To call the town picturesque is to use an inadequate word; at every
step, from the opening of the main street at the hill-foot up to the
stern mediaeval castle crowning its height, one marvels and admires.
So narrow are the ways that a cart drives the pedestrian into shop
or alley; two vehicles (but perhaps the thing never happened) would
with difficulty pass each other. As in all towns of Southern Italy,
the number of hair-dressers is astonishing, and they hang out the
barber's basin--the very basin (of shining brass and with a
semicircle cut out of the rim) which the Knight of La Mancha took as
substitute for his damaged helmet. Through the gloom of high
balconied houses, one climbs to a sunny piazza, where there are
several fine buildings; beyond it lies the public garden, a lovely
spot, set with alleys of acacia and groups of palm and flower-beds
and fountains; marble busts of Garibaldi, Mazzini, and Cavour gleam
among the trees. Here one looks down upon the yellow gorge of the
Crati, and sees it widen northward into a vast green plain, in which
the track of the river is soon lost.
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