An exquisite after-glow seemed
as if it would never pass away. Above thin, grey clouds stretching
along the horizon a purple flush melted insensibly into the dark
blue of the zenith. Eastward the sky was piled with lurid rack,
sullen-tinted folds edged with the hue of sulphur. The sea had a
strange aspect, curved tracts of pale blue lying motionless upon a
dark expanse rippled by the wind. Below me, as I leaned on the
sea-wall, a fisherman's boat crept duskily along the rocks, a splash
of oars soft-sounding in the stillness. I looked to the far
Calabrian hills, now scarce distinguishable from horizon cloud, and
wondered what chances might await me in the unknown scenes of my
further travel.
The long shore of the Ionian Sea suggested many a halting-place.
Best of all, I should have liked to swing a wallet on my shoulder
and make the whole journey on foot; but this for many reasons was
impossible. I could only mark points of the railway where some sort
of food or lodging might be hoped for, and the first of these
stoppages was Metaponto.
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