t Campo Morto, where fever prevails, and where they were
supposed to die of malaria. I saw Gasperone, the chief of a famous band,
in a prison at Civita Vecchia; he was said to be a relative of Cardinal
Antonelli, both coming from the brigand village of Sonnino, in the
Volscian mountains. In going to Naples our friends advised us to take a
guard of soldiers; but these were suspected of being as bad, and in
league with the brigands. So we travelled post without them; and though
I foolishly insisted on going round by the ruins of ancient Capua, which
was considered very unsafe, we arrived at Naples without any encounter.
Here we met with the son and daughter of Mr. Smith, of Norwich, a
celebrated leader in the anti-slavery question. This was a bond of
interest between his family and me; for when I was a girl I took the
anti-slavery cause so warmly to heart that I would not take sugar in my
tea, or indeed taste anything with sugar in it. I was not singular in
this, for my cousins and many of my acquaintances came to the same
resolution. How long we kept it I do not remember. Patty Smith and I
became great friends, and I knew her sisters; but only remember her
niece Florence Nightingale as a very little child. My friend Patty was
liberal in her opinions, witty, original, an excellent horsewoman, and
drew cleverly; but from bad health she was peculiar in all her habits.
She was a good judge of art. Her father had a valuable collection of
pictures of the ancient masters; and I learnt much from her with regard
to paintings and style in drawing. We went to see everything in Naples
and its environs together, and she accompanied Somerville and me in an
expedition to Paestum, where we made sketches of the temples. At Naples
we bought a beautiful cork model of the Temple of Neptune, which was
placed on our mineral cabinet on our return to London. A lady who came
to pay me a morning visit asked Somerville what it was; and when he told
her, she said, "How dreadful it is to think that all the people who
worshipped in that temple are in eternal misery, because they did not
believe in our Saviour." Somerville asked, "How could they believe in
Christ when He was not born till many centuries after?" I am sure she
thought it was all the same.

* * * * *

There had been an eruption of Vesuvius just before our arrival at
Naples, and it was still smoking very much; however, we ascended it, and
walked round the crater, r