to
going by sea. Mr. Figgs preferred the ease of the carriage. The
Doctor thought the sea air injurious. The Senator had the honesty
to confess that he was afraid of seasickness. They would not listen
to persuasion, but were all resolutely bent on keeping to the
carriage.

Buttons exhibited a feverish haste in searching after a boat. There
was but little to choose from among a crowd of odd-looking
fishing-boats that crowded the shore. However, they selected the
cleanest from among them, and soon the boat, with her broad sail
spread, was darting over the sea.

The boat of which they went in pursuit was far away over near the
other shore, taking long tacks across the bay. Buttons headed his
boat so as to meet the other on its return tack.

It was a magnificent scene. After exhausting every shore view of
Naples, there is nothing like taking to the water. Every thing
then appears in a new light. The far, winding cities that surround
the shore, the white villages, the purple Apennines, the rocky
isles, the frowning volcano.

This is what makes Naples supreme in beauty. The peculiar combinations
of scenery that are found there make rivalry impossible. For if you
find elsewhere an equally beautiful bay, you will not have so liquid
an atmosphere; if you have a shore with equal beauty of outline, and
equal grace in its long sweep of towering headland and retreating
slope, you will not have so deep a purple on the distant hills. Above
all, nowhere else on earth has Nature placed in the very centre of so
divine a scene the contrasted terrors of the black volcano.

Watching a chase is exciting; but taking part in it is much more so.
Buttons had made the most scientific arrangements. He had calculated
that at a certain point on the opposite shore the other boat would
turn on a new tack, and that if he steered to his boat to a point
about half-way over, he would meet them, without appearing to be in
pursuit. He accordingly felt so elated at the idea that he burst
forth into song.

The other boat at length had passed well over under the shadow of
the land. It did not turn. Further and further over, and still it
did not change its course. Buttons still kept the course which he
had first chosen; but finding that he was getting far out of the way
of the other boat, he was forced to turn the head of his boat
closer to the wind, and sail slowly, watching the others.

There was an island immediately ahead of the other boat. What