First Zeus—who always had a cheerful disregard of any rules of chivalry in dealing with his enemies—tied down the unlucky Titan Enceladus upon this very spot, and, gathering up enough of Sicily to make a mountain the size of Ætna, heaped it on top of him, probably congratulating himself the while that he had put a complete end to that particular annoyance. But quite a number of rulers since Zeus have discovered that in a rebellious temperament there reside resources of annoyingness which even a god cannot entirely foresee or provide against, and the Titan still heaves restlessly at his load from time to time, rocking the whole island with his struggles, toppling towers, engulfing cities, tearing the earth apart in his furies. Some of the myths accuse Demeter herself of having set Ætna alight in her frenzy, that all Sicily might thus be illumined to aid her in the search for Persephone, and that never since that reckless day has she been able to extinguish it, but must fight, with rain and dews and snows to save her people’s bread from the flames forever threatening to destroy it. The fire pours forth from time to time, spreading cruel ruin, but ever, aided by her, man creeps up and up once more. Up to Randazzo; 141up to Brontë, the “thunder town,” given to Lord Nelson by Marie Antoinette’s sister, then Queen of the Two Sicilies, where the Dukes of Brontë, Nelson’s descendants, still live part of each year in their wild eyrie. The vine and the olive climb and climb after each catastrophe. They cover the old scars of the eruptions, perch in crevices where a goat can scarce stand, and wring from the rich crumbs of soil “wine that maketh glad the heart of man, and oil that causeth his countenance to shine.” Up to the top of this Ætna—ten thousand feet up—on the last journey from Catania climbed Empedocles, that strange figure who passes with ringing brazen sandals through the history of Sicily. Empedocles, clothed in purple, crowned with a wreath of golden leaves, followed by thousands to whom he taught some strange, half Pythagorean worship, the form and meaning of which have vanished with time, save for some hints of a sort of mental healing practised upon his followers. Empedocles, composing vast poems of thousands of lines, and vaunting himself as a Super-man, saying: “An immortal god, and no longer a mortal man, I wander among you; honoured by all, adorned with priestly diadems and blooming wreaths. Into whatever illustrious towns I enter men and women pay me reverence, and I am accompanied by thousands who thirst for their advantage; some being desirous to know the future, and others, tormented by long and terrible disease, waiting to hear the spells that soothe suffering.”