The next few days were spent in traveling northward, sometimes by train, sometimes by automobile, and sometimes behind two small Italian horses.

Each night the Sunbonnet Babies slept in some quaint little town near a great old church or castle built hundreds of years ago.

Some of the towns stood on steep, rocky hills and were surrounded by strong, stone walls. There was always a village well within the walls, where the women and girls filled their graceful jugs with water every morning.

During spring and summer the men and women in these hillside towns work on their fertile little farms in the green valleys below. In the fall the children take long trips to the woods to gather ripe chestnuts to grind into flour, for the Italians are very fond of chestnut cakes.

The most wonderful thing which Molly and May saw on this northward journey was the Leaning Tower at Pisa.

For seven hundred years the beautiful white marble tower has stood there leaning lazily over to one side. Soon after it was started, the ground under it began to sink. The builders straightened it up as well as they could, but when it was finished its top leaned to one side nearly fourteen feet.

The Sunbonnet Babies were almost afraid to go up the winding stairs inside the Leaning Tower. But at last they bravely climbed the three hundred steps, round and round and up and up, until they reached the top where the great bells hang.

Even though a strong railing was around the top of the tower, Molly and May thought they would surely slip off, it leaned so far to one side. But they soon forgot their fears.

Near by they saw the great black and white cathedral and the beautiful round baptistry where the babies of Pisa are all baptized.

Toward the west they looked across broad, green fields to the blue sea seven miles away. Two thousand years ago the sea was only two miles from Pisa, but the river Arno, which flows down from the mountains, brings with it a great deal of soil which it drops when it reaches the sea. In this way five miles of new land have been made between Pisa and the sea.

There was not much except the Leaning Tower in the now quiet little city of Pisa to interest the Sunbonnet Babies, so they followed the river Arno up toward the mountains as far as the beautiful city of Florence.

It was Maytime, and there were roses everywhere—roses to sell and roses to give away. For the first time in their short lives Molly and May had all the roses they wanted.

"No wonder Florence is called the City of Flowers," said their mother one morning, as they visited the big flower market.

"Yes, everybody seems to be buying or selling flowers. Isn't it lovely?" cried Molly.

Then, before her parents knew what she was doing, Molly ran up to a small boy who was carrying two baskets of beautiful roses on a wooden yoke across his shoulders.

"O little boy!" she said. "Will you please let me sell your roses for you? I will give you all the money I make. I should love to sell them!"

"And so should I!" cried May. "Father, please ask him if we may sell his flowers for him," for the small boy could not quite understand what the little American girls wanted.

A few words from their father, however, brought a happy smile to the boy's face. This was enough for the Sunbonnet Babies. In a moment Molly was standing beside one of the flower baskets and May beside the other, with the radiant little Italian boy between them.

"Now," said Molly, "you hold the baskets while we sell the flowers. We will sell some to our own father first. Please, sir, here is a bunch of pink roses for you. They cost only one lira. I am sure you want them."

Of course he did want them, and many other people wanted to buy of the pretty little flower girls, too.

In a very few minutes the two baskets were empty, and the small boy was hurrying away to his father's flower stand with more money in his pocket than he had ever had before, while Molly and May found other interesting things to do.

From a corner of the market place they heard some one calling, "Ecco! Signor Filippo will now present his troup of trained tops for the crippled soldiers."

"Oh, let's see them!" exclaimed May. "Tops are such fun, and we ought to help the poor Italian soldiers, too."

So they watched young Filippo, who had been a soldier in the great war, spin his wonderful tops.

They were military tops which Filippo had made himself. There was an American soldier, an Italian soldier, a British soldier, and a French soldier. Then there was a Red Cross nurse and a jolly sailor boy. But prettiest of all was a dainty little girl with butterfly skirts, dancing gracefully about among the stiff soldiers.

It was really wonderful, the way Filippo kept the tops spinning. Molly and May paid him a whole lira for the fun they had in watching them.

As they were about to leave the market place they heard a clear, beautiful whistle which made them stop and listen.

"It is my blackbird, signorine," called a little boy. "See, he is here in this cage. I caught him in the field and taught him how to whistle. Now he can whistle better than any other blackbird in Florence. Would you like to buy him?"

"Why, yes, of course we should! But we cannot take care of a bird while we are traveling. He will be happier with you. We will give you some pennies to buy food for him." So they dropped two big Italian pennies into the little boy's hat, while he bowed very politely.

One whole lovely afternoon was spent in motoring over the hills beyond the city of Florence. They saw groves of olive trees that were hundreds and hundreds of years old, and large vineyards where purple grapes were growing.

On a hilly road beyond a small village they passed two women who were bringing down from the woods great bundles of fagots on the backs of small donkeys. They would burn these fagots in their fireplace stoves at home, for wood and coal are hard to get in Italy.

Best of all the things the Sunbonnet Babies saw on this happy drive was a rollicking brook. It came tumbling down over big stones and under white birch trees close by the roadside. Beyond the brook was a trim little wheat field, bright with scarlet poppies.

"It looks just like a brook I know in New England," said their mother. "Let us walk a little way and find out where it comes from."

"Oh, yes! Let's walk!" cried Molly and May and their father.

So they left their car and began following the brook under the shade of the tall trees. The children picked handfuls of scarlet poppies and beautiful blue cornflowers. They listened to the happy nightingales and mocking birds singing in the trees above them, and they watched handsome great dragon flies dart along close above the cool, splashing water.

On and on they walked, until at last they came to a beautiful, quiet spot shut in by trees and bushes, with only the brook flowing through it.

"What a splendid place for a picnic!" cried May. "How I wish we had something to eat!"

"I have some small cakes of sweet chocolate," said her mother. "Perhaps a good fairy will come along and change them into strawberry sandwiches for us. Let us sit down on the grass and see."

So they all sat down by the the brook and their mother divided the little round cakes of chocolate among them. They each had three.

"Sh-h! I believe the fairy is coming," whispered May. "I hear footsteps!"

At that moment the bushes were pushed gently aside and a little, barefooted old woman peeped smilingly through at them. A small, brown-eyed girl was with her. She was barefooted, too, and they each wore a wreath of grape leaves around their flying hair. The little girl had a bunch of fresh grape leaves in her hand, and the little old woman carried a small basket of luscious wild strawberries.

The child laughed and darted into the little group, laying a large grape leaf on the lap of each of the strangers. The little old woman followed close behind her, shaking strawberries from her basket onto each green leaf. Then the little girl quickly laid another leaf on top of the strawberries.

They were about to slip away into the bushes again when May called, "Wait, wait, good fairies! Thank you for your strawberries, and please let us give you our sweet chocolate."

The small basket was passed quickly around again and the tiny tinsel-covered cakes were all dropped into it. Then the two little people, with smiling lips and shining eyes, slipped away into the tall bushes.

"Oh! oh!" whispered Molly. "Were they really, truly fairies?"

"Of course they were," answered May.

"Well," said her mother, "they brought us strawberry sandwiches, anyway, and no one but fairies could have known how much we wanted them."

"That is so," said Molly. "Let's call it our Fairy Tea Party. I never, never tasted such sweet strawberries!"

The drive back to the Flower City was a quiet one. Molly and May had so much to think about. But when the next morning came they were eager for the new day's experience.

"What shall we do to-day, father?" asked Molly at the breakfast table.

"Well, how would you like to go shopping on an old, old bridge which crosses the river Arno?" asked her father.

"Shopping on a bridge!" exclaimed both little girls. "What can we buy on a bridge?"

"Oh, all the pretty jewelry you want," answered their father. "It is a two-story bridge. It is called Ponte Vecchio. On each side of the lower story is a row of small shops, most of which sell jewelry—pretty neck chains and pins and rings. The second story is part of a long, covered passage connecting two famous old palaces. The passage is more than a third of a mile long. It was built for the wedding of a prince in one of the families. The palaces are now filled with beautiful paintings and sculpture. We must go to see them soon."

And so several days were happily filled with shopping and driving and seeing beautiful pictures and wonderful old churches.

They found a tall bell tower in Florence even more graceful and lovely than the Leaning Tower at Pisa. It is called a "Lily in Stone," it is so very beautiful. The tower has stood there beside the great cathedral for nearly six hundred years, and it is as fresh and beautiful now as when it was first built.

The City in the Sea