The relations, who had assembled to welcome Carmel back, came often to the Casa Bianca, and in quite a short time they and the Ingletons were on terms of intimacy. Ernesto Trapani, a handsome young fellow, slightly older than Everard, was studying at the University of Palermo, in which city Vittore was at school, and the two brothers came home from Saturday to Monday. Douglas Greville, a tall boy of seventeen who had been at school in Paris, also went to the Palermo University for certain classes in chemistry, which would help him afterwards in the conduct of his father's business. The younger children of the various families, Aimee, Tito, and Claude Greville, Rosalia Trapani, and Berta, Gaspare, and Pepino Rosso, had lessons with private governesses, under whose charge they had learnt to chatter Italian, English, and French with the utmost ease. On the Saturday after the Ingletons' arrival all these young people came over to Casa Bianca, and it was decided to take picnic baskets, and go out in a body to show the guests some of the sights of the neighborhood. So a very gay party started off from the veranda. First they went through long groves of orange and lemon trees, where peasant women, with bright handkerchiefs tied over their heads, were gathering the fruit and packing it carefully in hampers. "You must simply live on oranges here," said Dulcie, accepting the ripe specimen offered her by Douglas. "Do you know this is the fifth I've had this morning?" "On the contrary, we hardly ever touch them ourselves," answered Douglas. "I suppose we have so many that we don't care about them here. I used to like them, though, when I was in Paris." "It would take me a long time to get tired of them," declared Dulcie. "I did not know before what a really ripe orange tastes like. They're absolutely delicious. Why don't we get them like this in England?" "They wouldn't keep if they were packed ripe, and fruit that ripens on a tree is always much sweeter than when it has been stored." "Yes, I know: our English apples are like that. I wish I could be here in the autumn to see your peaches and vines! I shan't want to go away from this ripping place. I've never seen anything so lovely in my life!"