To Boylston Adams Beal
Via Santo Stefano Rotondo, 6,
Rome. November 8, 1941
There has been great irregularity and uncertainty in the receipt of funds from America, and I thought seriously of leaving Italy, first for Switzerland and then for Spain. But the Swiss authorities would not give me a permit for residence; so that possibility was discarded at once. As for the journey to Spain, air being excluded by the doctor as dangerous for my heart, I found the land journey full of difficulties, especially as to money. You may take only 250 lire out of Italy, and you may bring no pesetas into Spain. How then are you to get from one frontier to another or from the Spanish frontier to Madrid? At the Spanish consulate here they gave me an announcement of a conducted trip to Spain from Turin, meant for fugitives from the East, bound to Lisbon and South America. It involved terrible experiences: two nights sitting up in trains, and four long delays at customshouses. I couldn’t face the prospect; became almost ill about it; and after consulting the doctor, decided to remain in Rome, and put up with the consequences. I have a respectable sum in Italian money, and have received some remittances since from George Sturgis; but the possibility of soon being cut off altogether from any means of support had to be faced. I had thought at various times of this Nursing Home of the “Blue Sisters”, or “The Little Company of Mary”, as a possible refuge in time of illness. My doctor happens to be one of their regular physicians, and encouraged me to consider the matter. I walked up to the Celius, and found the place, which I had never seen before, close under the walls of Santo Stefano Rotondo, and a step from the Villa Celimontana or Mattei, which is now open to the public. They agreed to take me in and give me a good room with a bathroom for half what I was paying at the Grand Hotel: but I had an idea in reserve which, after an interview with the Mother General who lives here, this being their first foundation, has proved feasible. The Order has a house in a suburb of Chicago called Evergreen Park; and it occurred to me that George Sturgis might pay by cheque to Chicago the amount of my expenses here in Rome, or a periodical donation that should amply cover those expenses. “I agree to that!” cried the Mother General at once; and seemed not to mind the possibility of not receiving that money for the present. Thus I am living here, in a sort of nunnery, gratis. Even if the United States comes formally into the war, I can continue here, with all necessities covered; and what cash I have or may receive can no doubt be made to suffice for my personal expenses, now almost nil. The food is as in Spain, not always very appetizing; but there are enough good simple things, and the spirit of the place is pleasant and reassuring. I have thus recovered great peace of mind about external matters, and I already had it about things internal.
From The Letters of George Santayana: Book Seven, 1941-1947. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2006.
Location of manuscript: The Houghton Library, Harvard University, Cambridge MA.