What was far worse, it was miserably cold; the wind blew about us, and we could get no fire. But there was no remedy for these grievances, and we resigned ourselves to fate and to bed. The two hideous old beldames who had brought us our wretched supper, had left us for the night, and no human being was near us, when we heard the sound of a heavy foot on the creaking staircase, and a man wrapped in a cloak, and armed with a sword and musket, stalked into the hall.

If we had been heroines, what terrors might have agitated, and what adventures might not have befallen us! But as we were not heroical, we neither screamed nor fainted, we only looked at him; and notwithstanding his formidable appearance, and that he had long black mustachoes and bushy eyebrows, he did us no mischief, though he might have cut our throats with all the ease in the world: indeed he had still abundance of leisure for the exploit, for he informed us that he had the honour of lodging in the house, that he was the only person who had that honour, and that he should have the honour of sleeping in the next room to ours.

Finding him so courteous, and being aware there was no means of getting quit of him, we treated him on our parts with the utmost civility, perhaps upon the principle that the Indians worship the devil; and exchanging the salutation of "Felicissima Notte!" (a wish which, however benevolent, there seemed small prospect of being granted,) our whiskered neighbour retreated into his apartment, the key of which he had in his pocket, and we con

tented ourselves with barricadoing our doors with the only table and chair that our desolate chamber contained; then in uncurtained and uncoverleted wretchedness, upon flock beds, the prey of innumerable fleas, and shaking with cold, if not with fear, we lay the live-long night; not even having wherewithal to cover us, for the potent smell of the filthy rug which performed the double duties of blanket and quilt, obliged us to discard it, and our carriagecloaks were but an inadequate defence against the blasts that whistled through the manifold chinks of the room.

LETTER IV.

We got up, however, at four o'clock the next morning, unmurdered our friend of the musket and the sword, I make no doubt, being still fast in the arms of Morpheus; and we began in the dark to wend our weary way from this miserable Osteria. First, we had a horse added to the three mules, and then a pair of oxen were yoked in front of all, and slowly toiling along, this combination of animals at last contrived to pull us up the long dreary barren hills, whose broken surface, strewed all over with huge masses of rock, were the only objects that met our view.

At ten o'clock we stopped at a solitary house on these wild wastes, called La Scala. It was the filthiest place I ever beheld, and the smell was so intolerable, that nothing but the excessive cold out of doors, could have induced us to have remained a single moment within it. Two hours, however, did we stay, cowering over the smoke of a wet wood fire, waiting till the mules were fed-for they

could get something to eat, but for us there was nothing; neither bread, coffee, eggs, milk, meat, fruit, vegetables, nor even macaroni, were to be had; so that we might have starved, or breakfasted upon salt fish fried in oil, had not our man, more provident than ourselves, produced a store of stale loaves and hard-boiled eggs that he had laid in at Siena. We had observed a large house near the village of San Quirico, which we passed through this morning, and I learnt from the dirty squalid mistress of La Scala, between the acts of puffing the fire with her breath, that it is a Palazzo, which belongs to the noble family of Chigi, but that they never live there now, and that San Quirico is inhabited only by poor people, "except indeed the canons of the church, who," she said, "were ricchissimi.” On inquiring into the amount of this excess of wealth, it proved to be 300 crowns a-year! "Blush, Grandeur! blush!"

From La Scala we toiled up apparently interminable hills, till at last-contrary to my expectations

we reached the top of the wild and savage mountain of Radicofoni. It was heaped with the tremendous ruins of nature. All around, huge blue fragments of basaltic rock were strewed so thickly, as in most places wholly to conceal the surface of the earth. When exposed to view between these heaps of shattered rock, it was quite bare, and looked as if from creation it had never borne one blade of grass. Dark barren hills of stone, rising all around us, met our eye in every direction; it is impossible to conceive a more desolate scene. It seemed as if the beings

that inhabited it, must of necessity partake of its savage nature; and the aspect of those we saw well accorded with its character.

The countrymen were all clothed in shaggy sheep-skins, with the wool outside, rudely stitched together to serve as a covering to their bodies; and pieces of the same were tied about their thighs, partially concealing the ragged vestments they wore beneath. Their legs and feet were bare; and this savage attire gave a strange, wild effect to the dark eyes that glared at us from beneath their bushy and matted locks. Indeed, their whole appearance reminded us literally of wolves in sheep's clothing.

The wintry blast howled around us in stormy gusts; but we braved its fury, though not without difficulty, in order to ascend to the town, or rather village, of Radicofoni, which is considerably higher up the mountain than the road, and wholly inaccessible to a carriage. Higher still than the town, and impending directly over it, rises an abrupt rock of most singular appearance, which has its base on the very summit of the mountain; and on the utmost pinnacle of this rock stands the Castle, or Fort, of Radicofoni.

To this perilous-looking elevation, the violence of the wind rendered it wholly impossible for us to attain, and it was with great difficulty we clambered up to the wretched little town of Radicofoni; which, after all, did not contain what we went to seek,-viz. casts from ancient medals and gems, which are made at the Baths of St Philip, a distance of five miles from hence, and therefore I con