or a minute or two could do nothing but recover nerve and breath.
Never in my life had I suffered such a wretched sense of feebleness.
The pharmacist looked at me with gravely compassionate eyes; when I
told him I was the Englishman who had been ill, and that I wanted to
leave to-morrow for Catanzaro, his compassion indulged itself more
freely, and I could see quite well that he thought my plan of travel
visionary. True, he said, the climate of Cotrone was trying to a
stranger. He understood my desire to get away; but--Catanzaro! Was I
aware that at Catanzaro I should suddenly find myself in a season of
most rigorous winter? And the winds! One needed to be very strong even
to stand on one's feet at Catanzaro. For all this I returned thanks,
and, having paid my bill, tottered back to the _Concordia_. It seemed
to me more than doubtful whether I should start on the morrow.

That evening I tried to dine. Don Ferdinando entered as usual, and sat
mute through his unchanging meal; the grumbler grumbled and ate, as
perchance he does to this day. I forced myself to believe that the food
had a savour for me, and that the wine did not taste of drugs. As I sat
over my pretended meal, I heard the sirocco moaning without, and at
times a splash of rain against the window. Near me, two military men
were exchanging severe comments on Calabria and its people. "_Che
paese_!"--"What a country!" exclaimed one of them finally in disgust.
Of course they came from the north, and I thought that their
conversation was not likely to knit closer the bond between the
extremes of Italy.

To my delight I looked forth next morning on a sunny and calm sky, such
as I had not seen during all my stay at Cotrone. I felt better, and
decided to leave for Catanzaro by train in the early afternoon. Shaking
still, but heartened by the sunshine, I took a short walk, and looked
for the last time at the Lacinian promontory. On my way back I passed a
little building from which sounded an astonishing noise, a confused
babble of shrill voices, blending now and then with a deep stentorian
shout. It was the communal school--not during playtime, or in a state
of revolt, but evidently engaged as usual upon its studies. The
school-house was small, but the volume of clamour that issued from it
would have done credit to two or three hundred children in unrestrained
uproariousness. Curiosity held me listening for ten minutes; the tumult
underwent no change of character, no