They passed beneath the light shadow of the olive plantation--the path was perfectly dry--over them, amongst the branches, the sun glanced from the fleeting snow, which it had thawed upon the leaves, till they had glimmered as from a soft spring shower. The little friend was in the best possible humour, and talked of her wanderings about Rome. People suspected that she was writing a book about Rome. However that might be, it was clearly proved that she had done such violence to her well-grounded opinions, as to permit it to be reported that she had explored the baths of Caracalla with an entirely unknown and youthful Italian, and had not even refused his offer of protection to her own house. "Do you believe, Mary," she cried now, "that I could easily make up my mind never to see my dear old England again? You know that at first we did not intend to stop here a single month. For you must know, sir, that I come of an old family, and my first ancestor fell at Hastings, winning his bit of land for himself and his descendants. And so my little bit of England is as much mine as the big one of a great landowner; and who likes to leave his own behind him? And yet who knows whether I might not be induced to pass the rest of my life here, if it were not dishonourable to forget one's fatherland, even though it forgets us and the good service our forefathers have done it?" "I do not know." answered Theodore, laughing, "you only do old England a service if you conquer a bit of Rome for yourself, and so tread in the footsteps of your forefathers." "You are pleased to be witty!" she said, and gave him a light tap with her fan. "But even suppose that I were of an age which made your joke more appropriate, do you seriously think--supposing that there was any foundation for your innuendo, and any one _should_ trouble himself about me,--do you think, I repeat, that English and Italian, or more properly Roman character, would in the long run, be able to get on together?" "You know, my dear Miss Betsy, that love works wonders, fills up valleys and pulls down mountains. As far as mere _character_ goes, I am not afraid. If the sentiments agree, what may the heart not do? I have seen more marriages rendered unhappy by difference of taste, than from difference of feeling. But what Roman would not share in your taste for everything Roman, for example?" "You are right," she said; "at the bottom, love is a matter of taste." Then she drew her green veil over her face, and seemed to wish to be left to her own reflections.