(A very distant Future, let us hope)

Tourist. Can you speak English?

Guide. Yes, sir. I lived in London for many years.

Tourist. It is a very long time since I was in Florence. What is there to see in your city now?

Guide. The city has been entirely improved, sir. There is the new Palazzo Municipale. It is superb.

Tourist. I don't think I should care for that. What else is there?

Guide. There are the new Boulevards, the Piazza Umberto and the Ponte Nuovo. They are all magnificent, and the American visitors admire them very much. So do the English visitors, but there are very few of them. It is curious, for Florence has been made quite new and handsome.

Tourist. I don't wish to see new buildings. Isn't there anything old?

Guide. Oh, yes, sir, of course. There is the Piazzo Vittorio Emmanuele. That is more than thirty years old.

Tourist. I remember the hideous square. But where are the old buildings? How about the Baptistery?

Guide. Oh, that was pulled down six years ago to make more room for the tramways. It was a dark, ugly old place. There is a beautiful new Battistero now, made of glass and iron, like the Crystal Palace near London, put up in place of the old Cathedral which nobody liked.

Tourist. What? You don't mean to say Giotto's Tower has gone?

Guide. There was some old campanile. I think it was sold to the Hawaii Territory World's Fair Syndicate.

Tourist. Anyhow, there's the Ponte Vecchio.

Guide. Oh, yes, sir. But nobody goes to see that. It was pulled down a great many years ago, and some old-fashioned, artistic Florentines made a great fuss, so it was put up again on dry land at the end of the Cascine. The Municipality used to do that years ago. Pull down an old building, and put it up again in quite a different place, and then say it was just the same. It hardly seemed worth the trouble. Happily they did not put up a memorial to every old building, as the English did to Temple Bar. As for the Ponte Vecchio, it was turned into a switchback railway at last, but it never paid. There is the Ponte Nuovo——

Tourist. No, thank you. But look here. There must be something. Where are the pictures?

Guide. They were taken to Rome, sir, when the Palazzo Pitti and the Palazzo degli Uffizi were pulled down.

Tourist. How about statues? I remember old statues everywhere, and some vile modern ones.

Guide. Yes, sir, years ago, but the old ones were all cleared away to make more room for the electric tramways. But there's a magnificent statue of Italy on the Piazza at Fiesole. The figure is two hundred feet high, made of cast iron, painted to look like marble. She holds an electric light in her hand, which you can see at night from miles away.

Tourist. But I'd rather not. How about the churches? Where is Santa Maria Novella?

Guide. Excuse me, sir; Santa Maria Novellissima. There was an old church once, but the present one is quite new. It is made of steel, with thin stone stuck all over it, to look like a stone building, just like the Tower Bridge in London. You know, sir, we get many artistic ideas from England. It is a very clever imitation, and much admired.

Tourist. No doubt. I'll ask you one final question. Which is the oldest building now standing in Florence?

Guide. Well, really, sir, I'm not quite sure. I should think the gasometer on the left bank of the Arno is about as old as anything. The Stazione Centrale was very ancient, but of course the new Railway Station——

Tourist. That'll do. I arrived at that station this morning. You take me back there, and I'll leave this unhappy place for ever. I'm off to Turin. It may be a rectangular, monotonous city, but it's now the oldest town in Italy.

At Lucerne.—Member of Parliament (ending a long explanation of a pet measure). And so you see, my dear, by the law of supply and demand, Capital must be benefited without injury to Labour. I hope I make myself clearly understood? Perhaps you might give me your view of the subject. The suggestions of fresh minds are frequently very valuable. I have noticed that you have been pondering over something for the last half-hour. You were thinking, perhaps, that greater liberty might be given to the framers of the initial contract?

Mrs. M.P. No, dear. The fact is, I have been considering all the morning which of my dresses I ought to wear to-night at the table d'hÔte!