ed realm we have to roam through before
returning home. It is with a feeling of more than common relief that we
see around us the lively faces and hear the glib tongues of the French.
It is like an earnest that the "roughing" we have undergone among
Bohemian boors and Italian savages is well nigh finished, and that,
henceforth, we shall find civilized sympathy and politeness, if nothing
more, to make the way smoother. Perhaps the three woful days which
terminated at half-past two yesterday afternoon, as we passed through
the narrow strait into the beautiful harbor which Marseilles encloses in
her sheltering heart, make it still pleasanter. Now, while there is
time, I must describe those three days, for who could write on the wet
deck of a steamboat, amid all the sights and smells which a sea voyage
creates? Description does not flourish when the bones are sore with
lying on planks, and the body shivering like an aspen leaf with cold.

About the old town of Civita Vecchia there is not much to be said,
except that it has the same little harbor which Trajan dug for it, and
is as dirty and disagreeable as a town can well be. We saw nothing
except a little church, and the prison-yard, full of criminals, where
the celebrated bandit, Gasparoni, has been now confined for eight years.

The Neapolitan Company's boat, _Mongibello_, was advertised to leave the
12th, so, after procuring our passports, we went to the office to take
passage. The official, however, refused to give us tickets for the third
place, because, forsooth, we were not servants or common laborers! and
words were wasted in trying to convince him that it would make no
difference. As the second cabin fare was nearly three times as high, and
entirely too dear for us, we went to the office of the Tuscan Company,
whose boat was to leave in two days. Through the influence of an Italian
gentleman, secretary to Bartolini, the American Consul, whom we met,
they agreed to take us for forty-five francs, on deck, the price of the
Neapolitan boat being thirty.

Rather than stay two days longer in the dull town, we went again to the
latter Company's office and offered them forty-five francs to go that
day in _their_ boat. This removed the former scruples, and tickets were
immediately made out. After a plentiful dinner at the albergo, to
prepare ourselves for the exposure, we filled our pockets with a supply
of bread, cheese, and figs, for the voyage. We then engaged a boatman