Of fishing-boats alone, I feel certain of being within bounds when I say they were out in hundreds. A long line of them stretched away from near the town, in the direction of Capri, not one of which appeared to have motion. Clusters of them lay scattered about in every direction, and the sails were drooping on board of vessels of nearly every sort of rig known in this picturesque sea. These elements of beauty might have been assembled elsewhere, though scarcely in such numbers and in so much perfection; but you will remember that, besides the peculiarities of the vessels, their varieties, the boats, the union of sublime land and glorious water, there was also a coast teeming with places over which history, from remote antiquity, had thrown its recollections and its charms. That bewitching and almost indescribable softness of which I have so often spoken, a blending of all the parts in one harmonious whole, a mellowing of every tint and trait, with the total absence of everything unseemly or out of keeping, threw around the picture a seductive ideal, that, blended with the known reality in a way, I have never before witnessed, nor ever expect to witness again. Travellers often come to this place on a hasty visit, and, encountering bad weather, or an unpropitious state of the atmosphere, they go away with false notions of the comparative excellence of things. We have now been ten months in Italy, and, certainly, had we gone away without visiting this portion of the country, we should have formed no accurate opinion of Italian nature. Had we come here during the bad weather, it is equally probable that, by transferring to a time of the year when no nature is seen to advantage the descriptions that refer to the more genial months, we might have felt disposed to accuse those who made them of exaggeration and fraud. Even now, the atmosphere is not of extraordinary purity. It has a sleepy haziness about it, that I find in admirable harmony with the season and the region; but experience has taught me to distinguish between months, and to look for its most peculiar and its greatest charm at a still later season of the year. It is not an easy thing to find a residence for a family that has no material objection. The price was the great obstacle to taking the villa of Cardinal Ruffo, and we reluctantly turned our eyes in another direction. We had now been three weeks in taverns, and one must experience it to feel the relief that is afforded by getting out of these public places into a private dwelling with a family. Our inn, notwithstanding, offered fewer objections and more attractions than any I was ever in. It was nearly empty at this season--a great advantage in itself, was well kept, had noble rooms, and overlooked the bay.