After That Comes Catanzaro And The Valley Of The Corace, The
Narrowest Point Of The Italian Continent, And Then The Heights Of Serra
And Aspromonte, The True "Italy" Of Old, That Continue As Far As Reggio.
Though I passed through some noble groves of chestnut on the way up, the
country here was a treeless waste.
Yet it must have been forest up to a
short time ago, for one could see the beautiful vegetable mould which
has not yet had time to be washed down the hill-sides. A driving road
passes the Croce Greca; it joins Acri with San Giovanni, the capital of
Sila Grande, and with Cosenza.
It was another long hour's march, always uphill, before I reached a
spacious green meadow or upland with a few little buildings. The place
is called Verace and lies on the watershed between the upper Crati
valley and the Ionian; thenceforward my walk would be a descent along
the Trionto river, the Traeis of old, as far as Longo-bucco which
overlooks its flood. It was cool here at last, from the altitude and the
decline of day; and hay-making was going on, amid the pastoral din of
cow-bells and a good deal of blithe love-making and chattering.
After some talk with these amiable folks, I passed on to where
the young Traeis bubbles up from the cavernous reservoirs of the earth.
Of those chill and roguish wavelets I took a draught, mindful of the day
when long ago, by these same waters, an irreparable catastrophe
overwhelmed our European civilization.
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