of this erection.

One is glad, for the sake of freedom, to think that not so many years ago the citizens of Perugia pulled down and utterly destroyed this hated fortress, set up by the tyrant Pope when the hill-city submitted to his dominion.

From a picturesque point of view, the fortress was probably more in harmony with the old streets behind it, especially with the frowning walls, than are the modern buildings that now border the new Piazza Vittor Emanuele, and take off the charm of approach on this side.

One need not, however, enter Perugia by way of Piazza Vittor Emanuele. Keeping below the huge wall, beside an avenue of green acacias, we climbed by a wide flight of shallow brick steps past the picturesque church of San Ercolano, then went through a lofty archway, with huge projecting imposts, into a street with tall, grey houses on either side.

One of these was evidently the back of a palace, and indeed it forms part of the Palazzo Baglione which fronts the next street, Via Riario; the very name Baglione made one shiver, remembering the chronicles of that bloodthirsty race.

We halted here before a shop, to its owner, a well-to-do merchant of Perugia, we had been given an introduction; he most courteously offered to show us his wine cellar, in which is a portion of the veritable Etruscan wall of Perugia, in excellent preservation. Some of the stones are about thirteen feet long and eighteen inches thick, huge uncemented blocks of travertine. The floor of the cellar is formed by the ancient way, so that one actually treads the road used by Etruscans before Rome was thought of!

The amount of forced labour represented by these walls of Perugia is painful to think of, for the stones in the merchant's cellar must have been brought from a very great distance. The blocks of travertine are certainly the finest specimens we saw in the city. The old wall went on from them by way of the Porta Marzia to the Porta Eburnea, then northwards (there are visible fragments of it in the Rione Eburnea) till it reached the famous arch near the Piazza Grimani, and so on eastward to Monte Sole, where it took a southern course again, to join the remains in Signor Betti's cellar.

The house stands on the edge of the hill, and from its back windows there is an extended view over the country on that side, and, looking south, over the garden of San Pietro de Casinensi, then kept in order by the boys of the reformatory. The fine old machicolated spire of San Pietro and the quaint campanile of San Domenico are striking landmarks from the high road winding out to the Tiber and Ponte San Giovanni.

We discovered one secret in the charm of Perugia when we turned from this lovely and varied landscape to the vivid contrast offered by the old grey street.

SAN DOMENICO
PERUGIA

Near to Signor Betti's house is a little curiosity shop, and in its window was a proof that the belief in "mal occhio" still exists among the peasants. Hanging from a rough brass watch chain, much the worse for wear, was a little bunch of hairs from a horse's tail, set as a charm, and considered to be a specific against "mal occhio," or any spell cast on horses, cows, etc. Near it was an irregular, stumpy bit of coral, a man's safeguard against a like disaster.

During our stay in Perugia we made acquaintance with Signor Bellucci, a very learned and courteous professor of the university, who most kindly showed us in his rooms, not only a very interesting and valuable collection of implements and other articles, beginning at the Stone Age, but also a collection of amulets and charms. Some of these, especially those for protection from lightning, are bits of prehistoric stones, and exhibit a grotesque mingling of pagan and mediæval superstition.

A little case embroidered with the Agnus Dei contained a triangular stone arrow-head, and this, the Professor said, used to be hung at the bed-head of the owner, between pictures of saints; on the occasion of a storm, candles were lighted, and prayers were offered before the amulet.

This collection of charms amounts to nearly two hundred specimens; it is full of interest, and it would require many pages to do it justice.

A very curious amulet was the fragment of a human skull enclosed in a little brass reliquary, considered to be a sovereign protection against epilepsy and kindred disorders. Tradition said that this bit of bone had belonged to the skull of a person, dead some two hundred years before, who had worked so many wonderful cures by his skill in medicine, and had lived such a long and saintly life, that he had been loved and venerated by all.

The Professor told us it was not uncommon, when a body was dug up in the course of excavations, to find a bit of the skull missing, and this amulet doubtless explained the use that had been made of such lost fragments.

Another charm was a little cross of holly-wood carved by Capuchin friars; it had been found hanging at an old woman's bed-head, to protect her from the spells of a witch. She would only part from it on condition that she might reserve some splinters of the wood, so as to prevent the witch from visiting her, and tormenting her for having parted from her safeguard.

In Brittany we often saw a branch of holly hanging beside the bed for the same purpose. There were corals in this Perugian collection of various shapes, for women and children, for safety in teething, for protection against "mal occhio," to stop bleeding, and above all, for the cure of melancholy. The dark stone with red spots, which I have heard called in England bloodstone, is said to be infallible in checking bleeding; it must be useful in a country where blood-letting and leeching are still common and frequent remedies.

One of the most amusing of the charms was a heart-shaped agate with a hole through the top. This was found in a house not far from Perugia, where from time immemorial it had been held in reverence, and in which its influence was supposed to have maintained perfect harmony among the inmates of the house. Professor Bellucci did not tell us why its possessors were willing to give it up: did they want a little change from this perpetual harmony?

Belief in witches is still very prevalent in Umbria. They are said to haunt cross-roads persistently at night-time, it is also said that he who walks late in the environs of Perugia will do well to carry a few small coins in his pocket, and to fling them abroad as an offering when he comes near to a cross-road, for assuredly a witch lies there in ambush, ready to work him harm. Also, when the traveller sees in some unfrequented by-road a heap of stones beside the way, he must at once add another stone to this cairn, so that he may keep down the phantom of the murdered traveller, whose unblessed body has been hastily put underground in the lonely spot.

FOUNTAIN OUTSIDE SAN DOMENICO.

Among these ciottoli, however, I did not see any of the charming little coral hands to be found farther south, with the forefinger and little finger, the other fingers closed, pointed in defence against "mal occhio." It is possible that this belief in the virtue of coral may have originated the