usy with Guido Santo. Please,
when we shall be there."

On arriving at the shore we first found a cove where Brancaccia and
Ricuzzu could be comfortable while Peppino, Carmelo and I went a little
way off into a secluded place behind the rocks, undressed and bathed. We
swam round and saluted the mother and child in their cove, but could not
get near enough to splash them because the water was only a few inches
deep near the shore and the proprieties had to be observed. When we were
tired of swimming we came out and dressed. Then I took the baby while
Peppino and Brancaccia went round into our dressing-room and he
superintended her bath. Carmelo, in the meantime constructed a fireplace
among the rocks and got his cooking things and all the parcels and
baskets out of the cart. Peppino and Brancaccia returned, and we found a
shallow, shady pool with a sandy bottom, undressed Ricuzzu, and put him
into it. I observed that the baby's clothes were reefed with safety
pins, but I said nothing about it, thinking the reefs could be let out
when he had attained twice the age he was when they were bought. The
proprieties did not matter with this bather, who soon learnt how to
splash us. It may have been his padrino's vanity, but I thought he
laughed loudest when he succeeded in splashing me.

The couple of peperoni had swelled into a regular colazione. First, of
course, we had pasta, this time it was called lingue di passeri
(sparrows' tongues), they have fifty different names for it according to
its size and shape, but it is always pasta. Carmelo made a sauce for it
over his fire with oil, onions, extract of tomatoes, and certain herbs;
the recipe is a secret which is to be imparted to Ricuzzu when he is
fifteen, but I think Brancaccia has already guessed it, though she is not
supposed to know. As a rule, I try to get only half as much pasta as a
Sicilian takes, and of that I can only eat half, but on this occasion,
either because of Carmelo's cooking or the sea breeze, or the presence of
Ricuzzu, I ate it all, and it made me feel like Rinaldo after the
terrible fight in which he kills the centaur and stands at the wings
panting for breath.

The pasta was followed by bacon and figs--an unexpectedly delicious
combination; the bacon is uncooked and cut very thin, the figs are fresh
and ripe, but it would not do in England because, although one could
probably find the bacon in Soho, our figs never attain to Sicilian
ripe