Part 18 (1/2)

”But I was going to s.h.i.+p them home, as presents.”

”You can still do that. Just give them to relatives you detest.”

William directed the servants to start putting the cla.s.sical menagerie in some kind of order. By the time he was done, I had remembered the question I had meant to ask him. ”What progress did you make on your journal entries?”

William proudly presented his work. ”The River Tiber runs through the town,” I read. And, a bit later, ”Here, also is the great amphitheater, which they call the Coliseum because of its size.” Clearly, William was not destined for a literary career.

Naples March, 1633 For our excursion toNaples , I hired avetturino . The man had been recommended to me by the Tuscan amba.s.sador toRome , Francesco Niccolini. I paid him a fee, in return for which he arranged the coach, our lodging, and one meal a day, for a fifteen-day round trip.

”Not allvetturini are as honest as this fellow,” I warned William. ”You will expect a private room and then find other guests in the same chamber, or even the same bed. Complain to the innkeeper, and he says that it was all that thevetturin o had contracted for. Complain to thevetturino and he insists that the innkeeper is responsible, and you must take the matter up with him. Round and round you go, and are never satisfied.”

We went inside the coach; the other servants had to ride on the outside. Our fellow pa.s.sengers looked up and then ignored us.

To pa.s.s the time, I told William a bit about what we expected to cover inNaples : Virgil's Tomb, the House of Cicero, and the many volcanic sites. The latter included the Phlegraean Fields, whose fumaroles led many a visitor to think of h.e.l.l; the Grotto of the Dog, whose vapors brought death; and of courseMount Vesuvius itself.

After a while, I urged William to poke his head out the window. The road here was paved with smooth stone, and, in the distance, it gleamed like a thread of silver. ”The Queen of Roads, the Via Appia,” I explained. ”This is where six thousand of Spartacus' followers were crucified by Marcus Licinius Cra.s.sus.”

William noticed that there were many crosses alongside the road, and asked me about them. ”Surely those aren't the ones erected by the legionaires?”

”No, those are modern. Each cross marks the place where a traveler was murdered,” I explained.

”Now, look there.” I pointed to a skull on a post. ”That marks where a bandit was executed.”

William thought about this. ”The crosses greatly outnumber the skulls.”

The most important of our Neapolitan excursions was toMount Vesuvius . We intended, like many tourists before us, to climb to the rim of the great crater, but this was not without risk. Only a little more than a year before, Vesuvius erupted with great force, killing over three thousand people.

Napleswas ruled, through a viceroy, by the king ofSpain . After the recent devastation, the viceroy had posted a warning to tourists and residents alike.

”Let's see how dutifully you have been studying your Italian, William. Read the sign aloud for me.”

”'As soon as an eruption begins, you must escape as quickly as you can,'” William recited. ”'If you worry about your property, your greed and folly will be punished. Listen to the voice of this marble; flee without hesitation.'”

I clapped my hands. ”Bravo!”

The volcano was still active; smoke rose from the crater high above us. Since Vesuvius was not presently spewing out ashes and lava, we nonetheless began our climb. It was difficult going in places; we occasionally had to walk through ash, which sometimes reached almost up to our knees.

At first William walked side-by-side with me. This gave me the opportunity to explain the theories concerning volcanic eruption. Strabo said that the rock was ignited by friction with compressed air, while Seneca urged that the heat came from the combustion of sulfur.

Now, I am usually a great walker. Still, I am almost forty-five years old, and I tired more quickly than William. I gradually slowed my pace. William, on the other hand, seemed more and more anxious to reach the top the closer we got. He would edge ahead of me, first by feet, then by yards. He would start running; I would call him back.

After a while, we reached amodus vivendi . William would run to the next turning, and then wait for me to catch up. I found walking in the ash very awkward, I fear. The servants stayed behind to help me, two in front, whom I held on to, and the third pus.h.i.+ng me from behind. In this manner we progressed perhaps three-quarters of the way up.

Then I noticed a gleam to one side of the path. ”Come, William!” I cried, and went off to have a look.

It was, as I thought, a little pocket of crystals. ”Lord Devons.h.i.+re, get out your magnifying lens,” I said, without looking up. ”William?”

”He went up, Mister Hobbes,” said Samuel.

”What! After him, Samuel! You, too, Patrick! Find him, and then don't let him out of your sight.

Geoffrey, a.s.sist me.”

Samuel and Patrick ran up the trail, with Geoffrey and me following. Patrick, being a trained footman, quickly took the lead and was soon out of sight himself. Samuel followed, running steadily.

I was pleased when I finally caught up and saw William standing by the lip of the famous crater, flanked by Samuel and Patrick. I was less pleased when I saw what William held in his hand. A rope.

”Where did that rope come from? And what is it for?” I demanded.

William clearly didn't think he had done anything amiss. ”I bought it from an Italian. I was thinking about Galileo, sir. About what he said about the importance of observation. I thought I could see how the volcano is formed better, if Samuel and Patrick lower me in with this rope. I could become famous, sir.”

”It would be simpler just to hang me with the rope,” I said. ”Because your family would see me hung if I eventhought about letting you do such a thing.”

Central Italy Spring, 1633 We returned toRome byvetturino , and then left theHolyCity almost immediately afterward. I was anxious to be outside thePapal States before Holy Week, when the Inquisition was at its most zealous.

We returned toFlorence , then crossed the Appennines, the mountain chain which formed the spine ofItaly . The mountain road was poorly maintained and we had to choose our way carefully, lest a horse break a leg. When we camped, the wind howled all night.

After a brief stop inBologna we pressed on, following the trade road toPadua . This highway crossed the Po, the longest river inItaly , about thirty miles downstream fromMantua . The Po was the border between the Papal States and theVenetianRepublic .

Unfortunately, we couldn't cross it at first. Our first warning of trouble was the ringing of the church bells ofFerrara .

”What does that mean, Mister Hobbes?”

”It could be anything, Milord. Plague. Fire. Invasion. Rioting. Flood.”

As we came closer to the city, the problem became apparent-thePo had flooded.

Ferrarahad grown up beside an ancient ford of thePo . Once, it lay above the Po Delta. However, in the twelfth century thePo had broken its left bank, near Ficarolo, carving out a new channel. Thus,Ferrara was now cradled between two distributaries, the Sa Roma to the north and the Po de Ferrara to the south.

The Po de Ferrara blocked our progress and, at the moment, it looked more like a lake than a river.

”Why do you suppose it flooded?”

I had no idea. But you do not get a degree fromOxford if you cannot come up with an explanation extempore. ”Rivers usually run high in the spring, when the snow melts. But it seems a little early still for that. Perhaps there was a spell of unseasonably warm weather up in the mountains. Or there was a lot of rain.”

”But it hasn't been raining that hard.”

”What matters isn't necessarily how much it rains here, but how much it rains at the river's source,” I explained.

”So what do we do now?”

”We had best retrace our steps, find higher ground.”

”And where will we spend the night?”