Before taking leave of Sartene, my heartiest eulogies are due to the hospitality of its inhabitants. It was my good fortune to meet with the greatest kindness from these amiable people; their noble and honest confidence cheered my heart, and I spent many a pleasant hour in their society. I could with difficulty tear myself from their hospitality; I accompanied them on their hunting expeditions among the mountains, and, above all, enjoyed myself many a summer day in their beautiful orchards. On leaving Sartene, early in the morning, I was accompanied by all those excellent gentlemen with whose friendship I had been honoured; and when bidding the company adieu, one of them—a cousin of the unfortunate Vittoria Malaspina—placed a note in my hands.
Upon opening it, I found its contents to be as follows:—
"To Signor Ferdinando.
"If you should ever happen to be in danger or in difficulty during your stay in our island, do not forget that you have a friend in Sartene.
Alessandro Casanova."
I preserve this note as a talisman, and at the same time as a testimony to the noble hospitality of Corsica. It was not sufficient for my Sartenese friend to assure me by hand and word that, as his guest, I was under his protection for the rest of my life, but he must needs add to his promise the additional guarantee of a written document.
CHAPTER VI.
THE TOWN OF BONIFAZIO.
About eight o'clock in the morning I set out from Sartene to Bonifazio, the most southerly town and fortress in Corsica. The road lay along a desolate coast, the hills sloping gradually towards the sea-shore. There is not a village to be seen all the way; and I should have perished from hunger and thirst, had not my travelling companions taken care to furnish themselves with bread and wine before setting out. Who not his bread with joy has eaten, by olive gray or vine-tree seated, He knows you not, ye heavenly powers!
We passed through the vale of Ortoli—everywhere waste hill-country, neither grain nor fruit-tree visible. The olive is no longer met with; cork-tree clumps and arbutus alone occupy the soil. We approached the south coast—still more desolate, if possible, than that which we had left behind us. Not far from the mouth of the Ortoli lies a solitary post-house, and opposite it a ridge of rock, on which stands the Tower of Roccapina. Close beside it, on the sharp edge of the cliff, there is a rugged and irregular rocky mass. It bears a striking resemblance to a colossal crowned lion, and is called among the people, Il leone coronato. This singular rock—so conspicuous an object along this line of coast, the first bit of Corsican ground which fell into the hands of Genoa when she wrested the island from the Pisans—stands there as if it were the monument or the arms of the Republic.