If he drives out beyond the Porta Pia, say, some
bright afternoon, and notes how the avenue between the beautiful old
villas is also bordered by many vacant lots advertised for sale as well
as built up with pleasant new houses, he will be able to carry away with
him the significant fact that a convenient and public-spirited
trolley-line has the same suburban effect in Rome, Italy, as in Rome,
New York. If he meets some squadrons of cavalry or some regiments of
foot, in that military necessity of constant movement which the civilian
can never understand, he may make the useful reflection that it is much
better to have the troops out of the city than in it, and he can praise
the wisdom of the Italian government accordingly. On the neighboring
mountains the presence or absence of snow forms the difference between
summer and winter in Rome, and will suggest the question whether, after
all, our one continental weather is better than the many local weathers
of Europe; and perhaps he will acquire national modesty in owning that
there is something more picturesque in the indications of those azure or
silvery tops than in his morning paper's announcement that there is or
is not a lower pressure in the region of the lakes.
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