The climate of Corsica is a very delightful one. More than half the days in the year are sunny ones, and of the dull, dreary kind that so often trouble our own island there are perhaps not more than fifty in a year. Mist and fog are seldom seen, and the rains, though heavy, do not last for long together. At times the islanders suffer from two objectionable winds, the mistral and the sirocco. The mistral comes over the sea from France. It is violent and cold, and arises in the highlands of Central France. It rushes down the Valley of the Rhone like “a blast from a giant’s bellows,” making those people who have gone to Southern France for warmth wish that they had stayed at home. Then it sweeps across the blue waters of the Mediterranean, and by the time it arrives at Corsica it has lost a little of its sting. Yet it still remains cold enough to be unpleasant. The sirocco is a hot wind from the south. It blows from the fiery desert of Sahara, and as its hot, sand-laden breath passes over the northern shores of Africa, the people find it nearly impossible to work, or even to move. In its journey across the Mediterranean it is slightly cooled, but it is never welcomed by the Corsicans, for not only is it still hot, but it has also become moist by contact with the water, and therefore produces great discomfort. CHAPTER II A PEEP AT CORSICAN HISTORY A few of the main events in Corsican history during the last three or four hundred years will be told in connection with the accounts given in the following chapters, of the principal towns of the island. But before speaking of these later years of bloodshed and strife, let us get a glimpse of what happened during earlier times. The first thing that strikes us on reading a history of Corsica is that, though the people live upon a small island, they have never acted as so many other island races have done. We never hear of Corsican sailors setting forth on voyages of adventure or exploration. There is no record of them invading the lands of their neighbours, either upon the islands or upon the shores of the Mediterranean. They do not appear to have practised piracy, preying upon the ships that passed their very doors as they carried the goods of other countries to and fro across the waters. As a rule, it may be said that they did not seek to interfere with anyone else. But, on the other hand, many people interfered with them. No one seemed to be able to leave them alone. The Mediterranean was of old “the Great Sea.” On its waters the earliest sailors of whom we know anything went out to trade and to travel. On its shores many of the great nations that we read about first grew to glory and then sank into silence. Amongst these we may mention the people of Carthage, Greece, Rome, Pisa, and Genoa. All these in turn invaded Corsica, and did their best to conquer the island.