fishing-boats that have put out from the marina float in the most dreamy manner.  I fear that the fishermen who have made a show of industry, and got away from their wives, who are busily weaving nets on shore, are yielding to the seductions of the occasion, and making a day of it.  And, as I look at them, I find myself debating which I would rather be, a fisherman there in the boat, rocked by the swell, and warmed by the sun, or a friar, on the terrace of the garden on the summit of Deserto, lying perfectly tranquil, and also soaked in the sun.  There is one other person, now that I think of it, who may be having a good time to-day, though I do not know that I envy him.  His business is a new one to me, and is an occupation that one would not care to recommend to a friend until he had tried it:  it is being carried about in a basket.  As I went up the new Massa road the other day, I met a ragged, stout, and rather dirty woman, with a large shallow basket on her head.  In it lay her husband, a large man, though I think a little abbreviated as to his legs.  The woman asked alms.  Talk of Diogenes in his tub!  How must the world look to a man in a basket, riding about on his wife’s head?  When I returned, she had put him down beside the road in the sun, and almost in danger of the passing vehicles.  I suppose that the affectionate creature thought that, if he got a new injury in this way, his value in the beggar market would be increased.  I do not mean to do this exemplary wife any injustice; and I only suggest the idea in this land, where every beggar who is born with a deformity has something to thank the Virgin for.  This custom of carrying your husband on your head in a basket has something to recommend it, and is an exhibition of faith on the one hand, and of devotion on the other, that is seldom met with.  Its consideration is commended to my countrywomen at home.  It is, at least, a new commentary on the apostolic remark, that the man is the head of the woman.  It is, in some respects, a happy division of labor in the walk of life:  she furnishes the locomotive power, and he the directing brains, as he lies in the sun and looks abroad; which reminds me that the sun is getting hot on my back.  The little bunch of bells in the convent tower is jangling out a suggestion of worship, or of the departure of the hours.  It is time to eat an orange.

Vesuvius appears to be about on a level with my eyes and I never knew him to do himself more credit than to-day.  The whole coast of the bay is in a sort of obscuration, thicker than an Indian summer haze; and the veil extends almost to the top of Vesuvius.  But his summit is still distinct, and out of it rises a gigantic billowy column of white smoke, greater in quantity than on any previous day of our sojourn; and the sun turns it to silver.  Above a long line of ordinary looking clouds, float great white masses, formed of the sulphurous vapor.  This manufacture of clouds in a clear, sunny day has an odd appearance;