Page:By order of the Czar.djvu/337

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BY ORDER OF THE CZAR. 325

English travelers bound to Milan, on the one hand, or to Venice on the other, rarely make Verona more than a resting-place for the night ; but it is well worth the sojourn of a week. Your hotel is one of the fine old Scaligeri palaces.

It was the Saturday market on one of the days of the Milbankes' stay there, and they found the courtyard of the Palace of the Capulets full of market carts and tethered horses ; the adjacent and surrounding buildings evidently humble lodging-houses, but even these had balconies, and were artistic in decay.

" Murray " says there are more baiconies in Verona than in any other city of Italy. Walter was very happy in his pleasant allusions to modern Romeos and Juliets, and to those who flirted in the balconies of old. Sam was delighted at any reference to his engagement with Dolly, who had some little difficulty now and then in restraining what Jenny had informed her was a too jubilant view of her position.

" The fact is, my dear," said Dolly to Jenny, " I feel as if I had had an awful escape. If I had been rescued from a fire or shipwreck, and had got well over it ; or, to be more prosaic, had been very ill in crossing from Calais to Dover, had quite recovered, and had a good dinner, I couldn't have felt more contented than I do now."

" But you mustn't let Sam see it."

" Why not ? " said Dolly. " He is under the impres- sion that I gave up Philip, not Philip me, and I really don't care whether he knows the entire truth or not. I have told him I am very happy, that even when I seemed to hold him at a distance I always loved him. You know, dear, you gave me a lot of advice about Philip. Don't you think it would be just as well to let me alone now to go my own way ? "

" Well, perhaps perhaps," said Jenny. " I own I was not very wise about the Forsyth business. But what is