Roderick had long silences, fits of profound lethargy, almost of
stupefaction. He used to sit in the garden by the hour, with his head
thrown back, his legs outstretched, his hands in his pockets, and his
eyes fastened upon the blinding summer sky. He would gather a dozen
books about him, tumble them out on the ground, take one into his lap,
and leave it with the pages unturned. These moods would alternate with
hours of extreme restlessness, during which he mysteriously absented
himself. He bore the heat of the Italian summer like a salamander, and
used to start off at high noon for long walks over the hills. He often
went down into Florence, rambled through her close, dim streets, and
lounged away mornings in the churches and galleries. On many of these
occasions Rowland bore him company, for they were the times when he
was most like his former self. Before Michael Angelo's statues and the
pictures of the early Tuscans, he quite forgot his own infelicities, and
picked up the thread of his old aesthetic loquacity. He had a particular
fondness for Andrea del Sarto, and affirmed that if he had been a
painter he would have taken the author of the Madonna del Sacco for his
model.
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