The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1869-02-05

heIleh oven, lust as the af Win US lb Winner 1
trembles over the hot stoves.
On the whole side of the mountain the diff |
ferent streams of hard lava stretched clear
down. The stream which had poured down
on this side fortnight before had remained
on half the height of the mountain, aud
stretched over the grey fields of ashes like
broad river Of black olods and pieces. Deeper
beneath, the older lava had formed dark
lake in the green pastures. Still farther down
Law the ruins of POmpeii, which had imbedded
itself right in the midst of a fruitful semi
circle, beautifully bounded by hill and sea.
Yet the eye was always drawn away from
the land as by sparkling mass of light TO the
gulf and its shining surface. Here, deep
beneath us, the steep incline Of Vesuvius rose
straight up from the mirror of the sea. AT
both sides the rocky coasts and, opposite, the
strand Of the islands, were surrounded by
mist like thin silver veil, but high above,
throned in the blue sky, sharply notched,
rose on the left the high peaked Mont Angelo;
in the middle, the huge rock of Capri, lying
straight before the gulf, on the right, the
proud royal head OF the EpomeO at Ischia. On
sharper examination, white points sparkled
through the whtish mist-the castle
of ST. Elmo, Nisita, Vivsra, Procida,
Iscbia. Here, in this joy and splen-
dor of the earth, men found II forever neoes-
sary to add one prison to another in order
to chain the volcanic outbreaks of the suffer
ing people. Far behind and besIeen the
islands and promontories, which are crowned
with forts and prisons, the midland sea
sparkled clearly. But it was rarely that
white sail was seen passing over it into the
gulf. The finest bay in the world is from
morning to evening as deserted and solitary as
if its shores were occupied by poor fshermen's
villages, and not by capital of half million
of men. To sea 10 sea thither roll all the
good fates of Italy. If this land is to be healed
and made sound, its inhabitants must learn to
move on the sea, to build ships, to found
mercantile associations and to seize again on
the trade of the Levant. But where shall
men of enterprise come among this people,
who always hang their little prOvisiOn-bag
around their necks, and think OF nothing the
entire day but how to fill it in the morning
and empty it in the EVENING" Must one
wait for more ship-owners and merchants
| from other peoples to settle on these shores,
| to send out fleets of trading vessels on the
scar In this the Italians could even learn
from the Greeks, whose lively activity on the
| sea leaves them already far behind, in spite
of old Turkish oppression and new English
envy.
Yet also in our vicinity there was something
! to see. Around our breakfast-place there
swarmed little narrow chafers of a dark brown
! color, like those one finds with us under
every loose stone. How came they upY When
one scratched the ashes with stick, a couple
! of them would fall dead Immediately from the
hot exhalstion. They had not, therefore,
craWled up. Neither could their larva have
lain among the old rubbish; for the ashes,
which had covered it, had come too lately from
the crater above us. The chafers must
therefore, have been, while fying-for they
had wing g-sheatbs-taken in swarms by cur
rent of air, and carried up the mountain. S ILL.,
their great number remains enigmatical. This
swarming little life near the hot jaws of desc
lation
When our breakfast was eaten, and our
guide appeared in better humOr, again urged
him to attempt climbing up the mountain.
Again, with every appearance of terror, he
refused, and implored us to come some other
| day, when the mountain was queter. | asked
him what he would do if we went up without
him ? Then he would wait two hours, he said,
and if we did not come back he would 90
down and give notice. As my wife, also, had
long been convinced that there was no danger,
we began to climb up. twas not so difficult,
because the ground, although very hot in
some places, consisted less of loose ashes than
of stones and new kind OF sulphur-cakes.
On looking back, saw that our good Curzo
Dominica-so our guide was called-had seated
himself TRANQUILITY. But when we entered the
clouds he sprang up suddenly, was with us in
a few bounds, and played again the diligent
and oblging servant, picking his way skill
| 1ully between the yellow heaps of sulphur.
In less than ten minutes we were on the top.
| AS If stunned, we stood in the beginning at
the bowling and raging and crashing before
us and beneath US. We looked as il from the
sharp edge of a wild uptorn chain of noun
tains down into a huge black gulf full of
steam, from which boiling currents of air and
black masses were thrown up. BY degrees,
when the clouds divided little, the outlines
became clearer and the view more quiet for
observation. 1t was the most frightful and
at the same time most magnificent scene
| one of those spectacles which fix themselves
powerfully ia the memory and remain hence
forth indestructible, justas when one has seen
for the first time the great ocean in wild
storm and tempest.
Five years before as already remarked, the
crater was on the level summit of the noun
tain, in the middle of which it formed beau
tiful wide circle. Its inner walls shone in
every color, diversified and hung with the
most beautiful crystals of sulphur, green and
red and yellow and brown. The bottom was
level ground of ashes and sulphur; here and
there a little cleft showed ITSELF out of which
steam drizzled up. The whole was an empty
kettle of immense diameter sunk into the fiat
head of the mountain, quite empty, and with
beautiful yellow sides.
II was now altogether different. The crater
seemed much smaller and much less deep, but
it had black fssured walls with sharp reefs
Just like the Somma when seen from below.
A deep and black uptorn mountain peak would
give the best idea of it. The ground, how
ever, was level as formerly, and covered with
ashes and sulphur. In the floor of the crater,
straight below us, was a large round hole,
exactly in the middle, out of which there was
o constant kissing and gurgling. A yellow