a Queen Victoria, who died in 1901, and Alfred, Lord Tennyson, who died in 1892.
b Noble factions that vied for power in thirteenth-century Florence.
c Giotto di Bondone (1276?-1337), revered as the first Italian master painter.
d Path along the right bank of the Arno River in Florence lined with elegant buildings, palaces, and plazas.
e It’s nothing (Italian).
f From A. E. Housman’s A Shropshire Lad (1896), which chronicles a youth spent in the countryside.
g Do nothing [don’t worry], I’m old (Italian).
h Listed in Baedeker as a seller of books and photographic reproductions of fine art.
i Members of the Misericordia, a fourteenth-century Florentine organization whose mission includes transportation of the sick and dying.
j Customs checkpoint at the city gates, where (Baedeker warns) foodstuffs might be taxed. †Idle (French).
k Go away! I’m busy! (Italian).
l Party of two men and two women (French). tGo soon, soon! (Italian).
m Forerunner of the traveler’s check that could be exchanged for local currency.
n Giovanni Boccaccio (1313-1375) wrote this literary masterpiece in the wake of the Black Death, an epidemic that devastated Europe.
r Lucy has in fact said in Italian: “Where good men? ... One—more—small.”
s There he is! (Italian).
t From Percy Bysshe Shelley’s “Adonais” (1821).
u Thank you so much! (Italian).
v An Italianate Englishman ... is the devil incarnate.
w Slightly misquoted from Tennyson’s “The Princess” (1847).
x Italian painter (1441?-1523) whose fresco nudes influenced Michelangelo.
y Rhine maidens in the opera whose title translates as Twilight of the Gods, the fourth section of the epic Ring cycle by Richard Wagner ( 1813-1883). †Variant of “soccer.”
z Charity Organization Society.
aa Mr. Beebe’s description echoes a passage in John Keats’s “Ode to a Nightingale” (1819).
ab Lines from “Lucy Ashton’s Song,” by Sir Walter Scott, from his novel The Bride of Lammermoor (1819).
ac Slight misquote from an 1895 speech by Samuel Butler.
ad We make for Italy (Latin).
ae Tomorrow we’ll go for a drive (Italian).
af Please, leave us. We are married (Italian).
ag I beg your pardon (Italian).
ah Good night, and thank you (Italian).