Rome, January 6, 1908. The _festas_ are not yet over. To-day is the feast of the Epiphany, Twelfth Night. I do hope and believe the last of the Christmas _fêtes_. It is a trying time; everybody you want to do any work for you is completely demoralized; the laborers will not labor, and the servants are forever gadding. It would be a good thing for Italy if these long holiday rites of junketing and idleness could be shortened. It isn’t that the people do anything disorderly or wrong, they just don’t do anything but amuse themselves. At home we keep adding new holidays--fatal policy! Last night being the eve of the Befana, we went over to the Piazza Navona to see the fun, and buy toys for the porter’s children. The piazza was lined with booths with toys and goodies for sale; the fun was fast and furious and I must confess quite innocent. Nobody gets drunk and there is no brawling, only bedlam of tin trumpets and other festive noises. Befana is to the children here what Christmas is at home. Christmas is little made of save as one of the great feasts of the Church. New Year is the day for the exchange of presents and felicitations among “grown ups”, and Befana for children. Befana is an old woman for whose coming the children hang up their stockings beside the kitchen fireplaces as we do for St. Nicholas. * * * * * March 4, 1908. Spring looked at us and then shook her head and took another nap. We are having the cold spell that always comes between the first and fifteenth of March. Our friend, the Monsignor, comes to see us a great deal and is a real comfort. The other day I passed him in a cab. It had come on to rain furiously; as he had no umbrella and I was going past his door, I stopped and asked if I should give him a lift. He refused shortly and soon after came to see me and told me that it would have made a scandal if he had been seen driving about Rome in a cab with a lady. The American pilgrims are teaching the Romans a thing or two. Among them are Bishop Ireland, his sister and a large group of “sisters”, traveling together. They take cabs every day and drive about with the Bishop, and nobody seems shocked! * * * * * Rome, Palm Sunday, 1908. Isn’t it wonderful that the winter is really over and that we are again going to have summer? It is a new mystery every year and how the things in nature go regularly on, and the acorns swell, the grain germinates, the coral insects toil and only this silly fool’s work does not grow and finish itself! Man’s a blur and a blot on the whole scheme, on account, I suppose, of his free will.