My departure from Malta was delayed by adverse winds, but at last, on Monday the 13th of July, I was awakened with the notice that the trabaccolo in which I had engaged my passage, was on the point of sailing. A trabaccolo is a small, decked boat with two masts: the present was a trading vessel bound for Venice, but stopping in the way at Agusta to take in a cargo of salt. It contained no regular accommodation for passengers, but there was plenty of room, and they made me up a bed, where I slept very comfortably. Some of the sailors were among the handsomest and best made men I have ever seen; all from the Venetian states, or from those of the Pope, bordering on the Adriatic. We arrived by the gentlest motion at Agusta, about six o’clock on Tuesday evening. On Wednesday I took possession of the single room called a lazaretto, and with the assistance of the supercargo and sailors of the vessel, formed my establishment: I had a couch, a table, and six chairs, an uncommon portion of furniture for a lazaretto. On the 18th I obtained my release, being transformed by the magicians of the town into an officer of engineers, by which means I obtained the privilege of counting the two days spent on the voyage as part of the quarantine. It is said to be owing to Sir T. Maitland’s negligence of quarantine regulations at Malta, that we have any quarantine to undergo on passing from that island into Sicily. Yet in other places, rank seems to be considered as a preservative against contagion, of which I could cite you examples if it were worth while. The Maltese are now threatened with a longer quarantine, on account of the jewels I have already mentioned to you, as having been hidden during the plague at Malta, and lately discovered. I thought this merely a contrivance to obtain money from me, but I have since found that after allowing communication for a fortnight on the usual terms, i. e. five days’ quarantine, an order was really issued on this account, to extend it to twenty-eight days. I took a walk through the town, where there was nothing to tempt me to stay; but although Agusta presents nothing very beautiful, yet there are some porticos, arcades, balustrades, and cornices in a long, straight, narrow street, which produce a very picturesque effect. I hired a boat for two pieces (about 8s. 9d.) to Santa Bonaccia. The boatmen would not take me to Syracuse, because they would have had to pay three pieces for port dues, and they told me it would cost me another to get through the examinations at the health-office, but after landing three miles off, you may enter the town without having to answer a single question. These three miles are altogether within the limits of the ancient city, and the little hamlet of Santa Bonaccia, is far from being at the extremity of the ancient walls. Indeed, besides the island on which alone the present town is placed, Syracuse altogether, comprising the quarters or cities of Acradina, Tyche, and Neapolis, appears to have occupied a space which forms nearly an equilateral triangle of five miles on each face, and it is said to have contained 2,000,000 inhabitants. I found a very comfortable inn, the Golden Lion, rather dear, but the landlord, if willing to obtain a good profit for himself, was very ready to give me both information and assistance, in order that I should not be imposed on by others.

Ortygia seems at first to have been an island rising in a gentle slope, and sheltering the magnificent harbour; time and perhaps the rubbish of the old city filled up the narrow channel, and it became a peninsula, but to complete the modern fortification this has been cut through, and it is again become an island, and has taken the name once belonging to the whole extent of the former city. The principal antiquity is the ancient temple of Minerva, which has been transformed into the cathedral church. Arches have been opened in the walls of the cell, while the intervals of the columns of the peristyle have been filled up; and by this means, what was the cell of the temple, is become the nave of the church, and the side aisles are obtained from the surrounding colonnades. This operation, and the loss of the ancient entablature have obliterated all the effect of the original edifice; we may still understand that it has been a noble building, impressive from the massive solidity of the Doric order, as executed in Sicily; but its ponderous capitals, thick proportions, and imperfect material, will not permit it to be placed in comparison with the union of grace and majesty, of just proportions, beautiful material, and exquisite workmanship, which distinguish the edifices of Athens.

The modern front of the Cathedral forms as great a contrast as possible with the ancient work, a light Corinthian, cut up in every direction; yet though sinning against every rule of good sense and good taste, it is not without something pleasing in its airy lightness.

We find in Syracuse the remains of another temple, which has been called that of Diana, merely because Cicero mentions two temples, one dedicated to Minerva, and one to Diana, and the vestiges of two temples still exist, one of which was doubtless that of Minerva. The temple mentioned by Cicero seems to have been a magnificent building, and one might expect to find columns as large, or perhaps larger than those of the other edifice; whereas, these measured just below the capital are little more than 2 feet in diameter. The projection of the abacus must be enormous, since it is about 6 feet square, but the whole is so much damaged, and so awkwardly built up in modern walls, that it is difficult to determine the dimensions. These disproportioned capitals are little more than 18 inches apart, and altogether it seems to have been a building of a very curious style of architecture.

The present situation of the Fountain of Arethusa is said to have nothing ancient but the name, and it certainly can boast of no beauty. The water issues from beneath an arch, but is supposed to be supplied by the ancient spring, except that in forming the ditch of the fortifications, the natural channels have been in some degree disturbed, and the water thereby rendered brackish. On leaving the island we meet with one standing column and some bases, the remains of a range of at least seven, which are said to have been part of a portico; but I know not why they might not have belonged to a temple.

The Amphitheatre is at some distance; it is considered as a Roman building, or rather it is a hollow, perhaps an old quarry appropriated by the Romans to their favourite diversions. It was small, and not at all proportioned to the size of the city. Some subterraneous corridors still exist.

The ancient quarries extend almost across the ancient city, and being cut down to a great depth, above 100 feet, show the thickness of this bed of calcareous rock. One of these is called the Paradiso, and at one angle of it there is a long winding cavern formed artificially, and well known under the appellation of the ear of Dionysius. Some persons have imagined it connected with the theatre, behind which it runs, but this opinion has no more to recommend it, than the vulgar tradition. There is a channel cut along the highest part of the roof, which turns suddenly round into a little chamber above the entrance; at the other end this channel seems continued beyond the accessible parts of the grotto, but its exit is unknown. The whole form, and the sweeping lines of its plan and section, exhibit evident traces of a design for some particular purpose; but from the unfinished appearance of the further end, it may be doubted if it ever was completed.

The Theatre occupies a most beautiful situation; the circuit of the steps, and of one precinction remain, but the lower part, and the foundations of the proscenium, if any exist, are hid in a canneto, i. e. a place in which reeds are grown. There is a very curious arrangement immediately below the precinction, the purpose of which I do not understand, which you will comprehend better from a sketch, than from any description I could give.

A little above the theatre there is a washing-place in front of a cavern, which has a very picturesque effect. The water is supplied by an aqueduct, which nearly follows the line of an ancient one, and the water afterwards turns a mill on the steps of the theatre. Beyond this is the Strada Sepolcrale; a street cut in the rock, about 20 feet deep, and with sepulchral niches and chambers also cut out of the solid rock on each side. A longer excursion in the same direction took me to the Hexapylon, Epipolis, or Citadel, and the extremity of the ancient walls, at the highest and most distant point of the triangle. It is about five miles from the present town, where the ground rises gradually into a very narrow ridge, and then breaks down suddenly. Underneath the point thus formed, there is a passage of considerable width, opening in each direction beyond the walls. There are also sally-ports for cavalry, and altogether the remains of ancient fortifications in this part are very curious and important. A conical hill, about three fourths of a mile beyond, called the Belvidere, which overlooks the whole extent of the city, has been supposed by some to be the ancient fortress of the Hexapylon, but there are not sufficient remains to force our assent to such an opinion. The view is very fine, and the whole country here very pleasant, but still higher hills rise at a short distance on the north, and limit the prospect. There is an ancient aqueduct cut in the rock, and a little below it a modern channel, which is, I believe, what now supplies the washing-place above-mentioned, and turns the mill in the theatre.

I have noticed one quarry in which the ear of Dionysius is situated. Great part of it is now garden and olive-ground, and there are other caverns, one of which is used as a rope-walk. An insulated mass rises in the midst, crowned with the ruins of a building, which are quite inaccessible. This quarry is the westernmost of the range. To the east are several others of a similar nature, and the gardens of a Capuchin convent occupy the eastern extremity of this range of quarries; a place as romantic as it is singular, where the richest vegetation intervenes between perpendicular faces of naked rock, which here likewise has been partially hollowed out into caverns. There is a vault below the church, where the good fathers are kept after death. They are first buried, and probably the earth has some drying property, then taken up, and seated in their Capuchin dresses in this place, where they have a very shocking appearance. After some years they fall to pieces, and make room for others. The Catacombs are also supposed to have been quarries. The entrance is in a convent, which exhibits indications of Norman architecture, but circular arches are here united with running foliage in the capitals. Something of a regular plan seems to have been followed in these very extensive excavations.

I could not leave Syracuse without visiting the Fountain Cyane, which is a little pool, somewhat larger than the New River head near Ware, but less regular in its form, and furnishing a more copious supply of water. The banks of the stream issuing from it are covered with the Arundo Donax, and with the Papyrus. It is deep, but so choaked with vegetation that the boat could hardly get along. On an eminence, at a small distance, are parts of the shafts of two Doric columns, of considerable size, but without capitals: they are standing erect in their places, and are believed to be the remains of a temple of Jupiter Olympus. Wilkins supposes them columns of the interior rather than of the outer peristyle, because they have only sixteen flutes. These flutes terminate abruptly at about one foot from the bottom.

There is in most of the Italian cities a coffee-house called the Casino, which is a place of resort for the nobles. At Syracuse they have a constitutional coffee-house, which will admit also respectable persons engaged in commerce, and others who cannot prove their membership of any noble family. These were established under English influence in several Sicilian cities, and I spent some pleasant evenings in this at Syracuse. The favourite game is draughts, in which, without any increase of the number of squares, the king has the power which we give to him at Polish draughts. The usual game in Italy does not permit a private in any case to take an adverse king, but in other respects the game is played as with us. In Greece sixteen men are used on each side, and they move either forward or laterally, never diagonally or backward, and take by passing over any unsupported man, just as we do, but in the direction in which they move.

Syracuse contains more of interest to the antiquary than to the architect, yet, since leaving it, I have regretted that I did not make a longer stay, and visit Noto and Ispica. At the latter place the chambers cut out of the rock on each side of a narrow valley are so numerous, as to merit the name of a subterraneous city.

I left Syracuse on the morning of the 24th of July, having engaged two horses, at two dollars each, to convey myself and my luggage to Catania. My landlord told me that it was an excellent road, perfectly carozzabile, but I suppose by a carriage, he must have meant a lettica, which is a sedan-chair, carried by mules, for certainly a wheel-carriage could not get along; yet the prince of Biscari praises it as an excellent road. We had hardly proceeded two miles when the baggage-horse, with the muleteer upon him, slipt and fell, and after two or three miles more, mine came down suddenly. After a little while my horse fell a second time, and I was bruised by the fall. This made the rest of my ride very painful: I obliged the guide to change horses, and to say the truth, felt it rather as an insult to my horsemanship, that he arrived at Catania without any farther accident. Between Syracuse and Agusta are the remains of a monument, supposed to have been a pyramid, or an acute cone, but it appears to me to have been a column: the purpose of its erection is unknown. At about eighteen miles from Syracuse we left the limestone beds, and came to a country probably volcanic. At twenty-four miles, we stopt at a little house near the sea-shore, where nothing was to be had but bad wine. However, I had taken the precaution to carry with me some bread, and a cold roast duck. The remaining eighteen miles are along a sandy district near the shore, the road probably never being a mile from the sea; for the whole forty-two miles we pass neither town nor village, and a great portion of the land is uncultivated. It wants water perhaps, but that seems to be attainable. The first part of the ride was the most beautiful, but the whole wanted an ornament it would have had in clearer weather. Ætna would, in that case, have been a conspicuous object. As it was I only obscurely traced his base, and the summit was always hid in the clouds.

Catania has lately suffered from an earthquake, which did not absolutely throw down many houses, but it injured them so much that numbers are incapable of being repaired; others less damaged, are propped up till the owners can restore them, and the principal street exhibits almost a continued range of these temporary supports. Nothing can look more forlorn, and even the width of the street contributes to its desolate appearance. Half the houses seem to have been in an unfinished state before the earthquake, but not uninhabited; a roof has been applied to the ground-floor or first story, and in that condition they remain, and are likely to remain, unless a fresh catastrophe should level them with the ground. In a town so subject to earthquakes, the usual Italian style of architecture, consisting of many lofty stories one over the other, should be abandoned, and low houses of one principal story, little or not at all elevated, and at most of only one small story above, ought to be adopted. A city so built may be very beautiful, especially if intermixed with groves and gardens, though its character of beauty will be perfectly distinct from that produced by narrow streets and lofty palaces. Here the principal streets are too wide, and the want of shade is a sensible inconvenience.

On the 25th I visited the museum of the prince of Biscari, which, if not like those of Rome, is very interesting from the number of Sicilian antiquities it contains. The department of natural history is poor, and the whole is neglected, as the present prince does not partake of the taste of his illustrious ancestor. I afterwards went to the baths, to two theatres, and an amphitheatre, which are all under the care of an old servant of the prince. He seems a good sort of man, but the waiter of the inn demands half of all that he receives from travellers; a truth which I suspected from the first, but which I ascertained afterwards on visiting the principal theatre a second time without him. This waiter, who is called Don Mario, is the most impudent and shameless knave I ever met with, and the landlord of the house being lately dead, the widow commits everything to his care, which makes the residence at the Leon d’oro very disagreeable.

The Baths are in the neighbourhood of the cathedral, and I believe partly under it; what remains is altogether subterraneous, they consist of a very irregular collection of vaulted rooms, none of them very large, but we distinguish the place of the hypocaust, and some other of the little arrangements which must have been necessary in such an establishment. There are also other baths which we know from inscriptions were termed Achillei, and that is just all we know about them. Of the Theatres one is small. It was probably covered, and is supposed to have been an odeum, or musical theatre. The taste of the Sicilians must have been different then from what it is now, since in modern times they would probably have built a large theatre for music, and a small one for theatrical representations. The other is large, and was uncovered, and the descent into the present ruins by a large flight of steps, is picturesque. They are both clogged up with modern houses, and also, particularly the larger one, with the earth and rubbish which has filled up the lower part. They are therefore understood with difficulty, and did not present to me features sufficiently interesting to make me wish to enter minutely into the details. They are both of Roman, not of Greek architecture. The remains of the amphitheatre are still less considerable, but the construction of these edifices is so simple and uniform, that a very small portion enables us to comprehend the arrangement of the whole. Some of the arches have been filled with lava, which must have entered in a fluid state, since it fits closely to all the parts of the artificial structure. I was also conducted to a place where some remains of the ancient walls have been surmounted by the lava. They are on the lower side of the town, and not, as might be expected, in the part opposed to the mountain. As the lava gets cool, it probably accumulates more rapidly. Besides these there is a circular domed room of Roman times, which is perhaps the most perfect antiquity remaining here. It is remarkable that a town, so repeatedly destroyed by earthquakes and torrents of lava, should exhibit so many remains of antiquity; and I think we may derive from them this important lesson, that circular forms offer the best resistance to these causes of destruction.

In spite of the many calamities the place has suffered, a portion of the ancient cathedral, built by Roger, the first Norman king of Sicily, still remains. The chief part of the present edifice is modern, and the interior is a fine room. The piers consist of double pilasters, and between the arches there is much ornament; but as the architecture is not interrupted by it, the exuberance does not displease. The choir exhibits the pointed arch. I will not undertake to say that this was of the time of Roger, but it is not improbable. He did not die till 1154, and there are other pointed arches of as early a date.

On the 26th I visited the noble collection of the Cavalier Gioeni, consisting chiefly of products of the volcano, whose overwhelming interest seems to have prevented naturalists from attending to any other part of the island. Although I had no introduction, the cavalier received me with the greatest politeness, and attended me himself: he thinks the ancient serpentine (which is a green porphyry, though not the stone known in Italy under that name,) to be a Sicilian stone. It is found in rounded masses on the shore, and at the back of Ætna, but not in sitû. Amber he considers a hardened bitumen which issues from the rocks as a clear fluid, but though found on the shores and rivers of Sicily in its complete state, the intermediate progress has never been detected.

There are two other fine museums in Catania, one belonging to the Benedictine convent, and the other to the baron Ricupero. At the latter also, the master was so obliging as to exhibit everything himself, and he showed himself to be thoroughly versed in coins and in Etruscan vases. The large glass cases of the Benedictines are dark and dirty. I was rather after the appointed time, of which the librarian did not fail to remind me, and when I began to apologize, begged me not to mention it, as it was his duty to wait for me. I have met with a similar answer where I was persuaded it was rather meant as a compliment than an incivility, and perhaps that was the case in this instance, but I confess it considerably shortened my examination.

I rambled one evening over a wide tract of lava which the prince of Biscari has endeavoured to reclaim. There are a few fig-trees in the hollows, and some caper plants scattered about the rocks. The Indian fig seems to do as well, or perhaps better than anything else, but all these are occupants merely of a few crevices, into which perhaps, the rain may have washed a little soil, or in some instances they may open a communication with the old surface below. The rock itself supports nothing but crustaceous lichens, and that very partially; yet the lava is, I believe, one hundred and twenty years old.

From Catania I determined to visit the summit of Ætna, and therefore took a horse to Nicolosi, about twelve miles distant. The road is very rough, among rocks of lava, but the country in general is extremely fertile: we have nothing here but the opposite extremes, either exuberant fertility, or utter barrenness. From this place I ascended on foot, in the hope of finding a great variety of natural productions, and examining them and the scenery at leisure; the first four miles from Nicolosi are on a bed of cinders, but mixed in the latter part of the way with small rocks of lava; then we pass about four miles of the woody region, and near the extremity of this division of the ascent is the Spelonca del Capriole, where we stopt to eat and to rest. Though we arrived there about one o’clock, my guide was very desirous of staying till midnight, and ascending the remaining part of the mountain in the dark, I preferred walking while I could see the objects about me, but found much less to interest me than I had expected. Ætna boasts that it stands single and alone, but this very circumstance robs it of great part of its beauty. Already, at Nicolosi, we were too much above other objects to enjoy much pleasure from them, and higher up we are continually sensible of this defect. The little conical hills scattered abundantly over the lower slopes, afford indeed some relief to the eye, but they are too small and too similar to satisfy it, or to excite the imagination. Each of these is generally divided into two summits by a hollow or groove passing through them from the west of north to the east of south. The woody region is on this route less extensive than I had anticipated; and though the trees are of a good size, there is nothing remarkable about them. They are mostly a variety of Quercus Robur, with a downy leaf, but beech and ilex are intermixed. No fern, except Pteris aquilina, and no rare mosses. Here are no bold crags, no wild and deep ravines, no foaming torrents, not even a moist rock, or a wet piece of ground, or a little spring or rill, except just below the patches of snow; and these, after a course of a few yards, unaccompanied by any trace of vegetation, disappear. The moisture of the atmosphere supports a few scattered plants in the loose soil. Everywhere cinders, and nothing but cinders. Ætna is a mountain of dust and ashes. The beds of lava are equally cinders in appearance. If we consider one of these as a fluid, moving mass, half a mile wide, and 20 or 30 feet thick, it is a sublime and terrible object, but the rough, naked plain which remains, is merely ugly; and the bare, rocky bank, not presenting any unbroken mass even in proportion to its trifling elevation, is hardly of sufficient consequence to form a feature in the landscape. Ætna is a volcano, and it has no interest but what it derives from this character. We continued traversing its heavy heaps of dark sand till a little before sunset, when we arrived at the Casa Inglese. During the night lightning was frequent, but the mountain made no noise and exhibited no light. I could hardly fancy myself so close to the most celebrated burning mountain in Europe.

About half an hour before sunrise my guide called me up and we began to ascend the cone. We first passed over a rough bed of lava, afterwards we mounted a slope of snow, which crackled under the feet as if fresh frozen. The snow, however, by no means forms a continued cap to the mountain, but is found merely in patches and hollows, and it can hardly be said that the mountain enters the snow-line, unless we suppose a considerable space at the summit to be warmed by the transmission of heated vapour. At the same time it is difficult to say exactly what the snow-line is. We might probably fix it where the mean temperature of summer, i. e. of the two hottest months of the year, does not exceed 32°, but this is in some degree both vague and arbitrary, and not easily determined. The ascent of the cone of loose cinders is very fatiguing, as they slide back at almost every step. In many places there are little spiracles of what I supposed at first to be smoke, but they proved to be steam, with but a slightly sulphureous smell. I was delighted when, by my guide’s motions, I perceived that he had arrived at the edge of the crater, but the pleasure was soon changed into disappointment. The sun was rising amongst clouds. A dense, white vapour, greatly below me, covered almost all Sicily, and the crater itself was so full of steam that I could see nothing. This steam however, partially cleared away at intervals, and by watching my opportunity, I was able to form a pretty distinct idea of the great crater. The edges are steep and rugged, and smoke, or rather steam, was rising almost everywhere; within, there were three little volcanoes, i. e. small, conical hills, each with its crater. The largest of these was quiet; the other two sent out smoke or steam; but no flames, or ignited matter, have been seen here for six years.

In descending, we passed by the Philosopher’s tower, reduced to a small fragment of rubble-work, and curious only from its situation. At a little distance from this we reached the edge of a wide valley, or hollow, which I think interested me more than anything else. It appears at some time to have been the ancient crater, before the present upper cone was raised, and a tremendous one it must have been. It is now a vast basin of I suppose full two miles in diameter, surrounded by broken, craggy precipices. On the slopes there is here and there some appearance of vegetation, but it is exceedingly trifling, and the bottom is all black and bare. About eight years ago a crater was formed within the basin, and a stream of lava issued from it a quarter of a mile in length, but not passing the bounds of this valley of desolation. Smoke was still issuing from its summit. I regretted much that I had not followed a plan I once conceived of descending to Taormina, which would have carried me through much more interesting scenes than the ascent from Catania, and I should have seen the famous chesnut-tree; but it was too late, for we had no provisions, and none were to be had in that direction. I therefore returned to Nicolosi, which we reached a little after noon, and there hired a mule to convey me back to Catania.