SOON after this we reached Clementina’s house. The old woman gave
the beef-steak and the medicine to her neighbour (whose husband,
just returned from Maremma, was down with fever), took up a large
wicker-covered flask, and called us to go with her to the “_fonte
fresca_” to get water. So we moved off through the chestnut woods,
and soon found the spring, half-hidden by the ferns and long grass.
It fully deserved its name and reputation; the water was so cold
and sparkling as to be almost exhilarating, and I felt a sudden new
sympathy with the feeling which prompted the Greeks to such efforts to
obtain the water of well-known springs.
When we had emerged from the wood on our way back, Clementina put down
her flask and seated herself on a bank with her back to the sunset. We
threw ourselves on the grass at her feet, and the old woman, beginning
again, told us the following version of our old friend Bluebeard:—
* * * * *
Once upon a time there was a woman who had three daughters. One day a
sexton knocked at her door and said:—
“Good wife, give me a piece of bread.”