One of its characteristics, which it shares with the old streets of most Italian towns, is that it is only used by foot-passengers, being of course too narrow for wheels; and it is paved across with flagstones from door to door, so that the feet and the voices echo pleasantly in it, and make a music of their own.

Without exception the ground floor of every house is a shop--the gayest, busiest most industrious little shops in the world.

There are shops for provisions, where the delightful macaroni lies in its various bins, and all kinds of frugal and nourishing foods are offered for sale.

There are shops for clothes and dyed finery; there are shops for boots, where boots hang in festoons like onions outside the window--I have never seen so many boot-shops at once in my life as I saw in the streets surrounding the house of Columbus.

And every shop that is not a provision-shop or a clothes-shop or a boot-shop, is a wine-shop--or at least you would think so, until you remember, after you have walked through the street, what a lot of other kinds of shops you have seen on your way.