, for nearly all the classic mountains of
Southern Italy are tenanted by an anchorite, generally an old and
ignorant, but pious peasant, of the type of Pietro Murrone, the holy
recluse of the Abruzzi, who was finally dragged from his cell to be
invested forcibly with the pontifical robes and tiara as Celestine the
Fifth. The present hermitage on Mont' Epomeo dates however from
comparatively modern times, for its first occupant is said to have been a
German nobleman, a certain Joseph Arguth, governor of Ischia under the
first Bourbon king, who in consequence of a solemn vow made in battle
deliberately passed his last years of existence on the topmost peak of the
island he had lately ruled. His example has been followed and his cell
filled by many successors, who have endured the spring rains, the summer
heats, the autumn storms and the winter chills upon this airy height,
where the glorious view may be found a compensation for eternal
discomfort, if hermits condescend to appreciate anything so mundane as
scenery. The shrine and cell are dedicated to St Nicholas of Bari, and to
this circumstance is due the local uninteresting name of Monte San Niccolo
to the entire mountain, whose crest, some 3000 feet above sea-level, we
finally gain by means of steps roughly hewn in the lava.

The view from this height, embracing two out of the three historic bays of
the Parthenopean coast, is one of the noblest and most extensive in
Southern Italy. Looking southward, the fantastic cliffs of Capri are seen
to rise abruptly from the ocean; beyond them appears the graceful outline
of Monte Sant' Angelo, with the crater of Vesuvius beside it, veiling the
clear blue sky with volumes of dusky smoke. Beneath extends the broken
line of shore, stretching north and south as far as the eye can travel,
with its classic capes and islands basking in the strong sunshine; whilst
behind the foam-fringed boundary of land and sea rises the jagged line of
the Abruzzi Mountains with the huge snow-clad mass of the Gran Sasso
d'Italia towering above the lower peaks. At our feet is spread the
beautiful and fertile island, in outward appearance little changed since
the days when the good Bishop Berkeley "of every virtue under Heaven"
penned its description nearly two centuries ago in a letter to Alexander
Pope, wherein he described Ischia as "an epitome of the whole earth."

In spite of the good Bishop's eloquent tribute to the genial climate and
the natural b