Excerpt from The Hidden Servants: And Other Very Old Stories Was seeking all his life that he could scarcely have failed to discover and applaud it had it been ever so retiring, ever so hidden? Nor does it matter that the Alexander home chances to be in Florence rather than in Venice, since it is Italy itself that lives in Francesca's work; nor that she is Protestant rather than Catholic, when it is religion pure and simple, unrestricted by any creed, that makes vital each line she writes or draws. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.