crumbling fortress that is not redolent of the memory of some personage whose name is inscribed on the roll of European history. It seems but right, therefore, that many works should have been written concerning this favoured corner of Italy, so replete with natural charm and with historical interest; and in truth multitudes of books, large and small, witty and dull, erudite and empty, light and heavy, prosaic and rhapsodical, have poured forth from the prolific pens of generations of authors. We feel sincerely the need of an apology for making a fresh addition to the ever-increasing pile of Neapolitan literature, and we can only urge in extenuation of our crime of authorship that the same scene appeals in varied ways to different persons, and that every fresh description is apt to shed additional light upon old familiar subjects. In the following pages we make no profession to act the part of a guide to the neighbourhood of Naples, for are there not the carefully prepared pages of Murray and Baedeker, to say nothing of the works of such writers as Augustus Hare, to lead the wanderer into every church and castle, to show him every nook in valley and mountain, and to supply him thoroughly with accurate dates and facts? No, our treatment of this theme may be deemed a poor one, but it has at least the merit and the courage of following its own peculiar lines. For we pursue our own course, and we touch lightly here and omit there; we run to dissertation in this place, we glide by silently in another. We take our own views of people and places, and give them for what they are worth to our readers to approve or to condemn, as they think fit. We offer a medley of history and of imagination, of biography and of private comment; and we crave indulgence for our short-comings by observing that any deficiencies in these pages can easily be remedied by application to the abundant literature upon Naples and its surrounding districts which every good library is presumed to contain. CHAPTER II THE VESUVIAN SHORE AND MONTE SANT’ ANGELO