drive along the crowded quays of the Marinella, and after passing the Castle of the Carmine, cross the Sebeto by the Ponte della Maddalena, leaving on the rt. the building called I Granili, built in the last cent. as public granaries, and converted into barracks. The road runs along the E. shores of the bay, but it is so completely shut out from the sea by the interminable badly-paved suburb which stretches almost as far as Torre del Greco, that it has more the character of a long, dusty street, than of a high road. The first of the suburban towns traversed by the road is S. Giovanni a Teduccio (11,116 inhab.); on the 1. of which,m. more inlaud, is Barra (8919 inhab.).

4 m. Portici (11,792 inhab.), is supposed to derive its name from the Porticum Herculis, mentioned by Petronius as the portico of a temple of Hercules at the W. end of Herculaneum. The road passes through the courtyard of the Palace, built 1738 by Charles III. Here were deposited the objects discovered at Pompeii and Herculaneum before their removal to Naples. The palace is only now remarkable for its beautiful situation at the head of the bay, all its furniture and objects of art having been removed, and the palace made over to the municipality of Naples. Portici, as well as S. Jorio and Barra, during the spring and autumn, are a favourite resort of the Neapolitans, and there is a pension near the palace, and a restaurant at the Stat. From the Fort and Mole of Granatello on the sea-shore there is a fine view of the bay. After passing through the courtyard of the palace we reach

Resina (12,175 inhab.), built upon the volcanic tufa and lava which cover Herculaneum. It nearly retains its name of Retina, the ancient port of the latter. There are many villas, the largest of which is La Favorita, with fine garden and containing a mosaic found in one of the Palaces of Tiberius at Capri. This villa, like the Palace of Portici, is built on the lava of 1631. Permission to enter obtained at the Palazzo Reale in Naples.

Ascent of Vesuvius.-A good road, winding first between vineyard walls and then over lava streams, leads from Resina in 1 hr. to the Observatory, about 2000 ft. above the sea. It was erected in 1844, and is under the superintendence of Prof. Palmieri. It con. tains a number of scientific appliances, and among them a peculiar instrument for registering the state of the mountain. Close to the observatory is the so-called Hermitage, a sort of osteria, where the common wine grown on the slopes of Vesuvius can be procured, and where guides and porters may also be had.

The view from this point is magnificent, stretching far away to theN.W. over the heights of Camaldoli, Posilipo, Misenum, Procida, Ischia with its pyramid-like Monte Epomeo cutting clear against the sky, the Ponza Islands, and Gaëta as far as the promontory of Monte Circello; to the S. towers the Monte S. Angelo, with Castellammare, Vico, Sorrento, and Massa at its foot, and beyond them the three-peaked Capri. The sunset view is perhaps the most lovely, but it hardly beats the magic effect of sunrise lighting up the immediate foreground of Naples and the other towns at the head of the bay. From the terrace of the observatory there is a good view of the lavastreams of 1858, 1868, and 1872.

A walk or ride of hr. from the Observatory brings us to the Atrio del Cavallo, near the bottom of the cone. Here may be seen several of the Bocche or openings from which the lava runs. The ascent from this point to the crater must be made on foot, and will take a good walker about 1 hr., though fresh lava-currents sometimes necessitate deviations from the direct road, and make the ascent longer and more difficult. The path is very steep, and the loose ashes since the eruption of 1872 make the foothold insecure and the walking painfully fatiguing. Porters will here be found waiting, and very troublesome in offering assistance. The view from the top is even more striking than that from the Observatory. "One look westwards," says

Goethe, "is enough to make one forget the fatigue and labour of the climb." The sulphureous vapour at the top is very trying, and a handkerchief should be occasionally held over the mouth, and the head turned away from the wind to relieve the stifling sensation produced by the vapour. The guide will take the traveller to the edge of the crater and assist him in cautiously looking over. The traveller will have to shift his position from time to time to avoid burning the soles of his shoes. The descent is very rapidly made in about hr. straight down over the loose ashes, and the Observatory will be reached again in about 1 hr. In winter, if there is 'frozen snow lying on the cone, the ascent is still more fatiguing, and the descent is then dangerous. (See Dickens''Pictures of Italy,' last chap.)

c. HISTORY OF THE VOLCANO AND
ITS ERUPTIONS.

VESUVIUS, TO Ŏpos Overovïov of Strabo, the Vesēvus and Vesbius of the Romans, one of the most active of modern volcanos, rises in the midst of the plain of Campania, and is surrounded on the N. and the E. by mountains of Apennine limestone. On the W. it is open to the plain of Naples, on the S. its base is washed by the sea. It is about 30 m. in circumference. It rises by a gentle declivity to what is called the first plain, which is about half a m. above the level of the sea, and about 5 m. in diameter. This plain forms the base of Monte Somma, which may be ascended from Massa or from Somma, and whose highest point, the Punta del Nasone, is 3747 ft. above the sea. Monte Somma extends for about 2 m. in an irregular semicircle round the N. and E. of what is now called Vesuvius, the two mountains being separated by the deep semicircular valley called the Atrio del Cavallo. The height of the eruptive cone of Vesuvius varies a good deal, but may be averaged at about 4000 ft. For more than 300 years Vesuvius has been the only active crater among the volcanic group of the Bay of Naples, which includes Ischia, Procida, [S. Italy.]

the Solfatara, Monte Nuovo, and Vesuvius. Before the Christian era Ischia and the Solfatara appear to have been the only Italian craters which were active within the historical period. Stromboli, the most northern of the Lipari islands, is the only other permanently active volcano in Europe, and lies about 70 m. N. of Etna, about 120 m.S.E. of Vesuvius.

Before the reign of Titus, Vesuvins showed no signs of activity. From an early period it appears to have been known as the Mons Summanus, and to have been crowned by a temple dedicated to Jupiter. In the 'Syntagma Inscriptionum' of Reinesius, and in the Benedictine 'Explication des divers Monumens,' will be found inscriptions to Jupiter Summanus; an inscription was found at Capua, with the words Jovi Vesuvio sacrum, D.D.

The ancient geographers recognised the volcanic character of Vesuvius from the analogy of its form with that of Ætna. Their descriptions, though brief, supply us with some facts which will aid us in tracing the history of the mountain. Diodorus Siculus was the first to describe Vesuvius as volcanic. Born at Agyrium, on the flanks of Etna, he must have been familiar with volcanic phenomena, as that mountain was twice in activity during his lifetime. On examining Vesuvius he found, as he tells us, many signs that it had been in activity in ancient times. Vitruvius mentions a tradition in his day that the mountain had emitted flames. Strabo, who wrote a few years later, describes it as having a truncated cone, with a barren and ashy aspect, "having cavernous hollows in its cineritious rocks, which look as if they had been acted on by fire." Whence he inferred that "in some former time there had burst from these cavernous orifices a fire which had now become extinct." Seneca remarked that Vesuvius in former times had given out more than its own volume of matter, and had furnished the channel, not the food, of the internal fire; in ipso monte non alimentum habit sed viam. Velleius Paterculus, who died under Tiberius, and Plutarch, in his Life of Crassus, in describing

the escape of Spartacus, give incidentally an interesting account of the condition of the mountain at that period. They state that the rocky hollow on the summit was clothed with wild vines, and that it was accessible only by one very steep and narrow passage on the side opposite to Naples. When Spartacus (A.U.C. 681) and his followers had entered this pass and encamped in the plain of the crater, Clodius besieged him in his retreat by occupying the pass and cutting off, as he supposed, the only means of escape. The gladiators, however, made ladders of the vine-boughs, "like ship-ladders, of such a length and so strong that they reached from the top of the hill to the very bottom. With these they all descended except one, who remained to throw down their armour to his companions, and then descended himself, last of all. The Romans, having no suspicion of this movement, were assailed in the rear by the gladiators, who had marched round the mountain, and were put to flight with the loss of their whole camp."

From these facts it is very probable, independently of geological evidence, that Somma, which now forms the N. peak of the mountain, was a part of the wall of the original crater. The most cursory examination of the crest of rocks comprising Somma is sufficient to show that it is the segment of a circle and it has been proved by careful measurements that this circle, if continued round the mountain, would include the whole of the more modern cone of Vesuvius within it, and give a centre which corresponds exactly with its present site. Somma, therefore, and the mountain of which it formed a part, was probably the Vesuvius described by the ancient geographers before the reign of Titus. Its flanks were then covered with luxuriant vegetation, and Pompeii and Herculaneum were flourishing cities at its base.

Talem dives arat Capua, et vicina Vesevo
Ora jugo.

VIRG. Georg. II. 224. In the 63rd year of our era, during the reign of Nero, the mountain began for the first time to give signs that the

volcanic fire was returning to its ancient channel. On the 5th February the whole neighbourhood was convulsed by an earthquake, which, as Seneca records, threw down a great part of Pompeii and Herculaneum. In 64 another earthquake occurred, which injured Naples and destroyed the theatre, where Nero had been acting a few minutes before. These earthquakes continued at intervals for 16 years.

The first eruption of Vesuvius of which there is any record occurred on the 24th August in the year 79, during the reign of Titus. It is memorable not only as the eruption which destroyed Pompeii and Herculaneum, and caused the death of Pliny the naturalist, but also as having had his nephew, the younger Pliny, for its historian. In his two well-known letters to Tacitus (vi. 16 and 20), describing the death of his uncle, Pliny says that about one in the afternoon his mother informed his uncle, who was stationed with the Roman fleet at Misenum, that a cloud appeared of unusual size and shape. "It was not," he says, "at that distance discernible from what mountain it arose, but it was found afterwards that it was from Vesuvius. I cannot give a more exact description of its figure than by likening it to that of a pinetree, for it shot up a great height in the form of a trunk, which extended itself at the top into the form of branches; occasioned, I imagine, either by a sudden gust of air which impelled it, the force of which decreased as it advanced upwards, or the cloud itself, being pressed back again by its own weight, expanded in this manner. appeared sometimes bright, and sometimes dark and spotted, as it became more or less impregnated with earth and cinders. This was a surprising phenomenon, and it deserved, in the opinion of that learned man, to be inquired into more exactly. He commanded a Liburnian galley to be prepared for him, and made me an offer of accompanying him, if I pleased. I replied it was more agreeable to me to pursue my studies. He went out of the house with his tablets in his hand. The mariners at Retina, being under consternation at the

It

dying; some lifting their hands to the gods; but the greater part imagining that the last and eternal night was come which was to destroy the gods and the world together. Among these were some who augmented the real terrors by imaginary ones, and made the frightened multitude falsely believe that Misenum was actually in flames. At length a glimmering light appeared, which we imagined to be rather the forerunner of an approaching burst of flames, as in truth it was, than the return of day. However, the fire fell at a distance from us. Then again we were immersed in thick darkness, and a heavy shower of ashes rained upon us, which we were obliged every now and then to shake off, otherwise we should have been crushed and buried in the heap. . . . . At last this dreadful darkness was dissipated by degrees, like a cloud of smoke; the real day returned, and even the sun appeared, though very faintly, and as when an eclipse is coming on. Every object which presented itself to our eyes, which were extremely weakened, seemed changed, being covered over with white ashes, as with a deep snow. We returned to Misenum, where we refreshed ourselves as well as we could, and passed an anxious night between hope and fear-though indeed with a much larger share of the latter, for the earthquake still continued, while several enthusiasts ran up and down, heightening their own and their friends' calamities by terrible predictions."

This description is not only interesting in itself, but is valuable as affording the evidence of an eye-witness as to the nature of the eruption. On this point the statement of Pliny is entirely confirmed by scientific observations on the materials which cover the buried cities. It appears that no lava flowed from the crater on this occasion, only ashes, red-hot stones, and loose fragments of volcanic materials being ejected. Many of these masses which have been found at Pompeii are not less than 8 lbs. in weight, while those which fell upon Stabiæ, 4 m. further, weigh only a few ounces. The crater vomited at the same time enormous volumes of

vapour, which fell upon the country around in torrents of heated water, charged with the dry light ashes which were suspended in the air. This water, as it reached the soil, carried with it in its course the cinders which had fallen, and thus deluged Herculaneum with a soft, pasty, volcanic mud or alluvium, which penetrated into places which neither scoriæ nor stones could have reached, and did far more damage than any other product of the eruption. Hic est pampineis viridis modo Vesvius umbris, Presserat hic madidos nobilis uva lacus ; Hæc juga, quàm Nisa colles, plus Bacchus amavit,

Hæc Veneris sedes, Lacedæmone gratior illi;

Hoc nuper Satyri monte dedere choros ;

Hic locus Herculeo nomine clarus erat :

Cuncta jacent flammis, et tristi mersa favilla,
Nec Superi vellent hoc licuisse sibi.

MARTIAL, Epig. IV. 44.

The effect of this eruption was to destroy the entire side of the mountain nearest to the sea, leaving, as the only remnants of the ancient crater, the lower ridge on the S. flank now called La Pedamentina, and that portion of the wall which, under the name of Somma, encircles about two-fifths of the new cone. This cone is the present Vesuvius, which has continued to be the almost exclusive channel of eruption to the present day.

More or less important eruptions occurred in 203;-in 472, when, according to Procopius, Europe was covered with ashes, which fell even at Constantinople;-in 512, when the same author says the ashes were carried as far as Tripoli;-in 685;—in 993;—in 1036, when the lava is said to have reached the sea;-in 1049;-in 1139;-in 1306;

and in 1500, this last a slight eruption, leaving, however, a crater 5 m. in circumference and 1000 paces deep. A long interval now ensued of 131 years, during which Vesuvius became so covered with vegetation, that in the 17th cent. Braccini found the sides of the crater overgrown with brushwood and forest-trees, and haunted by wild boars. At the bottom was a plain with cattle; and in the middle of this plain was a ravine in the floor of the crater, through which a winding path led down for about 1 m. among rocks and