On reaching Naples, he climbed Vesuvius, and saw for the first time the lava-streams and piles of scoria of a volcano still active; while the wonderful sections of the old crater of Somma furnished a link between the living present and the remote past--between Italy and Auvergne. He visited Ischia, where another delightful surprise awaited him, for on its old volcano, Monte Epomeo, he found, at a height of 2,000 feet above the sea, marine shells which belonged "to the same class as those in the lower regions of Ischia." They were contained in a mass of clay, and were quite unaltered. This was a great discovery, for the existence of these fossils "had not been dreamt of," and it showed that the land had been elevated to this extent without any appreciable change in the fauna inhabiting the Mediterranean. Except for this, the island was "an admirable illustration of Mont Dore." He made an excursion also to the Temples of Pæstum, wonderful from the weird beauty of their ruins, on the flat plain between the Apennines and the sea, but with interest geological as well as archæological, because of the blocks of rough travertine with which their columns are built. These he studied, and he visited the quarries from which they were hewn. His letters frequently contain interesting references to the tyranny of the Government, "the inquisitorial suppression of all cultivation of science, whether moral or physical," the idle, happy-go-lucky habits of the common people, the prevalent mendicancy, universal dishonesty, and general corruption. One instance may be worth quoting--it indicates the material with which "United Italy " has had to deal. He wanted to pre-pay the postage of a letter to England. The head waiter at his hotel had said to him, "'Mind, if it is to England you only pay fifteen grains' (sous). I thought the hint a trait of character, as they are all suspicious of one another. The clerk demanded twenty-five. I remonstrated, but he insisted, and, as he was dressed and had the manners of a gentleman, I paid. When I found on my return that I had been cozened, I asked the head waiter, with some indignation, 'Is it possible that the Government officers are all knaves?' 'Sono Napolitani, Signor; la sua eccellenza mi scusera, ma io sono Romano!'"[23] The old proverb, what is bred in the bone will out in the flesh, still holds good; but we may doubt whether the standard of virtue is quite so high as the speaker intimated in certain other provinces which Piedmont has acquired at the price of the cradle of the royal house and some of the best blood of the nation.