all Tennyson may have thought to say, for me it is not the North but the
South that is bright "and true and tender." For in the North the sky is
seldom seen and is full of clouds, while here it stretches up to God.
And then, the South has been true to all her ancient faiths and works,
to the Catholic religion, for instance, and to agriculture, the old
labour of the corn and the wine and the oil, while we are gone after
Luther and what he leads to, and, forsaking the fields, have taken to
minding machines.

And so, in some dim way I cannot explain, to come to Italy is like
coming home, as though after a long journey one were to come suddenly
upon one's mistress at a corner of the lane in a shady place.

It is perhaps with some such joy in the heart as this that the fortunate
traveller will come to Genoa the Proud, by the sea, lying on the bosom
of the mountains, whiter than the foam of her waves, the beautiful gate
of Italy.

II

The history of Genoa, its proud and adventurous story, is almost wholly
a tale of the sea, full of mystery, cruelty, and beauty, a legend of sea
power, a romance of ships. It is a narrative in which sailors, half
merchants, half pirates, adventurers every one, put out from the city
and return laden with all sorts of spoil,--gold from Africa, slaves from
Tunis or Morocco, the booty of the Crusades; with here the vessel of the
Holy Grail bought at a great price, there the stolen dust of a great
Saint.

This spirit of adventure, which established the power of Genoa in the