365788549682686e6513bdc9319b1941To George Sturgis
Grand Hotel
Rome. March 18, 1941

A lot of building and pulling down and park-making is going on in Rome. There is a perfect desert in front of St. Peter’s, and here from my windows I see them working desultorily on the new park round the Baths of Dioclesian and the great new Station. No thought, apparently, of earthquakes or bombs.

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