the senses refuse to take in anything more than a strange, exotic, gorgeous medley of light, color, sounds; an unfathomable jumble of men and animals, of quaint buildings and strange vehicles, of street cries weird but melodious, of the faintly scented brilliant atmosphere—of the half-revealed, half-guessed-at Soul of the City.

Perhaps the two main streets constitute the best monument the Spaniards have left behind them. They may not have cared for Sicily; but for themselves and their convenience and comfort they cared much. So the Spanish viceroy, Don Pedro de Toledo, ran a fine broad street straight from the smiling sea through the middle of the town, and called it for himself, the Toledo. It is now the Corso Vittorio Emmanuele—practically every city of any importance in Italy has testified in this same way to its love for the united country’s first king. Crossing this ancient Toledo is the other highway, the Via Maqueda, laid out by another viceroy, the Duque de Maqueda, a short time later. The curious square—it is an octagon, by the way—where these two streets intersect at right angles, is called by the whimsical Sicilians the Quattro Canti, or Four Corners. The façades of the abutting buildings are concave, and each affords lodgment for statues of a Season, a Spanish King and a female saint—who might be in a deal better company!

Our first morning on the Corso we were halted by a terrific outburst of sound from the very heart of the throng.

“What’s that?” I exclaimed, swinging my camera into position. “A fight; somebody being murdered?”

“The water-seller, whose bellow has musical quality and charm.”

But La Signora was not minded to be left a widow in a strange land for the sake of a putative photograph, and halted me. The cry stopped: as we listened it began again. Angry and defiant, bellicose even, it rose clear and strong above the noise of the street, held a moment, faded in slow diminuendo into the beautifully clear note of a great and playful animal baying for sheer joy of his own strength. The sauntering crowds paid not the slightest attention to the amazing volcanic outburst of vocal fireworks; not one of the alluring shops beside us was emptied of its customers; the tiny Sardinian donkeys in the shafts of the gayly painted little carts did not even lift an ear, but pattered gravely onward; and we, moving with the crowd, looked sheepishly at one another when we reached the corner. Standing in an angle of two house walls was a little seller of sweetened water, holding his big red amphora by one ear, his gaudy little yellow-red-blue stand bright with clinking bottles and glasses. As we stopped, he stunned us again with his musical bellow, and knowing we would not buy his “Aaaaacquuuuaaaa! Aaaaacquaaaaaaaa d-o-l-c’!” struck a picturesque attitude and posed for us instead. He is there yet—or another water-man is, for it is a fine corner for business.

Along the Via Maqueda and its continuations, the Ruggiero VII and the Avvenida della Libertà, the fashionable corso, or afternoon driving promenade of all classes, takes place. The handsome street is an endless chain of moving vehicles of every description. Here a spanking team of blooded bays with silver-mounted harness draws the smart London trap of a young Florio; there a rickety old barouche, guiltless of varnish for many a long year, so crowded with a stout family party of six that its rheumatic springs creak, and the wind-broken old hack who pulls it feels his waning powers severely taxed. A splendid young Arab, full of blood and pride, pulling a new victoria, follows a ducal cart and precedes another overflow meeting, this time a stag party. Flashily dressed young gallants with cigarettes and straw hats à l’Anglais, loll back in decent traps and carts, making sheep’s eyes at the demure young girls who ride in maiden reserve beside their silent mothers.

Every Palermitan who can, rides in this social promenade. What matter if his vehicle be but a cheap hired victoria; what if he go to bed supperless; has he not had the supreme delight of playing milord in elegant leisure among the nobility and the rich forestieri (tourists) who take the air on the city’s stateliest avenue?

It not infrequently transpires that one carriage, one horse and one coachman are owned—and alternately used—by two or three families. The coachman in all probability not having been paid for a year or two, cannot afford to run away; the emaciated steed, not having had a really square feed of good sweet oats for an equally distressing period, could not run away if he would; and if both horse and driver should by fell conspiracy bolt, the faithful old carriage would quickly fall to pieces rather than have any part in the undoing of its worthy owners.

“There is nothing to equal the Sicilian cart, carved, yellow, panelled.”

Those of the nobles too poor to own a carriage alone, and far too proud to appear in hired ones, are not too proud to adopt the tactics of their humbler brethren, and go shares in an outfit with other nobles of equal pretensions and as poor as themselves. Only one extravagance marks the common ownership of what might be called these “party rigs.” Each count or baron or prince naturally boasts “arms” as the insignia of his rank; and these symbols must of necessity embellish his carriage doors, that he who walks may know at a glance the name and fame of him who rides. From this dilemma the Sicilian has contrived an ingenious escape. Each noble has his own set of emblazoned doors. So when the tired horse brings his Highness the Prince back to his “palace,” presto! off come the princely doors, on go the ducal or baronial ones, and his Grace the Duke or the Baron rides serenely off in his own private equipage!

Of all the vehicles in the world, there is nothing, however, to equal the Sicilian cart, carved, yellow, paneled with lurid paintings that run the gamut of myth and history. One we saw had upon its panels scenes representing Columbus sailing from Palos and discovering America; a bloody fight around the citadel of Acre; the hermitage of Santa Rosalia; and on its tailboard a vivid presentation of the massacre of the Vespers. These carts are never very large, as carts go; but they are so marvelously wrought, they ought surely to come under the provisions of the law which forbids the exportation of any works of art. Wheels, shafts, axles, the edges of sides and posts and tailboards are all worked into neat geometrical designs, and on the axle is a carving built up clear to the bottom of the cart, a mass of intricate scroll-work and gingerbread, in the middle of which sits the patron saint of the fortunate owner.

“If you expect a cart-driver to tell you the truth, make him swear by the saint sitting upon his axle,” is almost a proverb in Palermo. Would there were saints on the cabs, too!

Often the horses’s decorations are equally fantastic, with a three-foot cock feather rising between his ears, an apoplectic purple bouquet of yarn upon the saddle, and plenty of shrill little bells at jingly intervals all over. These gorgeous outfits are used for ordinary delivery work, and