New-York tribune., 1908-04-11
P4RTHENOPE.
n LoUelY Region, It's Ruins and lis
Stories.
THE NAPLES RIVIERA. Rv Herbert VI. Naughar
illustrated l2mo, pT. go Frederick 4. Stoke
Company.

THE NAPLES RIVIERA. Rv Herbert VI Vaughan.
illustrated. l2mo, pp. go. Frederick 4. Stokes
COMPANY
To who knows by heart tho enchanting
region OF which Mr.. Vaughan writes, this book
comes to vivify a thousand remembered dc
lights; 10 who never hope to tread those
shores it brings their witchery of beauty and
of romantic history. 1t is "A tissue Of fresh and
piquant description and Of spirited narrative.
That IL may we'll be- for there few spots in
Europe which can offer more picturesque mate
rial than that to be found the Riviera
stretching from Cuma 10 Saerno. Stories Of
ancient days when Greek heroes or Roman en-
perOrs played more or less tragic parts upon the
scene; strange episodes of the Middle Ages;
glimpses of the fascinating world of the Renais
sance, and pictures of period nearer and hardly
less dramatic-of all these author treats
with an evident enjoyment at which his reader
takes fire.
There is not much to be said for Naples her
self to-day, for the city of Queen Giovanna is
being rapidly transformed into a Liverpool of
the South" Rebuilt in the ugliest modern fash
ion. there is little TO recall its former history,
the gloomy and ruinous castle prison that
frowns upon the shore. Setting forth il the d.
rection of Vesuvius are stayed at Hercula-
neum long enough for the author to remind
of the outrageously ruthless and ignorant way
in which the earlier excavations were made and
to tantaIize us with observations the vast
quantity Of treasures which must still exist un
touched in that grave of a city, far beneath the
surface The chapter the history of the
great volcano that dominates the shore leads us
TO another DEVOTED to the exquisitely lovely drive
from CasteIIainare to Amalf. Wherever he goes
Mr.. Vaughan is careful TO bring the human in
terest into the scene. Even the colorless cathe-
draI in the little town of Vico Equense has its
bit of tragedy recorded in the omission OF one
portrait from a row of pictured visages of past
bishops In the place where Monsignore Natale's
face should be is medallion Of a cherub with
the forefnger Of his right hand pressed in token
of silence upon his lips. Natalie, a patriot and
a Liberal, was hanged by Neapoitan mob on a.
summer day in 1899 under circumstances of
monstrous brutality Another bishop Of the
region one Tafuri OF Ravello. Mr.. Vaughan men
tions with less kindness than he accords to
Natalie The Cathedral of st. Pantaleone, built
in Ravello in the thirteenth century, was
miracle of mosaic and fresco and carving,
glowing mass of beautiful color. 1t is now de
scribed as a dull, soulless cavern or stucco- lts
present state dates from the eighteenth CEN
fury Mr. Vaughan says that Tafurl, in MS
frenzied eagerness to possess cathedral worthy
OF comparison with the fashionable atrocities IN
MASTER then being erected at Naples did not
hesitate to destroy wholesale al IlIe a'4"'0i'' N
ella borste ornamentation Of his Duomo. His ar
chitect-perhaps the miserable Faga' VINO ruined
the interior Of the cathedral at Palermo VINO
,,nowsa-dug I'D the fine old pavement, tore out
The roosaics and had them carted away, effaced
the frescos, and at last transformed the ven
erable building with its memories Of popes and
princes into commonplace whitewashed cham
her" Only the famous pulpit was left un-
touched.
The beautiful islands that ln of the Par
tbenonean shore furnish rich store OF sug-
1estion 10 the chronicer Here is Capri OF
whose charms the Emperor Augustus was the
discoverer-moved thereto. they say py the
breaking into leaf of withered lex Tree at 'no