The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1891-09-04

had intended remaining three or
four days in Genoa, but on the morn
ing of the second day 1 picked up a
daily paper, and one of the few para
graphs which my limited knowledge OF
italian enabled me to interpret stated
that Vesuvius was i'm an unusually
active state of eruption. The state
ment revived my lifelong curiosity to
see real live volcano, to see the
"Vesuvian bay" and Naples and
Pompeii, sol took the first train south
ward, land here am, with ali these
In sight whenever I choose to go to
my window and look at them.
49,
Leaving Genoa-with a right good
will-at noon, there is little to be seen
for two or three hours for the railroad
passes through almost innumerable
tunnels. Such glimpses as an occa-
sional flash of daylight gives, how
ever, show very pretty modern villas
costly esconced in some little valley on
the one side, and the sky-like glimmer
of the tranquil Mediterranean OH the
other. As we get farther away from
Genoa these villas give place to ugly
old villages, clinging, in a way that
has grown so familiar, close to some
time-eaten castle. At last the tunnels
are left behind and the rest CT the way,
until night comes lies across a country
as fiat as the Solomon valley in Kan
sas. The products are much the same
also,-wheat and corn and clover and
potatoes. The wheat has been har-
vested and the corn looks thin and
poor, tasseling at height OF three or
four feet. Here and there in the stub
BILE fields are the italian cattle have
read about,-big, long-horned, and
every hair white except the bushy
part of the tail, which is black. The
houses are the same style as those
farther north, plain oblong, without
q break any where in the white wall
except the cavern-like door and one or
two little square windows, and with
out the slightest suggestion of any at
tempt at ornamentation. They are
evidently built to include the barn
also, for the upper half-story is filled
with hay. There are numerous villag-
es but no interesting towns until Pisa is
reached, and there, looking from the
car window 1 see the world-famous
Leaning Tower. And it does lean,
fully as much as the pictures in the
old Biographies represent, the topmost
story Overhanging the base at one
side fully 10 feet. 1t is built of white
marble, 100 feet high, with eight pro-
iecf;ng galleries, and is really very
SERIOUS and airy and beautiful. Near
Il one sees the dome of the cathedral
q which the great bronze lamp still
hangs, the swinging of which suggest
"a 10 Galileo some 300 years ago the
principle of the pendulum. At the
tAt-4< @@f-11C clIuSeuIOc "CiC uolAt Aoeh
was IN Important city with a popula-
lion of 10000. But for some reason
or other it dropped on its BOOM and
can now claim scarcely 10000 people.
The town and the country around it
and all the Inhabitants thereof, look |
degenerate and worn out and hopeless,
as if they had lived away beyond
their allotted time aud were dazed aud
cut of place and weary.
**#
Rome is reached at eleven o'clock,
and there is no train for Naples until
eight the next morning. But I am
bot ready yet for the Eternal City and
70 see as little Of it as possible. The