ABSTRACT
In all times, and with especial intensity in the earlier periods, Italy must have presented the contrast, which strikes one at this day, between the brilliant civilization of the towns and the primitive simplicity of the country. The towns, in which men not only from all parts of Italy but from the whole world meet and live side by side, are on the highest level of culture. The countrysides, on the other hand, especially those which lie off the great ways of communication and are isolated by the nature of the land and the poverty of the inhabitants, even now live an extremely primitive life. If one goes even a short distance away from Rome or Naples, one finds oneself among a very backward population. Semi-barbarism lives next door to the most admirable artistic and intellectual development.
