he Galli--so the
islands are now called, as antiquaries tell us, from an ancient fortress
named Guallo--is very deep, and not a sign of habitation is to be seen
upon them. In bygone ages they were used as prisons; and many doges of
Amalfi languished their lives away upon those shadeless stones, watching
the sea around them blaze like a burnished shield at noon, and the peaks
of Capri deepen into purple when the west was glowing after sunset with
the rose and daffodil of Southern twilight.

The end of the Sorrentine promontory, Point Campanella, is absolutely
barren--grey limestone, with the scantiest over-growth of rosemary and
myrtle. A more desolate spot can hardly be imagined. But now the morning
breeze springs up behind; sails are hoisted, and the boatmen ship their
oars. Under the albatross wings of our lateen sails we scud across the
freshening waves. The precipice of Capri soars against the sky, and the
Bay of Naples expands before us with those sweeping curves and azure
amplitude that all the poets of the world have sung. Even thus the
mariners of ancient Hellas rounded this headland when the world was
young. Rightly they named yon rising ground, beneath Vesuvius,
Posilippo--rest from grief. Even now, after all those centuries of toil,
though the mild mountain has been turned into a mouth of murderous fire,
though Roman emperors and Spanish despots have done their worst to mar
what nature made so perfect, we may here lay down the burden of our
cares, gaining tranquillity by no mysterious lustral rites, no
penitential prayers or offerings of holocausts, but by the influence of
beauty in the earth and air, and by sympathy with a people unspoiled in
their healthful life of labour alternating with simple joy.

The last hour of the voyage was beguiled by stories of our boatmen, some
of whom had seen service on distant seas, while others could tell of
risks on shore and love adventures. They showed us how the tunny-nets
were set, and described the solitary life of the tunny-watchers, in
their open boats, waiting to spear the monsters of the deep entangled in
the chambers made for them beneath the waves. How much of AEschylean
imagery, I reflected, is drawn from this old fisher's art--the toils of
Clytemnestra and the tragedy of Psyttaleia rising to my mind. One of the
crew had his little son with him, a child of six years old; and when the
boy was restless, his father spoke of Barbarossa and Timberio (_sic_) to
keep