and the Po Valley than in Samnium, Lucania or
Bruttium. We had never thought of escape southward; northward we had meant
to work our way, from the instant of conceiving the idea of escaping. But
we had no settled, coherent plan as to how to achieve safety and keep
alive. We could not hide in the mountains indefinitely.

We both agreed that we could hide best in a large city. Marseilles might
have been a perfect hiding-place could we have reached it, full as it
always was of riff-raff from all the shores of the Mediterranean and from
all parts of Italy. But Marseilles we could reach only by the Aurelian
Highway, through Genoa along the coast, and the Aurelian Highway was
certain to be sown with spies and likely enough might be travelled upon by
officials who had known me from childhood and would probably know me
through any disguise.

Aquileia, on the other hand, was far more populous than Marseilles, even
more a congeries of rabble from all shores and districts, even more easy-
going. In Aquileia we should be able to earn a comfortable living by not
too onerous activities and to be wholly unsuspected. Towards Aquileia we
decided to try to make our way. The roads, being less travelled, would be
less spied-on and we should meet officials less likely to recognize me.

But, if we were to reach Aquileia, we must husband our silver. Agathemer's
idea was that, from where we reached the borders of Umbria, somewhere
between Trebia and Nursia, we should keep as near as possible to the chine
of the mountain-chain, using the roads, paths, tracks or trails highest up
the slope of the mountains; avoiding being seen as much as possible, and,
if we were seen, claiming to have lost our way through misunderstanding
the directions given us by the last natives we had met. He proposed to
steal food for us, instead of buying it, and expounded his ideas,
maintaining that it would be easy and not dangerous.

We tried his plan and succeeded well with it. So wild and untravelled were
the districts which we traversed that, nearly half the time, we were
welcomed at farmsteads, (to which welcome Agathemer's flageolet-playing
greatly assisted us), invited to spend the night and had lavished upon our
entertainment all their rustic abundance, so that we visibly grew fat.
When such luck did not befall us we had no trouble in helping ourselves to
supplies, for, far up the mountains, most habitations were shacks tenanted
only in summer and only by lad