6 RAMBLES OF A NATURALIST. 



yet penetrated to this region a fact which, perhaps, 

 more than any other, illustrates the stationary con- 

 dition of this part of Sicily; indeed, during the 

 whole time in which we were stationed west of 

 Palermo, we were never able to procure these vege- 

 tables, which everywhere else constitute an almost 

 unfailing resource to the poor. 



The road which we had taken led us back to Pa- 

 lermo. We once more passed through this town, 

 after having admired, for the last time, the strange 

 and magnificent church of Morreale ; we took a 

 hasty survey of the castle of La Bagaria, which 

 stands in the midst of its princely villas like a king 

 surrounded by his court; we next reached the ancient 

 Himera which, under the modern name of Termini, 

 yearly attracts a vast crowd of persons who come 

 to seek health at the warm springs for which this 

 place is celebrated. This part of our journey af- 

 forded us the greatest possible enjoyment, for the 

 weather, which had previously been cold and rainy, 

 had become fine and settled within the preceding 

 few days, whilst the land displayed in every part 

 a most exuberant vegetation. Our road followed 

 the irregularities of the coast, skirting from time to 

 time at the foot of mountains, and was sometimes 

 bordered with rose-laurels in full blossom*, and 



his attempts would have proved ineffectual, had not the famine which 

 followed the first wars of the revolution compelled men to submit 

 their prejudices to the pressure of necessity, and in a few years' time 

 the potatoe spread to the smallest villages of France." 



* The shrub which is designated by this name, belongs, in 

 reality, neither to the genus or family of the Laurels, but to the 

 genus Nerion, and to the family of the Apocynacece. The species to 



