ith Florence--the gem of Italy--in the
centre. Stand with me a moment on the height, and let us gaze on this
grand panorama, around which the Apennines stretch with a majestic
sweep, wrapped in a robe of purple air, through which shimmer the villas
and villages on their sides! The lovely vale lies below us in its garb
of olive groves, among which beautiful villas are sprinkled as
plentifully as white anemones in the woods of May. Florence lies in
front of us, the magnificent cupola of the Duomo crowning its clustered
palaces. We see the airy tower of the Palazzo Vecchio--the new spire of
Santa Croce--and the long front of the Palazzo Pitti, with the dark
foliage of the Boboli Gardens behind. Beyond, far to the south, are the
summits of the mountains near Siena. We can trace the sandy bed of the
Arno down the valley till it disappears at the foot of the Lower
Apennines, which mingle in the distance with the mountains of Carrara.

Galileo was wont to make observations "at evening from the top of
Fiesole," and the square tower of the old church is still pointed out as
the spot. Many a night did he ascend to its projecting terrace, and
watch the stars as they rolled around through the clearest heaven to
which a philosopher ever looked up.

We passed through an orchard of fig trees, and vines laden with
beautiful purple and golden clusters, and in a few minutes reached the
remains of an amphitheatre, in a little nook on the mountain side. This
was a work of Roman construction, as its form indicates. Three or four
ranges of seats alone, are laid bare, and these have only been
discovered within a few years. A few steps further we came to a sort of
cavern, overhung with wild fig-trees. After creeping in at the entrance,
we found ourselves in an oval chamber, tall enough to admit of our
standing upright, and rudely but very strongly built. This was one of
the dens in which the wild beasts were kept; they were fed by a hole in
the top, now closed up. This cell communicates with four or five others,
by apertures broken in the walls. I stepped into one, and could see in
the dim light, that it was exactly similar to the first, and opened into
another beyond.

Further down the mountain we found the ancient wall of the city, without
doubt of Etrurian origin. It is of immense blocks of stone, and extends
more or less dilapidated around the whole brow of the mountain. In one
place there stands a solitary gateway, of large stones, whic