The streets grew narrower and more densely thronged; the houses were more dirty and tumbledown, and the appearance of the people themselves suggested that we had reached some of the lower quarters of the city.

Here we passed through a further network of small streets of the name of which I took no note, and found ourselves at last in a very dark and narrow lane called the _Via del Giardino_.

Although my brother had, so far as I had observed, given no orders to the coachman, the latter seemed to have no difficulty in finding his Way, driving rapidly in the Neapolitan fashion, and proceeding direct as to a place with which he was already familiar.
In the Via del Giardino the houses were of great height, and overhung the street so as nearly to touch one another.

It seemed that this quarter had been formerly inhabited, if not by the aristocracy, at least by a class very much superior to that which now lived there; and many of the houses were large and dignified, though long since parcelled out into smaller tenements.

It was before such a house that we at last brought up.