How "A Dear Little Couple" Went Abroad

by Mary D. Brine

You may imagine how they enjoyed it, and when they saw a boatman from another boat jump over into the water and splash about to show his passengers how like a silver blue water-sprite he could look the children gave one of their delighted whoops right there, and then nearly fell out of their own boat with fright at the loud strange echo the cave gave back at their shout.

Well, after the passengers returned from the cave, the steamboat went on its way, and in due time the landing at Capri was made, and the passengers were told that they would have two hours of time in which to see everything of interest on the beautiful island, before the boat should start on to Sorrento (which is another charming resort not far from Capri).

Such a crowd of donkey boys and donkey girls as were on the dock when the steamboat stopped! They were all yelling at one time, trying to coax passengers to use their donkeys or their cabs, and pay them so much per hour.

"The Blue Grotto of Capri."

Now, you see, Capri is a funny sort of island, for it is "taller than it is broad," as people say. It rises right out of the bay in a lot of terraced cliffs, and as far up as you can see it is just a mass of green gardens and woods.

At the base of the island are the village streets, and odd little houses, and shops and hotels, and at one of the hotels our party of four ate a good dinner, before taking a carriage up the mountain road to Anacapri, a funny little bit of a village right at the very top of the island.

When the dinner was finished Mamma and Papa took the back seat in the open little "victoria" (as the carriage was called, though it was very small and crampy in its proportions), and the little couple, gay as larks, and wide-eyed with wonder, sat close together on the small footstool of a seat in front of the "grown-ups," and with a crack of the whip (which the horse didn't even jump at, because he is so used to it, and best of all, because the "crack" is only in the air and not against his bony sides) they all started off for "Anacapri."

I could tell you of a great many things they saw on the way, and of the natives they passed, who bobbed and curtsied to the travelers, and showed their white teeth, and held up their little brown babies, hoping for the gift of a coin or two. And I would like to describe the magnificent sight of the olive-gardens, and of the trees hanging full of lemons and oranges, and of the beautiful flowering vines which grew by the roadside, and the shade trees, and particularly of the grand sight which greeted their eyes with every turn of the winding road which brought the Bay of Naples (stretching itself far and wide and dotted all over with odd little ships and boats) into view. But I must skip all those things, and get you at last with the dear little couple to the mite of a village mentioned as "Anacapri."

From there our friends looked right down upon the bay and over at Naples, and if they had been little birds they would have spread their wings and taken a good fly into the blue sunny space before them—at least, that is what Teddy whispered in Polly's ear he would like to do.