Massachusetts spy and Worcester advertiser. [volume] ([Worcester, Mass.]) 1823-1825, 1824-09-01

Tor u house whose inhabitants may not
wish to be sucked into furnace ten
thousand fathoms deep, or roasted sub
acre GpertO; but il was then asleep, and
had never flung up spark or stone from
time immemorial. To those who look
upon It now in its terrors, grim, blasted,
and lifting up its sooty head among the
piles OF perpetual smoke that are to be
enlightened only by its bursts of fire the
very throne of pluto and Vulcan togeth-
er, no force Of fancy may picture what
1t was when the Roman built his palac-
es and pavilions on its side. A pyramid
OF three thousand feet high, painted over
'slth garden, forest, vineyard and orch
ard, rlpening under the southern sun,
zoned with colonades, and turrets, and
golden roofs, and marble porticOes, with
the eternal azure of the Campanian sky
for its canopy, and the Mediterranean at
It's feet. glittering in the coIors of sun
rise, noon and evening, like an infinite
Turkey carpet let down from the stems
OF throne,--all this was turned into
clnders, lava, and hot water, on (if we
can trust to chronology the first day of
November, Ammo Domiui 10, in the first
year Of the Emperor Titus. The whole
story is told in the younger Pliny's let.
tiers or, If the illustration of one who
thought himself born for describer, Dio
CdSsius, be sought, it will be found that
this eruption was worthy of the work il
had to do, and was handsome recon-
pense for the long slumber ofthe yolca-
no. The Continent throughout its whole
southern range, probably felt this yigor-
Gus awakening. Rome was covered
with the ashes, Of which Northern Afri-
ca, Egypt, Asia and Minor, had their
share the sun was turned into blood
and darkness, and the people thought
the destruction of the world had come.
At the close Of the eruption, Vesuy;.
us stood forth the naked Giant that he is
at this hour-the palaces and the gar
dens were all dust and air-the sky was
stained with that cloud which still sits
like crown of wrath upon his brow
the plain at his foot, where Herculane-
I'm and Pompeii spread their circnscs
aud temples, like children's toys, was
covered over with sand, charcoal, and
smoke; and the whole was left for
mighty moral against the Danger Of
trusting TO the sleep Of a volcano.
All was then at an end with the cities
below the population was burnt, and
had no more need Of houses. The Ro-
man mobiles had no passion for combust-
ion and kept aloof the winds and rain,
robbers, and the malaria, we're the sole
tenants of the land, and in this way roll
ed fifteen hundred years over the bones
OF the winners, sailors, and snug citizens
OF the Vcsuvian cities. But their time
was to come, and their beds were To- be
perforated by French and NeapoIitan
pick-axes, and 10 be visited by English
feet, and sketched and written about.
and Autographed, till all the world wish
ed that they had never been disturbed.
The fTstdiscoveries were accideutal.for
no Neapolitan ever stuck spade into
the ground that he could help, nor har.
bored voluntary idea but Of marcaro-
nj, intrigue, monkery, or the cunning
table. The spade struck upon a key,
which, of course, belonged to a door.
the door had an inscription and The
names of the buried cities we're brough.
TO light, 10 the bOundless perplexity OF
the learned, the merciless curiosity of
the blue-stockings Of the 18th century.
and all others to come, and the thank
less, reckless, and ridiculous profit of
that whole race ofrascality, the guides,
cicerones, abbes, and antiquariuus.
But Italian vigor is of all things the
most easily exhausted, where it has not
the lash or the bride to feed its waste,
and the cities slumbered for twenty
years more, till, in I'LL, a duke, who
was digging for marbles TO turn into
mortar, found a Hercules, and a whole
heap Of fractured beauties, a row of
Greek columns. and a little temple.
Again, the cities slumbered, till in 1888
a king OF Naples, on whom, light may
The earth rest, commenced digging, and
streets, temples, and theatres, opened
out 10 the sun, to be at rest no more.
SO few details ofthe original catastro-
phe are to be found in historians, that
we can scarcely estimate the actual hu-
man suffering, which is after all, almost
the only thing to be considered as mis-
fortune. II is probable that the popu-
lailon OF, at least, Pompeii, had time 10
make their escape. A pedlar's pack
would contain all the valuabIes left in
Pompeii, and the people who had time
thus TO clear their premises, must have
been singularly fond of hazard if they
staid lingering within the reach of the
eruption. But some melancholy evil
denceS remain that all were not SO sue
cessful. In one ofthe last excavations