w
him to do himself more credit than to-day. The whole coast of the bay
is in a sort of obscuration, thicker than an Indian summer haze; and
the veil extends almost to the top of Vesuvius. But his summit is still
distinct, and out of it rises a gigantic billowy column of white smoke,
greater in quantity than on any previous day of our sojourn; and the sun
turns it to silver. Above a long line of ordinary looking clouds, float
great white masses, formed of the sulphurous vapor. This manufacture
of clouds in a clear, sunny day has an odd appearance; but it is easy
enough, if one has such a laboratory as Vesuvius. How it tumbles up the
white smoke! It is piled up now, I should say, a thousand feet above the
crater, straight into the blue sky,--a pillar of cloud by day. One
might sit here all day watching it, listening the while to the melodious
spring singing of the hundreds of birds which have come to take
possession of the garden, receiving southern reinforcements from Sicily
and Tunis every morning, and think he was happy. But the morning has
gone; and I have written nothing.

THE PRICE OF ORANGES

If ever a northern wanderer could be suddenly transported to look down
upon the Piano di Sorrento, he would not doubt that he saw the Garden of
the Hesperides. The orange-trees cannot well be fuller: their branches
bend with the weight of fruit. With the almond-trees in full flower,
and with the silver sheen of the olive leaves, the oranges are apples of
gold in pictures of silver. As I walk in these sunken roads, and between
these high walls, the orange boughs everywhere hang over; and through
the open gates of villas I look down alleys of golden glimmer, roses
and geraniums by the walk, and the fruit above,--gardens of enchantment,
with never a dragon, that I can see, to guard them.

All the highways and the byways, the streets and lanes, wherever I go,
from the sea to the tops of the hills, are strewn with orange-peel; so
that one, looking above and below, comes back from a walk with a golden
dazzle in his eyes,--a sense that yellow is the prevailing color.
Perhaps the kerchiefs of the dark-skinned girls and women, which take
that tone, help the impression. The inhabitants are all orange-eaters.
The high walls show that the gardens are protected with great care; yet
the fruit seems to be as free as apples are in a remote New England town
about cider-time.

I have been trying, ever since I have been here, to ascer