ll, Merton: if we never meet again; if you hear amidst our old
and cheerful haunts that Clarence Glyndon sleeps the last sleep by the
shores of Naples, or amidst the Calabrian hills,--say to the friends of
our youth, 'He died worthily, as thousands of martyr-students have died
before him, in the pursuit of knowledge.'"

He wrung Merton's hand as he spoke, darted from his side, and
disappeared amidst the crowd.

That day Merton left Naples; the next morning Glyndon also quitted the
City of Delight, alone and on horseback. He bent his way into those
picturesque but dangerous parts of the country which at that time were
infested by banditti, and which few travellers dared to pass, even in
broad daylight, without a strong escort. A road more lonely cannot well
be conceived than that on which the hoofs of his steed, striking upon
the fragments of rock that encumbered the neglected way, woke a dull
and melancholy echo. Large tracts of waste land, varied by the rank and
profuse foliage of the South, lay before him; occasionally a wild goat
peeped down from some rocky crag, or the discordant cry of a bird of
prey, startled in its sombre haunt, was heard above the hills. These
were the only signs of life; not a human being was met, not a hut was
visible. Wrapped in his own ardent and solemn thoughts, the young man
continued his way, till the sun had spent its noonday heat, and a breeze
that announced the approach of eve sprung up from the unseen ocean
that lay far distant to his sight. It was then that a turn in the road
brought before him one of those long, desolate, gloomy villages which
are found in the interior of the Neapolitan dominions; and now he came
upon a small chapel on one side of the road, with a gaudily painted
image of the Virgin in the open shrine. Around this spot, which in the
heart of a Christian land retained the vestige of the old idolatry (for
just such were the chapels that in the Pagan age were dedicated to the
demon-saints of mythology), gathered six or seven miserable and squalid
wretches, whom the Curse of the Leper had cut off from mankind. They
set up a shrill cry as they turned their ghastly visages towards the
horseman; and, without stirring from the spot, stretched out their gaunt
arms, and implored charity in the name of the Merciful Mother. Glyndon
hastily threw them some small coins, and, turning away his face, clapped
spurs to his horse, and relaxed not his speed till he entered the
village.