Umbria was then, as it is now, a beautiful and fertile valley, rich in citron, almond, aloe, with forest trees of oak and pine and fir, to which long cultivation has added grapevines, engarlanding the elms, and orchards of the pale-leaved olive-tree, that give the landscape a somewhat transparent, aërial effect.

The various shades of the masses of different kinds of foliage, with which these heights were clothed, from that of the pale-leaved candle-nut, to the sombre green of the bread-fruit groves, contributed greatly to the pleasing effect of the landscape. On the right, as you looked towards the ocean, lay the flat tract, occupied by the sea-fowl, and which Johnny had named after them.