Page:Repository of Arts, Series 1, Volume 01, 1809, January-June.djvu/104

78 hospitality of our worthy captain kind In the extreme. We passed during the night thro' the Faro of Messina, and the once formidable Straits of Scylla and Charybdis, with all the unconcern and sang froid of true British sailors. My classic fears had prompted me to read to the captain the speech of Helenus to Æneas in thethird book of Virgil, which he treated with sovereign contempt, declaring the venerable seer to be no better than an old woman, and the whole story a dd hg. The event, certainly, was by no means calculated to raise the Maronian nautics in my estimation, and in some measure justified the captain's blunt and severe sentence.

But my fears were soon afterwards more sensibly affected by a strong sulphureous vapour, which pervaded every part of the vessel, and induced me to believe it was on fire: I instantly hurried from my cot, but on enquiry, learned, to my great relief, that the smell which had alarmed me proceeded from Mount Stromboli, a burning volcano, then about six miles distant. I did not regret the interruption of my sleep, and all my fears were suspended in contemplating the truly sublime spectacle from the quarter-deck, which the flames exhibited: this you will easily credit when I inform you, that even at so great a distance the objects onboard were so illumined as to cause a very perceptible shadow. It is more than probable, that the whole space between Mounts Ætna and Vesuvius forms connected receptacles of materials for subterraneous fire, and that those mountains and Stromboli serve as occasional vomitories of the raging element; and I think it very probable, that by these means the kingdoms of Naples and Sicily are in some degree preserved from destruction. That they are not entirely sufficient for this salutary purpose, we have reason to conclude from the calamitous earthquakes to which Messina and Calabria have at various periods been exposed. On the other hand, it is but fair to acknowledge, that these convulsions of nature have sometimes been attended with beneficial consequences; since the Lipari Islands evidently, and probably also the Straits of Messina, owe their existence to volcanic revolutions anterior to the records of history.

On the —th, early in the morning, we sailed through the straits between the island of Capri and the territory of Sorrento. The former, once the theatre of the beastly revels of the crafty tyrant Tiberius, is now inhabited by a few humble monks and poor fishermen: some of its ancient and invenerable ruins were distinctly visible from our ship, and their sequestered site induced a recollection of the nefarious and brutish scenes transacted within their walls, so faithfully and con amore depicted by Suetonius: with these, however, I took care not to acquaint our good captain, lest I should experience a similar rebuff to the one I received between Scylla and Charybdis.

The disgusting train of ideas elicited by the view of Capri, was soon wiped away by a contrast of scene, infinitely more pleasing. On leaving the strait, we at once entered the bay of Naples, and beheld the city with its beautiful mole, castles, and churches;