months each year upon the hillside, tending
goats. When rough weather came, he wrapped himself in a blanket from
the snow that falls and melts upon the ledges. In summer time he
basked the whole day long, and slept the calm ambrosial nights away.
Something of this free life was in the burning eyes, long clustering
dark hair, and smooth brown bosom of the faun-like creature. His
graceful body had the brusque, unerring movement of the goats he
shepherded. Human thought and emotion seemed a-slumber in this youth
who had grown one with nature. As I watched his careless incarnate
loveliness I remembered lines from an old Italian poem of romance,
describing a dweller of the forest, who

Haunteth the woodland aye 'neath verdurous shade,
Eateth wild fruit, drinketh of running stream;
And such-like is his nature, as 'tis said,
That ever weepeth he when clear skies gleam,
Seeing of storms and rain he then hath dread,
And feareth lest the sun's heat fail for him;
But when on high hurl winds and clouds together,
Full glad is he and waiteth for fair weather.

Giuseppe led us down those curious volcanic _balze_, where the soil
is soft as marl, with tints splashed on it of pale green and rose
and orange, and a faint scent in it of sulphur. They break away into
wild chasms, where rivulets begin; and here the narrow watercourses
made for us plain going. The turf beneath our feet was starred with
cyclamens and wavering anemones. At last we reached the chestnut
woods, and so by winding paths descended on the village. Giuseppe
told me, as we walked, that in a short time he would be obliged to
join the army. He contemplated this duty with a dim and undefined
dislike. Nor could I, too, help dreading and misliking it for him.
The untamed, gentle creature, who knew so little but his goats as
yet, whose nights had been passed from childhood _a la belle
etoile_, whose limbs had never been cumbered with broadcloth or
belt--for him to be shut up in the barrack of some Lombard city,
packed in white conscript's sacking, drilled, taught to read and
write, and weighted with the knapsack and the musket! There was
something lamentable in the prospect. But such is the burden of
man's life, of modern life especially. United Italy demands of her
children that by this discipline they should be brought into that
harmony which builds a nation out of diverse elements.

From Ischia to Naples

Ischia showed a new aspect on the morning o