XVI.
Plymouth,
My dear St. John,
After a year's holiday, I am here, about to sail again for New Zealand, in S.S. Rimutaka. In January I went abroad, for, though I have been twice round the world, I knew nothing of the Continent, and was especially anxious to visit Italy. At Cannes I found our old Eton and Oxford friend, Wollaston, who is the permanent Chaplain of St. Paul's Church, having had to give up his living in England owing to throat trouble. He advised me to make an expedition to the Island of St. Honorat, one of the Isles de Lerins, some six miles distant, where I had a most interesting time.
One of these Islands is the place where the man with the iron mask was confined; the other famous for its monastery, founded by Honoratus in 410 A.D. It is a little gem of beauty in the blue Mediterranean; "Beata ilia Insula" was its old title; that Isle of Happiness. Not far from the landing-place there is an archway crossing the road that leads to the buildings, and on it these words:
"Pulcrior in toto non est locus orbe Lerina,
Dispeream hie si non vivere semper amem,"
i.e.
"In all the world no place more lovely than Lerina.
Let me die if I would not live here for ever."
