resolving its features into large, calm masses, as the horses labored up
the narrow, stony road into a mysterious wood of gigantic olives,
gnarled, twisted and rent as no other tree could be and live. The scene
was wild and weird in the dying light, and it grew almost savage as we
wound upward among the robber-haunted hills. Night had fallen before we
reached the mountain-town. Our coachman dashed through the dark slits of
streets, where it seemed as if our wheels must strike the houses on each
side, cracking his whip and jingling the bells of the harness. Under
black archways sat groups of peasants, their swart visages lit up from
below by the glow of a brazier, while a flaring torch stuck through a
ring overhead threw fierce lights and shadows across the scene. Sharp
cries and shouts like maledictions rose as we passed, and as we turned
into the little square on which the inn stands we wondered in what sort
of den we should have to lodge. We followed our host of the little
Albergo della Regnia up the steep stone staircase with many misgivings:
he flung open a door, and we beheld a carpeted room, all furnished and
hung with pink chintz covered with cupids and garlands. There were
sofas, low arm-chairs, a writing-table with appurtenances, a tea-table
with snowy linen and a hissing brass tea-kettle. Opening from this were
two little white nests of bed-rooms, with tin bath-tubs and an abundance
of towels. We could not believe our eyes: here were English comfort and
French taste. Were we in May Fair or the Rue de Rivoli? Or was it a
fairy-tale?

[Illustration: CASTLE AT OSTIA.]

The fairy-tale went on next day, when, after wending our way through the
dirty, crooked little streets, we crossed a courtyard and descended a
long subterranean stairway to emerge on a magnificent terrace with a
heavy marble balustrade, whence flights of steps led down to lower