The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1886-02-07

highway to the heart Of Naples, as it has been
for more than nineteen hundred years. The
great ADpian way to Capua, within thirty
miles of Puteoli, thence this magnificent Roman
high road, under the name Of the Consular"
way was continued to Puteoli, and then the Con-
sular way pushed on through Neapolis (Naplesl,
Herculaneum, Pompeii, Stabia, Nucera, Saler-
mum, Paestum Gown to Rhegium. This tunnel
of Posilippo was formerly called the grotto or
tunnel of Puteoli. The arcients worked it in
this manner viz: they began their perforations
at each end, and, Also from above in two places
equldIstant from the termini of the tunnel.
The guide books. both Murray and Baedekar,
Will tell you that the perforatons or shafts from
above were made by Alfonso l. in the fifteenth
century, which is altogether wrong No less
than four tunnels OF Roman construction existed
In the vicinity OF Naples and they, all of them,
even the latest, redscovered and opened in 1872,
have shafts from above.
The Romans were great road, tunnel and
bridge builders. and we have never yet gwen
their engineers half the credit which we should
for their great science and skill Nowhere, not
even In the city OF Rome. or on the Roman
Campagna. are there SO many evidences OF their
engineering SKILL as are to be found in the vicln-
ity OF Naples A young architect from London,
with whom l have recently gone over tnese
classic scenes. has been perfectly astonlshed
at the engineering abilities displayed by the
Romans in their public and private works near
Naples. l have been glad to see that
at the recent meeting of the British
Association Of Science, held at Aberdeen,
Scotland, Mr.. b. Baker, an eminent British civil
engineer, read paper recalling certain eng!n-
eering feats of the ancients. AS there are many
engineers and others who are readers OF the
Journal think it will interest them for me to
quote one portion of Mr.. Bakers paper. Mr.:
Baker says: II have no doubt that as able and
enterprising engineers existed prior to the age OF
steam and steel as exist now, and their work was
as beneficial to mankind, though different in di
rectlon. In the important matter Of water sup
ply to towns, indeed, 1 doubt whether, having
reference to facility of execution, even greater
works were not done two thousand years ago
than now. Herodotus speaks of tunnel, eight
feet square and nearly a mile long, driven
through mountain in order to supply the city of
Samos with water, and his statement, though
long doubted, was verified in 1882, through the
abbot of neighboring cloister ac-
cldentally unearthing some stone slabs.
The German Archaeological Society
sent out Ernst Fabricius to make a complete
survey of the work, and the record reads like
that OF modern engineering undertaking.
Thus from covered reservoir in tbs hills pro-
ceeded an arched conduit about 1,000yards long,
partly driven as a tunnel and partly executed
on the cut and cover system adopted on the
London underground railway. The tunnel
proper, more than LOO yards in length, was
hewn by hammer and chisel through the solid
limestone rock It was driven from the two ends
like the great Alpine tunnels, without interme-
date shafts, and the engineers OF z, 400 years
ago might we'll be congratulated for getting only
some dozen feet out of level, and little more out
of line From the lower end of the tunnel
branches were constructed to supply the city
mains and fountains, and the explorers found
ventilating shafts and side entrances, earthen-
ware socket pipes with cement joints, and other
interesting details connected with the water
supply Of towns"
This tunnel of Posilippo is also fine specimen
of ancient engineering. Millions of human beings
have each year, for nearly twenty centuries,
passed through it. Roman chariots and other
ancient vehicles have left their autographs
scraped and scratched into the lining stone; and
modern wagons and carriages still rub their hubs
against it, leaving their traces for generations to
come. Strabo wrote about this tunnel; Seneca
described his passage through it; Petronius satir-
lied it. and Petrarch, Boccaccio. Cappaccio, and
more modern writer's have told US their thoughts
about it; and it seems good for thousand years
to come. Virgil's tomb is just above its eastern
entrance, and the poets farms (where he wrote
part of both the "Georgics" and the "Eneid')
are over it. But we will hasten through it to
Puteoi and Baia and other classic places, which
will be for my next letter. j. G. FLETCHER.