94 TRAVEL, ADVENTURE, AND SPORT. 



line of white towns and villages, broken here and 

 there by vague promontories and stretches of shadowy 

 beach from Torre del Annunziata, which lies perilous 

 on the dark skirts of Vesuvius, to the distant glimmer 

 of human habitations towards Baise on the other side. 

 And if the sun is verging towards the west, it is. over 

 the mountain-mass of Ischia, towering high out of the 

 dazzling water, that he sends the mist of light which 

 seems to weave itself into a changing tissue of gold 

 and purple upon Mount Epomeneo, and over the 

 low-lying hillocks of Procida. To the east, the eye, 

 if it could ever tire of the bay before it, can escape 

 to the open sea, and to the glorious coast towards 

 Amain, which scarcely condescends to slope its 

 mountainous sides towards the sea, but yet holds 

 half-way up lines of inaccessible white towns perched 

 among the cliffs and facing the south or mezzo-gionio, 

 as the Italians say, and it is a better word. Not the 

 south, the mere quarter from which the winds blow, 

 but noon in full impersonation, the blazing joyous 

 mid-day, zenith and crown of all the hours. These 

 same towns secure to the landscape here, as in most 

 parts of Italy, that unfailing charm of human interest 

 which, even when historical associations are wanting, 

 gives an additional delight to the scene. The coast 

 of the Gulf of Salerno' could not be otherwise than 

 grand under any circumstances, yet but for the glim- 

 mer of yonder inaccessible Positano on the further 

 headland, and all the touches of light between which 



