The Wellington enterprise. [volume] (Wellington, Ohio) 1867-188?, 1882-11-22
A BURIED CITY.

or nunDer OF weeks we naQ Deen
living at the foot of burning mountain,
in rough little village, bearing the fa-
nous name of Pompeii. a
Living IN Pompeii, and every morn
ing looking out of the windows to see If
Vesuyius is belching forth fatal flame,
or only threatening smoke, does not
mean that one is living among the ruins
of that old Roman city. We were in a
modern peasant hamlet of a few
scattering houses just outside the high
walls that shut in the ruins.
Most of the readers of the Companion
have heard the tragic story of Pom
peii-a bright city destroyed in the full
noon of a summers day, when its
streets were full of people, and its shops
of purchasers; when mothers in hum
dreds of shaded courts worked at their
embroidery, and watched their children
merrily at play around tinkling fount-
aims. The whole life of this gay italian
city was going on as busily and as nat
urally as life goes on in any American
city to-day, when that awful mountain
that lowered near it burst its bounds,
and rained q deadly tempest of scorch-
ing lava and blistering ashes down upon
it. For three long summer days the
air was filled with ashes, and the fiery
wa flowed, leaving, at last, a black
waste, beneath which Pompeii lay lost
to human sight for seventeen hundred
years.
Now, would like to tell you what
we saw in and about the ruins of this
buried city, just eighteen hundred years
from the day when its life was blotted
out forever.
Pompei was destroyed A. D. 79. AT
that time Italy was not known as
Italy. but as the Roman Empire, the
Proudest name in history; numbering
its subjects by millions upon millions Of
different races and different religions
AT the time of this great eruption
other cities OF the plain beside Pompeii
were swallowed up. The writer Pliny
was at this time on the shore of the
Mediterranean, and has stated that he
saw the black tempest extend over the
sea as well as over the plain. Some OF
the cities well known in history have
never been unearthed, and lie to-day
dead under fertile farms, gardens and
vineyards, Just as they have lain since
the day of their burial i'e
Pompeii itself is only partially ex-
cavated.i A large part of it still lies
dANCh SAOoAAu-
When the fiery storm ragged, many
Pompeians escaped, fleeing in boats by
the sea- Many, however, were over
whelmed, and died suffocated in cellars,
temples, even in tombs where they took
refuge. To-day can be seen, where ex-
cavations have already been made, hui
man forms in all the agonies of death,
and in one place the guides point out in
q nol1ar tho inHonfof1nnc n
by the heads of strangling women and
children They show also oil in glass
bottles; the bones of the chickens and
fish that had served for dinners, per
haps, the day before the tragedy; even
eggs and fruit preserved in their natural
forms. There are also joints of meal
and trussed fowls Just ready to be
cooked, or just cooked, and also the
skeletons of domestic animals twisted in
every form of painful death.
From the position of some of the hui
man bodies, it is supposed that they had
once escaped, but returning after the
storm was over to dig among the ashes
for some traces of their homes, were
even then swallowed up by the shifting
lava, or strangled by the lingering sui.
phurous fumes Some of these bodies
may have been those of thieves from
neighboring Naples, digging for valu.
ables to which they had no right 3
So much of Pompeii has been un.
earthed that one can freely wander
through the streets, enter at viii the
rooAess dwellings, bath places, temples
and shops. and muse among the statues
of the public squares, The principal
streets are as narrow as alleys, as was
the fashion of cities in those days, and
have turning-off places, where one char
lot must wait for another to pass. They
are paved with immense square stones,
and upon the stones one can plainly see
ruts worn by wheels eighteen centuries
ago. Upon the house walls also can be
seen painted notices serving the same
purposes as modern placards, and an
nouncing that such and such a Pompei-
an citizen is candidate for the votes oi
bis fellow-eitizens, while upon street
corners are still visible, although almost
obliterated, names and numbers. Ir
he shops one can see the counters
where wine and oil were sold, with tbs
basins to hold those fluids, now full OF
rain-water. In the bakers shops are
still the ovens from which perfec
toaves of bread, burnt black, were
aiken only few years age, the same
loayes that one can see now at the mu
scum pear the gate. ses'
So clase is one brought to the every.
lay life of the old Pompeians among
.hese ruins, from whence it seems as /
the owners had only just gone, that i
seems almt s. impertinent to enter thei
houses in their absence. The walls ar,
Ill standing. covered still with the ga,
rescos of flowers. fruits and ligeres