PORTO VENERE PISA WAX MODEL FOR THE PERSEUS IN THE BARGELLO, BENVENUTO CELLINI THE MADONNA DELLA CINTOLA, BY NANNI DI BANCO, DUOMO, FLORENCE SINGING BOYS FROM THE CANTORIA OF LUCA DELLA ROBBIA, OPERA DEL DUOMO, FLORENCE THE CRUCIFIXION, BY FRA ANGELICO, S. MARCO, FLORENCE ST. JOHN THE DIVINE, BY DONATELLO, DUOMO, FLORENCE THE LADY WITH THE NOSEGAY (VANNA TORNABUONI), IN THE BARGELLO, BY ANDREA VERROCCHIO "LA NOTTE," FROM TOMB OF GIULIANO DE' MEDICI, BY MICHELANGELO THE ADORATION OF THE SHEPHERDS, BY DOMENICO GHIRLANDAJO, ACCADEMIA THE THREE GRACES, FROM THE PRIMAVERA, BY SANDRO BOTTICELLI, ACCADEMIA THE BIRTH OF VENUS, BY SANDRO BOTTICELLI, UFFIZI GALLERY THE ANNUNCIATION, BY ANDREA VERROCCHIO, UFFIZI GALLERY PIETA, BY FRA BARTOLOMMEO, PITTI GALLERY THE TOMB OF ILARIA DEL CARETTO, BY JACOPO DELLA QUERCIA, DUOMO, LUCCA THE TOMB OF THE MARTYR S. ROMANO IN S. ROMANO, LUCCA, BY MATTEO CIVITALI [Illustration: A MAP OF THE CITIES OF NORTHERN TUSCANY] * * * * * I. GENOA I The traveller who on his way to Italy passes along the Riviera di Ponente, through Marseilles, Nice, and Mentone to Ventimiglia, or crossing the Alps touches Italian soil, though scarcely Italy indeed, at Turin, on coming to Genoa finds himself really at last in the South, the true South, of which Genoa la Superba is the gate, her narrow streets, the various life of her port, her picturesque colour and dirt, her immense palaces of precious marbles, her oranges and pomegranates and lemons, her armsful of children, and above all the sun, which lends an eternal gladness to all these characteristic or delightful things, telling him at once that the North is far behind, that even Cisalpine Gaul is crossed and done with, and that here at last by the waves of that old and great sea is the true Italy, that beloved and ancient land to which we owe almost everything that is precious and valuable in our lives, and in which still, if we be young, we may find all our dreams. What to us are the weary miles of Eastern France if we come by road, the dreadful tunnels full of despair and filth if we come by rail, now that we have at last returned to her, or best of all, perhaps, found her for the first time in the spring at twenty-one or so, like a fair woman forlorn upon the mountains, the Ariadne of our race who placed in our hand the golden thread that led us out of the cavern of the savage to the sunlight and to her. But though, indeed, I think all this may be clearer to those who come to her in their first youth by the long white roads with a song on their lips and a dream in their hearts--for the song is drowned by the iron wheels that doubtless have their own music, and the dream is apt to escape in the horror of the night imprisoned with your fellows; still, as we are so quick to assure ourselves, there are other ways of coming to Italy than on foot: in a motor-car, for