The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1884-11-02

Roman towns, as Oplonto, which was cut
through when the railway was opened to Castel-
lammare-and the ancient towns found in the
diggings near Bosco-tre- Case and Bosco-reale, on
the slopes of Vesuvius above Pompeii. 1t also
may be said that in several of the countries of
southern Europe are other ancient towns that
were completely buried after the breaking-up of
the Roman empire. There is town
which a large book has been written
and there is another of equal size found in Port
ugal, across the Tagus south of Lisbon. All
these places have been many centuries IN their
graves
But to-day I wish to call the attention of
your readers to a town in northern Italy, which
was buried only little more than two centuries
ago, only three years before the landing at Ply
mouth. That is, If l can get the attention OF
your readers during the week of the presidential
election The place l refer to is, or rather was
Pleurs, or Piuro On the I'd of August, 1881, in
company with Harry Milligan and three agreea-
BILE ladies Harry is always on hand under such
clrcumstancesl, went from one end OF the Lake
of Como to the other, and at nightfall we stopped
ct a picturesque hotel in little village not far
from the head of the lake. The view was mag
nificent from our windows, for we could see
across the lake the nearer mountains of north
ern Italy, and looming, far beyond, in snowy
grandeur, those of southeastern Switzerland
We could also. see lesser elevations, but still
mountains, eighteen miles north of us, and be-
tween the base of these mountains began the
Italy they will see the Italian town of CHA
VIENNA, which is situated at the entrance of the
Val Bregaglia. Now, only four miles from
Chiavenna was once the happy, hourishing town
of Pleurs 1.-THE very name means tears( where
life was as dear to it's $500 inhabitants as to
any of u.s. But on the night of the 4th of Sep
TENDER, 1913 portion Of Monte Conto slid
down upon Pleurs and IT'S Two thousand and
five hundred people were buried in one huge
grave. Not single person escaped 1t was
nlaeA healthy
spot that the richer inhabitants of Chiavenna
had many country seats at Pleurs. When the
dreadful calamity occurred, from far and near
laborers were brought by hundreds, but long
continued excavations failed TO find anything
alive or dead. Indeed. it is said that with all
their labors nothing but a bell and two lamps
were found.
Here was an obliteration far beyond any
thing recorded in history; for no other town
that have ever heard OF, or read of, persisted
without some one left to tell the tale of de-
struction When Pompeii was over
whelmed it contained, according to
the best data, about 5000 inhabitants;
but of these it is computed that % 200 escaped
for the number of skeletons, or por-
tons of skeletons of human beings
found in the one third of the city already
excavated amounts to only 600. If we allow to
the remainder the same proportion, the total of
those who lost their lives at Pompeii would be
l,SOO. But at Pleurs, as one record has it.
every soul within it perished." The inhab
itants we are informed, had had many previous
warnings, to which, unfortunately for them,
they paid no heed. For ten years and more that
portion of Monte Comic, which hung over Pleurs
had shown great erevices. and on the very day
the catastrophe took place the shepherds on the
side of the mountain observed that their cows,
and sheep and goats fled in terror from the place.
The fact is that heavy rains preceded the
catastrophe, and, doubtless, the animals felt
starting or trembling of the huge mass of stones
and earth, and thus fled from the spot the
shepherds being compelled to follow their focks
and herds or their lives would have been sacri
feed as well as those of the inhabitants of
Pleurs. From our hotel on Lake Como we could
see the abrupt perpendicular cliff of Monte
Comic, which had thus been changed from the
wooded, sloping mountain of the morning to
something as steep as the palisades OF the
Hudson.
1t is now thirty nine years since Dr. George
b. Cheever wrote account of the overwhelm-
ing of Pleurs. Dr. Clever visited this region,
and walked from Chiavenna up the valley to
the place where poor Pleurs was buried. His
brief notice of the catastrophe was the first and
only which l ever saw until about nine
years ago when the Indianapolis journal pub
lShed very full account of the terrible de-
struction of Pleurs, probably taken from some
English paper or magazine. DR.. Cheever de-
scribed his feelings as he walked over the
ground out of which great chestnut trees of
more than two centuries now stood ut was,
Cheever writes, "a solemn thing to stand upon
the tomb of twenty five hundred beings, all
sepulchered alive. No efforts have ever
discovered trace Of the inhabitants, not
bone, not vestige. The mountains that Gov
ers them shall be thrown off az the resurrection,
but never before 1t is singular enough that the
town was situated on the tomb of another vii
lage which had previously been overwhelmed by
a similar catastrophe For that reason it was
named Pleurs The Town of Tears"
DR.. Cheever then, In his thoughtful manner
and he is as great a thought begetter as Cole
ridge-dwells on that which had made Pleurs
aplace that was sought for, "for," he continues,
Its lonely, romantic situation and pleasant air
attracted the wealthy families to spend especial
ly the summer months in so delightful retreat.
| wonder that no poet has made this scene the
subject of thrilling story The day before the
lid of their vast sepulchre fell the people were as
happy and as secure as those of Pompeii on the
night of the great Vesuvan eruption. At Pieurs
the sun rose and set on the 4th of September,
1918, as a bridegroom. The people lay down
securely to rest, or pursued their accustomed
festivities into the bosom of the night, with
plans for the morrow: but that night the noun
tain fell and destroyed them all At midnight
great roar was heard far over the country, and
shock felt as of an earthquake; and then a sol
emn stiffness followed. In the morning a cloud
of vapor hung over the valley, and the bed of
the Maria was dry. The river had been stopped
by the falling of the mountain across its chan
mel, and the town of Pleurs. with the village of
Celano, had disappeared forever.
How many a tale this green and rocky mound
doth tell of expectations blasted. of plans sud
denly broken, of domestic arrangements TRACE
dies and comedies interrupted in the midst of
pleasures and prayer, of loss and gain, of pow
erty and wealthsof sickness and health-all
overtaken at once; the dying and the living cut
off together, their death and burial being one
and the same,"
Certainly our minds are more arrested by such
a sudden, overwhelming calamity as that at
Pompeii, 70 A. D., or that at Peurs in 1913 or
that at Ischia in 1883, but when we think upon
it, there is even more food for reflection in the
thought that here in Naples, in forty-one days,
1900 human beings were swept into eternity by
a disease which was as fatal TO life as the ashes Of
Yesuvius to Pompeii, or the crushing mountain
that fell upon Pleurs. Elessed be God that
there is better world free from calamity, dis
ease and tears j. @. FLETCHER
PASQUILINO BRIGNOLI.