the dense tangles of evergreens which I have described, where he lived upon the charity of countryfolk and shepherds.  In the eyes of those simple people it was a sacred duty to relieve the necessities of the outlaws, and to guard them from the bloodhounds of justice.  There was scarcely a respectable family in Corsica who had not one or more of its members thus alla campagna, as it was euphemistically styled.  The Corsicans themselves have attributed this miserable state of things to two principal causes.  The first of these was the ancient bad government of the island:  under its Genoese rulers no justice was administered, and private vengeance for homicide or insult became a necessary consequence among the haughty and warlike families of the mountain villages.  Secondly, the Corsicans have been from time immemorial accustomed to wear arms in everyday life.  They used to sit at their house doors and pace the streets with musket, pistol, dagger, and cartouch-box on their persons; and on the most trivial occasion of merriment or enthusiasm they would discharge their firearms.  This habit gave a bloody termination to many quarrels, which might have ended more peaceably had the parties been unarmed; and so the seeds of vendetta were constantly being sown.  Statistics published by the French Government present a hideous picture of the state of bloodshed in Corsica even during this century.  In one period of thirty years (between 1821 and 1850) there were 4319 murders in the island.  Almost every man was watching for his neighbour’s life, or seeking how to save his own; and agriculture and commerce were neglected for this grisly game of hide-and-seek.  In 1853 the French began to take strong measures, and, under the Prefect Thuillier, they hunted the bandits from the macchi, killing between 200 and 300 of them.  At the same time an edict was promulgated against bearing arms.  It is forbidden to sell the old Corsican stiletto in the shops, and no one may carry a gun, even for sporting purposes, unless he obtains a special licence.  These licences, moreover, are only granted for short and precisely measured periods.

In order to appreciate the stern and gloomy character of the Corsicans, it is necessary to leave the smiling gardens of Ajaccio, and to visit some of the more distant mountain villages—­Vico, Cavro, Bastelica, or Bocognano, any of which may easily be reached from the capital.  Immediately after quitting the seaboard, we enter a country austere in its simplicity, solemn without relief, yet dignified by its majesty and by the sense of freedom it inspires.  As we approach the mountains, the macchi become taller, feathering man-high above the road, and stretching far away upon the hills.  Gigantic masses of granite, shaped like buttresses and bastions, seem to guard the approaches to these hills; while, looking backward over the green plain, the sea lies smiling in a haze of blue among the rocky horns and misty headlands