The town of Syracuse looks as I could imagine the cities of the Bible would have looked, when one sees it from the mouth of the Anapo at the opposite side of the great port on a July noon. Not a film of smoke rises from the low flat roofs of the mellow white-and-yellow houses, which, in their turn, seem to be crouching down within the shadow of the city walls. There is even a temple, for the cathedral is but the Temple of Minerva, with the columns still protruding from the northern face. I should have said that only Will and I went to the mouth of the river, walking from where the water became too shallow for the _barcas_; the rest of the Admiral's party rumbled off in the coaches to see the ruins of Epipolæ and Achradina, and the Greek castle of Euryalus and the street of tombs, the theatre, amphitheatre, and much more that I cannot remember of ancient Syracuse, though the Admiral had had Mr. Comyn to tell the younger officers about them most carefully. Will and I had been dismissed, as not being in fit condition to ride in gilt coaches with crimson velvet hangings, and had orders to have the barge at the landing-stairs under the Marina at such a time. I know that I was glad to be excused from parading in state round miles of old stones. The Admiral would not willingly miss a stone that had any ancient history hanging about it; and with a guide telling the story first in Sicilian, and the Governor, who was slow at taking the drift, putting it into Italian for Mr. Comyn, and Mr. Comyn, who was slow with his Italian, putting it into English for the Admiral, and the Admiral, not being satisfied, putting his questions and persisting with them till he understood his point, it would be a long day. The roads, too, were such that the coaches went slower than a walk. Will had more in his mind, but this I did not know then. You may be sure that the Admiral had not embarked on this inland voyage of discovery before he had made certain that the wind would be lacking to carry the fleet, which had now everything on board, out. Seeing that the day was one of those days without enough air to blow a candle out, he said to Will: "I am afraid that we have offended his Chameleonship after all." And somehow I believe that Will's translation of this to the Governor was a very lame affair. CHAPTER VII.--Satisfying a Prince's Honour. Coming to where the road into the city and the road to the ruins divided, at a spot where a few almost-buried columns marked the site of the ancient market-place--the Agora is the Greek term, I believe--the Prince of Favara and his sister made their excuses and bade their servants drive home to the Mont' alti palace; and here they waited till sunset, within their palace, in the best poor state that the Marchese's reduced circumstances permitted.