blinds, and painted shop-signs are a perpetual
diversion to the eye.... But alas! the price of food is prohibitive; and
a man must live where he can.


"ANOTHER WAY OF LOVE" is the complement to "One Way of Love," and
displays the opposite mood. The one lover patiently gathers June roses
in case they may catch his lady's eye. The other grows tired of such
patience even when devoted to himself; he tires of June roses, which are
always red and sweet. His lady-love is bantering him on this frame of
mind. It is true, she says, that such monotony is trying to a man's
temper: there is no comfort in anything that can't be quarrelled with;
and the person she addresses is free to "go." She reminds him, however,
that June may repair her bower which his hand has rifled, and the next