By the Ionian Sea: Notes of a Ramble in Southern Italy

whether I had any appetite. A vision of the dining-room came before me,

and I shook my head. “Still,” he urged, “it would be well to eat

something.” And, turning to the hostess, “He had better have a

beefsteak and a glass of Marsala.” The look of amazement with which I

heard this caught the Doctor’s eye. “Don’t you like bistecca?” he

inquired. I suggested that, for one in a very high fever, with a good

deal of lung congestion, beefsteak seemed a trifle solid, and Marsala

somewhat heating. “Oh!” cried he, “but we must keep the machine going.”

And thereupon he took his genial leave.

I had some fear that my hostess might visit upon me her resentment of

the Doctor’s reproaches; but nothing of the kind. When we were alone,

she sat down by me, and asked what I should really like to eat. If I

did not care for a beefsteak of veal, could I eat a beefsteak of

mutton? It was not the first time that such a choice had been offered

me, for, in the South, bistecca commonly means a slice of meat done

on the grill or in the oven. Never have I sat down to a bistecca

which was fit for man’s consumption, and, of course, at the Concordia

it would be rather worse than anywhere else. I persuaded the good woman

to supply me with a little broth. Then I lay looking at the patch of

cloudy sky which showed above the houses opposite, and wondering

whether I should have a second fearsome night. I wondered, too, how

long it would be before I could quit Cotrone. The delay here was

particularly unfortunate, as my letters were addressed to Catanzaro,

the next stopping-place, and among them I expected papers which would

need prompt attention. The thought of trying to get my correspondence

forwarded to Cotrone was too disturbing; it would have involved an

enormous amount of trouble, and I could not have felt the least

assurance that things would arrive safely. So I worried through the

hours of daylight, and worried still more when, at nightfall, the fever

returned upon me as badly as ever.

Dr. Sculco had paid his evening visit, and the first horror of

ineffectual drowsing had passed over me, when my door was flung

violently open, and in rushed a man (plainly of the commercial

species), hat on head and bag in hand. I perceived that the diligenza

had just arrived, and that travellers were seizing upon their bedrooms.

The invader, aware of his mistake, discharged a volley of apologies,

and rushed out again. Five minutes later the door again banged open,

and there entered a tall lad with an armful of newspapers; after

regarding me curiously, he asked whether I wanted a paper. I took one

with the hope of reading it next morning. Then he began conversation. I

had the fever? Ah! everybody had fever at Cotrone. He himself would be

laid up with it in a day or two. If I liked, he would look in with a

paper each evening—till fever prevented him. When I accepted this

suggestion, he smiled encouragingly, cried “Speriamo!” and clumped

out of the room.

I had as little sleep as on the night before, but my suffering was

mitigated in a very strange way. After I had put out the candle, I

tormented myself for a long time with the thought that I should never

see La Colonna. As soon as I could rise from bed, I must flee Cotrone,

and think myself fortunate in escaping alive; but to turn my back on

the Lacinian promontory, leaving the cape unvisited, the ruin of the

temple unseen, seemed to me a miserable necessity which I should lament

as long as I lived. I felt as one involved in a moral disaster; working

in spite of reason, my brain regarded the matter from many points of

view, and found no shadow of solace. The sense that so short a distance

separated me from the place I desired to see, added exasperation to my

distress. Half-delirious, I at times seemed to be in a boat, tossing on

wild waters, the Column visible afar, but only when I strained my eyes

to discover it. In a description of the approach by land, I had read of

a great precipice which had to be skirted, and this, too, haunted me

with its terrors: I found myself toiling on a perilous road, which all

at once crumbled into fearful depths just before me. A violent

shivering fit roused me from this gloomy dreaming, and I soon after

fell into a visionary state which, whilst it lasted, gave me such

placid happiness as I have never known when in my perfect mind. Lying

still and calm, and perfectly awake, I watched a succession of

wonderful pictures. First of all I saw great vases, rich with ornament

and figures; then sepulchral marbles, carved more exquisitely than the

most beautiful I had ever known. The vision grew in extent, in

multiplicity of detail; presently I was regarding scenes of ancient

life—thronged streets, processions triumphal or religious, halls of

feasting, fields of battle. What most impressed me at the time was the

marvellously bright yet delicate colouring of everything I saw. I can

give no idea in words of the pure radiance which shone from every

object, which illumined every scene. More remarkable, when I thought of