SUMMER CRUISE

IN

THE MEDITERRANEAN.

SUMMER CRUISE

IN

THE MEDITERRANEAN

ON BOARD AN AMERICAN FRIGATE.

BY

N. PARKER WILLIS.

LONDON:

T. BOSWORTH, 215, REGENT STREET.

1853.

LONDON:

BRADBURY AND EVANS, PRINTERS, WHITEFRIARS

PREFACE.

Of one of the most delicious episodes in a long period of foreign travel, this volume is the imperfect and hastily written transcript. Even at the time it was written, the author felt its experience to be a dream—so exempt was it from the interrupting and qualifying drawbacks of happiness in common and working life—but, now, after an interval of many years, it seems indeed like a dream, and one so full of unmingled pleasure, that its telling almost wants the contrast of a sadness. Of the noble ship, whose summer cruise is described, and her kind and hospitable officers, the recollection is as fresh and grateful now, as when, (twenty years ago,) the author bade them farewell in the port of Smyrna. Of the scenes he passed through, while their guest, he has a less perfect remembrance—relying indeed on these chance memoranda, for much that would else be forgotten. It is with a mingled sense of the real and the unreal, therefore, that the book is offered, in a new shape, to the Public, whose approbation has encouraged its long existence, and the author trusts that his thanks to the surviving officers of that ship may again reach them, and that the kind favour of the reading Public may be again extended to this his record of what he saw in the company of these officers, and by their generous hospitality.

Highland Terrace,

October, 1852.

CONTENTS.

LETTER I.

Cruise in the Frigate “United States”—Elba—Piombino—Porto Ferrajo—Appearance of the Bay—Naval Discipline—Visit to the Town Residence of Napoleon—His Employment during his Confinement on the Island—His sisters Eliza and Pauline—His Country House—Simplicity of the Inhabitants of Elba [1]

LETTER II.

Visit to Naples, Herculaneum, and Pompeii [7]

LETTER III.

Account of Vesuvius—The Hermitage—The famous Lagrima Christi—Difficulties of the Path—Curious Appearance of the Old Crater—Odd Assemblage of Travellers—The New Crater—Splendid Prospect—Mr. Mathias, Author of the Pursuits of Literature—The Archbishop of Tarento [16]

LETTER IV.

The Fashionable World of Naples at the Races—Brilliant Show of Equipages—The King and his Brother—Rank and Character of the Jockeys—Description of the Races—The Public Burial Ground at Naples—Horrid and inhuman Spectacles—The Lazzaroni—The Museum at Naples—Ancient Relics from Pompeii—Forks not used by the Ancients—The Lamp lit at the time of our Saviour—The antique Chair of Sallust—The Villa of Cicero—The Balbi Family—Bacchus on the Shoulders of a Faun—Gallery of Dians, Cupids, Joves, Mercuries, and Apollos, Statue of Aristides, &c. [23]

LETTER V.

Pæstum—Temple of Neptune—Departure from Elba—Ischia—Bay of Naples—The Toledo—The Young Queen—Conspiracy against the King—Neapolitans Visiting the Frigates—Leave the Bay—Castellamare [32]

LETTER VI.

Baiæ—Grotto of Posilipo—Tomb of Virgil—Pozzuoli—Ruins of the Temple of Jupiter Serapis—The Lucrine Lake—Late of Avernus, the Tartarus of Virgil—Temple of Proserpine—Grotto of the Cumæan Sybil—Nero’s villa—Cape of Misenum—Roman villas—Ruins of the Temple of Venus—-Cento Camerelle—The Stygian Lake—The Elysian Fields—Grotto del Cane—Villa of Lucullus [38]

LETTER VII.

Island of Sicily—Palermo—Saracenic appearance of the town—Cathedral—The Marina—Viceroy Leopold—Monastery of the Capuchins—Celebrated Catacombs—Fanciful Gardens [45]

LETTER VIII.

The Lunatic Asylum at Palermo [51]

LETTER IX.

Palermo—Fête given by Mr. Gardiner, the American Consul—Temple of Clitumnus—Cottage of Petrarch—Messina—Lipari Islands—Scylla and Charybdis [57]

LETTER X.

The Adriatic—Albania—Gay Costumes and Beauty of the Albanese—Capo d’Istria—Trieste resembles an American Town—Visit to the Austrian Authorities of the Province—Curiosity of the Inhabitants—Gentlemanly Reception by the Military Commandant—Visit to Vienna—Singular Notions of the Austrians respecting the Americans—Similarity of the Scenery to that of New England—Meeting with German Students—Frequent Sight of Soldiers and Military Preparation—Picturesque Scenery of Styria [63]

LETTER XI.

Gratz—Vienna [70]

LETTER XII.

Vienna—Magnificence of the Emperor’s Manège—The Young Queen of Hungary—The Palace—Hall of Curiosities, Jewelry, &c.—The Polytechnic School—Geometrical Figures described by the Vibrations of Musical Notes—Liberal Provision for the Public Institutions—Popularity of the Emperor [76]

LETTER XIII.

Vienna—Palaces and Gardens—Mosaic Copy of Da Vinci’s “Last Supper”—Collection of Warlike Antiquities; Scanderburg’s Sword, Montezuma’s Tomahawk, Relics of the Crusaders, Warriors in Armour, the Farmer of Augsburg—Room of Portraits of Celebrated Individuals—Gold Busts of Jupiter and Juno—The Glacis, full of Gardens, the General Resort of the People—Universal Spirit of Enjoyment—Simplicity and Confidence in the Manners of the Viennese—Baden [82]

LETTER XIV.

Vienna—The Palace of Liechstenstein [87]

LETTER XV.

The Palace of Schoenbrunn—Hietzing, the Summer Retreat of the Wealthy Viennese—Country-House of the American Consul—Specimen of Pure Domestic Happiness in a German Family—Splendid Village Ball—Substantial Fare for the Ladies—Curious Fashion of Cushioning the Windows—German Grief—The Upper Belvidere Palace—Endless Quantity of Pictures [92]

LETTER XVI.

Departure from Vienna—The Eil-Wagon—Motley quality of the passengers—Thunderstorm in the Mountains of Styria—Trieste—Short Beds of the Germans—Grotto of Adelsburgh—Curious Ball-Room in the Cavern—Nautical preparations for a Dance on board the “United States” swept away by the Bora—Its successful Termination [98]

LETTER XVII.

Trieste, its Extensive Commerce—Hospitality of Mr. Moore—Ruins of Pola—Immense Amphitheatre—Village of Pola—Coast of Dalmatia, of Apulia and Calabria—Otranto—Sails for the Isles of Greece [106]

LETTER XVIII.

The Ionian Isles—Lord and Lady Nugent—Corfu—Greek and English Soldiers—Cockneyism—The Gardens of Alcinous—English Officers—Albanians—Dionisio Salomos, the Greek Poet—Greek Ladies—Dinner with the Artillery Mess [110]

LETTER XIX.

Corfu—Unpopularity of British Rule—Superstition of the Greeks—Accuracy of the Descriptions in the Odyssey—Advantage of the Greek Costume—The Paxian Isles—Cape Leucas, or Sappho’s Leap—Bay of Navarino, Ancient Pylos—Modon—Coran’s Bay—Cape St. Angelo—Isle of Cythera [115]

LETTER XX.

The Harbour of Napoli—Tricoupi and Mavrocordato, Otho’s Cabinet Councillors—Colonel Gordon—King Otho—The Misses Armanspergs—Prince of Saxe—Miaulis, the Greek Admiral—Excursion to Argos, the ancient Terynthus [122]

LETTER XXI.

Visit from King Otho and Miaulis—Visit an English and Russian Frigate—Beauty of the Greek men—Lake Lerna—The Hermionicus Sinus—Hydra—Ægina [129]

LETTER XXII.

The Maid of Athens—Romance and Reality—American Benefactions to Greece—A Greek Wife and Scottish Husband—School of Capo d’Istrias—Grecian Disinterestedness—Ruins of the most Ancient Temple—Beauty of the Grecian Landscape—Hope for the Land of Epaminondas and Aristides [134]

LETTER XXIII.

Athens—Ruins of the Parthenon—The Acropolis—Temple of Theseus—The Oldest of Athenian Antiquities—Burial-Place of the Son of Miaulis—Reflections on Standing where Plato taught, and Demosthenes harangued—Bavarian Sentinel—Turkish Mosque, erected within the Sanctuary of the Parthenon—Wretched Habitations of the Modern Athenians [139]

LETTER XXIV.

The “Lantern of Demosthenes”—Byron’s Residence in Athens—Temple of Jupiter Olympus, Seven Hundred Years in Building—Superstitious Fancy of the Athenians respecting its Ruins—Hermitage of a Greek Monk—Petarches, the Antiquary and Poet, and his Wife, Sister to the “Maid of Athens”—Mutilation of a Basso Relievo by an English Officer—The Elgin Marbles—The Caryatides—Lord Byron’s Autograph—Attachment of the Greeks to Dr. Howe—The Sliding Stone—A Scene in the Rostrum of Demosthenes [145]

LETTER XXV.

The Prison of Socrates—Turkish Stirrups and Saddles—Plato’s Academy—The American Missionary School at Athens—The Son of Petarches, and Nephew of “Mrs. Black of Ægina” [150]

LETTER XXVI.

The Piræus—The Sacra Via—Ruins of Eleusis—Gigantic Medallion—Costume of the Athenian Women—The Tomb of Themistocles—The Temple of Minerva—Autographs [155]

LETTER XXVII.

Mytilene—The Tomb of Achilles—Turkish Burying Ground—Lost Reputation of the Scamander—Asiatic Sunsets—Visit to a Turkish Bey—The Castles of the Dardanelles—Turkish Bath, and its Consequences [160]

LETTER XXVIII.

A Turkish Pic-Nic on the plain of Troy—Fingers v. Forks—Trieste—The Boschetto—Graceful Freedom of Italian Manners—A Rural Fête—Fireworks—Amateur Musicians [166]

LETTER XXIX.

The Dardanelles—Visit from the Pacha—His Delight at hearing the Piano—Turkish Fountains—Caravan of Mules laden with Grapes—Turkish Mode of Living—Houses, Cafés, and Women—The Mosque and the Muezzin—American Consul of the Dardanelles, another “Caleb Quotem” [171]

LETTER XXX.

Turkish Military Life—A Visit to the Camp—Turkish Music—Sunsets—The Sea of Marmora [179]

LETTER XXXI.

Gallipoli—Aristocracy of Beards—Turkish Shopkeepers—The Hospitable Jew and his lovely Daughter—Unexpected Rencontre—Constantinople—The Bosphorus, the Seraglio, and the Golden Horn [184]

LETTER XXXII.

Constantinople—An Adventure with the Dogs of Stamboul—The Sultan’s Kiosk—The Bazaars—Georgians—Sweetmeats—Hindoostanee Fakeers—Turkish Women and their Eyes—The Jews—A Token of Home—The Drug Bazaar—Opium Eaters [190]

LETTER XXXIII.

The Sultan’s Perfumer—Etiquette of Smoking—Temptations for Purchasers—Exquisite Flavour of the Turkish Perfumes—The Slave Market of Constantinople—Slaves from various Countries, Greek, Circassian, Egyptian, Persian—African Female Slaves—An Improvisatrice—Exposure for Sale—Circassian Beauties prohibited to Europeans—First sight of one, eating a Pie—Shock to Romantic Feelings—Beautiful Arab Girl chained to the Floor—The Silk Merchant—A cheap Purchase [196]

LETTER XXXIV.

The Bosphorus—Turkish Palaces—The Black Sea—Buyukdere [201]

LETTER XXXV.

The Golden Horn and its Scenery—The Sultan’s Wives and Arabians—The Valley of Sweet Waters—Beauty of the Turkish Minarets—The Mosque of Sulymanye—Mussulmans at their Devotions—The Muezzin—The Bazaar of the Opium-eaters—the Mad House of Constantinople, and Description of its inmates—Their Wretched Treatment—The Hippodrome and the Mosque of Sultan Achmet—The Janizaries—Reflections on the Past, the Present, and the Future [207]

LETTER XXXVI.

Sultan Mahmoud at his Devotions—Comparative Splendour of Papal, Austrian, and Turkish Equipages—The Sultan’s Barge or Caïque—Description of the Sultan—Visit to a Turkish Lancasterian School—The Dancing Dervishes—Visit from the Sultan’s Cabinet—The Seraskier and the Capitan Pacha—Humble Origin of Turkish Dignitaries [215]

LETTER XXXVII.

The Grand Bazaar of Constantinople, and its infinite Variety of Wonders—Silent Shopkeepers—Female Curiosity—Adventure with a Black-Eyed Stranger—The Bezestein—The Stronghold of Orientalism—Picture of a Dragoman—The Kibaub-Shop—A Dinner without Knives, Forks, or Chair—Cistern of the Thousand and One Columns [223]

LETTER XXXVIII.

Belgrade—The Cottage of Lady Montagu—Turkish Cemeteries—Natural Taste of the Moslems for the Picturesque—A Turkish Carriage—Washerwomen Surprised—Gigantic Forest Trees—The Reservoir—Return to Constantinople [229]

LETTER XXXIX.

Scutari—Tomb of the Sultana Valide—Mosque of the Howling Dervishes—A Clerical Shoemaker—Visit to a Turkish Cemetery—Bird’s-Eye View of Stamboul and its Environs—Seraglio Point—The Seven Towers [234]

LETTER XL.

Beauties of the Bosphorus—Summer-Palace of the Sultan—Adventure with an old Turkish Woman—The Feast of Bairam—The Sultan his own Butcher—His Evil Propensities—Visit to the Mosques—A Formidable Dervish—Santa Sophia—Mosque of Sultan Achmet—Traces of Christianity [240]

LETTER XLI.

Unerring Detection of Foreigners—A Cargo of Odalisques—The Fanar, or Quarter of the Greeks—Street of the Booksellers—Aspect of Antiquity—Purchases—Charity for Dogs and Pigeons—Punishment of Canicide—A Bridal Procession—Turkish Female Physiognomy [245]

LETTER XLII.

The Perfection of Bathing—Pipes—Downy Cushions—Coffee—Rubbing Down—“Circular Justice,” as displayed in the Retribution of Boiled Lobsters—A Deluge of Suds—The Shampoo—Luxurious Helps to the Imagination—A Pedestrian Excursion—Story of an American Tar, burdened with Small Change—-Beauty of the Turkish Children—A Civilised Monster—Glimpse of Sultan Mahmoud in an Ill-Humour [251]

LETTER XLIII.

Punishment of Conjugal Infidelity—Drowning in the Bosphorus—Frequency of its occurrence accounted for—A Band of Wild Roumeliotes—Their Picturesque Appearance—Ali Pacha, of Yanina—A Turkish Funeral—Fat Widow of Sultan Selim—A Visit to the Sultan’s Summer Palace—A Travelling Moslem—Unexpected Token of Home [257]

LETTER XLIV.

Farewell to Constantinople—Europe and the East compared—The Departure—Smyrna, the great Mart for Figs—An Excursion into Asia Minor—Travelling Equipments—Character of the Hajjis—Encampment of Gipsies—A youthful Hebe—Note—Horror of the Turks for the “Unclean Animal”—An Anecdote [263]

LETTER XLV.

Natural Statue of Niobe—The Thorn of Syria and its Tradition—Approach to Magnesia—Hereditary Residence of the Family of Bey-Oglou—Character of its present Occupant—The Truth about Oriental Caravanserais—Comforts and Appliances they yield to Travellers—Figaro of the Turks—The Pilaw—Morning Scene at the Departure—Playful familiarity of a Solemn old Turk—Magnificent Prospect from Mount Sypilus [268]

LETTER XLVI.

The Eye of the Camel—Rocky Sepulchres—Virtue of an old Passport, backed by Impudence—Temple of Cybele—Palace of Crœsus—Ancient Church of Sardis—Return to Smyrna [274]

LETTER XLVII.

Smyrna—Charms of its Society—Hospitality of Foreign Residents—The Marina—The Casino—A narrow Escape from the Plague—Departure of the Frigate—High Character of the American Navy—A Tribute of Respect and Gratitude—The Farewell [279]

SUMMER CRUISE in THE MEDITERRANEAN.

LETTER I.

Cruise in the Frigate “United States”—Elba—Piombino—Porto Ferrajo—Appearance of the Bay—Naval Discipline—Visit to the Town Residence of Napoleon—His Employment during his Confinement on the Island—His sisters Eliza and Pauline—His Country House—Simplicity of the Inhabitants of Elba.

I had come from Florence to join the “United States,” at the polite invitation of the officers of the ward-room, on a cruise up the Mediterranean. My cot was swung immediately on my arrival, but we lay three days longer than was expected in the harbour, riding out a gale of wind, which broke the chain cables of both ships, and drove several merchant vessels on the rocks. We got under way on the 3rd of June, and the next morning were off Elba, with Corsica on our quarter, and the little island of Capreja just ahead.

The firing of guns took me just now to the deck. Three Sardinian gun-boats had saluted the commodore’s flag in passing, and it was returned with twelve guns. They were coming home from the affair at Tunis. It is a fresh, charming morning, and we are beating up against a light head-wind, all the officers on deck looking at the island with their glasses, and discussing the character of the great man to whom this little barren spot was a temporary empire. A bold fortification just appears on the point, with the Tuscan flag flying from the staff. The sides of the hills are dotted with desolate looking buildings, among which are one or two monasteries, and in rounding the side of the island, we have passed two or three small villages, perched below and above on the rocks. Off to the east, we can just distinguish Piombino, the nearest town of the Italian shore, and very beautiful it looks, rising from the edge of the water like Venice, with a range of cloudy hills relieving it in the rear.

Our anchor is dropped in the bay of Porto Ferrajo. As we ran lightly in upon the last tack, the walls of the fort appeared crowded with people, the whole town apparently assembled to see the unusual spectacle of two ships-of-war entering their now quiet waters. A small curving bay opened to us, and as we rounded directly under the walls of the fort, the tops of the houses in the town behind appeared crowded with women, whose features we could easily distinguish with a glass. By the constant exclamations of the midshipmen, who were gazing intently from the quarter-deck, there was among them a fair proportion of beauty, or what looked like it in the distance. Just below the summit of the fort, upon a terrace commanding a view of the sea, stood a handsome house, with low windows shut with Venetian blinds and shaded with acacias, which the pilot pointed out to us as the town residence of Napoleon. As the ship lost her way, we came in sight of a gentle amphitheatre of hills rising away from the cove, in a woody ravine of which stood a handsome building, with eight windows, built by the exile as a country-house. Twenty or thirty, as good or better, spot the hills around, ornamented with avenues and orchards of low olive-trees. It is altogether a rural scene, and disappoints us agreeably after the barren promise of the outer sides of the isle.

The “Constellation” came slowly in after us, with every sail set, and her tops crowded with men; and as she fell under the stern of the commodore’s ship, the word was given, and her vast quantity of sail was furled with that wonderful alacrity which so astonishes a landsman. I have been continually surprised in the few days that I have been on board, with the wonders of sea discipline; but for a spectacle, I have seen nothing more imposing than the entrance of these two beautiful frigates into the little port of Elba, and their magical management. The anchors were dropped, the yards came down by the run, the sails disappeared, the living swarm upon the rigging slid below, all in a moment, and then struck up the delightful band on our quarter-deck, and the sailors leaned on the guns, the officers on the quarter railing, and boats from the shore, filled with ladies, lay off at different distances, the whole scene as full of repose and enjoyment, as if we had lain idle for a month in these glassy waters. How beautiful are the results of order!

We had made every preparation for a pic-nic party to the country-house of Napoleon yesterday—but it rained. At sunset, however, the clouds crowded into vast masses, and the evening gave a glorious promise, which was fulfilled this morning in freshness and sunshine. The commodore’s barge took off the ladies for an excursion on horseback to the iron mines, on the other side of the island—the midshipmen were set ashore in various directions for a ramble, and I, tempted with the beauty of the ravine which enclosed the villa of Napoleon, declined all invitations with an eye to a stroll thither.

We were first set ashore at the mole to see the town. A medley crowd of soldiers, citizens, boys, girls, and galley-slaves, received us at the landing, and followed us up to the town-square, gazing at the officers with undisguised curiosity. We met several gentlemen from the other ship at the café, and taking a cicerone together, started for the town-residence of the emperor. It is now occupied by the governor, and stands on the fine summit of the little fortified city. We mounted by clean, excellent pavements, getting a good-natured buon giorno! from very female head thrust from beneath the blinds of the houses. The governor’s aide received us at the door, with his cap in his hand, and we commenced the tour of the rooms with all the household, male and female, following to gaze at us. Napoleon lived on the first floor. The rooms were as small as those of a private house, and painted in the pretty fresco common in Italy. The furniture was all changed, and the fire-places and two busts of the emperor’s sisters (Eliza and Pauline) were all that remained as it was. The library is a pretty room, though very small, and opens on a terrace level with his favourite garden. The plants and lemon-trees were planted by himself, we were told, and the officers plucked souvenirs on all sides. The officer who accompanied us was an old soldier of Napoleon’s and a native of Elba, and after a little of the reluctance common to the teller of an oft-told tale, he gave us some interesting particulars of the emperor’s residence at the island. It appears that he employed himself, from the first day of his arrival, in the improvement of his little territory, making roads, &c., and behaved quite like a man who had made up his mind to relinquish ambition, and content himself with what was about him. Three assassins were discovered and captured in the course of the eleven months, the first two of whom he pardoned. The third made an attempt upon his life, in the disguise of a beggar, at a bridge leading to his country-house, and was condemned and executed. He was a native of the emperor’s own birthplace in Corsica.

The second floor was occupied by his mother and Pauline. The furniture of the chamber of the renowned beauty is very much as she left it. The bed is small, and the mirror opposite its foot very large, and in a mahogany frame. Small mirrors were set also into the bureau, and in the back of a pretty cabinet of dark wood standing at the head of the bed. It is delightful to breathe the atmosphere of a room that has been the home of the lovely creature whose marble image by Canova thrills every beholder with love, and is fraught with such pleasing associations. Her sitting-room, though less interesting, made us linger and muse again. It looks out over the sea to the west, and the prospect is beautiful. One forgets that her history could not be written without many a blot. How much we forgive to beauty! Of all the female branches of the Bonaparte family, Pauline bore the greatest resemblance to her brother Napoleon: but the grand and regular profile which was in him marked with the stern air of sovereignty and despotic rule, was in her tempered with an enchanting softness and fascinating smile. Her statue, after the Venus de’ Medicis, is the chef d’œuvre of modern sculpture.

We went from the governor’s house to the walls of the town, loitering along and gazing at the sea; and then rambled through the narrow streets of the town, attracting, by the gay uniforms of the officers, the attention and courtesies of every smooched petticoat far and near. What the faces of the damsels of Elba might be, if washed, we could hardly form a conjecture.

The country-house of Napoleon is three miles from the town, a little distance from the shore, farther round into the bay. Captain Nicholson proposed to walk to it, and send his boat across—a warmer task for the mid-day of an Italian June than a man of less enterprise would choose for pleasure. We reached the stone steps of the imperial casino, after a melting and toilsome walk, hungry and thirsty, and were happy to fling ourselves upon broken chairs in the denuded drawing-room, and wait for an extempore dinner of twelve eggs and a bottle of wine as bitter as criticism. A farmer and his family live in the house, and a couple of bad busts and the fire-places, are all that remain of its old appearance. The situation and the view, however, are superb. A little lap of a valley opens right away from the door to the bosom of the bay, and in the midst of the glassy basin lies the bold peninsular promontory and fortification of Porto Ferrajo, like a castle in a loch, connected with the body of the island by a mere rib of sand. Off beyond sleeps the main-land of Italy, mountain and vale, like a smoothly-shaped bed of clouds; and for the foreground of the landscape, the valleys of Elba are just now green with fig-trees and vines, speckled here and there with fields of golden grain, and farm-houses shaded with all the trees of this genial climate.

We examined the place, after our frugal dinner, and found a natural path under the edge of the hill behind, stretching away back into the valley, and leading, after a short walk, to a small stream and a waterfall. Across it, just above the fall, lay the trunk of an old and vigorous fig-tree, full of green limbs, and laden with fruit half ripe. It made a natural bridge over the stream, and as its branches shaded the rocks below, we could easily imagine Napoleon, walking to and fro in the smooth path, and seating himself on the broadest stone in the heat of the summer evenings he passed on the spot. It was the only walk about the place, and a secluded and pleasant one. The groves of firs and brush above, and the locust and cherry-trees on the edges of the walk, are old enough to have shaded him. We sat and talked under the influence of the “genius of the spot,” till near sunset, and then, cutting each a walking-stick from the shoots of the old fig-tree, returned to the boats and reached the ship as the band struck up their exhilarating music for the evening on the quarter-deck.

We have passed two or three days at Elba most agreeably. The weather has been fine, and the ships have been thronged with company. The common people of the town come on board in boat-loads, men, women, and children, and are never satisfied with gazing and wondering. The inhabitants speak very pure Tuscan, and are mild and simple in their manners. They all take the ships to be bound upon a mere voyage of pleasure; and, with the officers in their gay dresses, and the sailors in their clean white and blue, the music morning and evening, and the general gaiety on board, the impression is not much to be wondered at.

Yesterday, after dinner, Captain Nicholson took us ashore in his gig, to pass an hour or two in the shade. His steward followed, with a bottle or two of old wine, and landing near the fountain to which the boats are sent for water, we soon found a spreading fig-tree, and, with a family of the country people from a neighbouring cottage around us, we idled away the hours till the cool of the evening. The simplicity of the old man and his wife, and the wonder of himself and several labourers in his vineyard, to whom the captain gave a glass or two of his excellent wines, would have made a study for Wilkie. Sailors are merry companions for a party like this. We returned over the unruffled expanse of the bay, charmed with the beauty of the scene by sunset, and as happy as a life, literally sans souci, could make us. What is it, in this rambling absence from all to which we look forward to in love and hope, that so fascinates the imagination?

I went, in the commodore’s suite, to call upon the governor this morning. He is a military, commanding-looking man, and received us in Napoleon’s saloon, surrounded by his officers. He regretted that his commission did not permit him to leave the shore, even to visit a ship, but offered a visit on the part of his sister, and a company of the first ladies of the town. They came off this morning. She was a lady-like woman, not very pretty, of thirty years perhaps. As she spoke only Italian, she was handed over to me, and I waited on her through the ship, explaining a great many things of which I knew as much as herself. This visit over, we get under way to-morrow morning for Naples.

LETTER II.

Visit to Naples, Herculaneum, and Pompeii.

I have passed my first day in Naples in wandering about, without any definite object. I have walked around its famous bay, looked at the lazzaroni, watched the smoke of Vesuvius, traversed the square where the young Conradine was beheaded and Masaniello commenced his revolt, mounted to the castle of St. Elmo, and dined on macaroni in a trattoria, where the Italian I had learned in Tuscany was of little more use to me than Greek.

The bay surprised me most. It is a collection of beauties, which seems more a miracle than an accident of nature. It is a deep crescent of sixteen miles across, and a little more in length, between the points of which lies a chain of low mountains, called the island of Capri, looking, from the shore, like a vast heap of clouds brooding at sea. In the bosom of the crescent lies Naples. Its palaces and principal buildings cluster around the base of an abrupt hill crowned by the castle of St. Elmo, and its half million of inhabitants have stretched their dwellings over the plain towards Vesuvius, and back upon Posilipo, bordering the curve of the shore on the right and left, with a broad white band of city and village for twelve or fourteen miles. Back from this, on the southern side, a very gradual ascent brings your eye to the base of Vesuvius, which rises from the plain in a sharp cone, broken in at the top, its black and lava-streaked sides descending with the evenness of a sand-hill, on one side to the disinterred city of Pompeii, and on the other to the royal palace of Portici, built over the yet unexplored Herculaneum. In the centre of the crescent of the shore projecting into the sea by a bridge of two or three hundred feet in length, stands a small castle built upon a rock, on one side of which lies the mole with its shipping. The other side is bordered, close to the beach, with the gardens of the royal villa, a magnificent promenade of a mile, ornamented with fancy temples and statuary, on the smooth alleys of which may be met, at certain hours, all that is brilliant and gay in Naples. Farther on, toward the northern horn of the bay, lies the mount of Posilipo, the ancient coast of Baiæ, Cape Mysene, and the mountain isles of Procida and Ischia, the last of which still preserves the costumes of Greece, from which it was colonised centuries ago. The bay itself is as blue as the sky, scarcely ruffled all day with the wind, and covered by countless boats fishing or creeping on with their picturesque lateen sails just filled: while the atmosphere over sea, city, and mountain, is of a clearness and brilliancy which is inconceivable in other countries. The superiority of the sky and climate of Italy is no fable in any part of this delicious land—but in Naples, if the day I have spent here is a fair specimen, it is matchless even for Italy. There is something like a fine blue veil of a most dazzling transparency over the mountains around, but above and between there seems nothing but viewless space—nothing like air that a bird could rise upon. The eye gets intoxicated almost with gazing on it.

We have just returned from our first excursion to Pompeii. It lies on the southern side of the bay, just below the volcano which overwhelmed it, about twelve miles from Naples. The road lay along the shore, and is lined with villages, which are only separated by name. The first is Portici, where the king has a summer palace, through the court of which the road passes. It is built over Herculaneum, and the danger of undermining it has stopped the excavations of unquestionably the richest city buried by Vesuvius. We stopped at a little gate in the midst of the village, and taking a guide and two torches, descended to the only part of it now visible, by near a hundred steps. We found ourselves at the back of an amphitheatre. We entered the narrow passage, and the guide pointed to several of the upper seats for the spectators which had been partially dug out. They were lined with marble, as the whole amphitheatre appears to have been. To realise the effect of these ruins, it is to be remembered that they are imbedded in solid lava, like rock, near a hundred feet deep, and that the city, which is itself ancient, is built above them. The carriage in which we came, stood high over our heads, in a time-worn street, and ages had passed and many generations of men had lived and died over a splendid city, whose very name had been forgotten! It was discovered in sinking a well, which struck the door of the amphitheatre. The guide took us through several other long passages, dug across and around it, showing us the orchestra, the stage, the numerous entrances, and the bases of several statues which are taken to the museum at Naples. This is the only part of the excavation that remains open, the others having again been filled with rubbish. The noise of the carriages overhead in the streets of Portici was like a deafening thunder.

In a hurry to get to Pompeii, which is much more interesting, we ascended to daylight, and drove on. Coasting along the curve of the bay, with only a succession of villas and gardens between us and the beach, we soon came to Torre del Greco, a small town which was overwhelmed by an eruption thirty-nine years ago. Vesuvius here rises gradually on the left, the crater being at a distance of five miles. The road crossed the bed of dry lava, which extends to the sea in a broad, black mass of cinders, giving the country the most desolate aspect. The town is rebuilt just beyond the ashes, and the streets are crowded with the thoughtless inhabitants, who buy and sell, and lounge in the sun, with no more remembrance or fear of the volcano, than the people of a city in America.

Another half-hour brought us to a long, high bank of earth and ashes, thrown out from the excavations; and passing on, we stopped at the gate of Pompeii. A guide met us, and we entered. We found ourselves in the ruins of a public square, surrounded with small low columns of red marble. On the right were several small prisons, in one of which was found the skeleton of a man with its feet in iron stocks. The cell was very small, and the poor fellow must have been suffocated without even a hope of escape. The columns just in front were scratched with ancient names, possibly those of the guard stationed at the door of the prison. This square is surrounded with shops, in which were found the relics and riches of tradesmen, consisting of an immense variety. In one of the buildings was found the skeleton of a new-born child, and in one part of the square the skeletons of sixty men, supposed to be soldiers, who, in the severity of Roman discipline, dared not fly, and perished at their post. There were several advertisements of gladiators on the pillars, and it appears that at the time of the eruption, the inhabitants of Pompeii were principally assembled in the great amphitheatre, at a show.

We left the square, and visiting several small private houses near it, passed into a street with a slight ascent, the pavement of which was worn deep with carriage-wheels. It appeared to have led from the upper part of the city directly to the sea, and in rainy weather must have been quite a channel for water, as high stones at small distances were placed across the street, leaving open places between for the carriage-wheels. (I think there is a contrivance of the same kind in one of the streets of Baltimore.)

We mounted thence to higher ground, the part of the city not excavated. A peasant’s hut and a large vineyard stand high above the ruins, and from the door the whole city and neighbourhood are seen to advantage. The effect of the scene is strange beyond description. Columns, painted walls, wheel-worn streets, amphitheatres, palaces, all as lonely and deserted as the grave, stand around you, and behind is a poor cottage and a vineyard of fresh earth just putting forth its buds, and beyond, the broad, blue, familiar bay, covered with steamboats and sails, and populous modern Naples in the distance—a scene as strangely mingled, perhaps, as any to be found in the world. We looked around for a while, and then walked on through the vineyard to the amphitheatre which lies beyond, near the other gate of the city. It is a gigantic ruin, completely excavated, and capable of containing twenty thousand spectators. The form is oval, and the architecture particularly fine. Besides the many vomitories or passages for ingress and egress, there are three smaller alleys, one used as the entrance for wild beasts, one for the gladiators, and the third as that by which the dead were taken away. The skeletons of eight lions and a man, supposed to be their keeper, were found in one of the dens beneath, and those of five other persons near the different doors. It is presumed that the greater proportion of the inhabitants of Pompeii must have escaped by sea, as the eruption occurred while they were nearly all assembled on this spot, and these few skeletons only have been found.[^[1]]

We returned through the vineyard, and stopping at the cottage, called for some of the wine of the last vintage (delicious, like all those in the neighbourhood of Vesuvius), and producing our basket of provisions, made a most agreeable dinner. Two parties of English passed while we were sitting at our out-of-doors table. Our attendant was an uncommonly pretty girl of sixteen, born on the spot, and famous just now as the object of a young English nobleman’s particular admiration. She is a fine, dark-eyed creature, but certainly no prettier than every fifth peasant girl in Italy. Having finished our picturesque meal, we went down into the ancient streets once more, and arrived at the small temple of Isis, a building in excellent preservation. On the altar stood, when it was excavated, a small statue of Isis, of exquisite workmanship (now in the museum, to which all the curiosities of the place are carried), and behind this we were shown the secret penetralia, where the priests were concealed, who uttered the oracles supposed to be pronounced by the goddess. The access was by a small secret flight of stairs, communicating with the apartments of the priests in the rear. The largest of these apartments was probably the refectory, and here was found a human skeleton near a table, upon which lay dinner utensils, chicken bones, bones of fishes, bread and wine, and a faded garland of flowers. In the kitchen, which we next visited, were found cooking utensils, remains of food, and the skeleton of a man leaning against the wall with an axe in his hand, and near him a considerable hole, which he had evidently cut to make his escape when the door was stopped by cinders. The skeleton of one of the priests was found prostrate, near the temple, and in his hand three hundred and sixty coins of silver, forty-two of bronze, and eight of gold, wrapped strongly in a cloth. He had probably stopped before his flight to load himself with the treasures of the temple, and was overtaken by the shower of cinders and suffocated. The skeletons of one or two were found upon beds, supposed to have been smothered while asleep or ill. The temple is beautifully paved with mosaic (as indeed are all the better private houses and public buildings of Pompeii), and the open inner court is bordered with a quadrilateral portico. The building is of the Roman Doric order. (I have neither time nor room to enumerate the curiosities found here and in the other parts of the city, and I only notice those which most impressed my memory. The enumeration by Madame Stark, will be found exceedingly interesting to those who have not read her laconic guide-book.)

We passed next across a small street to the tragic theatre, a large handsome building, where the seats for the vestals, consuls, and other places of honour, are well preserved, and thence up the hill to the temple of Hercules, which must have been a noble edifice, commanding a superb view of the sea.

The next object was the triangular forum, an open space surrounded with three porticoes, supported by a hundred Doric columns. Here were found several skeletons, one of which was that of a man who had loaded himself with plunder. Gold and silver coins, cups, rings, spoons, buckles, and other things, were found under him. Near here, under the ruins of a wall, were discovered skeletons of a man and a woman, and on the arms of the latter two beautiful bracelets of gold.

We entered from this a broad street, lined with shops, against the walls of which were paintings in fresco, and inscriptions in deep-red paint, representing the occupations and recording the names of the occupants. In one of them was found a piece of salt-fish, smelling strongly after seventeen centuries! In a small lane leading from this street, the guide led us to a shop, decorated with pictures of fish of various kinds, and furnished with a stove, marble dressers, and earthern jars, supposed to have belonged to a vender of fish and olives. A little further on was a baker’s shop, with a well-used oven, in which was found a batch of bread burnt to a cinder. Near this was the house of a midwife. In it were found several instruments of a simple and excellent construction, unknown to the moderns, a forceps, remains of medicines in a wooden box, and various pestles and mortars. The walls were ornamented with frescoes of the Graces, Venus, and Adonis, and similar subjects.

The temple of the pantheon is a magnificent ruin, and must have been one of the choicest in Pompeii. Its walls are decorated with exquisite paintings in fresco, arabesques, mosaics, &c., and its court is one hundred and eighty feet long, and two hundred and thirty broad, and contains an altar, around which are twelve pedestals for statues of the twelve principal deities of the ancients. Gutters of marble are placed at the base of the triclinium, to carry away the blood of the victims. A thousand coins of bronze, and forty or fifty of silver, were found near the sanctuary.

We passed on to the Curea, a semi-circular building, for the discussion of matters of religion by the magistrates; a temple of Romulus; the remains of a temple of Janus; a splendid building called the chalcidicum, constructed by the priestess Eumachea and her son, and dedicated as a temple of concord, and came at last, by a regular ascent, into a large and spacious square, called the forum civile. This part of the city of Pompeii must have been extremely imposing. Porticoes, supported by noble columns, encompassed its vast area; the pedestals of colossal statues, erected to distinguished citizens, are placed at the corners; at the northern extremity rose a stately temple of Jupiter: on the right was another temple to Venus; beyond, a large public edifice, the use of which is not known; across the narrow street which bounds it stood the Basilica, an immense building, which served as a court of justice and an exchange.

We passed out at the gate of the city and stopped at a sentry-box, in which was found a skeleton in full armour—a soldier who had died at his post! From hence formerly the road descended directly to the sea, and for some distance was lined on either side with the magnificent tombs of the Pompeians. Among them was that of the Vestal virgins, left unfinished when the city was destroyed; a very handsome tomb, in which was found the skeleton of a woman, with a lamp in one hand and jewels in the other (who had probably attempted to rob before her flight), and a very handsome square monument, with a beautiful relievo on one of the slabs, representing (as emblematic of death) a ship furling her sails on coming into port. Near one of the large family sepulchres stands a small semi-circular room, intended for the funeral feast after a burial; and here were found the remains of three men around a table, scattered with relics of a meal. They were overwhelmed ere their feast was concluded over the dead!

The principal inn of Pompeii was just inside the gate. We went over the ruins of it. The skeleton of an ass was found chained to a ring in the stable, and the tire of a wheel lay in the court-yard. Chequers are painted on the side of the door as a sign.

Below the tombs stands the “suburban villa of Diomed,” one of the most sumptuous edifices of Pompeii. Here was found everything that the age could furnish for the dwelling of a man of wealth. Statues, frescoes, jewels, wine, household utensils of every description, skeletons of servants and dogs, and every kind of elegant furniture. The family was large, and in the first moment of terror, they all retreated to a wine vault under the villa, where their skeletons (eighteen grown persons and two children) were found seventeen centuries after! There was really something startling in walking through the deserted rooms of this beautiful villa—more than one feels elsewhere in Pompeii, for it is more like the elegance and taste of our own day; and with the brightness of the preserved walls, and the certainty with which the use of each room is ascertained, it seems as if the living inhabitant would step from some corner and welcome you. The figures on the walls are as fresh as if done yesterday. The baths look as if they might scarce be dry from use. It seems incredible that the whole Christian age has elapsed since this was a human dwelling—occupied by its last family while our Saviour was walking the world!

It would be tedious to enumerate all the curious places to which the guide led us in this extraordinary city. On our return through the streets, among the objects of interest was the house of Sallust, the historian. I did not think, when reading his beautiful Latin at school, that I should ever sit down in his parlour! Sallust was rich, and his house is uncommonly handsome. Here is his chamber, his inner court, his kitchen, his garden, his dining-room, his guest-chamber, all perfectly distinguishable by the symbolical frescoes on the wall. In the court was a fountain of pretty construction, and opposite, in the rear, was a flower-garden, containing arrangements for dining in open air in summer. The skeleton of a female (supposed to be the wife of the historian) and three servants, known by their different ornaments, were found near the door of the street.

We passed a druggist’s shop and a cook-shop, and entered, treading on a beautiful mosaic floor, the “house of the dramatic poet,” so named from the character of the paintings with which it is ornamented throughout. The frescoes found here are the finest ancient paintings in the world, and from some peculiarity in the rings upon the fingers of the female figures, they are supposed to be family portraits. With assistance like this, how easily the imagination repeoples these deserted dwellings.

A heavy shower drove us to the shelter of the wine-vaults of Diomed, as we were about stepping into our carriage to return to Naples. We spent the time in exploring, and found some thirty or forty earthen jars still half-buried in the ashes which drifted through the loop-holes of the cellar. In another half-hour the black cloud had passed away over Vesuvius, and the sun set behind Posilipo in a flood of splendour. We were at home soon after dark, having had our fill of astonishment for once. I have seen nothing in my life so remarkable as this disentombed city. I have passed over, in the description, many things which were well worth noting, but it would have grown into a mere catalogue else. You should come to Italy. It is a privilege to realise these things which could not be bought too dearly, and they cannot be realised but by the eye. Description conveys but a poor shadow of them to the fancy.

LETTER III.

Account of Vesuvius—The Hermitage—The famous Lagrima Christi—Difficulties of the Path—Curious Appearance of the Old Crater—Odd Assemblage of Travellers—The New Crater—Splendid Prospect—Mr. Mathias, Author of the Pursuits of Literature—The Archbishop of Tarento.

Mounted upon asses much smaller than their riders, and with each a bare-legged driver behind, we commenced the ascent of Vesuvius. It was a troublesome path worn through the rough scoria of old eruptions, and after two hours’ toiling, we were glad to dismount at “the hermitage.” Here lives a capuchin friar on a prominent rib in the side of the volcano, the red-hot lava dividing above his dwelling every year or two, and coursing away to the valley in two rivers of fire on either side of him. He has been there twelve years, and supports himself, and probably half the brotherhood at the monastery, by selling Lagrima Christi to strangers. It is a small white building with a little grass and a few trees about it, and looks like an island in the black waste of cinders and lava.

A shout from the guide was answered by the opening of a small window above, and the shaven crown of the old friar was thrust forth with a welcome and a request that we would mount the stairs to the parlour. He received us at the top, and gave us chairs around a plain board table, upon which he set several bottles of the far-famed wine of Vesuvius. One drinks it, and blesses the volcano that warmed the roots of the grape. It is a ripe, rich, full-bodied liquor, which “ascends me into the brain” sooner than any continental wine I have tasted. I never drank anything more delicious.

We remounted our asses and rode on, much more indifferent than before, to the roughness of the path. It strikes one like the road to the infernal regions. No grass, not a shrub, nothing but a wide mountain of cinders, black and rugged, diversified only by the deeper die of the newer streaks of lava. The eye wearied of gazing on it. We mounted thus for an hour or more, arriving at last at the base of a lofty cone whose sides were but slopes of deep ashes. We left our donkeys here in company with those of a large party that had preceded us, and made preparations to ascend on foot. The drivers unlaced their sashes, and passing them round the waists of the ladies, took the ends over their shoulders, and proceeded. Harder work could scarce be conceived. The feet had no hold, sinking knee-deep at every step, and we slipped back so much, that our progress was almost imperceptible. The ladies were soon tired out, although more than half dragged up by the guides. At every few steps there was a general cry for a halt, and we lay down in the warm ashes, quite breathless and discouraged.

In something more than an hour from the hermitage we reached the edge of the old crater. The scene here was very curious. A hollow, perhaps a mile round, composed entirely of scoria (like the cinders under a blacksmith’s window) contained in its centre the sharp new cone of the last eruption. Around in various directions, sat some thirty groups of travellers, with each their six or seven Italian guides, refreshing themselves with a lunch after the fatigue of the ascent. There were English, Germans, French, Russians, and Italians, each speaking their own language, and the largest party, oddly enough, was from the United States. As I was myself travelling with foreigners, and found my countrymen on Vesuvius unexpectedly, the mixture of nations appeared still more extraordinary. The combined heat of the sun and the volcano beneath us, had compelled the Italians to throw off half their dress, and they sat or stood leaning on their long pikes, with their brown faces and dark eyes glowing with heat, as fine models of ruffians as ever startled a traveller in this land of bandits. Eight or ten of them were grouped around a crack in the crater, roasting apples and toasting bread. There were several of these cracks winding about in different directions, of which I could barely endure the heat, holding my hand at the top. A stick thrust in a foot or more, was burnt black in a moment.

With another bottle or two of “lagrima Christi” and a roasted apple, our courage was renewed, and we picked our way across the old crater, sometimes lost in the smoke which steamed up through the cracks, and here and there treading on beautiful beds of crystals of sulphur. The ascent of the new cone was shorter, but very difficult. The ashes were so new and light, that it was like a steep sand-bank, giving discouragingly at the least pressure, and sinking till the next step was taken. The steams of sulphur as we approached the summit, were all but intolerable. The ladies coughed, the guides sneezed and called on the Madonna, and I never was more relieved than in catching the first clear draught of wind on the top of the mountain.

Here we all stood at last—crowded together on the narrow edge of a crater formed within the year, and liable every moment to be overwhelmed with burning lava. There was scarce room to stand, and the hot ashes burnt our feet as they sunk into it. The females of each party sunk to the ground, and the common danger and toil breaking down the usual stiff barrier of silence between strangers, the conversation became general, and the hour on the crater’s edge passed very agreeably.

A strong lad would just about throw a stone from one side to the other of the new crater. It was about forty feet deep, perhaps more, and one crust of sulphur lined the whole. It was half the time obscured in smoke, which poured in volumes from the broad cracks with which it was divided in every direction, and occasionally an eddy of wind was caught in the vast bowl, and for a minute its bright yellow surface was perfectly clear. There had not been an eruption for four or five months, and the abyss, which is, for years together, a pit of fire and boiling lava, has had time to harden over, and were it not for the smoking steams, one would scarce suspect the existence of the tremendous volcano slumbering beneath.

After we had been on the summit a few minutes, an English clergyman of my acquaintance, to our surprise, emerged from the smoke. He had been to the bottom for specimens of sulphur for his cabinet. Contrary to the advice of the guide, I profited by his experience, and disappearing in the flying clouds, reached the lowest depths of the crater with some difficulties of foothold and breath. The cracks, which I crossed twice, were so brittle as to break like the upper ice of a twice frozen pond beneath my feet, and the stench of the exhaling gases was nauseating beyond all the sulphuretted hydrogen I have ever known. The sensation was painfully suffocating from the moment I entered the crater. I broke off as many bits of the bright golden crystals from the crust as my confusion and failing strength would allow, and then remounted, feeling my way up through the smoke to the summit.

I can compare standing on the top of Vesuvius and looking down upon the bay and city of Naples, to nothing but mounting a peak in the infernal regions overlooking paradise. The larger crater encircles you entirely for a mile, cutting off the view of the sides of the mountain, and from the elevation of the new cone, you look over the rising edge of this black field of smoke and cinders, and drop the eye at once upon Naples, lying asleep in the sun, with its lazy sails upon the water, and the green hills enclosing it clad in the indescribable beauty of an Italian atmosphere. Beyond all comparison, by the testimony of every writer and traveller, the most beautiful scene in the world, the loveliest water, and the brightest land, lay spread out before us. With the stench of hot sulphur in our nostrils, ankle deep in black ashes, and a waste of smouldering cinders in every direction around us, the enjoyment of the view certainly did not want for the heightening of contrast.

We made our descent by jumps through the sliding ashes, frequently tumbling over each other, and retracing in five minutes the toil of an hour. Our donkeys stood tethered together on the herbless field of cinders, and we were soon in the clumsy saddles, and with a call at the hermitage, and a parting draught of wine with the friar, we reached our carriages at the little village of Resina in safety. The feet of the whole troop were in a wretched condition. The ladies had worn shoes, or slight boots, which were cut to pieces of course, and one very fine-looking girl, the daughter of an elderly French gentleman, had, with the usual improvidence of her nation, started in satin slippers. She was probably lamed for a month, as she insisted on persevering, and wrapped her feet in handkerchiefs to return.

We rode along the curve of the bay, by one of these matchless sunsets of Italy, and arrived at Naples at dark.

I have had the pleasure lately of making the acquaintance of Mr. Mathias, the distinguished author of the “Pursuits of Literature,” and the translator of Spenser and other English poets into Italian. About twenty years ago, this well-known scholar came to Italy on a desperate experiment of health. Finding himself better almost against hope, he has remained from year to year in Naples, in love with the climate and the language, until, at this day, he belongs less to the English than the Italian literature, having written various original poems in Italian, and translated into Italian verse, to the wonder and admiration of the scholars of the country. I found him this morning at his lodgings, in an old palace on the Pizzofalcone, buried in books as usual, and good-humoured enough to give an hour to a young man who had no claim on him beyond the ordinary interest in a distinguished scholar. He talked a great deal of America naturally, and expressed a very strong friendship for Mr. Everett, whom he had met on his travels, requesting me at the same time to take to him a set of his works as a remembrance. Mr. Mathias is a small man, of perhaps sixty years, perfectly bald, and a little inclined to corpulency. His head is ample, and would make a fine picture of a scholar. His voice is hurried and modest, and from long residence in Italy, his English is full of Italian idioms. He spoke with rapture of Da Ponte, calling me back as I shut the door, to ask for him. It seemed to give him uncommon pleasure that we appreciated and valued him in America.

I have looked over, this evening, a small volume, which he was kind enough to give me. It is entitled “Lyric Poetry, by T. I. Mathias; a new edition, printed privately.” It is dated 1832, and the poems were probably all written within the last two years. The shortest extract I can make is a “Sonnet to the Memory of Gray,” which strikes me as very beautiful.

“Lord of the various lyre! devout we turn

Our pilgrim steps to thy supreme abode,

And tread with awe the solitary road

To grace with votive wreaths thy hallowed urn.

Yet, as we wander through this dark sojourn,

No more the strains we hear, that all abroad

Thy fancy wafted, as the inspiring God

Prompted ‘the thoughts that breathe, the words that burn.’

“But hark! a voice in solemn accents clear

Bursts from heaven’s vault that glows with temperate fire;

Cease, mortal, cease to drop the fruitless tear;

Mute though the raptures of his full-strung lyre,

E’en his own warblings, lessened on his ear,

Lost in seraphic harmony expire.”

I have met also, at a dinner party lately, the celebrated antiquary, Sir William Gell. He, too, lives abroad. His work on Pompeii has become authority, and displays very great learning. He is a tall, large-featured man, and very commanding in his appearance, though lamed terribly with the gout.

A friend, whom I met at the same house, took me to see the archbishop of Tarento yesterday. This venerable man, it is well known, lost his gown for his participation in the cause of the Carbonari (the revolutionary conspirators of Italy). He has always played a conspicuous part in the politics of his time, and now, at the age of ninety, unlike the usual fate of meddlers in troubled waters, he is a healthy, happy, venerated old man, surrounded in his palace with all that luxury can give him. The lady who presented me took the privilege of intimate friendship to call at an unusual hour, and we found the old churchman in his slippers, over his breakfast, with two immense tortoise-shell cats, upon stools, watching his hand for bits of bread, and purring most affectionately. He looks like one of Titian’s pictures. His face is a wreck of commanding features, and his eye seems less to have lost its fire, than to slumber in its deep socket. His hair is snowy white—his forehead of prodigious breadth and height—and his skin has that calm, settled, and yet healthy paleness, which carries with it the history of a whole life of temperance and thought.

The old man rose from his chair with a smile, and came forward with a stoop and a feeble step, and took my two hands, as my friend mentioned my name, and looked me in the face very earnestly. “Your country,” said he, in Italian, “has sprung into existence like Minerva, full grown and armed. We look for the result.” He went on with some comments upon the dangers of republics, and then sent me to look at a portrait of Queen Giovanna, of Naples, by Leonardo da Vinci, while he sat down to talk with the lady who brought me. His secretary accompanied me as a cicerone. Five or six rooms, communicating with each other, were filled with choice pictures, every one a gift from some distinguished individual. The present king of France has sent him his portrait! Queen Adelaide has sent a splendid set of Sèvres china, with the portraits of her family; the Queen of Belgium had presented him with her miniature and that of Leopold; the King and Queen of Naples had half-furnished his house; and so the catalogue went on. It seemed as if the whole continent had united to honour the old man. While I was looking at a curious mosaic portrait of a cat, presented to him on the death of the original, by some prince whose name I have forgotten, he came to us, and said he had just learned that my pursuits were literary, and would present me with his own last work. He opened the drawer of a small bureau and produced a manuscript of some ten pages, written in a feeble hand. “This,” said he, “is an enumeration from memory of what I have not seen for many years, the classic spots about our beautiful city of Naples, and their associations. I have written it in the last month to wile away the time, and call up again the pleasure I have received many times in my life in visiting them.” I put the curious document in my bosom with many thanks, and we kissed the hand of the good old priest and left him. We found his carriage, with three or four servants in handsome livery, waiting for him in the court below. We had intruded a little on the hour for his morning ride.

I found his account of the environs merely a simple catalogue, with here and there a classic quotation from a Greek or Latin author, referring to them. I keep the MS. as a curious memento of one of the noblest relics I have seen of an age gone by.

LETTER IV.

The Fashionable World of Naples at the Races—Brilliant Show of Equipages—The King and his Brother—Rank and Character of the Jockeys—Description of the Races—The Public Burial Ground at Naples—Horrid and inhuman Spectacles—The Lazzaroni—The Museum at Naples—Ancient Relics from Pompeii—Forks not used by the Ancients—The Lamp lit at the time of our Saviour—The antique Chair of Sallust—The Villa of Cicero—The Balbi Family—Bacchus on the Shoulders of a Faun—Gallery of Dians, Cupids, Joves, Mercuries, and Apollos, Statue of Aristides, &c.

I have been all day at “the races.” The King of Naples, who has a great admiration for everything English, has abandoned the Italian custom of running horses without riders through the crowded street, and has laid out a magnificent course on the summit of a broad hill overlooking the city on the east. Here he astonishes his subjects with ridden races, and it was to see one of the best of the season, that the whole fashionable world of Naples poured out to the campo this morning. The show of equipages was very brilliant, the dashing liveries of the various ambassadors, and the court and nobles of the kingdom, showing on the bright greensward to great effect. I never saw a more even piece of turf, and it was fresh in the just-born vegetation of spring. The carriages were drawn up in two lines, nearly half round the course, and for an hour or two before the races, the king and his brother, Prince Carlo, rode up and down between with the royal suite, splendidly mounted, the monarch himself upon a fiery grey blood-horse, of uncommon power and beauty. The director was an Aragonese nobleman, cousin to the king, and as perfect a specimen of the Spanish cavalier as ever figured in the pages of romance. He was mounted on a Turkish horse, snow-white, and the finest animal I ever saw; and he carried all eyes with him, as he dashed up and down, like a meteor. I like to see a fine specimen of a man, as I do a fine picture, or an excellent horse, and I think I never saw a prettier spectacle of its kind, than this wild steed from the Balkan and his handsome rider.

The king is tall, very fat, but very erect, of a light complexion, and a good horseman, riding always in the English style, trotting and rising in his stirrup. (He is about twenty-three, and so surprisingly like a friend of mine in Albany, that the people would raise their hats to them indiscriminately I am sure.) Prince Charles is smaller and less kingly in his appearance, dresses carelessly and ill, and is surrounded always in public with half a dozen young Englishmen. He is said to have been refused lately by the niece of the wealthiest English nobleman in Italy, a very beautiful girl of eighteen, who was on the ground to-day in a chariot and four.

The horses were led up and down—a delicate, fine-limbed sorrel mare, and a dark chestnut horse, compact and wiry—both English. The bets were arranged, the riders weighed, and, at the beat of a bell, off they went like arrows. Oh what a beautiful sight! The course was about a mile round, and marked with red flags at short distances; and as the two flying creatures described the bright green circle, spread out like greyhounds, and running with an ease and grace that seemed entirely without effort, the king dashed across the field followed by the whole court; the Turkish steed of Don Giovanni restrained with difficulty in the rear, and leaping high in the air at every bound, his nostrils expanded, and his head thrown up with the peculiar action of his race, while his snow-white mane and tail flew with every hair free to the wind. I had, myself, a small bet upon the sorrel. It was nothing—a pair of gloves with a lady—but as the horses came round, the sorrel a whip’s length ahead, and both shot by like the wind, scarce touching the earth apparently, and so even in their speed that the rider in blue might have kept his hand on the other’s back, the excitement became breathless. Away they went again, past the starting-post, pattering, pattering on with their slender hoofs, the sorrel still keeping her ground, and a thousand bright lips wishing the graceful creature success. Half way round the blue jacket began to whip. The sorrel still held her way, and I felt my gloves to be beyond peril. The royal cortège within the ring spurred across at the top of their speed to the starting-post. The horses came on—their nostrils open and panting, bounding upon the way with the same measured leaps a little longer and more eager than before; the rider of the sorrel leaning over the neck of his horse with a loose rein, and his whip hanging untouched from his wrist. Twenty leaps more! With every one the rider of the chestnut gave the fine animal a blow. The sorrel sprang desperately on, every nerve strained to the jump, but at the instant that they passed the carriage in which I stood, the chestnut was developing his wiry frame in tremendous leaps, and had already gained on his opponent the length of his head. They were lost in the crowd that broke instantly into the course behind them, and in a moment after a small red flag was waved from the stand. My favourite had lost!

The next race was ridden by a young Scotch nobleman, and the son of the former French ambassador, upon the horses with which they came to the ground. It was a match made up on the spot. The Frenchman was so palpably better mounted, that there was a general laugh when the ground was cleared and the two gentlemen spurred up and down to show themselves as antagonists. The Parisian himself stuffed his white handkerchief in his bosom, and jammed down his hat upon his head with a confident laugh, and among the ladies there was scarce a bet upon the grave Scotchman, who borrowed a stout whip, and rode his bony animal between the lines with a hard rein and his feet set firmly in the stirrups. The Frenchman generously gave him every advantage, beginning with the inside of the ring. The bell struck, and the Scotchman drove his spurs into his horse’s flanks and started away, laying on with his whip most industriously. His opponent followed, riding very gracefully, but apparently quite sure that he could overtake him at any moment, and content for the first round with merely showing himself off to the best advantage. Round came Sawney, twenty leaps ahead, whipping unmercifully still; the blood of his hired hack completely up, and himself as red in the face as an alderman, and with his eye fixed only on the road. The long-tailed bay of the Frenchman came after, in handsome style, his rider sitting complacently upright, and gathering up his reins for the first time to put his horse to his speed. The Scotchman flogged on. The Frenchman had disdained to take a whip, but he drove his heels hard into his horse’s sides soon after leaving the post, and leaned forward quite in earnest. The horses did remarkably well, both showing much more bottom than was expected. On they came, the latter gaining a little and working very hard. Sawney had lost his hat, and his red hair streamed back from his redder face; but flogging and spurring, with his teeth shut and his eyes steadily fixed on the road, he kept the most of his ground and rode away. They passed me a horse’s length apart, and the Scotchman’s whip flying to the last, disappeared beyond me. He won the race by a couple of good leaps at least. The king was very much amused, and rode off laughing heartily, and the discomfited Frenchman came back to his party with a very ill-concealed dissatisfaction.

A very amusing race followed between two midshipmen from an English corvette lying in the bay, and then the long lines of splendid equipages wheeled into train, and dashed off the ground. The road, after leaving the campo, runs along the edge of the range of hills, enclosing the city, and just below, within a high white wall, lies the public burial-place of Naples. I had read so many harrowing descriptions of this spot, that my curiosity rose as we drove along in sight of it, and requesting my friends to set me down, I joined an American of my acquaintance, and we started to visit it together.

An old man opened the iron door, and we entered a clean, spacious, and well-paved area, with long rows of iron rings in the heavy slabs of the pavement. Without asking a question, the old man walked across to the farther corner, where stood a moveable lever, and fastening the chain into the fixture, raised the massive stone cover of a pit. He requested us to stand back for a few minutes to give the effluvia time to escape, and then, sheltering our eyes with our hats, we looked in. You have read, of course, that there are three hundred and sixty-five pits in this place, one of which is opened every day for the dead of the city. They are thrown in without shroud or coffin, and the pit is sealed up at night for a year. They are thirty or forty feet deep, and each would contain perhaps two hundred bodies. Lime is thrown upon the daily heap, and it soon melts into a mass of garbage, and by the end of the year the bottom of the pit is covered with dry white bones.

It was some time before we could distinguish anything in the darkness of the abyss. Fixing my eyes on one spot, however, the outlines of a body became defined gradually, and in a few minutes, sheltering my eyes completely from the sun above, I could see all the horrors of the scene but too distinctly. Eight corpses, all of grown persons, lay in a confused heap together, as they had been thrown in one after another in the course of the day. The last was a powerfully made, gray old man, who had fallen flat on his back, with his right hand lying across and half covering the face of a woman. By his full limbs and chest, and the darker colour of his legs below the knee, he was probably one of the lazzaroni, and had met with a sudden death. His right heel lay on the forehead of a young man, emaciated to the last degree, his chest thrown up as he lay, and his ribs showing like a skeleton covered with skin. The close black curls of the latter, as his head rested on another body, were in such strong relief that I could have counted them. Off to the right, quite distinct from the heap, lay, in a beautiful attitude, a girl, as well as I could judge, of not more than nineteen or twenty. She had fallen on the pile and rolled or slid away. Her hair was very long, and covered her left shoulder and bosom; her arm was across her body, and if her mother had laid her down to sleep, she could not have disposed her limbs more decently. The head had fallen a little away to the right, and the feet, which were small, even for a lady, were pressed one against the other, as if she were about turning on her side. The sexton said that a young man had come with the body, and was very ill for some time after it was thrown in. We asked him if respectable people were brought here. “Yes,” he said, “many. None but the rich would go to the expense of a separate grave for their relations. People were often brought in handsome grave-clothes, but they were always stripped before they were left. The shroud, whenever there was one, was the perquisite of the undertakers.” And thus are flung into this noisome pit, like beasts, the greater part of the population of this vast city—the young and the old, the vicious and the virtuous together, without the decency even of a rag to keep up the distinctions of life! Can human beings thus be thrown away?—men like ourselves—women, children, like our sisters and brothers? I never was so humiliated in my life as by this horrid spectacle. I did not think a man—a felon even, or a leper—what you will that is guilty or debased—I did not think anything that had been human could be so recklessly abandoned. Pah! It makes one sick at heart! God grant I may never die at Naples!

While we were recovering from our disgust, the old man lifted the stone from the pit destined to receive the dead on the following day. We looked in. The bottom was strewn with bones, already fleshless and dry. He wished us to see the dead of several previous days, but my stomach was already tried to its utmost. We paid our gratuity, and hurried away. A few steps from the gate, we met a man bearing a coffin on his head. Seeing that we came from the cemetery, he asked us if we wished to look into it. He set it down, and the lid opening with a hinge, we were horror-struck with the sight of seven dead infants! The youngest was at least three months old, the eldest perhaps a year; and they lay heaped together like so many puppies, one or two of them spotted with disease, and all wasted to baby-skeletons. While we were looking at them, six or seven noisy children ran out from a small house at the road-side and surrounded the coffin. One was a fine girl of twelve years of age, and instead of being at all shocked at the sight, she lifted the whitest of the dead things, and looked at its face very earnestly, loading it with all the tenderest diminutives of the language. The others were busy in pointing to those they thought had been prettiest, and none of them betrayed fear or disgust. In answer to a question of my friend about the marks of disease, the man rudely pulled out one by the foot that lay below the rest, and holding it up to show the marks upon it, tossed it again carelessly into the coffin. He had brought them from the hospital for infants, and they had died that morning. The coffin was worn with use. He shut down the lid, and lifting it again upon his head, went on to the cemetery, to empty it like so much offal upon the heap we had seen!

I have been struck repeatedly with the little value attached to human life in Italy. I have seen several of these houseless lazzaroni literally dying in the streets, and no one curious enough to look at them. The most dreadful sufferings, the most despairing cries, in the open squares, are passed as unnoticed as the howling of a dog. The day before yesterday, a woman fell in the Toledo, in a fit, frothing at the mouth, and livid with pain; and though the street was so crowded that one could make his way with difficulty, three or four ragged children were the only persons even looking at her.

I have devoted a week to the museum at Naples. It is a world! Anything like a full description of it would tire even an antiquary. It is one of those things (and there are many in Europe) that fortunately compel travel. You must come abroad to get an idea of it.

The first day I buried myself among the curiosities found at Pompeii. After walking through the chambers and streets where they were found, I came to them naturally with an intense interest. I had visited a disentombed city, buried for seventeen centuries—had trodden in their wheel-tracks—had wandered through their dining-rooms, their chambers, their baths, their theatres, their market-places. And here were gathered in one place, their pictures, their statues, their cooking utensils, their ornaments, the very food as it was found on their tables! I am puzzled, in looking over my note-book, to know what to mention. The catalogue fills a printed volume.

A curious corner in one of the cases was that containing the articles found on the toilet of the wealthiest Pompeian’s wife. Here were pots of rouge, ivory pins, necklaces, ear-rings, bracelets, small silver mirrors, combs, ear-pickers, &c. &c. In the next case were two loaves of bread, found in a baker’s oven, and stamped with his name. Two large cases of precious gems, cameos and intaglios of all descriptions, stand in the centre of this room (among which, by the way, the most exquisitely done are two which one cannot look at without a blush). Another case is filled with eatables, found upon the tables—eggs, fish-bones, honey-comb, grain, fruits, &c. In the repository for ancient glass are several cinerary urns, in which the ashes of the dead are perfectly preserved; and numerous small glass lachrymatories, in which the tears of the survivors were deposited in the tombs.

The brazen furniture of Pompeii, the lamps particularly, are of the most curious and beautiful models. Trees, to which the lamps were suspended like fruit, vines, statues holding them in their hands, and numerous other contrivances, were among them, exceeding far in beauty any similar furniture of our time. It appears that the ancients did not know the use of the fork, as every other article of table service except this has been found here.

To conceive the interest attached to the thousand things in this museum, one must imagine a modern city, Boston for example, completely buried by an unexpected and terrific convulsion of nature. Its inhabitants mostly escape, but from various causes leave their city entombed, and in a hundred years the grass grows over it, and its very locality is forgotten. Near two thousand years elapse, and then a peasant, digging in the field, strikes upon some of its ruins, and it is unearthed just as it stands at this moment, with all its utensils, books, pictures, houses, and streets, in untouched preservation. What a subject for speculation! What food for curiosity! What a living and breathing chapter of history were this! Far more interesting is Pompeii. For the age in which it flourished and the characters who trod its streets, are among the most remarkable in history. This brazen lamp, shown to me to-day as a curiosity, was lit every evening in the time of Christ. The handsome chambers through which I wandered a day or two ago, and from which were brought this antique chair, were the home of Sallust, and doubtless had been honoured by the visits of Cicero (whose villa, half-excavated, is near by,) and by all the poets and scholars and statesmen of his time. One might speculate endlessly thus! And it is that which makes these lands of forgotten empires so delightful to the traveller. His mind is fed by the very air. He needs no amusements, no company, no books except the history of the place. The spot is peopled wherever he may stray, and the common necessities of life seem to pluck him from a far-reaching dream, in which he had summoned back receding ages, and was communing, face to face, with philosophers and poets and emperors, like a magician before his mirror. Pompeii and Herculaneum seem to me visions. I cannot shake myself and wake to their reality. My mind refuses to go back so far. Seventeen hundred years!

I followed the cicerone on, listening to his astonishing enumeration, and looking at everything as he pointed to it, in a kind of stupor. One has but a certain capacity. We may be over-astonished. Still he went on in the same every-day tone, talking as indifferently of this and that surprising antiquity as a pedlar of his two-penny wares. We went from the bronzes to the hall of the papyri—thence to the hall of the frescoes, and beautiful they were. Their very number makes them indescribable. The next morning we devoted to the statuary—and of this, if I knew where to begin, I should like to say a word or two.

First of all comes the Balbi family—father, mother, sons, and daughters. He was pro-consul of Herculaneum, and by the excellence of the statues, which are life itself for nature, he and his family were worth the artist’s best effort. He is a fine old Roman himself, and his wife is a tall, handsome woman, much better-looking than her daughters. The two Misses Balbi are modest-looking girls, and that is all. They were the high-born damsels of Herculaneum, however; and, if human nature has not changed in seventeen centuries, they did not want admirers who compared them to the Venuses who have descended with them to the “Museo Borbonico.” The eldest son is on horseback in armour. It is one of the finest equestrian statues in the world. He is a noble youth, of grave and handsome features, and sits the superb animal with the freedom of an Arab and the dignity of a Roman. It is a beautiful thing. If one had visited these Balbis, warm and living, in the time of Augustus, he could scarcely feel more acquainted with them than after having seen their statues as they stand before him here.

Come a little farther on! Bacchus on the shoulders of a faun—a child delighted with a grown-up playfellow. I have given the same pleasure to just such another bright “picture in little” of human beauty. It moves one’s heart to see it.

Pass now a whole gallery of Dians, Cupids, Joves, Mercuries, and Apollos, and come to the presence of Aristides—him whom the Athenians exiled because they were tired of hearing him called The Just. Canova has marked three spots upon the floor where the spectator should place himself to see to the best advantage this renowned statue. He stands wrapped in his toga, with his head a little inclined, as if in reflection, and in his face there is a mixture of firmness and goodness from which you read his character as clearly as if it were written across his forehead. It was found at Herculaneum, and is, perhaps, the simplest and most expressive statue in the world.

LETTER V.

Pæstum—Temple of Neptune—Departure from Elba—Ischia—Bay of Naples—The Toledo—The Young Queen—Conspiracy against the King—Neapolitans Visiting the Frigates—Leave the Bay—Castellamare.

Salvator Rosa studied the scenery of La Cava—the country between Pompeii and Salerno, on the road to Pæstum. It is a series of natively abrupt glens, but gemmed with cottages and hanging gardens, through which the wildness of every feature is as apparent as those of a savage through his trinkets. I was going to Pæstum with an agreeable party, and we came out upon the bluffs overhanging Salerno and the sea, an hour before sunset.

We darted down upon the little city lying in the bend of the bay, like a bird’s descent upon her nest. The road is cut through the side of the precipice, and runs to the bottom with a single sweep. We were to pass the night here, and go to Pæstum the next morning, see the ruins, and return here to sleep once more before returning to Naples.

We were five or six miles from Salerno before sunrise, and entering upon the dreary wastes of Calabria. The people we passed on the road were dressed in skins with the wool outside, and the country looked abandoned by nature itself, scarce a flourishing tree or a healthy plant within the range of the sight. We turned from the main road after a while, crossed a ruinous bridge, and tracked a broad, waste, gloomy plain, till my eyes ached with its barrenness. In an hour more, three stately temples began to rise in the distance, increasing in grandeur as we approached. A cluster of ruined tombs on the right—a grass-grown and broken city wall, through a rent of which passed the road—and we stood among them, in the desert, amid temples of inimitable beauty!

There seemed to be a general feeling in the party that silence and solitude were the spirits of the place. We separated and rambled about alone. The grand temple of Neptune stands in the centre. A temple in the midst of the sea could scarce seem more strangely placed. I stood on the high base of the altar within and looked out between the columns on every side. The Mediterranean slept in a broad sheet of silver on the west, and on every other side lay the bare, houseless desert, stretching away to the naked mountains on the south and east, with a barrenness that made the heart ache, while it filled the imagination with its singleness and grandeur. I descended to look at the columns. They were eaten through and through with snails and worms, and all of the same rich yellow so admirably represented in the cork models. But their size, and their noble proportion as they stand, cannot be represented. They seem the conception and the work of giant minds and hands. One’s soul rises among them.

We walked round the ruins for hours. A little towards the sea, lie the traces of an amphitheatre, filled with fragments of statuary, and parts of immense friezes and columns. We all assembled at last in the great temple, and sat down on the immense steps towards the east in the shadow of the pediment, speculating on the wonderful fabric above us, till we were summoned to start on our return. To think that these very temples were visited as venerable antiquities in the time of Christ! What events have these worm-eaten columns outlived! What moths of an hour, in comparison, are we?

It is difficult to conceive how three such magnificent structures, so near the sea, the remains of a great city, should have been lost for ages. A landscape-painter, searching for the picturesque, came suddenly upon them fifty years ago, and astonished the world with his discovery! It adds to their interest now.

We turned our horses’ heads towards Naples. What an extraordinary succession of objects were embraced in the fifty miles between—Pæstum, Pompeii, Vesuvius, Herculaneum!—and, added to these, the thousand classic associations of the lovely coast along Sorrento! The value of life deepens incalculably with the privileges of travel.

Written on board the frigate “United States.”—We set sail from Elba on the 3rd of June. The inhabitants, all of whom, I presume, had been on board of the ships, were standing along the walls and looking from the embrasures of the fortress to see us off. It was a clear summer’s morning, without much wind, and we crept slowly off from the point, gazing up at the windows of Napoleon’s house as we passed under, and laying on our course for the shore of Italy. We soon got into the fresher breeze of the open sea, and the low white line of villages on the Tuscan coast appeared more distant, till, with a glass, we could see the people at the windows watching our progress. Fishing-boats were drawn up on shore, and the idle sailors were leaning in the half shadow which they afforded; but with the almost total absence of trees, and the glaring white of the walls, we were content to be out upon the cool sea, passing town after town unvisited. Island after island was approached and left during the day; barren rocks with only a lighthouse to redeem their nakedness: and in the evening at sunset we were in sight at Ischia, the towering isle in the bosom of the bay of Naples. The band had been called as usual at seven, and were playing a delightful waltz upon the quarter-deck; the sea was even, and just crisped by the breeze from the Italian shore; the sailors were leaning on the guns listening; the officers clustered in their various places; and the murmur of the foam before the prow was just audible in the lighter passages of the music. Above and in the west glowed the eternal but untiring teints of the summer sky of the Mediterranean, a gradually fading gold from the edge of the sea to the zenith, and the early star soon twinkled through it, and the air dampened to a reviving freshness. I do not know that a mere scene like this, without incident, will interest a reader, but it was so delightful to myself, that I have described it for the mere pleasure of dwelling on it. The desert stillness and loneliness of the sea, the silent motion of the ship, and the delightful music swelling beyond the bulwarks and dying upon the wind, were such singularly combined circumstances! It was a moving paradise in the waste of the ocean.

Sail was shortened last night, and we lay-to under the shore of Ischia, to enter the bay of Naples by daylight. As the morning mist lifted a little, the peculiar shape of Vesuvius, the boldness of the island of Capri, the sweeping curves of Baiæ and Portici, and the small promontory which lifts Naples toward the sea, rose like the features of a familiar friend to my eye. It would be difficult to have seen Naples without having a memory steeped in its beauty. A fair wind set us straight into the bay, and one by one the towns on its shore, the streaks of lava on the sides of its volcano, and, soon after, the houses of friends on the street of the Chiaga became distinguishable to the eye. There had been a slight eruption since I was here; but now, as before, there was scarce a puff of smoke to be seen rising from Vesuvius. My little specimen of sulphur which I took from the just hardened bosom of the crater now destroyed, lies before me on the table as I write, more valued than ever, since its bed has been melted and blown into the air. The new and lighter-coloured streak on the right of the mountain, would have informed me of itself that the lava had issued since I was here. The sound of bells and the hum of the city reached our ears, and running in between the mole and the castle, the anchor was dropped, and the ship surrounded with boats from the shore.

The heat kept us on board till the evening, and with several of the officers I landed and walked up the Toledo as the lazzaroni were stirring from their sleep under the walls of the houses. With the exception of the absence of the English, who have mostly flitted to the baths, Naples was the same place as ever, busy, dirty, and gay. Her thousand beggars were still “dying of hunger,” and telling it to the passenger in the same exhausted tone; her gay carriages and skeleton hacks were still flying up and down, and dashing at and over you for your custom; the cows and goats were driven about to be milked in the street; the lemonade-sellers stood in their stalls; the money changers at their tables in the open squares; puncinello squeaked and beat his mistress at every corner; the awnings of the cafés covered hundreds of smokers and loungers; and this gay, miserable, homeless, out-of-doors people, seemed as degraded and thoughtless, and, it must be owned, as insensibly happy as before. You would think, to walk through the Toledo of Naples, that two-thirds of its crowd of wretches, and all its horses and dogs, were at their last extremity, and yet they go on, and, I was told by an Englishman resident here, who has been accustomed to meet always the same faces, seem never to change or disappear, suffering, and groaning, and dragging up and down, shocking the eye and sickening the heart of the inexperienced stranger for years and years.

We passed the prima sera, the first part of the evening, as most men in Italy pass it, eating ices at the thronged café, and at nine we went to the splendid theatre of San Carlo to see La Sonnambula. The king and queen were present, with the dissolute old queen-mother and her gray-headed lover. I was instantly struck with the alteration in the appearance of the young queen. When I was here three months ago, she was just married, and appeared frequently in the public walks, and a fresher or brighter face I never had seen. She was acknowledged the most beautiful woman in Naples, and had, what is very much valued in this land of pale brunettes, a clear rosy cheek, and lips as bright as a child’s. She is now thin and white, and looks to me like a person fading with a rapid consumption.

Several conspiracies have been detected within a month or two, the last of which was very nearly successful. The day before we arrived, two officers in the royal army, men of high rank, had shot themselves, each putting a pistol to the other’s breast, believing discovery inevitable. One died instantly, and the other lingers to-day without any hope of recovery. The king was fired at on parade the day previous, which was supposed to have been the first step, but the plot had been checked by partial disclosure, hence the tragedy I have just related.

The ships have been thronged with visitors during the two or three days we have lain at Naples, among whom have been the prime minister and his family. Orders are given to admit every one on board that wishes to come, and the decks, morning and evening, present the most motley scene imaginable. Cameo and lava sellers expose their wares on the gun-carriages, surrounded by the midshipmen—Jews and fruit-sellers hail the sailors through the ports—boats full of chickens and pigs, all in loud outcry, are held up to view with a recommendation in broken English—contadini in their best dresses walk up and down, smiling on the officers, and wondering at the cleanliness of the decks, and the elegance of the captain’s cabin—Punch plays his tricks under the gun-deck ports—bands of wandering musicians sing and hold out their hats, as they row around, and all is harmony and amusement. In the evening, it is pleasanter still, for the band is playing, and the better class of people come off from the shore, and boats filled with these pretty, dark-eyed Neapolitans, row round and round the ship, eying the officers as they lean over the bulwarks, and ready with but half a nod to make acquaintance and come up the gangway. I have had a private pride of my own in showing the frigate as American to many of my foreign friends. One’s nationality becomes nervously sensitive abroad, and in the beauty and order of the ships, the manly elegance of the officers, and the general air of superiority and decision throughout, I have found food for some of the highest feelings of gratification of which I am capable.

We weighed anchor yesterday morning (the twentieth of June), and stood across the bay for Castellamare. Running close under Vesuvius, we passed Portici, Torre del Greco, and Pompeii, and rounded-to in the little harbour of this fashionable watering-place soon after noon. Castellamare is about fifteen miles from Naples, and in the summer months it is crowded with those of the fashionables who do not make a northern tour. The shore rises directly from the sea into a high mountain, on the side of which the king has a country-seat, and around it hang, on terraces, the houses of the English. Strong mineral springs abound on the slope.

We landed directly, and mounting the donkeys waiting on the pier, started to make the round of the village walks. English maids with their prettily dressed and rosy children, and English ladies and gentlemen, mounted, like ourselves on donkeys, met us at every turn as we wound up the shady and zigzag roads to the palace. The views became finer as we ascended, till we look down into Pompeii, which was but four miles off, and away toward Naples, following the white road with the eye along the shore of the sea. The paths were in fine order, and as beautiful as green trees, and shade, and living fountains, crossing the road continually, could make them. In the neighbourhood of the royal casino, the ground was planted more like a park, and the walks were terminated with artificial fountains, throwing up their bright waters amid statuary and over grottoes, and here we met the idlers of the place of all nations, enjoying the sunset. I met an acquaintance or two, and felt the yearning unwillingness to go away which I have felt on every spot almost of this “delicious land.”

We set sail again with the night-breeze, and at this moment are passing between Ischia and Capri, running nearly on our course for Sicily. We shall probably be at Palermo to-morrow. The ship’s bell beats ten, and the lights are ordered out, and under this imperative government, I must say, “good night!”

LETTER VI.

Baiæ—Grotto of Posilipo—Tomb of Virgil—Pozzuoli—Ruins of the Temple of Jupiter Serapis—The Lucrine Lake—Lake of Avernus, the Tartarus of Virgil—Temple of Proserpine—Grotto of the Cumæan Sybil—Nero’s villa—Cape of Misenum—Roman villas—Ruins of the Temple of Venus—Cento Camerelle—The Stygian Lake—The Elysian Fields—Grotto del Cane—Villa of Lucullus.

We made the excursion to Baiæ on one of those premature days of March common to Italy. A south wind and a warm sun gave it the feeling of June. The heat was even oppressive as we drove through the city, and the long echoing grotto of Posilipo, always dim and cool, was peculiarly refreshing. Near the entrance to this curious passage under the mountain, we stopped to visit the tomb of Virgil. A ragged boy took us up a steep path to the gate of a vineyard, and winding in among the just budding vines, we came to a small ravine, in the mouth of which, right over the deep cut of the grotto, stands the half-ruined mausoleum which held the bones of the poet. An Englishman stood leaning against the entrance, reading from a pocket copy of the Æneid. He seemed ashamed to be caught with his classic, and put the book in his pocket as I came suddenly upon him, and walked off to the other side whistling an air from the Pirata, which is playing just now at San Carlo. We went in, counted the niches for the urns, stood a few minutes to indulge in what recollections we could summon, and then mounted to the top to hunt for the “myrtle.” Even its root was cut an inch or two below the ground. We found violets, however, and they answered as well. The pleasure of visiting such places, I think, is not found on the spot. The fatigue of the walk, the noise of a party, the difference between reality and imagination, and, worse than all, the caprice of mood—one or the other of these things disturbs and defeats for me the dearest promises of anticipation. It is the recollection that repays us. The picture recurs to the fancy till it becomes familiar; and as the disagreeable circumstances of the visit fade from the memory, the imagination warms it into a poetic feeling, and we dwell upon it with the delight we looked for in vain when present. A few steps up the ravine, almost buried in luxuriant grass, stands a small marble tomb, covering the remains of an English girl. She died at Naples. It is as lovely a place to lie in as the world could show. Forward a little toward the edge of the hill some person of taste has constructed a little arbour, laced over with vines, whence the city and bay of Naples is seen to the finest advantage. Paradise that it is!

It is odd to leave a city by a road piercing the base of a broad mountain, in at one side and out at the other, after a subterranean drive of near a mile! The grotto of Posilipo has been one of the wonders of the world these two thousand years, and it exceeds all expectation as a curiosity. Its length is stated at two thousand three hundred and sixteen feet, its breadth twenty-two, and its height eighty-nine. It is thronged with carts and beasts of burden of all descriptions, and the echoing cries of these noisy Italian drivers are almost deafening. Lamps, struggling with the distant daylight as you near the end, just make darkness visible, and standing in the centre and looking either way, the far distant arch of daylight glows like a fire through the cloud of dust. What with the impressiveness of the place, and the danger of driving in the dark amid so many obstructions, it is rather a stirring half-hour that is spent in its gloom! One emerges into the fresh open air and the bright light of day with a feeling of relief.

The drive hence to Pozzuoli, four or five miles, was extremely beautiful. The fields were covered with the new tender grain, and by the short passage through the grotto we had changed a busy and crowded city for scenes of as quiet rural loveliness as ever charmed the eye. We soon reached the lip of the bay, and then the road turned away to the right, along the beach, passing the small island of Nisida (where Brutus had a villa, and which is now a prison for the carbonari).

Pozzuoli soon appeared, and mounting a hill we descended into its busy square, and were instantly beset by near a hundred guides, boatmen, and beggars, all preferring their claims and services at the tops of their voices. I fixed my eye on the most intelligent face among them, a curly-headed fellow in a red lazzaroni cap, and succeeded, with some loss of temper, in getting him aside from the crowd and bargaining for our boats.

While the boatmen were forming themselves into a circle to cast lots for the bargain, we walked up to the famous ruins of the temple of Jupiter Serapis. This was one of the largest and richest of the temples of antiquity. It was a quadrangular building, near the edge of the sea, lined with marble, and sustained by columns of solid cipolino, three of which are still standing. It was buried by an earthquake and forgotten for a century or two, till in 1750 it was discovered by a peasant, who struck the top of one of the columns in digging. We stepped around over the prostrate fragments, building it up once more in fancy, and peopling the aisles with priests and worshippers. In the centre of the temple was the place of sacrifice, raised by flights of steps, and at the foot still remain two rings of Corinthian brass, to which the victims were fastened, and near them the receptacles for their blood and ashes. The whole scene has a stamp of grandeur. We obeyed the call of our red-bonnet guide, whose boat waited for us at the temple stairs, very unwillingly.

As we pushed off from the shore, we deviated a moment from our course to look at the ruins of the ancient mole. Here probably St. Paul set his foot, landing to pursue his way to Rome. The great apostle spent seven days at this place, which was then called Puteoli—a fact that attaches to it a deeper interest than it draws from all the antiquities of which it is the centre.

We kept on our way along the beautiful bend of the shore of Baiæ, and passing on the right a small mountain formed in thirty-six hours by a volcanic explosion, some three hundred years ago, we came to the Lucrine Lake, so famous in the classics for its oysters. The same explosion that made the Monte Nuovo, and sunk the little village of Tripergole, destroyed the oyster-beds of the poets.

A ten minutes’ walk brought us to the shores of Lake Avernus—the “Tartarus” of Virgil. This was classic ground indeed, and we hoped to have found a thumbed copy of the Æneid in the pocket of the cicerone. He had not even heard of the poet. A ruin on the opposite shore, reflected in the still dark water, is supposed to have been a temple dedicated to Proserpine. If she was allowed to be present at her own worship, she might have been consoled for her abduction. A spot of more secluded loveliness could scarce be found. The lake lay like a sheet of silver at the foot of the ruined temple, the water looking unfathomably deep through the clear reflection, and the fringes of low shrubbery leaning down on every side, were doubled in the bright mirror, the likeness even fairer than the reality.

Our unsentimental guide hurried us away as we were seating ourselves upon the banks, and we struck into a narrow footpath of wild shrubbery which circled the lake, and in a few minutes stood before the door of a grotto sunk in the side of the hill. Here dwelt the Cumæan sybil, and by this dark passage, the souls of the ancients passed from Tartarus to Elysium. The guide struck a light and kindled two large torches, and we followed him into the narrow cavern, walking downward at a rapid pace for ten or fifteen minutes. With a turn to the right, we stood before a low archway which the guide entered, up to his knees in water at the first step. It looked like the mouth of an abyss, and the ladies refused to go on. Six or seven stout fellows had followed us in, and the guide assured us we should be safe on their backs. I mounted first myself to carry the torch, and holding my head very low, we went plunging on, turning to the right and left through a crooked passage, dark as Erebus, till I was set down on a raised ledge called the Sibyl’s bed. The lady behind me, I soon discovered by her screams, had not made so prosperous a voyage. She had insisted on being taken up something in the side-saddle fashion; and the man, not accustomed to hold so heavy a burden on his hip with one arm, had stumbled and let her slip up to her knees in water. He took her up immediately, in his own homely but safer fashion, and she was soon set beside me on the sibyl’s stony couch, dripping with water, and quite out of temper with antiquities.

The rest of the party followed, and the guide lifted the torches to the dripping roof of the cavern, and showed us the remains of beautiful mosaic with which the place was once evidently encrusted. Whatever truth there may be in the existence of the sybil, these had been, doubtlessly, luxurious baths, and probably devoted by the Roman emperors to secret licentiousness. The guide pointed out to us a small perforation in the rear of the sybil’s bed, whence, he said (by what authority I know not), Caligula used to watch the lavations of the nymph. It communicates with an outer chamber.

We reappeared, our nostrils edged with black from the smoke of the torches, and the ladies’ dresses in a melancholy plight, between smoke and water. It would be a witch of a sybil that would tempt us to repeat our visit.

We retraced our steps, and embarked for Nero’s villa. It was perhaps a half mile further down the bay. The only remains of it were some vapour baths, built over a boiling spring which extended under the sea. One of our boatmen waded first a few feet into the surf, and plunging under the cold sea-water, brought up a handful of warm gravel—the evidence of a submarine outlet from the springs beyond. We then mounted a high and ruined flight of steps, and entered a series of chambers dug out of the rock, where an old man was stripping off his shirt, to go through the usual process of taking eggs down to boil in the fountain. He took his bucket, drew a long breath of fresh air, and rushed away by a dark passage, whence he reappeared in three or four minutes, the eggs boiled, and the perspiration streaming from his body like rain. He set the bucket down, and rushed to the door, gasping as if from suffocation. The eggs were boiled hard, but the distress of the old man, and the danger of such sudden changes of atmosphere to his health, quite destroyed our pleasure at the phenomenon.

Hence to the cape of Misenum, the curve of the bay presents one continuation of Roman villas. And certainly there was not probably in the world, a place more adapted to the luxury of which it was the scene. These natural baths, the many mineral waters, the balmy climate, the fertile soil, the lovely scenery, the matchless curve of the shore from Pozzuoli to the cape, and the vicinity, by that wonderful subterranean passage, to a populous capital on the other side of a range of mountains, rendered Baiæ a natural paradise to the emperors. It was improved as we see. Temples to Venus, Diana, and Mercury, the villas of Marius, of Hortensius, of Cæsar, of Lucullus, and others whose masters are disputed, follow each other in rival beauty of situation. The ruins are not much now, except the temple of Venus, which is one of the most picturesque fragments of antiquity I have ever seen. The long vines hang through the rent in its circular roof, and the bright flowers cling to the crevices in its still half-splendid walls with the very poetry of decay. Our guide here proposed a lunch. We sat down on the immense stone which has fallen from the ceiling, and in a few minutes the rough table was spread with a hundred open oysters from Fusaro (near Lake Avernus), bottles at will of lagrima Christi from Vesuvius, boiled crabs from the shore beneath the temple of Mercury, fish from the Lucrine lake, and bread from Pozzuoli. The meal was not less classic than refreshing. We drank to the goddess (the only one in mythology, by the way, whose worship has not fallen into contempt), and leaving twenty ragged descendants of ancient Baiæ to feast on the remains, mounted our donkeys and started over land for Elysium.

We passed the villa of Hortensius, to which Nero invited his mother, with the design of murdering her, visited the immense subterranean chambers in which water was kept for the Roman fleet, the horrid prisons called the Cento Camerelle of the emperors, and then rising the hill at the extremity of the cape, the Stygian lake lay off on the right, a broad and gloomy pool, and around its banks spread the Elysian fields, the very home and centre of classic fable. An overflowed marsh, and an adjacent corn-field will give you a perfect idea of it. The sun was setting while we swallowed our disappointment, and we turned our donkeys’ heads toward Naples.

We left the city again this morning by the grotto of Posilipo to visit the celebrated Grotto del Cane. It is about three miles off, on the borders of a pretty lake, once the crater of a volcano. On the way there arose a violent debate in the party on the propriety of subjecting the poor dogs to the distress of the common experiment. We had not yet decided the point when we stopped before the door of the keeper’s house. Two miserable-looking terriers had set up a howl, accompanied with a ferocious and half-complaining bark, from our first appearance around the turn of the road, and the appeal was effectual. We dismounted and walking toward the grotto, determined to refuse to see the phenomenon. Our scruples were unnecessary. The door was surrounded with another party less merciful, and as we approached, two dogs were dragged out by the heels, and thrown lifeless on the grass. We gathered round them, and while the old woman coolly locked the door of the grotto, the poor animals began to kick, and after a few convulsions, struggled to their feet and crept feebly away. Fresh dogs were offered to our party, but we contented ourselves with the more innocent experiments. The mephitic air of this cave rises to a foot above the surface of the ground, and a torch put into it was immediately extinguished. It has been described too often, however, to need a repetition. We took a long stroll around the lake, which was covered with wild-fowl, visited the remains of a villa of Lucullus on the opposite shore, and returned to Naples to dinner.

LETTER VII.

Island of Sicily—Palermo—Saracenic appearance of the town—Cathedral—The Marina—Viceroy Leopold—Monastery of the Capuchins—Celebrated Catacombs—Fanciful Gardens.

Frigate United States, June 25.—The mountain coast of Sicily lay piled up before us at the distance of ten or twelve miles, when I came on deck this morning. The quarter-master handed me the glass, and running my eye along the shore, I observed three or four low plains, extending between projecting spurs of the hills, studded thickly with country-houses, and bright with groves which I knew, by the deep glancing green, to be the orange. In a corner of the longest of these intervals, a sprinkling of white, looking in the distance like a bed of pearly shells on the edge of the sea, was pointed out as Palermo. With a steady glass its turrets and gardens became apparent, and its mole, bristling above the wall with masts; and, running in with a free wind, the character of our ship was soon recognised from the shore, and the flags of every vessel in the harbour ran up to the mast, the customary courtesy to a man-of-war entering port.

As the ship came to her anchorage, the view of the city was very captivating. The bend of the shore embraced our position, and the eastern half of the curve was a succession of gardens and palaces. A broad street extended along in front, crowded with people gazing at the frigates, and up one of the long avenues of the public gardens, we could distinguish the veiled women walking in groups, children playing, priests, soldiers, and all the motley frequenters of such places in this idle clime, enjoying the refreshing sea-breeze, upon whose wings we had come. I was impatient to get ashore, but between the health-officer and some other hindrances, it was evening before we set foot upon the pier.

With Captain Nicholson and the purser I walked up to the Toledo, as the still half-asleep tradesmen were opening their shops after the siesta. The oddity of the Palermitan style of building struck me forcibly. Of the two long streets, crossing each other at right angles and extending to the four gates of the city, the lower story of every house is a shop, of course. The second and third stories are ornamented with tricksy-looking iron balconies, in which the women sit at work universally, while from above projects, far over the street, a grated enclosure, like a long birdcage, from which look down girls and children (or, if it is a convent, the nuns), as if it were an airy prison to keep the household from the contact of the world. The whole air of Palermo is different from that of the towns upon the continent. The peculiarities are said to be Saracenic, and inscriptions in Arabic are still found upon the ancient buildings. The town is poetically called the concha d’oro, or “the golden shell.”

We walked on to the cathedral, followed by a troop of literally naked beggars, baked black in the sun, and more emaciated and diseased than any I have yet seen abroad. Their cries and gestures were painfully energetic. In the course of five minutes we had seen two or three hundred. They lay along the sidewalks, and upon the steps of the houses and churches, men, women, and children, nearly or quite naked, and as unnoticed by the inhabitants as the stones of the street.

Ten or twenty indolent-looking priests sat in the shade of the porch of the cathedral. The columns of the vestibule were curiously wrought, the capitals exceedingly rich with fretted leaf-work, and the ornaments of the front of the same wild-looking character as the buildings of the town. A hunchback scarce three feet high, came up and offered his services as a cicerone, and we entered the church. The antiquity of the interior was injured by the new white paint, covering every part except the more valuable decorations, but with its four splendid sarcophagi standing like separate buildings in the aisles, and covering the ashes of Ruggiero and his kinsmen; the eighty columns of Egyptian granite in the nave; the ciborio of entire lapis-lazuli with its lovely blue, and the mosaics, frescoes, and relievos about the altar, it could scarce fail of producing an effect of great richness. The floor was occupied by here and there a kneeling beggar, praying in his rags, and undisturbed even by the tempting neighbourhood of strangers. I stood long by an old man, who seemed hardly to have the strength to hold himself upon his knees. His eyes were fixed upon a lovely picture of the virgin, and his trembling hands loosed bead after bead as his prayer proceeded. I slipped a small piece of silver between his palm and the cross of his rosary, and without removing his eyes from the face of the holy mother, he implored an audible blessing upon me in a tone of the most earnest feeling. I have scarce been so moved within my recollection.

The equipages were beginning to roll toward the “Marina,” and the sea-breeze was felt even through the streets. We took a carriage and followed to the corso, where we counted near two hundred gay, well-appointed equipages, in the course of an hour, What a contrast to the wretchedness we had left behind! Driving up and down this half mile in front of the palaces on the sea, seemed quite a sufficient amusement for the indolent nobility of Palermo. They were named to us by their imposing titles as they passed, and we looked in vain into their dull unanimated faces for the chivalrous character of the once renowned knights of Sicily. Ladies and gentlemen sat alike silent, leaning back in their carriages in the elegant attitudes studied to such effect on this side of the water, and gazing for acquaintances among those passing on the opposite line.

Toward the dusk of the evening, an avant-courrier on horseback announced the approach of the viceroy Leopold, the brother of the King of Naples. He drove himself in an English hunting-wagon with two seats, and looked like a dandy whip of the first water from Regent Street. He is about twenty and quite handsome. His horses, fine English bays, flew up and down the short corso, passing and repassing every other minute, till we were weary of touching our hats and stopping till he had gone by. He noticed the uniform of our officers, and raised his hat with particular politeness to them.

As it grew dark, the carriages came to a stand around a small open gallery raised in the broadest part of the Marina. Rows of lamps, suspended from the roof, were lit, and a band of forty or fifty musicians appeared in the area, and played parts of the popular operas. We were told they performed every night from nine till twelve. Chairs were set around for the people on foot, ices circulated, and some ten or twelve thousand people enjoyed the music in a delicious moonlight, keeping perfect silence from the first note to the last. These heavenly nights of Italy are thus begun, and at twelve the people separate and go to visit, or lounge at home till morning, when the windows are closed, the cool night air shut in, and they sleep till evening comes again, literally “keeping the hours the stars do.” It is very certain that it is the only way to enjoy life in this enervating climate. The sun is the worst enemy to health, and life and spirits sink under its intensity. The English, who are the only people abroad in an Italian noon, are constant victims to it.

We drove this morning to the monastery of the Capuchins. Three or four of the brothers in long grey beards, and the heavy brown sackcloth cowls of the order tied round the waist with ropes, received us cordially, and took us through the cells and chapels. We had come to see the famous catacombs of the convent. A door was opened on the side of the main cloister, and we descended a long flight of stairs into the centre of three lofty vaults, lighted each by a window at the extremity of the ceiling. A more frightful scene never appalled the eye. The walls were lined with shallow niches, from which hung, leaning forward as if to fall upon the gazer, the dried bodies of monks in the full dress of their order. Their hands were crossed upon their breasts or hung at their sides, their faces were blackened and withered, and every one seemed to have preserved, in diabolical caricature, the very expression of life. The hair lay reddened and dry on the dusty skull, the teeth, perfect or imperfect, had grown brown in their open mouths, the nose had shrunk, the cheeks fallen in and cracked, and they looked more like living men cursed with some horrid plague, than the inanimate corpses they were. The name of each was pinned upon his cowl, with his age and the time of his death. Below in three or four tiers, lay long boxes painted fantastically, and containing, the monk told us, the remains of Sicilian nobles. Upon a long shelf above sat perhaps a hundred children of from one year to five, in little chairs worn with their use while in life, dressed in the gayest manner, with fanciful caps upon their little blackened heads, dolls in their hands, and in one or two instances, a stuffed dog or parrot lying in their laps. A more horribly ludicrous collection of little withered faces, shrunk into expression so entirely inconsistent with the gaiety of their dresses, could scarce be conceived. One of them had his arm tied up, holding a child’s whip in the act of striking, while the poor thing’s head had rotted and dropped upon its breast; and a leather cap fallen on one side, showed his bare skull, with the most comical expression of carelessness. We quite shocked the old monk with our laughter, but the scene was irresistible.

We went through several long galleries filled in the same manner, with the dead monks standing over the coffins of nobles, and children on the shelf above. There were three thousand bodies and upward in the place, monks and all. Some of them were very ancient. There was one, dated a century and a half back, whose tongue still hangs from his mouth. The friar took hold of it, and moved it up and down, rattling it against his teeth. It was like a piece of dried fish-skin, and as sharp and thin as a nail.

At the extremity of the last passage was a new vault appropriated to women. There were nine already lying on white pillows in the different recesses, who had died within the year, and among them a young girl, the daughter of a noble family of Palermo, stated in the inscription to have been a virgin of seventeen years. The monk said her twin-sister was the most beautiful woman of the city at this moment. She was laid upon her back, on a small shelf faced with a wire grating, dressed in white, with a large bouquet of artificial flowers on the centre of the body. Her hands and face were exposed, and the skin, which seemed to me scarcely dry, was covered with small black ants. I struck with my stick against the shelf, and startled by the concussion, the disgusting vermin poured from the mouth and nostrils in hundreds. How difficult it is to believe that the beauty we worship must come to this!

As we went toward the staircase, the friar showed us the deeper niches, in which the bodies were placed for the first six months. There were fortunately no fresh bodies in them at the time of our visit. The stench, for a week or two, he told us, was intolerable. They are suffered to get quite dry here, and then are disposed of according to their sex or profession. A rope passed round the middle, fastens the dead monk to his shallow niche, and there he stands till his bones rot from each other, sometimes for a century or more.

We hurried up the gloomy stairs, and giving the monk our gratuity, were passing out of the cloister to our carriage, when two of the brothers entered, bearing a sedan chair with the blinds closed. Our friend called us back, and opened the door. An old grey-headed woman sat bolt upright within, with a rope around her body and another around her neck, supporting her by two rings in the back of the sedan. She had died that morning, and was brought to be dried in the capuchin catacombs. The effect of the newly deceased body in a handsome silk dress and plaited cap was horrible.

We drove from the monastery to the gardens of a Sicilian prince, near by. I was agreeably disappointed to find the grounds laid out in the English taste, winding into secluded walks shaded with unclipped trees, and opening into glades of greensward cooled by fountains. We strolled on from one sweet spot to another, coming constantly upon little Grecian temples, ruins, broken aqueducts, aviaries, bowers furnished with curious seats and tables, bridges over streams, and labyrinths of shrubbery, ending in hermitages built curiously of cane. So far, the garden, though lovely, was like many others. On our return, the person who accompanied us began to surprise us with singular contrivances, fortunately selecting the coachman who had driven us as the subject of his experiments. In the middle of a long green alley he requested him to step forward a few paces, and, in an instant, streams of water poured upon him from the bushes around in every direction. There were seats in the arbours, the least pressure of which sent up a stream beneath the unwary visitor; steps to an ascent, which you no sooner touched than you were showered from an invisible source; and one small hermitage, which sent a jet d’eau into the face of a person lifting the latch. Nearly in the centre of the garden stood a pretty building, with an ascending staircase. At the first step, a friar in white, represented to the life in wax, opened the door, and fixed his eyes on the comer. At the next step, the door was violently shut. At the third, it was half opened again, and as the foot pressed the platform above, both doors flew wide open, and the old friar made room for the visitor to enter. Life itself could not have been more natural. The garden was full of similar tricks. We were hurried away by an engagement before we had seen them all, and stopping for a moment to look at a magnificent Egyptian Ibis, walking around in an aviary like a temple, we drove into town to dinner.

LETTER VIII.

The Lunatic Asylum at Palermo.

Palermo, June 28.—Two of the best conducted lunatic asylums in the world are in the kingdom of Naples—one at Aversa, near Capua, and the other at Palermo. The latter is managed by a whimsical Sicilian baron, who has devoted his time and fortune to it, and, with the assistance of the government, has carried it to great extent and perfection. The poor are received gratuitously, and those who can afford it enter as boarders, and are furnished with luxuries according to their means.

The hospital stands in an airy situation in the lovely neighbourhood of Palermo. We were received by a porter in a respectable livery, who introduced us immediately to the old baron—a kind-looking man, rather advanced beyond middle life, of manners singularly genteel and prepossessing. “Je suis le premier fou,” said he, throwing his arms out, as he bowed on our entrance. We stood in an open court, surrounded with porticoes lined with stone seats. On one of them lay a fat, indolent-looking man, in clean gray clothes, talking to himself with great apparent satisfaction. He smiled at the baron as he passed, without checking the motion of his lips, and three others standing in the doorway of a room marked as the kitchen, smiled also as he came up, and fell into his train, apparently as much interested as ourselves in the old man’s explanations.

The kitchen was occupied by eight or ten people, all at work, and all, the baron assured us, mad. One man, of about forty, was broiling a steak with the gravest attention. Another, who had been furious till employment was given him, was chopping meat with violent industry in a large wooden bowl. Two or three girls were about, obeying the little orders of a middle-aged man, occupied with several messes cooking on a patent stove. I was rather incredulous about his insanity, till he took a small bucket and went to the jet of a fountain, and getting impatient from some cause or other, dashed the water upon the floor. The baron mildly called him by name, and mentioned to him, as a piece of information, that he had wet the floor. He nodded his head, and filling his bucket quietly, poured a little into one of the pans, and resumed his occupation.

We passed from the kitchen into an open court, curiously paved, and ornamented with Chinese grottoes, artificial rocks, trees, cottages, and fountains. Within the grottoes reclined figures of wax. Before the altar of one, fitted up as a Chinese chapel, a mandarin was prostrated in prayer. The walls on every side were painted in perspective scenery, and the whole had as little the air of a prison as the open valley itself. In one of the corners was an unfinished grotto, and a handsome young man was entirely absorbed in thatching the ceiling with strips of cane. The baron pointed to him, and said he had been incurable till he had found this employment for him. Everything about us, too, he assured us, was the work of his patients. They had paved the court, built the grottoes and cottages, and painted the walls, under his direction. The secret of his whole system, he said, was employment and constant kindness. He had usually about one hundred and fifty patients, and he dismissed upon an average two-thirds of them quite recovered.

We went into the apartments of the women. These, he said, were his worst subjects. In the first room sat eight or ten employed in spinning, while one infuriated creature, not more than thirty, but quite gray, was walking up and down the floor, talking and gesticulating with the greatest violence. A young girl of sixteen, an attendant, had entered into her humour, and with her arm put affectionately round her waist, assented to everything she said, and called her by every name of endearment while endeavouring to silence her. When the baron entered, the poor creature addressed herself to him, and seemed delighted that he had come. He made several mild attempts to check her, but she seized his hands, and with the veins of her throat swelling with passion, her eyes glaring terribly, and her tongue white and trembling, she continued to declaim more and more violently. The baron gave an order to a male attendant at the door, and beckoning us to follow, led her gently through a small court planted with trees, to a room containing a hammock. She checked her torrent of language as she observed the preparations going on, and seemed amused with the idea of swinging. The man took her up in his arms without resistance, and laced the hammock over her, confining everything but her head, and the female attendant, one of the most playful and prepossessing little creatures I ever saw, stood on a chair, and at every swing threw a little water on her face, as if in sport. Once or twice, the maniac attempted to resume the subject of her ravings, but the girl laughed in her face and diverted her from it, till at last she smiled, and dropping her head into the hammock, seemed disposed to sink into an easy sleep.

We left her swinging and went out into the court, where eight or ten women in the gray gowns of the establishment were walking up and down, or sitting under the trees, lost in thought. One, with a fine, intelligent face, came up to me and courtesied gracefully without speaking. The physician of the establishment joined me at the moment, and asked her what she wished. “To kiss his hand,” said she, “but his looks forbade me.” She coloured deeply, and folded her arms across her breast and walked away. The baron called us, and in going out I passed her again, and taking her hand, kissed it, and bade her good-bye. “You had better kiss my lips,” said she, “you’ll never see me again.” She laid her forehead against the iron bars of the gate, and with a face working with emotion, watched us till we turned out of sight. I asked the physieian for her history. “It was a common case,” he said. “She was the daughter of a Sicilian noble, who, too poor to marry her to one of her own rank, had sent her to a convent, where confinement had driven her mad. She is now a charity patient in the asylum.”

The courts in which these poor creatures are confined open upon a large and lovely garden. We walked through it with the baron, and then returned to the apartments of the females. In passing a cell, a large majestic woman strided out with a theatrical air, and commenced an address to the Deity, in a strain, which showed her possessed of superiority both of birth and endowment. The baron took her by the hand with the deferential courtesy of the old school, and led her to one of the stone seats. She yielded to him politely, but resumed her harangue, upbraiding the Deity, as well as I could understand her, for her misfortunes. They succeeded in soothing her by the assistance of the same playful attendant who had accompanied the other to the hammock, and she sat still, with her lips white and her tongue trembling like an aspen. While the good old baron was endeavouring to draw her into a quiet conversation, the physician told me some curious circumstances respecting her. She was a Greek, and had been brought to Palermo when a girl. Her mind had been destroyed by an illness, and after seven years’ madness, during which she had refused to rise from her bed, and had quite lost the use of her limbs, she was brought to this establishment by her friends. Experiments were tried in vain to induce her to move from her painful position. At last the baron determined upon addressing what he considered the master-passion in all female bosoms. He dressed himself in the gayest manner, and, in one of her gentle moments, entered her room with respectful ceremony, and offered himself to her in marriage! She refused him with scorn, and with seeming emotion he begged forgiveness and left her. The next morning, on his entrance, she smiled—the first time for years. He continued his attentions for a day or two, and after a little coquetry, she one morning announced to him that she had re-considered his proposal, and would be his bride. They raised her from her bed to prepare her for the ceremony, and she was carried in a chair to the garden, where the bridal feast was spread, nearly all the other patients of the hospital being present. The gaiety of the scene absorbed the attention of all; the utmost decorum prevailed: and when the ceremony was performed the bride was crowned, and carried back in state to her apartment. She recovered gradually the use of her limbs, her health is improved, and, excepting an occasional paroxysm, such as we happened to witness, she is quiet and contented. The other inmates of the asylum still call her the bride; and the baron, as her husband, has the greatest influence over her.

While the physician was telling me these circumstances, the baron had succeeded in calming her, and she sat with her arms folded, dignified and silent. He was still holding her hand, when the woman whom we had left swinging in the hammock, came stealing up behind the trees on tiptoe, and putting her hand suddenly over the baron’s eyes, kissed him on both sides of his face, laughing heartily, and calling him by every name of affection. The contrast between this mood and the infuriated one in which we had found her, was the best comment on the good man’s system. He gently disengaged himself, and apologised to his lady for allowing the liberty, and we followed him to another apartment.

It opened upon a pretty court, in which a fountain was playing, and against the columns of the portico sat some half dozen patients. A young man of eighteen, with a very pale, scholar-like face, was reading Ariosto. Near him, under the direction of an attendant, a fair, delicate girl, with a sadness in her soft blue eyes that might have been a study for a mater dolorosa, was cutting paste upon a board laid across her lap. She seemed scarcely conscious of what she was about, and when I approached and spoke to her, she laid down the knife and rested her head upon her hand, and looked at me steadily, as if she was trying to recollect where she had known me. “I cannot remember,” she said to herself, and went on with her occupation. I bowed to her as we took our leave, and she returned it gracefully but coldly. The young man looked up from his book and smiled, the old man lying on the stone seat in the outer court rose up and followed us to the door, and we were bowed out by the baron and his gentle madmen as politely and kindly as if we were concluding a visit with a company of friends.