Francesco's eyelids drooped and he fell into a deep and dreamless sleep.
[CHAPTER III]
QUAINT WAYFARERS
EARLY on the following morning Francesco left Rome through the ancient Flaminian gate and started upon his journey towards Viterbo.
It was a fair morning, golden and light.
Over the Campagna hung white mists, that hovered longest where the Tiber rolled; but over the green mountains of Rocca Romana the woods were alight with sunbeams and the glancing streams ran sparkling through meadows, starred with dragon-flower and cyclamen, and shaded with heavy boughs of beach and chestnut.
In lieu of following the Via Aurelia, where it wound towards the coast by Santa Marinella and Santa Severa and mediaeval Palo, and the volcanic soil and the steep ravines by Cervetri, where the long avenues of cliff sepulchres are all that remain to show the site of ancient Caeré, Francesco pursued the beaten cattle-tracks, avoiding the Maccarese marshes and following the course of the Aeroné as far as the high cliffs, up by forsaken Galera. And soon the downs and moors, the tumuli and tombs and the heaving expanse of the Roman Campagna lay behind him, and with them the fear of encountering roving companies of Provencals, which might still remain in these regions.