depart, when, as at a signal given, guests still more unwelcome made their appearance, if I may use the expression, in the dark. Fleas, spiders, bugs, mosquitoes, sand-flies, cock-roaches, with other genera and species innumerable, made a simultaneous attack upon us in all parts: we turned, we tumbled, we roared, we swore, we scratched, we caught, we killed, but all in vain: our blood-thirsty assailants were too numerous, too daring, and too hungry to be repelled. It was evidently long since they had made so delicious a meal. It will scarcely be believed, that even in this state of purgatory, we at length fell asleep, thanks to our exertions on the preceding day. But we had not long sunk into soft forgetfulness before the silken bands of sleep were burst asunder by a noise like the discharge of artillery, or the explosions of Mount Etna, proceeding from the adjoining apartment. One of us rose to ascertain the cause of this horrible disturbance: it was our indefatigable landlord, who was making up for the time he had lost in our company, by working at his anvil during the night. We could not help smiling in the morning at the motley condition of our features, which bore evident marks of their being the leavings of the plentiful banquet we had afforded to so many voracious hordes.

Calatabiano is situated on the side of Etna: it is a miserable village, though dignified by the inhabitants with the appellation of town: its human population is scanty, but for vermin, I will back it against any three cities in Europe.

Having taken, I hope, an eternal adieu of our loquacious host, who made several desperate efforts to detain us, by beginning various stories, to which we resolutely turned a deaf ear, we rode on before breakfast to Lingua Grossa, a small town, containing two thousand inhabitants, prettily situated on a declivity. It owes its name to the rustic pronunciation of the people of the district. As this was a convenient spot for fixing one's quarters when visiting the " Castagno de' Cento Cavalli," and the eruption of the preceding year, which I was anxious to examine after the extinction of the conflagration, we left our horses at the very indifferent inn of the place, and provided ourselves with mules, the paths being too rugged for the former animals. In the neighbourhood of Lingua Grossa is a fine forest of pitch trees, of which the inhabitants extract and prepare the juice.

The leaves and branches of the "Castagno de' Cento Cavalli" are a magnificent spectacle, and seem a forest in themselves; but the trunk by no means corresponds with the expectations raised of it. It has all the appearance at present of five distinct trees; if it be but one, as is generally allowed, it must, when entire, have been the wonder of the vegetable creation: it measures in circumference one hundred and sixty-four feet, a truly prodigious size. There are several others in the vicinity, which would be reckoned of extraordinary growth at a greater distance from this colussus of the woods. Carrera, who wrote in 1635, describes this tree. Without agreeing with him that it must have existed thousands of years, it is certainly very ancient, as it was nearly in the same state in his time as at present: he says that twenty-seven horsemen entered at once into its hollow, and that a flock of three hundred sheep have sometimes found refuge there;

the same author also mentions certain oaks near Tre Castagne, which six men holding by each other's hands could scarcely encompass.

We next proceeded, under the direction of our guide, to visit the scene of the eruption of the preceding year. After four hours ride, wearrived at the foot of the hill which overlooks the plain where it took place; leaving our animals there, we ascended to the summit, and precipitated ourselves down the declivity of ashes sloping into the valley, nearly in the centre of which rises the hill which poured forth the torrent of lava; our guide indeed remonstrated, and we had not calculated the ascent on our return; a few minutes took us to the bottom, and we crossed the plain, sinking deep at every step in the fine black sand. We found the height of the hill to be about three hundred feet, and had great difficulty in making our way to the summit. The crater is about fifty yards in diameter, and was still exhaling smoke the lava had every where externally assumed the appearance of other streams of sciara, that is, of large rocks and stones confusedly heaped one upon another, except in the immediate vicinity of the mouth, where it was almost smooth. In the crater it still felt hot to the hand, and a stick inserted into the crevices took fire. We found several pieces of scoriæ so perforated, as to resemble sponges, and very light; scoriæ similar to these have probably occasioned the mistake of several travellers who have numbered the pumice stone among the productions of Ætna, which in reality is not found on the mountain. The lava of this eruption is of a horn-stone base; it is more than usually porous, but hard, and contains shoerls and feltspars: we perceived some of the former loose among the ashes, but they are by no means so abundant here as on Monte Rosso. It being late we left this spot, in hopes of being able to reach Lingua Grossa in good time for supper, but were sadly disappointed in our expectations; we found to regain the height from which we had descended into the valley, an undertaking which had nearly defied our strength, and reduced us to take our night's lodging al fresco, and supperless, in the gloomy vale into which we had penetrated with so much ease; it was literally

Facilis descensus Averni,

Sed revocare gradum superasque evadere ad auras,

Hoc opus, hic labor est.

In climbing this steep acclivity, which was covered to some depth with a coating of fine sand and yielding cinders, we could scarcely make good a single pace in five; the ashes constantly gave way under our feet, and we often retrograded two steps instead of advancing one; if by accident we met with a stone which showed its head above the sand, we found by experience that we could not trust our weight upon it, without risk of being rolled down again like the stone of Sisyphus to the bottom of the ascent, and having our Herculean task to commence afresh: at times we strove to help ourselves with our hands, but these not only served to loosen more effectually the light ashes, but it also filled our eyes, mouths, ears, and nostrils with the subtle dust, which rolled down in suffocating clouds on the rearmost of the party. Every third minute we were obliged to turn round and throw our

selves on our backs to repose, or, almost fainting, to apply our parched lips to a flask of brandy which we fortunately had with us, and which we may thank for having accomplished our task, at least for that night. At each halt we cast our anxious eye down to observe our progress, and cheerless indeed was the prospect of the valley below, which at every step seemed obstinately to preserve the same distance. I have ascended many of the steepest mountains of Europe, but I never underwent a fatigue so sharp and painful as the present: suffice it to say, that it was half-past six when we left the plain, and that we did not regain the brow of the hill until a quarter after ten. We found our attendants, who were with the mules, in astonishment at our protracted stay, and although we made the best of our road, it was one o'clock before we reached Lingua Grossa, where a good supper and a few glasses of excellent Etna wine soon recruited our exhausted spirits.

We breakfasted next day at Castiglione, a town built on the rocky summit of an Ætnæan hill. Three miles from this place is Francavilla, beautifully situated on the side of a steep ascent, from whence there is a fine view of the plains at the foot of the mountain. In the neighbourhood of Francavilla is the river of the same name, one of the principal streams which supply the Alcantara; on its banks, and in the adjacent country, flourish a number of very fine plane trees. We left Motta Camastra, a village on the summit of a hill, which appeared almost inaccessible to our right, and passed on to Auricella, or, as it is commonly called, Rocella, situated also, like most other places in the vicinity, on the top of a lofty mountain.

When we arrived at Randazzo, we inquired for the inn, and were shown to a wretched fandaco, the door of which was open, but on alighting from our horses we did not find it so easy to effect an entrance; a goat, of a most venerable aspect, with a beard that swept the ground, and seemed to speak him the father of many generations, presented his formidable horns, and kept us at bay, nor would he relinquish his position until in our impatience we violated the sanctity of his person by the application of some smart strokes of the whip; having forced an entrance vi et armis, an old woman conducted us to certain miserable chambers, each furnished with a bedstead, on which lay what had, from the inequalities of its surface, more the appearance of a sack stuffed with pebbles than a mattrass, the duties of which it was destined to fulfil. On our consulting our host, who now came in, concerning our supper, he assured us we should want for nothing, but should have all the place afforded: but what was that? Was there any fish? None at present, but there would be some to-morrow; could we have a beef-steak?-No; beef was rarely killed at Randazzo. A pork chop ?-He was afraid not; was there castrato or moutone? both of which signify mutton; he paused for a moment, and then said, that with a joint of mutton he believed he could furnish us, and that it should be on the table in about two hours: this was good news, and we got ready for supper. Our host kept his word, soon after the appointed time a huge quarter of mutton smoked upon our board; but ye immortal gods! what mutton! the body of Cycnus was not more impervious to the lance of Achilles, than this invulnerable joint to our

knives, whilst its acute odour drew tears from our eyes; a dreadful suspicion came across my mind; I seized my hat and rushed into the yard, where, alas! my worst fears were fatally confirmed. His hoary hide, half stripped from his aged body, his throat gashed by an unseemly wound, with one of his fore quarters missing, hung by his hind legs on the wall, the venerable patriarch who had so valiantly opposed our entrance. Overcome with sorrow, I hastened back to relate the melancholy tale to my companions, whose veneration for the departed was too great to allow them to continue their carnivorous attempts on his mangled members: one of us only, inattentive, like Ceres, from excessive grief when she devoured the shoulder of Pelops, applied a mouthful to his lips, which he pronounced, probably from respect to his deceased acquaintance, not so bad as he had anticipated, whilst another observed, that although our host had served us with moutone, he certainly had not given us castrato.

Having supped tolerably, after all, without our host's mutton, we retired to scratch, for I am convinced that the fleas, bugs, spiders, &c., of Randazzo were a colony from Calatabiano, so similar were their bites and their voracity; we slept, however, soundly on our flinty couches, in spite of our numerous bedfellows, till dawn, when we rose to resume our journey, after disbursing rather largely for our accommodation; I venture to say, that no gourmand ever paid more for the best Southdown mutton than we for the unfortunate hircus which had been sacrificed in our honour. Near Randazzo is the singular "Lago di Gurrita," through which the river Giudicello is said to pass like the Rhone through the lake of Geneva. Eight miles from Randazzo is the monastery of "Santa Maria detta Maniaci ;" a mile above the convent once stood the castle of Maniaci, built in the year 932, by George Maniaces, prefect of Sicily, in commemoration of a famous victory gained by him over the Saracens, but no vestige of it is at present remaining. Continuing our circuit round the mountains, through a country of great fertility and beauty, but inferior in both respects to the delicious plains on the other side, we arrived at the modern town of Bronte, which contains about seven thousand inhabitants, where they prepare an excellent wine, known by the name of Bronte Madeira. This is the place which gave the title of Duke to Lord Nelson. One of the least creditable passages in the life of this great man, was his interest and friendship with the Court of Naples; nor can we easily forgive him the execution of the brave, the liberal, the enlightened Caracciolo, when the admiral of a free nation consented to administer to the vengeance of a despot, and a British man-of-war was prostituted to the office of a Neapolitan scaffold.

But his lordship on this occasion yielded to softer solicitations than those of the king of Naples or his ministers. Nelson was so great a

character, and his virtues so overbalance his defects, that we need not fear, in this instance, to give him up to the justice of history. England owes more to him than to any other man of the age; during his lifetime he was the scourge of her enemies, and he died in the very act of securing her safety; until the last hope of the enemy's navy was crushed at Trafalgar, she was never safe from invasion: had that glorious action terminated differently, the torrent of those armies which

afterwards overwhelmed and subdued the continent, would have been turned upon England.

Having dined at Bronte, and drank to the memory of the British hero, in a bumper of the wine of the place, we pushed on to Troina, which we had fixed on for our night's residence. It is a considerable town, containing a population of about six thousand souls, situated on a height in a magnificently wooded country; there are some ruins of the ancient place still remaining; the citadel is said to have stood on the site of the great church; it was ruined by Count Roger, who recovered it from the Saracens. We found here what, in Sicily, may pass for a comfortable inn. Loquacity seems the vice of Sicilian landlords our host related to us the story of the Countess L who a few years since was murdered by her husband at some place in the vicinity. It appears that the count had surprised his lady in a very suspicious situation with her paramour; being armed, the latter fell an immediate victim to his fury, but the former contrived to effect her escape to the house of her relations, who, dreading the fiery temper and determined character of the count, under pretence of punishment, but in reality for the sake of security, had her placed in the public prison. One evening the count having gained admission, by pretending a wish for reconciliation, he murdered his unfortunate wife, as she vainly supplicated for mercy on her knees, with nine blows of a stiletto, in the presence of the terrified female who was in attendance upon her.

Next morning we proceeded down the beautiful Val di Troina, and crossing the Fiume Salso, arrived at Centorbi, the ancient Centuripæ, a town containing three thousand inhabitants, built on a steep and rugged rock, with five points, which have caused it to be compared to a star-fish. It is one of the oldest places in Sicily, and was founded by the Siculi: it was formerly of great size and renown, but was razed to its foundations A. D. 1232, by the Emperor Frederic III., for having rebelled against him. The country round is very fertile. Salt of a red colour is found in the vicinity.

Leaving Centorbi, we passed through the miserable village of Carcaci, situated in a swamp, and consequently subject to that dreadful visitation, the malaria. The few sickly objects, who came to the doors to see the strangers pass, from their deplorable appearance excited my commiseration. Poor as this hamlet is, it gives the title of duke to one of the most respectable families of Catania. Crossing the Semathus, by the "Ponte di Carcaci," we again returned to the skirts of Etna, from which we had diverged a little, to visit Troina and Centorbi. We passed the night at Aderno, the ancient Hadranum, which at present contains a population of five thousand souls. Plutarch mentions this place, in his life of Timoleon; the inhabitants were famous for their peculiar worship of the god Adranus, whose fane, said to have been guarded by a thousand dogs, must have resembled a kennel rather than a temple.

At a short distance from Aderno is the neat town of Biancavilla, which lies at the foot of Etna. Not far from this place is Paterno, from which one of the richest and most powerful princes of Palermo