That splendid, dangerous dandy, Alcibiades, was one of these ambassadors. Almost under the feet of Jane and Peripatetica, as they sat with their mouths full of crisp delectable little tarts, had the wily Athenian spoken in the Catanian theatre. The older men enjoyed his eloquent, graceful Greek, but they were quite determined not to be persuaded by it to let his fleet enter their harbour, his army enter their city, or to be used as a base from which to strike the Syracusians. The Catanians didn’t like Syracuse, but they didn’t mean to embroil themselves with her. They secretly 139hoped the Athenians would reduce that dangerous neighbour to despair, but if either destroyed the other—why, then it would be well to be able to show the victor their clean hands. Alcibiades was quite aware he was not convincing them, but he enjoyed turning brilliant periods in public, and was meanwhile pleasantly conscious of the young men in the audience admiring the chasing of his buckles, the artful folds of his gold-embroidered chalmyde, the exquisite angle at which he knotted his fillet, privately resolving to readjust their own provincial toilets by the model of this famous glass of fashion. And when they all poured out of the theatre after his brilliantly preferred request had been politely refused, he could afford to smile calmly, for, behold! there was the Athenian fleet in the harbour, the Athenian army in the city. He had not been using those well-turned phrases for mere idleness. They had availed to keep the authorities occupied while his subordinates had executed his commands. And their caution was of no avail whatever, for in due time, when Alcibiades was in exile and the Athenians rotting in the Latomiæ, Syracuse duly turned and “took it out of” Catania. Took it out good and hard too. There was no use stopping over a train to see the old theatre and realize for themselves this curious bit of history; it only meant crawling through black passages by the light of a smoky candle, for Ætna in 1669—in a fit of ennui with poor Catania—had pitched down thousands of tons of lava upon her and hid all the rich city’s ancient glories from the sun. It was from Catania that another interesting Greek 140had set out upon his last journey. A journey to the crest of that volcano which has been constantly taking a hand in the destinies of Sicily, with what—in its careless malice, its malignant furies—seems almost like the personal wickedness of some demon; that incalculable mountain whose soaring outlines had been coming out at Jane and Peripatetica all day whenever the train turned a corner, as if to reassure them that they couldn’t lose her if they tried. Ætna was from the very beginning the pre-eminent fact in this part of Sicily.