The Holt County sentinel., 1900-11-30


the boys of the party as Papa" had al
ready won the sobriquet of "stronx a
manno" and "fatta manno" among the
Italians following us A street fakir had
stood on tho steps Of his carriage for at
least two miles urging him to purchase
some of his wares, as he vigorously and
persistently cried their merits, courtesy
/ and kindly refusals to purchase being
! equally futile in removing the now vOci-
ferrous nuisance. our h avy weight, finally
: losing the good stock of patience he
usually carried, lifted the expostulating
fakir off the steps of his carriage with
the toe of his not too gentle boot, the
disc ,nsolate fakir p cking himself up out
Of the dir. and recognizing in me at
once.l suppose, IAN easy mark" at once
jumped upon the steps Of my carriage
and as he began expatiating on the ex-
cellence of his wares, emphasized the
treatment he had received, by ruefully
pointing at the Troy man and adding
'stronga manno," fatto manno," "vella
bad Americana" After two miles OF
equally futile efforts to unload penny
articles at franc prices, and after the
waste of an intenss amount Of indigna-
ton aud gesticulation, as he crawled
slowly out of the carriage, without, how
ever, the aid of any plant boot leather,
h. pointed his hand menacingly at me
and disparaglngly said. pointing to-
wards "Papa's" carriage, 'likee fatto
manno." The implied rebuke and his
indignant tone were equally crushing,
and it required balm Of two coppers
on my part to assuage his lacerated feel
| ings: two coppers will do much with
lacerated feelings in sunny Italy, l will
observe
AS We proceeded towards the suburbs
of the city, tine streets grew less crowded
and congested, both with traffic and with
pedestrians, and we began to pass beau
/ tiful villas, with the gleam Of marble in
every open archway from the wide lawns
studded with flowers and shrubbery ex-
tending from portal gate to wide Italian
porIico; these villas commanded a wide
view of the Mediterranean and the Nea-
politan coast, and stood usually in the
midst of ornamental grounds, magnificent
ly decorated with statuary and fountains.
and laid out in groves and terraces and
shady drive ways. Every thing that
could crafty the tas e or appeal to the
eve was lavished on these villas, and
their ornamental grounds. The streets
began to widen into open country, sur
rounded on both sides by high stone
walls, enclosing tempting groves of ripe
orange, lemon, lines and figs, with trel
Uses of vines hanging from tree to tree.
The land, through which the road
winds, gradually ascends, but seemed
rich and fertile; by the roadside are
charming cottages and little farm houses,
whose white washed walls are usually
half hid from the road by great trellises
of vines and thick groves of fruit bear
ing trees-in front of each porch the lit
tie round table and the rude bench which
mark the rural wine houses everywhere
in Italy. The soil upon which these
orchards and vineyards rise in terraces
is largely composed of lava and volcanic
c'nders; the cherry trees rich with their
red fruit, the oranges cleaning yellow
through the overhanging branches, the
intense green foliage of the olive and
the spreading, awkward looking fig trees,
all produced on lava reduced to soil by
the disentegrating effects of the heat
and storm and the lapse of ages. As We
proceeded the groves grew fewer and the
vegetation more sparse. Above US on
the slopes appeared what looked like
black wave at first sight; the scene,
hitherto so smiling, became on nearer
approach a melancholy one indeed;
what we thought black wave, as we
first saw it, proves to be great blocks Of
dark, ashy colored lava; the road winds
irregularly, now through. now around
these blocks, which dark and forbidding,
cover landscape once as fair as the one
we have just left behind. The road
seems thread Of ribbon through black
causeway; enormous masses OF lava sur
round US on every side, in hue dark red
and black, like SO many torrents and
cataracts frozen into petrifaction; here
and there few blades of grass appear,
but vegetation is virtually confined to a
few lichens of pale and sickly growth.
Every where the happiness and charm
of the present, as seen in the green and
fertile slopes below, and the desolation
and misery OF the past as reflected by
the stricken country about you, and the
uncertain security of the future as en-
phasized by the sinister cloud OF smoke,
hanging like pail above you. Ere long
the gap between the black waves widens
little, ard as we proceed higher, opens
into a gem like oasis in the general
desolation surrounding us. In this
oasis is the dining hall and station OF
the Funicular railroad. Here We take
a good lunch, and after the usual fierce
onslaught upon us by the carriage
drivers for the never ending tips and
macaroni; we take the railway partly
destroyed by the fierce eruption of May.
but sufficiently repaired to allow US to
make part of the journey upward upon
it. The cars are odd shaped affairs,
with s-ats facing each other, in size
and appearance like the sleigh like
seats of the merry go -roundsi in our own
country, while the size of the com part
ments are about the same. The cars run
Many people worry because they be-
heve they have heart disease. The