GLEANINGS IN EUROPE. ITALY: BY AN AMERICAN. IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. II. _PHILADELPHIA_: CAREY, LEA, AND BLANCHARD. 1838. ENTERED according to ACT OF CONGRESS, in the year 1838, BY CAREY, LEA, AND BLANCHARD, In the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. ITALY. LETTER XVIII. Mountain paths near Sorrento.—The Scaricatòjo.—Picturesque house.—Amalfi.—Salerno.—Eboli.—The Castle.—View from it.—Unhealthiness of the Peasantry.—Buffaloes.—Useful breed of Oxen.—Scene of Murder.—Pæstum.—The Temple of Neptune.—Scenery of Pæstum.—Beautiful route to Pompeii.—Castel-a-Mare.—American Vessels seized by Murat.—Influence of the Commercial Class in America.—Rights of individual Citizens disregarded. The season having advanced far enough to remove all apprehension of malaria, we sent notice to our friend Mr. Hammett, at Naples, and prepared to visit Pæstum. On the appointed day the consul appeared, and, the next morning, after an early breakfast, we left _la Casa detta del Tasso_, on donkeys as usual, and took one of the mountain paths that led towards the gulf of Salerno. We had often explored these very heights, and had often admired the loveliness of the view, as from the elevations we overlooked both bays, and all the radiant scenery, but never more so than on this occasion. The shores of this promontory, on the gulf of Salerno, are, as a rule, much higher than those of the bay of Naples, though they cannot well be more precipitous. At the highest point of the road we dismissed the donkeys, and prepared to make the descent on foot, followed by a man to carry the night-sack and the cloaks. The place to which we were going, and, in particular, the path which leads to it, has great local celebrity, and that deservedly, among the lovers of the picturesque, under the name of the _Scaricatòjo_, which signifies, I believe, a place to discharge at, or a landing. W——, who justifies his Pennsylvanian descent by a love of puns, termed it the “Scare-you-the-toes-oh!”—and really it is one of the last places on the coast I should have expected to find a marine landing at. The precipice is very high, many times higher than that of Sorrento, and almost as steep. We went down it by a zig-zag, half stairs and half path, or what —— would call an _amphibious_ road, wondering what there could be at the bottom, but the sea. We did find, however, a landing just large enough to receive a boat or two, and the site of a small house, in which two or three custom-house officers live; for