ON THE APPIAN WAY

Little People Everywhere

RAFAEL IN ITALY

A GEOGRAPHICAL READER

BY ETTA BLAISDELL McDONALD

Joint author of "Boy Blue and His Friends,"
"The Child Life Readers," etc.

AND JULIA DALRYMPLE

Author of "Little Me Too," "The Make-Believe Boys," etc.

School Edition

BOSTON

LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY

1910

Copyright, 1909,

By Little, Brown, and Company.

PREFACE

The very best way to understand the life and customs of a foreigncountry is to visit it. If that is impossible one may still learn muchby reading a story of the people who live there. As this is true ofgrown people, so is it true of children. They can become acquaintedwith the children of other lands by reading stories of their simple,daily life, and by living it for a little while within the pages ofthe story-book.

It is no longer the fashion for our school children to learn by rotethe facts written down in their geography about all the corners of theearth; they must know rather the children in these foreign lands,—thesights they see, their work and play, their festivals and holidays,their homes, their ambitions.

Such a tale is told in this little book about Italy. Rafael Valla, alad of fourteen, is seen first in Venice; he rows his boat on thecanals, hears the music of the band in the Square of St. Mark, goes tothe Rialto bridge for the serenade, and suddenly, through a chancemeeting with an American girl and her mother, the way is opened forhim to see Italy. He joins them in Florence, and they ride over theTuscan roads in an automobile, stopping to see the peasants gatheringgrapes, and to visit an olive-farm. In Rome they see the ruins of theancient city under the direction of a guide, and they go to Naples,and visit Pompeii and Vesuvius.

The book is full of pictures of Italian life. One sees the childrenfeeding the pigeons in Venice, the Easter festival in Florence, thevintage with its merry-making in Tuscany, the Roman ruins, thepicturesque street-life in Naples with its noise and gayety, and thesilent streets of Pompeii. There are many such pen pictures of Italianlife, and the story should appeal to the imagination of the child andawaken his interest in Italy and its people.

CONTENTS