Thy height makes fall from me ten thousand drops.
Here in Messina I found the (sometimes) great English The death of Sir Frances Verney.Gallant Sr. Frances Verny lying sick in a Hospitall, whom sixe weekes before I had met in Palermo: Who after many misfortunes in exhausting his large patrimony, abandoning his Countrey, and turning Turk in Tunneis; he was taken at Sea by the Sicilian Gallies: In one of which he [IX. 398.]was two yeares a slave, whence hee was redeemed by an English Jesuite, upon a promise of his Conversion to the Christian faith: When set at liberty, hee turned common Souldier, and here in the extreamest calamity of extreame miseries, contracted Death: Whose dead Corpes I charitably interred in the best manner, time could affoord me strength, bewailing sorrowfully the miserable mutability of Fortune, who from so great a Birth, had given him so meane a Buriall; and truly so may I say, Sic transit gloria mundi.
After sixteene dayes attendance for passage, their fortunately accoasted heere twelve Napolitan Gallies come from Apulia, and bound for Naples: In one of which, by favour of Marquesse Dell Sancta Cruce the Generall, I imbarked, and so set forward through the narrow Seas, which divide Italy and Sicilia: The strait whereof, is 24. miles in length, in breadth 6. 4. and 2. miles. This Sea, is called the faro of Messina, and fretum Siculum; at the West end whereof, wee met with two contrary chopping tides, which somewhat rusling like unto broken Seas, did choake the Gallies with a strugling force:
Incidunt in Scyllam, cupiens vitare Charibdim.
Who strive to shunne, the hard Calabrian coast,
On sandy Scilla, wrestling they are lost.
A comparison of irrepugnable streames.Yet of no such eminent perill, or repugnable Currents, as be in the firths of Stronza and Westra: especially Pentland firth, which divideth Katnes from Pemonia, the mayne Land of Orknay; wherein who unskilfully looseth from eyther sides, may quickly loose sight both of Life and Land for ever. As we entred in the Gulfe of Saint Eufemia, we fetched up the little Ile of Strombolo: This Isolet is a round Rocke, and a mile in Compasse, [IX. 399.]growing to the top like to a Pomo, or Pyramide, and not much unlike the Isolets of Basse and Elsey, through the toppe whereof, as through a Chimney arriseth a continuall fire, and that so terrible, and furiously casting foorth great stones and flames, that neyther Galley nor Boate, dare Coast or boord it.
South from hence, and in sight thereof, on the North Coast of Sicily lye the two Ilands, Vulcan Major, and Minor; whereof the lesser perpetually burneth, and the greater is long since consumed. On the fourth day we touched at Ischa, the greatest Ile belonging to Naples, and 20. miles in Circuite, being strongly begirded with Rockey heights. The chiefe Towne is Ischa, whether Ferdinando of Naples fled, being thrust out of his Kingdome by Charles the eight.
A boyling Fountaine in the Ile of Ischa.There is a Fountayne here of that incredible heate, that in short time will boyle any fish or flesh put in it, and the taste agreeable to digestion. Departing from thence, and coasting the mayne shoare, we had a Moorish Frigot in Chase, where seazing on her, we found 16. Moores therein, and sixe Christians, three men, two Women, and a Boy, whom they had taken up, in going betweene two Townes by the Sea side. The Peasants were set at liberty, and the Moores immediately preferred to chaynes of Iron, bloody lashes, tugging of Gally oares, and perpetuall slavery.
Neere the Marine, and in sight of Naples, wee boorded close by the foote of the Hill Vesuvio, which in time past did burne, but now extinguished: It was here that the elder Pliny who had spent all his time in discovering the secrets of Nature; pressing neere to behold it, was stifled with the flame, so that he dyed in the same place, which [IX. 400.]is most excellently described in the Booke of his Epistles, by his Nephew the younger.