So they set forth, and had gone but a little way, when the narrow street

emerged into a piazza, on one side of which, glistening and dimpling in

the moonlight, was the most famous fountain in Rome. Its murmur--not

to say its uproar--had been in the ears of the company, ever since they

came into the open air. It was the Fountain of Trevi, which draws its

precious water from a source far beyond the walls, whence it flows

hitherward through old subterranean aqueducts, and sparkles forth as

pure as the virgin who first led Agrippa to its well-spring, by her

father's door.

"I shall sip as much of this water as the hollow of my hand will hold,"

said Miriam.

"I am leaving Rome in a few days; and the tradition goes, that a

parting draught at the Fountain of Trevi insures the traveller's return,

whatever obstacles and improbabilities may seem to beset him. Will you

drink, Donatello?"

"Signorina, what you drink, I drink," said the youth.

They and the rest of the party descended some steps to the water's

brim, and, after a sip or two, stood gazing at the absurd design of the

fountain, where some sculptor of Bernini's school had gone absolutely

mad in marble. It was a great palace front, with niches and many

bas-reliefs, out of which looked Agrippa's legendary virgin, and several

of the allegoric sisterhood; while, at the base, appeared Neptune, with

his floundering steeds, and Tritons blowing their horns about him, and

twenty other artificial fantasies, which the calm moonlight soothed into

better taste than was native to them.

And, after all, it was as magnificent a piece of work as ever human

skill contrived. At the foot of the palatial facade was strewn, with

careful art and ordered irregularity, a broad and broken heap of massive

rock, looking is if it might have lain there since the deluge. Over a

central precipice fell the water, in a semicircular cascade; and from

a hundred crevices, on all sides, snowy jets gushed up, and streams

spouted out of the mouths and nostrils of stone monsters, and fell in

glistening drops; while other rivulets, that had run wild, came leaping

from one rude step to another, over stones that were mossy, slimy, and

green with sedge, because, in a Century of their wild play, Nature had

adopted the Fountain of Trevi, with all its elaborate devices, for her

own. Finally, the water, tumbling, sparkling, and dashing, with

joyous haste and never-ceasing murmur, poured itself into a great

marble-brimmed reservoir, and filled it with a quivering tide; on which

was seen, continually, a snowy semicircle of momentary foam from the

principal cascade, as well as a multitude of snow points from smaller

jets. The basin occupied the whole breadth of the piazza, whence flights

of steps descended to its border. A boat might float, and make voyages

from one shore to another in this mimic lake.




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