Many a weary mile have I since accomplished in a state of health almost incredible, though I am now convinced that I have performed my last; but it was a beautiful one!
On the eastern shores of the Bay of Naples rises the mountain of St. Angelo. For days had I gazed upon it with a wistful eye, and with all the eagerness of my childhood, when I never saw a distant hill but I was restless until I had reached it. Notwithstanding that my strength now daily diminished, my desire so increased upon me, that but a brief time had elapsed ere I had gratified it. This mountain protrudes abruptly into the Mediterranean, dividing the bay of Salerno from that of Naples.
I have enjoyed the grandest scenery of Europe, but never, never such as this, or at such a moment. The death stillness of the day was appalling—the air was motionless, the heavens cloudless, and the deep blue sea, far, far beneath me, without a ripple; and not a sound reached my ear but that of my own watch. There I rested on the summit, basking in the sun, and enjoying a view, if such might be so called, worthy an angel's while to fly down and witness, and which, I dare say, one does now and then among these aërial solitudes.
And now my feverish curiosity with regard to distant countries is satisfied to the full. It once was such as extended to other worlds, when I would welcome death in order to indulge it. The time is now approaching, then, when I must set out for "that bourne from which no traveller returns." My love of roaming has happily waned with the power of gratifying it, and I am now on my return, by easy stages, for the monastery of La Trappe, and I trust that a few days more will place me in its peaceful retirement, for I am weary.
T.C. Savill, Printer, 4, Chandos Street, Covent Garden.
Typographical errors corrected in text: