If you're tired of dreary gray winter, savor this excerpt from Under the Tuscan Sun by Frances Mayes. Mayes and her partner purchase an old house in Tuscany and, because they both teach and can spend long periods in Italy only in the summer, this enthralling book is filled with sunshine and appetizing harvests. Can't you just smell the basil and taste the tomatoes in this passage?

"When tomatoes are ripe, nothing is better than cold tomato soup with a handful of basil and a garnish of polenta croutons. Panzanella, little swamp, is another tomato favorite, a salad of oil, vinegar, tomatoes, basil, cucumber, minced onion, and stale bread soaked in water and squeezed dry - a true invention from necessity. Since bread must be bought every day, Tuscan cooking makes good use of leftovers. The rough loaves work perfectly for bread puddings and for the best French toast I've ever had. We go for days without meat and don't even miss it, then a roasted faraona (guinea hen) with rosemary, or sage-stuffed pork loin, remind us of how fabulous the plainest meats can be.

I cut a small basketful of thyme, rosemary, and sage, wishing I could beam one of each plant to San Francisco, where I keep a window box of faltering herbs going. Here, the sun doubles their size every few weeks. The oregano near the well quickly spreads to a circle about three feet wide. Even the wild mint and lemon balm I dug up on the hill and moved have taken off. Mint thrives. Vergil says deer wounded by hunters seek it for wounds. In Tuscany, where hunters long since have driven out most wild life, the mint is more plentiful than deer. Maria Rita, at the frutta e verdura, tells me to use lemon balm in salads and vegetables, as well as in my bathwater.

I think I would like cutting herbs even if I weren't cooking. The pungency of just-snipped herbs adds as much to the cook's enjoyment as to taste. After weeding the thyme, I don't wash my hands until the fragrance fades from my hands. I planted a hedge of sage, more than I ever could use, and let most flower for the butterflies. Sage flowers, along with lavender, look pretty in wildflower bouquets. The rest I dry or use fresh, usually for white beans with chopped sage and olive oil, a favorite of Tuscans, who are known as 'bean eaters.' "Anytime we grill, Ed tosses long wands of rosemary on the coals and on the meat. The crispy leaves not only add flavor, they're good to nibble, too. When he grills shrimp, he threads them on rosemary sticks.

I have pots of basil by the kitchen door because it is supposed to keep out flies. During the wall-building and well-drilling weeks, I saw a worker crush leaves in his hand and smear his wasp sting. He said it took away all the pain. A larger patch grows a few feet away. The more I cut off, the more seems to grow. I use whole leaves in salad, bunches for pesto, copious amounts in sauteed summer squashes and tomato dishes. Of all herbs, basil holds the essence of Tuscan summers."

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