Living nobly

I keep thinking of my host family’s decision to live, during their stays in Venice, in the cozy-cramped side-wing of the palace instead of the main house. There seems to me to be something symbolic about that decision, something – well, like their chosen quarters – small. To my mind it simply isn’t noble of them. To live nobly requires perhaps some sacrifice. I am reminded of the father of the hero of the Manuscript found in Saragossa, who delighted in living in his ancient family seat precisely because it was drafty and its roof leaked: its discomfort reminded him of the time when he had to stand for a week immersed up to his neck in ice-cold water during the siege of Breda. I am also reminded of Tomasi di Lampedusa’s Leopard’s hero – prince of Salina, the last of the grand feudal landlords of Sicily – whose companion was a great dane, Bendico. His grandson, writing about him with love and admiration, as if to preserve his grandfather’s towering figure for posterity, also had a dog. It was a small bitch named, ridiculously, Pop. Tomasi confessed to having reluctantly come to like her. Perhaps he found an emotional attachment to a small dog as ignoble as I find my hosts’ preference for the cramped south wing.