Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-05-10
NAPLES OLD AND NEW
A City of Curious Contrasts and Rich
Historic Memories.
1 SPOT THAT INSPIRES ART
And Stirs the Mind and Heart in Manner
Most Magical.
A PARADISE FOR POETIC DREAMERS

NAPLES, ITALY, April 9.-There can be
nothing more restlul and delicious than the
trip by steamer from Palermo, Sicily, acros,
the italian arm OF the Mediterranean to the
bright and slovenly, magnificent and detest.
able metropolis of Italy, landlord-cursed,
nobility-housing. revolution-breeding, laz-
zaroni-producing, retrogressive, yet always
progressive, Naples.
Aside from the soft and tender skies, the
landward perfumes which, despite ones
highest efforts at mental activity, insiduous-
ly impel siesta and sleep, and such intoxi-
eating zephyrs that one no longer wonders at
the inspiration to an art which left us the
Farnese Narcissus, the Venus of Capua, or
Milo, the impaIpable Echo turned to an eter-
nal human listener in countless forms by
brush or chisel, or as many matchless DI-
anas bending over their white and slumber-
full Endymions to kiss them back to con-
sciousness, all the way eastward toward the
Neapolitan shore the mind and heart are
marvelously wrought by the story of the
peoples and places of this wave-washed west
ern peninsula-edge of Italy. The sky, air
and sea are tenderly enthralling to the phys
ical sense; but there is an intensity of men
tai interest that fills the soul of thought
with as tender and hushed solemnity. In
front of this shore one stands lace to face
with human tragedies of the densest OF Old
World populations and activities for 5000
years; indeed, from q time when mythology
tells us gods were half men, and men were
demi-gods, down past that almost inconceiv-
able reach of time in which the very face of
sea and earth were changed, innumerable
races and dvnasties grew to perfection, and
passed away, miracles of cities were built,
lost from sight, dug out again and repeopled,
and the splendid, yet pathetic, Italy Of to-
day sits buried in bloom and vine above the
half-known monuments of the past, no re-
naissance of power and art can ever again
produce.
STIRS MIND AND HEART.
The night, the sea, the balmy airs and the
glowing stars compel the mood for these
wondrous sweeps of thought-life, resist
them as you may. But when the morning
comes and sets just there before you
hundred miles of storied shore-the sunny
islands nearest, the background of green
and purple mountains with Vesuvius loom
ing over all, the splendid city of Naples,
reaching its shining arms to the right and
left about the luminous bay, and then a
half hundred cities and villages climbing
the craggy shore, like professions OF cowled
monks pilgriming to as many mountain
shrines-the consciousness of presence and
reality, where in ones thought throughout
the lifetime before all had been as vague
and misty dream, stirs the mind and heart
magically to their profoundest depths.
The first complete view of the Gulf of
Naples sweeps the thought to time when,
even ages back of the peopllng of the first
Naples, old Parthenope, by the Greeks, the
present conformation of shore, outreaching
promontories and farther vine-clad islands
was made by the action of some monstrous
prehistoric volcano with crater hun
dred times as vast as that possessed by either
Etna or Vesuvius to-day. This, rearing its
head above the sea, boiled and roared, per-
haps Tor other ages, and then sank back be-
meath the waves. The waters cleaning
above it to-day are those Of the G ult OF Ma
Piles. The broken volcanoes edges, still
standing. mark the semicircular heights
above the city of Naples. the long, splendid
arm sweeping around to the south, below
which is Salerno Gulf, and then, out to sea,
are its outjuttings, showing in Mount st.
Contanzo and the island of Capri; while its
northern rim is outlined by the heights
west of Naples, Cape Misenum and the
islands of Procida and Ischia, breaking of
grandly to the southwest
A POETIC PEN PICTURE.
More than three-quarters of the rim of
this tremendous extinct crater is thus
clearly discerned. AS late as 1902 Mount
Epomeo, in Ischia, hinted of the olden
volcanic furies by pouring out destructive
floods of lava; while, dominating the
eastern shore of the guilt, and marking the
limits of volcanic action on that side OF the
original mouth of flame, Vesuyius has since
stood grim, silent and burnt mountain"
at the time of Christ's birth, but in the
year 70 burning and crumbling into two
great divisions; and, though sending forth
no lava, belching such showers of hot and
wet ashes, as to hide splendid HeEculaneum
and lordly Pompeii from sight of human
eyes for 1900 years.
Naples itself faces the south along that
northern arm of the gulf known as the Bay
of Naples; and you have picture of its
shape and contour if you will imagine
tremendous checkered-back turtle which has
crept down a steep bank to'a glowing water
side, to bask there in the sun. Its wary head
is the Castle DELI Ovo. Its fore legs stretch
lazily around to the east and west. Its hind
legs protrude to the right and left In the
countryward streets of Salute and Foria.
And its shining tail is represented by the
splendid height of Capodimonte behind,
where gleam the walls of that noble pile,
the Pallazo Reale.
must have had its origin in the mind of
some enthusiast who approached the city
from the sea. Across foreground of bluest |
waters and brightest sails, is seen a marvel |
ously beautiful shore, dotted by villa, ham
let, church and shrine, and then, around to |
the north, with Vesuvius ever sending forth |
its threatening smoke above, lies the won
derfully enhancing region of the dead cities |
-Castellammare, Pompeii and Hercula-
neum, the latter but two hours stroll from |
the splendid city which reaches even to it |
in thickly-settled environs embowered in |
vines and flowers.
GRAND HISTORIC MEMORIES.
Within this still standing almost COM
plete circle of olden crater-rim what maies- |
tic historic memories are awakened. There |
where tiny Capri. the ancients' ''island OF
goats, receives against its headland walls
the thunderings Of the Mediterranean, Ii
berius lay concealed nearly q year after the
fall of Sejanus; during the Napoleonic wars
the island was taken by the English and
fortified into another Gibraltar; and then
retaken by a brilliant coup-de-main of the
dashing Prince Murat. Sorrento, lust
around within the mainland gull edge, the
ancient Surrentum of the Romans, is the
birthplace or immortal Tasso, who after his
glorious but inexpressibly sad and pathetic
career returned, disguised as a wandering
shepherd, and was welcomed and adored by
his devoted sister, Cornelia. Beyond, is
Castellammare, now the summer resort Of
the Nea politan aristocracy just as it WASH in
ancient times when Augustus, NJ. Agrippa
and Antonius Plus sought the cool cloisters
of its majestic chestnut groves and enjoyed,
as one may now enjoy, the fragrance and de-
light of its orange groves and plantations of
mulberry, pomegranate, fig and olive; and
where the elder PlinY perished while OBJ
serving the Vesuvian eruption which buried
the city and with it Herculanenm and |