To-day there was scarce a healthy man in Cotrone: no one had strength to resist a serious illness.

This state of things he took very philosophically; I noticed once more the frankly mediaeval spirit in which he regarded the populace.

Talking on, he interested me by enlarging upon the difference between southern Italians and those of the north.

Beyond Rome a Calabrian never cared to go; he found himself in a foreign country, where his tongue betrayed him, and where his manners were too noticeably at variance with those prevailing.

Italian unity, I am sure, meant little to the good Doctor, and appealed but coldly to his imagination.
I declared to him at length that I could endure no longer this dreary life of the sick-room; I must get into the open air, and, if no harm came of the experiment, I should leave for Catanzaro.