A
two-cent tip contents them, one of four cents makes them your friends
for life; as for a five-cent tip, I do not know what it does, but I
advise the reader when he goes to Rome to try it and see.
One fine thing is that the cabmen are in great superabundance in Rome,
and the number of barrel-ribbed, ewe-necked, and broken-kneed horses is
in no greater proportion than in Paris. Still, the average is large,
though, if you will go to the stand, you may select any horse you please
without offence. It was a cheerful sight, verging upon gayety, to see
every morning the crowd of cabs at our stand and to hear the drivers'
talk, sometimes rising into protest and mutual upbraiding. But one
Thursday morning, the brightest of the spring, a Sunday silence had
fallen on the place, and a Sabbath solitude deepened to the eye the
mystery that had first addressed itself to the ear. Then, suddenly, we
knew that we were in the presence of that Italian conception of a
general strike which interprets itself as a _sciopero.
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