friend evidently saw the question in his eyes, for he said:

"The man who knows not Naples knows not pleasure."

"Is that a Neapolitan saying?" asked Artois.

"Yes, and it is true. There is no town like Naples for pleasure. Even
your Paris, Emilio, with all its theatres, its cocottes, its
restaurants--no, it is not Naples. No wonder the forestiere come here.
In Naples they are free. They can do what they will. They know we
shall not mind. We are never shocked."

"And do you think we are easily shocked in Paris?"

"No, but it is not the same. You have not Vesuvius there. You have not
the sea, you have not the sun."

Artois began laughingly to protest against the last statement, but the
Marchesino would not have it.

"No, no, it shines--I know that,--but it is not the sun we have here."

He spoke to the seamen in the Neapolitan dialect. They were brown,
muscular fellows. In their eyes were the extraordinary boldness and
directness of the sea. Neither of them looked gay. Many of the
Neapolitans who are much upon the sea have serious, even grave faces.
These were intensely, almost overpoweringly male. They seemed to
partake of the essence of the elements of nature, as if blood of the
sea ran in their veins, as if they were hot with the grim and inner
fires of the sun. When they spoke their faces showed a certain