The Savannah morning news., 1902-02-16
REV. Mr.. STR0NG'S LETTER.
VISIT TO THE OLD CITY OF
POMPEII.

rhe Number Living Within Its
Gates at the Time of Its Destruc-
tion-What the People Were Do
ing at the Time of the Eruption
of Vesuvius-Tbe Lost City Re-
mained Lost 1,SOO Years-The
Little POmpeian Museum and Its
Contents-A Description of the
Theaters How the Pompeians
Kent Warm-A Glance at Their
HOmes-They Were Houses ON the
Ground-Other Matters of Special
Interest.
i Aired and twenty two years ago, one
midsummer day, Pompeii disappeared
from sight beneath an eruption of We
suyius. 1t was a very old city even
then; it appears in history 800 years be-
fore Christ, but its walls and charac-
Il Ter of architecture show it to have had
II local habitation and a name on the
earth many years earlier. At the time
of the destruction 10000 people lived
within its gates. They were not all de-
f stroyed, as barely hundred bodies
have been found en-ashed, as it were.
II was a common summer day, such
as exists every summer on that beau
tful bay. There had been few symp-
toms of disease in that fiery neighbor
of Nero's; perhaps a rumbling or two
underground, and the smoke out of its
laws took the not unusual form of a
pine-tree, as the younger Pliny tells us
in an extant letter. No eruption had
taken place within the memory of
man, although evidences exist of them
|. in prehistoric times. The whole busy
life of provincial town of the third
class began that day-Aug. "A, 79 A. D..
1.-The same as on every day before.
Only the housekeeper did his market
ing early-the baker cooked his loaves
over night (and his loaves were found
I'm the oven 1900 years later, and the
wine merchant filled his amphoral with
good F'alernian wine for the crowd, OF
country folk that were coming to
town-because that day was a red-let-
ter one in the history of the city. Great
games, vast gladiatorial contests, char
lot races were to take place in the am
phitheater, capable of seating 10000
persons. Nero had stopped their games
for ten years as punishment to the
citizens who had offended his imperial,
or rather satanic, majesty. But now
. these bloody scenes were to be renewed
with new barbarity. There was lion
of two which had only arrived a few
days ago; there was also a Christian
or two, one of the hated sect of the
Nazarenes who refused to sacrifice TO
the gods; SO there was to be great
sport that dayl The whole population
14n1 ia6 1rcr1 firta
and were crowdlng down the streets Of
Abundanzia and Mold to the eastern
part of the city where stood the great
amphitheater. Dion CaSSiuS tells us
4 that here was assembled on that fate
full morning the entire population of
the city-save, of course, the few pris-
oners in the Jail (whose forms manacled
with iron have been dug), and the
wounded gladiators in their barracks;
all the rest were at the games. The
magistrates were in the lower tier of
81 seats next to the arena; the second tier
Il was occupied by the middle classes;
while the slaves and plebians were
crowding the upper tiers. A gladia-
torial contest between the swordman
and the net-man had already taken
place and the net had been successfully
flung over his antagonist, and the aud
ience, by turning their thumbs down,
had condemned the unfortunate man
to DEATH His body had been dragged
out of the arena, and sand sprinkled
over the blood to prevent the stones
from being slippery. And now the
n great event; the lion and the Christian
who was given a short knife to protect
81 himself. AT that moment came the
rumbling loud and clear; next the
81 stream of flame fled upwards from the
crater belching forth scoriae and rocks,
which fell in SWarms over the city.
"a The crowd fled tnrrOr- stricken from the
theater. They crowded down the mar
n row streets, only wide enough for one
Roman chariot towards the sea. There
was time for most of them who did not
Voluntarily seek refuge in their houses,
10 escape. All that day, all that night
as snow falls layer on layer on win
Yer meadows, the stream tell of ashes,
mud and scoTiae. When daylight broke
again, there was left of Pompeii above
the stream of debris only the highest
wall of the theater; all else-houses,
temples, forums, baths, art in sculp-
lure and painting-was buried out Of
the sight of man.
And there it remained-a lost city
iof 1900 years. This was strange, too,
because the wall of which / have spok-
en-, remained always in sight, still more
strdhge when we remember that an
aqueduct for carrying water to neigh
St4HS CITY was run TOT nearly a ullle
beneath its ruins. Yet it was not until
l,4S that a peasant in digging a well
discovered a painted room with sculp-
lures and other objects of antiquity;
then interest became keen. In more
OF less desultory way the excavations
FL We're continued until nearly half of The
city has been laid bare and now the
Italian government works regularly ev-
cry year, but at the rate the work is
proceeding 1t will take fifty years and
some millions of money before Pompeii
Is entirely restored to the world. An
enterprising engineer of our country
would do the work-in, we will say,
one ear,judging from the excavations
now being done in New York city.
Meanwhile the buried city Is a -four
shlng cabbage garden on top. Think
oI cabbages growing over such wealth
Vi stdtuary and painting!
it was not altogether a bright day
Wheh we took the train at Naples to
hwdFel the fourteen miles to Pompeii.
Aou travel part OF the way between
t WIS OF maccaroni on the one side and
M ruins OF Herculaneum on the other.
me latter city having been overwhelm-
ny the lava, instead OF ashes. Is
sDacely eXoavated at all. Within an
u"uf we reach the station within 200
gsiua of the Sea Gate OF Pompeii.
WIN expectation raised TO the highest
W pass through the crowd Of beggars
" lUlTa ..I.