The Sun.
London, England, 1863-01-09 00:00:00

MR. GLADSTONE ON SICILY.

In our Tuesday's impression we gave a brief outline of a
lecture delivered by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the
Boys' National School-room, Hawarden, in the course of
which he gave some account of a tour made by him in
Sicily, with his ascent of Mount Etna, in 1838. The follow-
ing is a fuller report of the right hon. gentleman's address:—

Mr. GLADSTONE was received with loud and continued
applause, and having addressed the audience as friends and
neighbours, said that he very cheerfully undertook the task
of delivering a lecture on that occasion; at the same time
he must trust to the indulgence of his audience, as that was
merely an attempt on his part to construct a lecture from a
little black book he held in his hand, containing what was
jotted down during his tour in Sicily,and from Mr. Murray's
handbook, The whole would be very inartificial, for though
he could not say that he was unaccustomed to public speak-
ing, he would say he could not give very good accounts of
his own travels. First of all he would introduce the island
of Sicily, which lays at the foot of Italy, was one of the most
southern points of Europe, and had a climate partaking both
of an European and African character. He was not aware
that the dimensions of the island had ever been rigidlytaken,
but the latest survey showed it to be 200 miles in diameter,
that was from east to west, and 120 in its greatest length
from north to south. That island had been long known to the
world, having been described 3,000 years ago in the works
of Homer. Its fortune had been very peculiar. No other
place had passed under a greater number of the governing
nations of the world than that. Its first inhabitants were
called Sicilii ; these were succeeded by the Greeks, under
whom it became more powerful than at any after period of
its history. It was said that the population was as great as
eight millions ; ho wever that might be, there was no doubt
that its productiveness was very great. It had in it seven
cities, each of which was a great State. Its fertility was so
extraordinary that during the Roman periods it was
reckoned to be the granary of Rome. From the Greeks it
passed to the Carthagenians, and from them to the Romans.
After the Romans, the Vandals got possession of it; after
the Vandals the Goths held it, and from them it passed to
the Saracens. It afterwards became a part of the Byzantine
empire, and finally the Normans possessed it. Its modern
history was not less remark able, for it had since been in the
hands of all the dominant states of Europe. Germany has
held it. France and Spain had possessed it ; recently it was
in the hands of the English, who, he was glad to say, had
left a good impression there, and still enjoyed popularity
with the inhabitants. (Applause.) He was not aware of
any other State with respect to which it could be said that
it had passed under so many masters. Though Mount
Etna was the chief object of interest in Sicily, it was cer-
tainly not the only one. The ruins it contains were of
themselves sufficient to give great interest to the island.
These, however, did not form the object of his visit in
1838, as his great ambition was to go up Mount Etna. In
that year his eyesight became unequal to his work ; he was
recommended to travel, and he accordingly selected that
island as the object of his journey, which was performed in
company with a friend. The route chosen on going from
Naples was that usually taken by those travellers who wish
to know something of the country, which unfortunately had
hitherto remained very little known. One main reason for
this had been political. The island was at the time he visited
it in a very discontented state, and those who then ruled were
not anxious that many foreigners should make their way
into it. That state of things was now changed, and the in-
habitants were the reverse of what they were at the time of
his visit. Having explained on the map the general con-
formation of the island, he proceeded to make a few obser-
vations on its great natural richness, showing that it ought
to abound with everything, and be one of the great gardens
of Europe. Everything it produced was excellent, and it
was as well suited to produce cotton and rice as wheat, for
though cotton and rice were tropical plants, the climate was
perfectly suited to them. No Englishman could travel
there without being struck with the fine quality of the soil,
but it was sad to observe that there agriculture was now
more backward than it was 3,000 years ago. Virgil came
out as the first writer on agriculture, and the description he
gives of it in his day would be applicable to Sicilian agricul-
ture of the present day. In order to give the English far-
mer an idea of the way in which it is carried on, he related
an anecdote of a certain proprietor, who wished to make
some improvements in agriculture, and for that purpose
purchased a number of English made ploughs, but he found
that they did not act as he had expected, and they were
abandoned for the following reason :—A small shrub, called
the palmetto, grows in Sicily, which has rather tough roots,
and if the top is out off it will revive again. The people
consider it too much trouble to dig up these roots, and the
result was that a team of 40 or 50 oxen may be seen going
round the bunches of palmetto, carefully avoiding them,
and nowhere cutting more than two or three inches into the
soil. The English ploughs were found to cut much deeper
—far too deep for the proprietor referred to,as they constantly
tore up the roots, and would not go round the palmetto
shrubs. There were no roads,except in two or three favoured
spots,the island generally being totally unprovided in this re-
spect. On one occasion,when he and his fellow-traveller were
making their way around the coast,they met the King—not
the gentleman who is now piningin exile,but his father—who
was making a tour around the coast, The road just there was
in such a fearful state that,in order to prevent his Majesty
from sinking,the people spread a quantity of straw over it,and
thus rendered it paseablo for the moment. Another kind of
road there was the bed of a stream. We had such roads occa-
sionally in England, but the worst of them could give but a
faint idea of the wretched state of the Sicilian roads. At
Palermo they experienced a very disagreeable effect from a
wind which comes from the deserts of Africa, and seems to
destroy the muscular force of the body, impressing one
with the belief that one's limbs do not belong to one's self,
but to somebody else. With respect to the means of loco-
motion, he observed that the relative position of horses and
mules was reversed in Scily. The price of a mule would be
£4O or £5O, whilst that of a horse would be about half the
money, which in that country was considered a very large
sum. They were obliged to ride about 12 hours a day upon
these animals, and very uncomfortable work it was, as all
parts of the body were continually creaking and rubbing
against one another. These things were very inconvenient
at the time, but they were all forgotten in the retrospect of
a journey. One very peculiar thing in connexion with these
mules was, that you could never acquire any kindly feelings
towards them, or induce them to become friendly towards
yourself; you could do nothing but punch and beat them
the whole way. Whenever complaint was made to the guide
about their slow progress, the only reply would be that it
was their own fault, as they did not lay on the animals suffi-
ciently. The superior guide they had with them made use
of a very peculiar instrument—a sort of fifth finger, which
came out of his hand, and was dug into the animal's side.
The reason of his using this sharp point was to avoid the
exertion of muscular force which would have been necessary
had he employed a blunt instrument. Having described the
ruins which they passed on their way to Catania, he re.
marked upon the feeling which at that time existed between
the people and the government. When they arrived there
they found that the town had suffered severely from the ra-
vages of cholera, and the people were firmly impressed with
the belief that the King had procured it, and that the only
way to escape its influence was to murder persons of high
rank. They exonerated the priests from any participation in
this act, as many of them died of cholera themselves. That
was a very ludicrous fact on one side, but a very melancholy
one on the other, as it was impossible to conceive anything
more illustrative of the bad government under which they
lived at the period than that such a belief should have ob-
tained. Having made a few observations upon the manner in
which volcanic mountains are formed, he proceeded to de-
scribe the appearance of Mount Etna. The mountain was
divided into three, or rather four regions: the lower was
the cultivated region, the second was the region of wood,
the third that of snow, and the fourth was the cone, When
he ascended on 31st October a portion of the last winter's
snow remained in the fissures, but the internal warmth of
the cone was sufficient to prevent its lying on the surface.
Travellers generally proceeded from Catania to Niaolosi, and
there passed the night; their object being to reach the moun-
tain top at sunrise. That time was chosen for a threefold
purpose—to obtain the view from the mountain top, to
see the shadow of the mountain itself, and thirdly, to ob-
serve any volcanic action which might be going on. The
I hon. gentleman here described the situation of the moun-
tain in relation to the surrounding eminences, and having
extinguished the lights, he endeavoured, by means of a
simple apparatus, to convey to his audience some idea of the
wonderful manner in which the shadow is projected by the
rays of the rising sun into an elongated angle, extending to
a distance of 100 miles or more. On their way up the moun-
tain they stopped first at Nicolosi, and were there told to
rest themselves, as they would have to climb during the
whole of the night. While lying in bed trying to sleep, but
quite unable to do so, he was pleased to hear what he con-
sidered to be the thundering of the mountain. It seemed to
be a low dead noise, and appeared to be near his head at the
time. Next morning he informed the people of the inn that
he had heard the thundering of the mountain, but he was
greatly disappointed and somewhat mortified when in-
formed that he was mistaken; that the stable was immedi-
ately at the head of the bed where he had been endea-
vouring to rest, and that the sound was merely the stamp-
ing of the mules. Having rapidly sketched the ascent from
Nicolosi, he observed that at the cone of Etna there were
three separate points of interest. One was the great crater,
which was a mile in circumference, and looked as if a con-
siderable piece of I he mountain top had been sliced off; the
second was a smaller crater, which stood on the lip or
southernmost corner of the great crater ; and the third was
the highest peak of the mountain, and stood to the north-
east. The smaller crater was in such a state of extreme
activity that it became impossible to ascend the cone by the
usual path. It shot forth great masses of lava, 20, 50, and
100 pounds in weight, to a great elevation, and these falling
on the sides of the crater, rolled down, and rendered it im-
possible to get up that way. , A path was, however, open
on the south-west side, which they took, but found very
great difficulty in climbing up the hard surface. On reach-
ing the top, an enchanting scene repaid their labours; they
saw the two craters in action. and could not but admire the
great diversity which existed between them. The great
crater appeared like a large soup plate, continually filling
with lava, swelling onwards from the centre and approach-
ing the lip of the crater, continually bulging more and
more, until at length the protuberance became so great tha
it tore itself off from the rams and fell over upon the side of

the crater, exposing to view a great mass of r ed-hot lava.
The smaller crater emitted greater columns of smoke, and
ashes rushed up frog the bowels of the earth. T'he lava
was not purely liquid ; was simply a heat ed solid. Seeing
this great mass open, he dettJmined to test whatits real hard-
ness 'vas. Picking up with both hands a fragment of stone,
40 or 501bs. weight, he flung it v. ith as much force as he
could at the lava, and one side of it C.nly:sunk in. They still
wished to reach the peak, but the quesi!on was how ? They
were going along the west side-of the great uter, and were
near the corner. The heated lava was too near to allow there
to go close to it, and there was precipitous ground upon
which they did not like to tread. The only course open
for them was to walk over the lava, and as it w.:ls very hard,
though filled with cracks and fissures, they dete:mined to
do so. As they walked they poked their sticks int:o these
fissures and brought them out igeited. For some reason or
another, the hour he prized most wtO that on the top of
Mount Etna; it was the greatest physical delight and en-
joyment he had ever experienced ; a state of excitement
and pleasure which, after the lapse of 24 years, he was at a
loss to understand. The peak was reached in safety-, but
it was found to be full of little reefs filled with sulpilurie
vapours. The right hon. gentleman then road an extract
from the " Virgil " of Dryden, who had himself placed
on record a most admirable description of the various
phenomena observed on a visit to Mount Etna. They
were detained ten days in sight of the mountain, and
looking back from time to time they saw the progress of the
swelling of the lava. Within two days after they had left
the mountain, it was carried over the lip of the crater
towards the north end. This could not be observed in the
daytime, as the lava was exteriorly of a brown colour ; but
in the night time they appeared like huge tongues of Ere
reaching out from the mountain side and gradually length,-
ened from day to day. On going along the coast of Cala-
bria, they for a length of time continued near the sea, and:
always saw these tongues of fire; but they must have been.
frozen, and rendered harmless long before they got near then
cultivated region. He should not suppose that any erup-
tion from the central crater would be dangerous, as it had
such a great distance to flow before it could do any harm;;
and, in the length of time which would elapse, it would be-
come cold. The eruptions of Vesuvius would be more dan-
gerous than those of Etna, as the lava has such a short
distance to travel before it comes upon cultivated ground.
At length they bade Etna farewell, though with great re-
gret, and travelled from Messina to Naples in that most
miserable of conveyances—a mail coach—not one of those
which run at the rate of 12 miles an hour, but a great
wooden house placed upon the axles, without springs, and
jolting along at the rate of three or three and a half miles
an hour. They arrived at Naples more dead than alive ;
and if the hour on the volcano top was one of ecstacy, the
moment they got to bed at Naples after their fearful jolt-
ing was one of daylight. In bringing his lecture to a con-
clusion, Mr. Gladstone remarked that Sicily was a coun-
try of very great interest, and he had more pleasure in
taking it for the subject of his narrative because he believed
it would soon see a new and brighter future.

COUNTRY MARKETS.

1,-

MANCHESTER-JAN. 8.

This morning at our market there was a firm sale for
best English wheat, at Is to 2s per qr advance on the cur-
rencies of last week, and American advanced ld to 2d per
1001bs. Flour moved off slowly. Oats the turn dearer,
and oatmeal 6d per load up. Indian corn and beans were
unchanged.

BIRMINGHAM—JAN. 8.
English wheat was sold at 48s to 56s for white, and 40s
to 54s per 36 stone for red. Barley, new malting, 35s to
42s per qr; grinding, 24s to 28s Oats, old, 25s to 30s
per 30 stone ; Irish, 23s to 255. Beans, 40s to 44s per qr.
Peas, 40s to 48s per 36 stone.