etation is of the
tropical type. The cactus is common, although it grows to no such
monstrous heights as in Arizona. Orange and lemon groves prevail as far
as the eye can see. On every height towns and villages crown the crests
and sweep in winding terraces around the hillsides. Olive orchards
abound. Castles and ruins gleam white in the sunshine on the ledge of
rocky precipices. The curved shores shine like broken lines of silver,
with deep indentations at Naples and at Castellammare. Between these two
points rises Vesuvius, the thin blue smoke constantly curling from the
summit that, since the eruption of 1906, has lost much of its elevation.
In many places there is hardly the width of a roadway between the low
mountains and the coast, but the cliffs are tropically luxurious in
vegetation. Everywhere the habitations of the people crowd the space.
From the monasteries and the castles that crown the heights, both
distant and near to the clustered villages of the plain and those
clinging to the hillsides, the scene is one unending panorama of human
life. For Naples is only the focussing point of these densely populated
regions of Southern Italy. The city stretches along the coast on both
sides her semicircular bay; but the terraced hills, the stretches of
land beyond, and every peak and valley are thickly sown with human
habitations. Its commanding heights, two of which rise in the middle of
the town, and its beautiful mirrored expanse of water give to it the
most unparalleled variety and beauty of landscape loveliness.

"What words can analyze," says George S. Hillard, "the parts and details
of this matchless panorama, or unravel that magic web of beauty into
which palaces, villas, forests, gardens, vineyards, the mountains, and
the sea are woven? What pen can paint the soft curves, the gentle
undulations, the flowing outlines, the craggy steeps, and the far-seen
heights, which, in their combination, are so full of grace and, at the
same time, expression? Words here are imperfect instruments, and must
yield their place to the pencil and the graver. But no canvas can
reproduce the light and color which play round this enchanting region.
No skill can catch the changing hues of the distant mountains, the
star-points of the playing waves, the films of purple and green which
spread themselves over the calm waters, the sunsets of gold and orange,
and the aerial veils of rose and amethyst which drop upon the hills from
the ski