By-the-bye, is there anything I can bring you ?" "Nothing, thanks." They went down together, shook hands, and away drove the carriage.

At the public fountain in the little piazza, where stands the image of Sant' Andrea, a group of women were busy or idling, washing clothes and vegetables and fish, drawing water in vessels of beautiful shape, chattering incessantly--such a group as may have gathered there any morning for hundreds of years.

Children darted after the vehicle with their perpetual cry of "Un sord', signor!" and Elgar royally threw to them a handful of coppers, looking back to laugh as they scrambled.
A morning of mornings, deliciously fresh after the rain, the air exquisitely fragrant.

On the mountain-tops ever so slight a mist still clinging, moment by moment fading against the blue.
"Yes, I shall be able to work here," said Elgar within himself.
"December, January, February; I can be ready with something for the spring.".