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National Geographic : 1936 Sep
Contents
SOJOURNING IN THE ITALY OF TODAY In a first-class compartment on a train the foot must not be placed on the seats until the plush has been well protected by a paper or some extra garment. If a thoughtless traveler neglects this precaution, a guard, endowed with second sight, is at once at the compartment door and sternly makes him realize he is for tunate to be permitted to end his days in possession of the offending foot. Not many are thoughtless a second time. However, should you be traveling with a small dog, you buy a ticket for the dog for a nominal sum, and the pet is allowed to sit on the plush, feet and all! ONE-WAY SIDEWALKS IN ROME There is another regulation that high and low must observe. The large cities have strips marked off in their busy streets which pedestrians are to use for crossing. In such places jaywalking is not allowed and traffic officers are at hand to shoo ab sent-minded people inside .the strips. Rome has one-way sidewalks on some of her narrow streets-the popular Corso Umberto, for example. If you leave a shop and want to walk against traffic to get to another shop a few doors farther along, the stern eye of the law is at once upon you. Sometimes it is lenient and sometimes not. One of the first things the Fascist gov ernment did was to begin the building of ocean liners. From the beginning they were comfortable and popular boats. They con tinued to build, always better, bigger, and more luxurious vessels, keeping the newest for the New York route and substituting the earlier ones for the South American trade. Today they have splendid services to South Africa, India, and the Far East as well (page 373). The Italian Line boats which now ply between New York and Italy are equal to the finest afloat. The cheerful, friendly at mosphere is not surpassed on any other ships that sail the seas. Perfect service is a matter of training, but friendly, cheerful service is a matter of disposition. Every member of the ship's personnel seems to wish to make the crossing agree able to each passenger. If you cross sev eral times on the same boat, or meet a former steward on another of the Italian ships, he greets you with real pleasure. For several years we have taken a wire haired terrier to Italy with us. Stewards on Italian liners have repeatedly recognized the dog and called it by name-an atten tion hard to equal. Italians are passionately devoted to chil dren, and the stewardesses make life on shipboard easy for mothers who travel with out nurses. The halcyon days have passed when for eigners, who were content to rest quietly in a place for a while, could enjoy the ameni ties of life for a dollar a day. Those tales make pleasant bedtime reading, but have passed into the soft blue haze of forgotten things, along with penny candy, winter underwear, and the exhilaration of a trolley ride. Today a person travels in Italy as eco nomically or as expensively as he wishes. The new hotel coupons and travelers' checks issued, abroad to foreigners at a more favorable rate of exchange make his sojourn more economical. GASOLINE AT $1.24 A GALLON Motoring, however, is another matter. Italy has to import gasoline and oil. Mo toring is a joy if money is no object. If it is an object, the beauty of the countryside or of a picturesque hill town is somewhat dimmed by computations, on the backs of old envelopes, of the staggering costs of a full gasoline tank. As long ago as 1930 an American, ac customed to groaning at State taxes which obliged him to pay 20 cents a gallon, was horror-struck in Italy when forced to pay 40 cents a gallon. In 1935 and 1936 up to the time this is written, however, 40-cent gasoline in Italy would have been considered a gift. The American dollar had depreciated in value, and the war in Africa had sent prices skyrocketing. The price of gasoline was greatly increased in order to conserve every drop for the air force and the motorized units. Ordinary gasoline cost $1.24 a gal lon. Ethyl gasoline was $1.36 a gallon. The result was that for economic and patriotic reasons many automobile owners put up their cars. Although this brought idleness and short rations to all garage and auto repair men, the Government refused to permit proprie tors to close their shops and lay off em ployees. In many cases this had to be done willy-nilly, which in turn was hard on the owners of the buildings and so on all down the line. 371
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