I do not know whether what I am going to say will have the force and significance that I wish to convey, but a city like Perugia, taken as a whole, all its gates, all its towers, all its upward-sweeping details, is like a cathedral in itself, a Gothic cathedral. You would have to think of the ridge on which it stands as providing the nave and the transepts and the apse and then the quaint little winding streets of the town itself with their climbing houses and towers would suggest the pinnacles, spandrels, flying buttresses, airy statues and crosses of a cathedral like Amiens. I know of no other simile that quite suggests Perugia,--that is really so true to it. No one save an historical zealot could extract much pleasure from the complicated political and religious history of this city. However once upon a time there was a guild of money-changers and bankers which built a hall, called the Hall of the Cambio, which is very charming; and at another time (or nearly the same time) there was a dominant Guelph party which, in conjunction with some wealthy townsmen known as the “Raspanti,” built what is now known as the Palazzo Publico or Palazzo Communale, in what is now known as the Piazza del Municipio, which I think is perfect. It is not a fortress like the Bargello or the Palazzo Vecchio at Florence, but it is a perfect architectural thing, the charm of which remains with me fresh and keen. It is a beautiful structure--one that serves charmingly the uses to which it is put--that of a public center for officials and a picture-gallery. It was in one of these rooms, devoted to a collection of Umbrian art, that I found a pretentious collection of the work of Perugino, the one really important painter who ever lived or worked in Perugia--and the little city now makes much of him. If I felt like ignoring the long-winded art discussions of comparatively trivial things, the charm and variety of the town and its present-day life was in no wise lost upon me.