excitement at the thought of what I might see on the following
day. The next morning the visit to the islands themselves
delighted me so much that I could not understand how I had
managed to come upon anything so charming, and wondered what
would result from it. After stopping only one day, I left the
place with the feeling that I had now to flee from something to
which I did not belong, and went round Lake Maggiore, up past
Socarno, to Bellinzona, where I was once again on Swiss soil;
from there I proceeded to Lugano, intending, if I followed out my
original plan of travel, to stay there some time. But I soon
suffered from the intense heat; even bathing in the sun-scorched
lake was not refreshing. Apart from the dirty furniture, which
included the Denksopha ('thinking sofa') from the Clouds by
Aristophanes, I was sumptuously lodged in a palatial building,
which in the winter served as the government house of the canton
of Tessin, but in the summer was used as a hotel. However, I soon
fell again into the condition that had troubled me so long, and
prevented me from taking any rest, owing to my extreme nervous
strain and excitement, whenever I felt disposed to idle
pleasantly. I had taken a good many books with me, and proposed
to entertain myself with Byron. Unfortunately it required a great
effort on my part to take any pleasure in his works, and the
difficulty of doing so increased when I began to read his Don
Juan. After a few days' time I began to wonder why I had come,
and what I wanted to do here, when suddenly Herwegh wrote saying
that he and several friends intended to join me at this place. A
mysterious instinct made me telegraph to my wife to come also.
She obeyed my call with surprising alacrity, and arrived
unexpectedly in the middle of the night, after travelling by
post-chaise across the St. Gotthard Pass. She was so fatigued