twilight found us at the end of the first stage in Monreale. From thence onward the journey continued for a while through pitchy darkness. The broad highway is engineered with admirable skill along the sides of mountains and over deep ravines, through a region of most uncommon beauty, it is said, but now hidden from us by the impenetrable gloom. However, as the night advanced the clouds rolled away with surprising suddenness, and left a bright moon rising over the mountains. We began to see something of the beautifully varied country, though viewing it at a disadvantage through the narrow window of a covered coach. Wherever the rugged nature of the country permitted every rood of ground was under exquisite cultivation, and already had its first soft covering of springing vegetation. The night-air was sweet with the spring-like odors of freshly-turned earth and of wild-flowers: from time to time white masses of flower-laden almond trees flashed past the window, looking in the moonlight wonderfully like the snow-drifts which at this season line the roads in New England.

CONVENT OF SAN MARINO, NEAR PALERMO.

After nightfall the surface of the rich and well-cultivated country seemed as solitary as a wilderness: not a creature was stirring along the road. The intense silence of the night was broken only by the hum of our coach-wheels and the sharp snap of hoofs from our cavalry guard. How unlike were all the surroundings to those of an ordinary modern night-journey over the mail-routes of Europe! The primitive conveyance, the quiet of the lonely road, the arms of the attendant troop of horsemen flashing in the light of the moon,—all the concomitants of an old-time night-journey seemed to carry us back from the age of railroads to an earlier time.

Eleven drowsy hours of staging, and then a long, slow ascent, brought us up to the hilltop where stands the village of Calatafimi. The chief inn of the town is probably not surpassed in Europe in the number of its small discomforts, animate and inanimate, but it must be made the base of operations for visiting the ruins of Segesta. The remnant of the night spent in sleep prepared us for our investigations on the following day. It was pleasant, rising in the cool early morning, to step out from the comfortless interior of the tavern to enjoy on a southern balcony the temperate warmth of the low sun and to look down on the lovely landscape. Before us lay a fertile rolling country clad with verdure, and rising gradually upward toward the south to an elevation deserving to be called a mountain from its great height, yet from its gentle slope and cultivated sides rather to be called a hill. A field near the crest of that distant hill, marked only by a few white crosses, is a spot memorable in Sicilian history, for there lie the heroes who fell fighting with Garibaldi for the unity of Italy on May 15, 1860. Sicily has in all ages been a battle-ground for the contending races of two continents: on Sicilian soil Athens received her most disabling blow, and here too the Punic power was broken; yet there is hardly one among the battlefields of Sicily upon which greater destinies have been settled than on this field of Calatafimi.

Before the morning was far advanced we started out in search of the village curé, the unfailing friend of strangers, that we might inquire of him about the safety of visiting the ruin and in regard to the pleasantest way of reaching it. Picking our way about through the mud of the squalid village, we at length found the old gentleman just coming from his little church on the side of the castle hill at the end of the town. Filled with unfeigned delight that the monotony of his existence should be broken by the advent of two foreigners, especially such living wonders as Americans, the benign priest took a lively interest in our case, gave us the information for which we had asked, vouching for the safety of the country, and begged us to walk on with him. For five minutes we followed on together the road cut in the hillside beneath the walls of the Saracenic citadel, our companion all the while talking vehemently, and helping out our lame knowledge of the language with gestures so dramatic that an understanding of his words was hardly needed. Suddenly the road curved round the side of the hill; we stood on the floor of a deserted quarry; the old man ceased speaking and pointed forward: "Ecco!" Before us the hill dropped abruptly down in a precipice: far below a deep valley spread out before our eyes, "fair as the garden of the Lord." As the light of the morning sun streamed down through its length, bringing out in great brilliancy the fresh green of spring, it looked like a paradise of luxuriant vegetation. The gray of olive trees and the darkness of orange-groves contrasted with the color of springing plants, and everywhere were scattered the pink-and-white plumes of the blossoming almonds. Beyond the valley a rugged, saddle-shaped mountain rose to an imposing height, and upon the summit line stood in solitary majesty the Doric temple of Segesta, each column in clear relief against the blue of the sky. It is so far removed from all abodes of men, standing alone for thousands of years in the region of the clouds—so grand in its severe and noble outlines—so venerable in its mysterious antiquity—so blended with the natural beauties of the place,—that it seems rather to belong to the power that raised the mountains than to any workmanship of man. The world cannot show a more wonderful example of art exquisitely harmonized with the grandeur of natural scenery.

Eager for a closer view of the temple, we returned immediately to the town, and, being provided with a guide and a beast, were soon on the way down the winding road to the valley. A bridle-path diverged from the main road: an avenue of over-arching olive trees shaded the way, and on all sides here, as everywhere through the country, the orange-crop loaded the trees almost to breaking—the most beautiful of all crops as the fruit hangs upon the branches. As we passed the lower slopes dotted with browsing sheep, and began the rugged ascent of the mountain on which the temple stands, the pathway crept up the edge of a profound gorge: it was a perilous way, clinging close to the edge of the bank, and at some points, where we could look down a thousand feet to the torrent below, the path was so narrow and broken that even our sure-footed mountain-donkeys hesitated to advance. The picturesque but hard climb at length came to an end at the edge of the broad, flattened summit of the mountain. Again the temple suddenly came in sight, but now near at hand. The mountain-shepherds have planted with wheat the level of the summit, and the pale yellow of the volcanic rock from which the temple is built harmonizes well with the color of its surroundings. It cannot be called a ruin. It stands as the builders left it in the fifth century before Christ. Not a column is broken, not a stone has fallen. The interior was never finished, but the outside is perfect.

The pure outlines of a Doric temple are beautiful in any situation, but the impression which this one made upon us in the bright morning sunlight, standing in the midst of verdure and flowers on the brink of that stupendous chasm and overlooking that glorious country, is not a thing to be conveyed in words.

The interest of the temple is comprised in its size, antiquity and beauty, for no mention of it is made in history. Its approximate age is inferred from the internal evidence of the structure. The subjection of the city of Segesta from b. c. 409 to the powers of Carthage and Rome