They tell me every day is there Not more nor less than Sunday gay; In shining robes and garments fair The people walk upon their way. One gazes there on castle walls As grand as those of Babylon, A bishop and two generals! What joy to be in Carcassonne! Ah! might I but see Carcassonne!

Yet could I these two days have spent, While still the autumn sweetly shone, Ah, me! I might have died content When I had looked on Carcassonne.

The vicar's right; he says that we Are ever wayward, weak and blind; He tells us in his homily Ambition ruins all mankind;

Thy pardon, Father, I beseech, In this my prayer if I offend; One something sees beyond his reach From childhood to his journey's end. My wife, our little boy …

Jordan has a strange, haunting beauty and a sense of timelessness. Dotted with the ruins of empires once great, it is the last resort of yesterday in the world…

[Descriptio Britanniae] Campis late pansis collibusque amoeno situ locatis, praepollenti culturae aptis, montibus alternandis animalium pastibus maxime covenie…

Naples, Italy, summer of 1924. Happy, just arrived from Brazil, Count Francesco Matarazzo enters his favourite tailor shop. He checks measures, examines dozens…