_Sorrento,
April._
You have only just this minute gone. I wonder if you are thinking of
me--I don’t believe you are. I shall treasure the pretty gold pen you
gave me, to write you with. I am christening it now. Aunt calls me
Pliny--she says I write so much that she is sure I indite my letters
from the bath.
Will you hear my lesson? Although I have not been out of school very
long I find I have forgotten a lot and I have really enjoyed reading
about the very early days of Rome, of the Etruscan lords, the raids of
the Sabines and the Celts, and the sack of Rome by the Gauls, the
starting of the republic with the plebs and patricians, about
Hannibal, the Punic wars, and the Macedonian wars, and all kinds of
wars.
Checkers was tickled to death with my anonymous letter signed “Brown
Eyes.” He didn’t say a word, but has smiled ever since receiving it.
All women, he declares, are devils. I notice, however, like the
sailors, he discovers a pretty girl in every port. He’s as fickle,
looking this way and that, as a blade of grass in a high wind. I just
wrote some more nonsense, supposed to be from an Italian girl who had
seen him on the street and had fallen in love with the handsome
American boy. I wish he would fall in love with Sybil, however, but
they are such good friends that I do not so far see a glimmer of hope.
Now I am going to bed, but instead of dreaming of something pleasant,
for instance of you, I shall be wide awake and my head buzzing with
history and dates,--Goths taking the city of Florence,--where we go
tomorrow,--the visit of Charlemagne and the story of the Countess
Mathilde who ruled for over forty years, of endless feuds and battles
and Guelphs and Ghibellines of long ago. Now perhaps I can go to
sleep, having written you all this, and if you don’t remember your
history, you had better read it up.
As one of Checkers’ numerous girls once declared, “You are so
fascinating I can’t stop I writing!” This must be my case for here is
a very long letter. I wish we could stop in Rome on the way north, but
shall expect you for over Sunday in Florence.
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