ean.

At sunrise we sailed away into the land-locked waters of the Mediterranean
Sea, where man for a million years has loved, lived, fought and died among
beautiful, blooming islands that nestle on its bosom like emeralds in the
crown of immortality.

We passed along the coast of Spain to Cape Nao, in sight of the Balearic
Islands, on to Barcelona, to the mouth of the river Rhone, and up to the
ancient city of Avignon.

In and around this city popes, princes and international warriors lived in
royal style; but they are virtually forgotten, while Petrarch, the poetic
saint and laureate of Italy, is as fresh in the memory of man as the day he
died--July 18th, 1374, at the age of seventy.

William and myself remained all night in the Lodge House of the Gardens of
"Vacluse," the hermit home of the sighing, soaring poet, who pined his
life away in platonic love for "Laura," who married Hugh de Sade, when she
was only seventeen years of age, and presented the nobleman ten children as
pledges of her homespun affection.

And this is the married lady who Petrarch, the poet, wasted his sonnets
upon, and was treated in fact as we were told by the "oldest inhabitant" of
Avignon, with supercilious contempt.

Boccaccio and Petrarch were intimate friends, and both of these passionate
poets lavished their love on "married flirts," who give promise to the ear
and disappointment to the heart.

I could see that while Shakspere reveled deep in the mental philosophy of
Petrarch, and even plucked a flower from his rustic bower, he had no
sympathy with lovesick swains, and as we signed our names in the Lodge
House book, he wrote this:

_Petrarch, grand, immortal in thy sonnets;
Sugared by the eloquence of philosophy--
Destined to shine through the rolling ages;
Emulating, competing with the stars.
Thy love for Laura, pure, unreciprocated;
Yet, thou, foolish man, passion dazed and sad,
Like many of the greatest of mankind
Lie dashed in the vale of disappointment;
And flowers of hope, given by woman,
Have crowned thy brows with nettles of despair!_

Next day the Albion sailed into the Mediterranean, passed by the island of
Corsica (cradle of one of the greatest soldiers of the world), through the
Strait of Bonifacio, and in due course kept on to the flourishing city of
Naples.

It was dark twilight when we came to peer into the surrounding hills and
mountains of classic Italy.

To the wo