Edward L. Pierce, Memoir and letters of Charles Sumner: volume 2

[100] the chisel and the pencil, or stand in a public square like her Forum. Would that Felton could see these things! How his soul would expand and palpably feel—what he has been groping after in books—the power and beauty of ancient art! Capo Miseno is on the opposite side of the bay. One day's excursion carried me over the scene of the Cumaean Sibyl (I would fain have sent you home a mistletoe from the thick wood), round the ancient Lake Avernus, even down the dark cave which once opened to the regions of night; by the Lucrine bank, whence came the oysters on which Horace and Juvenal fed; over the remains of Baiae, where are still to be seen those substructions and piles, by which, as our old poets said, their rich owners sought to abridge the rightful domain of the sea; and on the top of Capo Miseno, in the shade of the vine, with fresh breezes coming from Hesperus and the West; and in the ancient gardens of Lucullus I sat down to such a breakfast as the poor peasants of this fertile land could supply. Lucullus's servants, I doubt not, fared better than we did; but who, amidst such a scene, could think of the coarse bread and the poor wine? Then there is the Museum at Naples, where are collected all the spoils of Herculaneum and Pompeii, with other productions that are full of interest and beauty and grace. Several days are exhausted in examining its treasures. Here are the frescos that have been taken from the walls of the houses of Pompeii, and the bronzes and the marbles that have been there disentombed. But you know all this. Naples is a disagreeable place saving its fine scenery and its classical interests. Beggary is here incarnate. You cannot leave the house without being surrounded by half a dozen squalid wretches with most literally scarcely a rag to cover their nakedness; they travel with you, and go into the country with you—whenever you make a sortie from the town —as if joined to your person; and on the quays they stretch themselves at full length, while a hot sun is letting fall its perpendicular rays. The streets are narrow and dirty, and the famed Toledo is without a sidewalk (a good word, though American). I have several letters of introduction here, but I shall leave the place without taking advantage of any. I have travelled from Marseilles with three Frenchmen, young men of rank, in whose company I have made all my excursions, and for some time have not been in the way of hearing English. From my French friends I have learned some lessons in economy. It is to me astonishing to observe the nicety with which they drive a bargain; and as one of them has always held our common purse and acted as manager, I have had the benefit of it without the trouble. To-morrow we start together, in a carriage we have hired, for Rome.

Rome, May 21.

I am in the Eternal City. We passed through dirty Capua (shorn of all its soft temptations); with difficulty found a breakfast of chocolate and bread where Hannibal's victorious troops wasted with luxury and excess; enjoyed the perfume of the orange and lemon trees that line the way in the territories of Naples; at midnight awoke the last gendarme of his Neapolitan Majesty, who swung open the heavy gates through which we entered the territories of the Supreme Pontiff; rode all night; crossed for twenty-eight