The great plain between the hills and the sea grows very impressive; so silent it is, so mournfully desolate, so haunted with memories of vanished glory.

I looked at the Crathis--the Crati of Cosenza--here beginning to spread into a sea-marsh; the waters which used to flow over golden sands, which made white the oxen, and sunny-haired the children, that bathed in them, are now lost amid a wilderness poisoned by their own vapours.
The railway station, like all in this region, was set about with eucalyptus.

Great bushes of flowering rosemary scented the air, and a fine cassia tree, from which I plucked blossoms, yielded a subtler perfume.

Our lunch was not luxurious; I remember only, as at all worthy of Sybaris, a palatable white wine called Muscato dei Saraceni.
Appropriate enough amid this vast silence to turn one's thoughts to the Saracens, who are so largely answerable for the ages of desolation that have passed by the Ionian Sea.
Then on for Taranto, where we arrived in the afternoon.

Meaning to stay for a week or two I sought a pleasant room in a well-situated hotel, and I found one with a good view of town and harbour.