LIFE IN AX ISLAXD. 115 



his honour, as is the duty of the faithful. Except 

 these fireworks and the service in the chapel, which 

 was thronged to the very door with kneeling wor- 

 shippers, and much private performance upon the 

 penny whistle, that most cherished of Italian toys, 

 I am not aware that there were any other means of 

 excitement at the festa ; but such as it was, it an- 

 swered all the requirements of our Capriotes, Avho are 

 a contented race. 



After saying so much, however, of the beauties of 

 Capri, it may be well to warn the unwary traveller 

 of the perils attending the arrival. When the slow 

 little steamer which comes twice a-week from Naples 

 (the maladetto Vapore, at which Feliciello swears all 

 manner of picturesque oaths) steams into sight, a 

 world of excited people, chiefly women, rush with 

 their donkeys to the Marina, Feliciello comes but 

 seldom, and by appointment, being a person of pre- 

 tensions ; but his wife, to whom we have already 

 referred, is among the throng. When the little boat 

 which lands the passengers approaches the beach, this 

 crowd rushes upon it like a horde of furies. Nobody 

 thinks twice in Capri of kilting siich scanty trousers 

 or petticoats as it may possess, and rushing with 

 brown shapely limbs knee-deep into the water on any 

 emergency ; and it cannot be denied that it is a little 

 alarming to be dragged headlong out of the boat and 

 fought for by a crowd of nondescript creatures, naked 

 and wet and shining to the knee, and with faces 



