The gentlemen of commerce rose
to wild excitement, and roundly abused the driver; as soon as we
really started, their wrath changed to boisterous gaiety. On we
rolled, pitching and tossing, mid darkness and tempest, until,
through the broken window, a sorry illumination of oil-lamps showed
us one side of a colonnaded street. "Bologna! Bologna!" cried my
companions, mocking at this feeble reminiscence of their fat
northern town. The next moment we pulled up, our bruised bodies
colliding vigorously for the last time; it was the _Albergo
Concordia_.
A dark stone staircase, yawning under the colonnade; on the first
landing an open doorway; within, a long corridor, doors of bedrooms
on either side, and in a room at the far end a glimpse of a
tablecloth. This was the hotel, the whole of it. As soon as I
grasped the situation, it was clear to me why my fellow travellers
had entered with a rush and flung themselves into rooms; there
might, perchance, be only one or two chambers vacant, and I knew
already that Cotrone offered no other decent harbourage.
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