It is only the middle portion of the western coast of Italy, about a hundred miles from Rome, that is volcanic; the volcanic character always appears south of the Apennines, and prevails in a portion of Latium, as is evident from the soil and the lakes, as e.g., the Alban hills and the Alban lake; the lake of Nemi is a crater. The territory of Campania in its ancient sense (Terra di Lavoro) is of the same character, but it does not extend very far into the interior, for it is visible only in the Phlegraean plains as far as the Liris, and in the country about the gulf of Naples as far as the range of mountains, which terminates between Sorrento and Amalfi; this mountain forms the southern boundary of the volcanic ground. All the rest of Italy is essentially non-volcanic; Lombardy contains indeed a few springs to which one might be inclined to ascribe a volcanic origin, but at any rate only in an improper sense; the coast of the kingdom of Naples on the Adriatic, the whole of Apulia and Iapygia is altogether a limestone country. This stone, in its noblest form, as marble, appears especially in Tuscany on the frontier of Liguria, where the Apennines begin to form a distinct range; it is there that it appears most perfectly crystallised. In the south-eastern countries, on the other hand, it gradually changes into chalk, and forms natural saltpetre by an _affinité disposée_. Although Italy is called a unique country, although we think of it as the fair and charming Hesperia, and as the country of oranges described by the poets, still it presents the very greatest variety of climate; the differences are as great, and perhaps even greater than in Germany. We may divide the whole country into three natural parts; we might perhaps make four, but there are in reality only three great divisions. The first may be termed _Greek Italy_, comprising very little more than the country occupied by Greek settlements, that is, the country of the ancient Itali from the neighbourhood of Terracina exclusive of Latium. Imagine a line running from Terracina across the mountains, the Liris and Vulturnus, down to Beneventum, through the valley of the Calor as far as the Garganus: the country south of this line is what I term Greek Italy, because its vegetation and its climate are Greek; the difference between this part and the countries north of it is greater than that existing between the latter and Germany. All the plants and trees which are seen at Rome only here and there, and are kept up with great labour and difficulty, grow there naturally and almost wild, as, for example, the cactus and aloe, which are really southern plants; the pine-tree is rare, and firs scarcely occur at all, while the dwarf-palm already grows between the rocks. Everything not only ripens earlier, as olives and figs, but the fruit is altogether of a different, a southern character; the vegetation is so mighty and gigantic that we in the north can scarcely form an idea of it.