t matter; I can always go to town for that," and so they put up
with much that they might remedy if they were really beyond the reach of
civilisation. Consequently he was not able to treat us as we deserved.
We replied that we were glad it was so, because he was treating us much
better.

After dinner we joined the other managers and directors in a room of a
larger building; a mandoline and guitar were brought and some of them
played. Presently Michelino sang. He surprised me by the beauty and
power of his young voice and by his management of it, also by his musical
intelligence and by his complete self-possession. He sang the tenor
songs of many operas and other popular melodies, especially I remember
his singing the _Stornelli Montagnoli_, which is so beautiful that the
buffo said it would save itself in the Escape from Paris. To all this
the guitar-player vamped an accompaniment which Michelino relentlessly
silenced by a gesture when it became unbearable. It was absurd to see
him lording it over the company, nearly a dozen of us and the youngest
nearly old enough to be his father. When it was time to retire, beds
were found for the visitors and I passed a comfortable night in Beppe's
hut.

Next day we were taken into the mine to see what goes on underneath the
freedom of the rolling hills. We dived down in a lift, ever so deep into
the darkness, and probably it was dangerous, but when I go down lifts and
see over mines, as when I wander among the tottering ruins of Messina, I
have learnt to hope that the accident will be some other day. We saw
nearly naked men, monsters of the abyss, crouching in cavernous places,
pick-axing the sulphurous rock in the dim light of their miner's lamps,
while others were bringing broken pieces along the low, dark galleries
and sending them up in the trucks to the light. And the workers were
groaning and moaning as they worked. Day after day, always the same
monotonous groaning and moaning, always the same monotonous pick-axing
the rock in the dim light, always the same monotonous sending up the
broken pieces. It was very hot in some places and very cold in others,
and I was glad to follow the broken pieces up and return to the fresh air
and the sunshine.

Beppe told me that Trabonella is the largest sulphur mine in Europe, that
the total length of its galleries is thirty kilometres, which is about as
far as from the Albert Hall to Windsor Castle. They employ a thousand
m