J 
 
 , 
 
PMUKKi Recording k Act of O-npres*, in the year 185*, bv 
 
 KIG3INS & KELLOGG, 
 
 In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United Statet, for tbt Souther 
 Pintriot of .Yew York 
 
 W. H TI.ISOV, Stereotype* K. O. J> 
 
TO 
 3D E .A. & ML 
 
 THIS LITTLE BOOK 
 
 IS LOVINGLY OFFERED. 
 
 University of California Berkeley 
 
 Bequest of 
 Norman Neuerburg 
 
PKEF A CE. 
 
 FOE the benefit of my young friends in America, who 
 have not read about Vesuvius and the cities which once 
 lay at its foot, I have written this little story of Mary 
 and her Mother. While I write, the great volcano is 
 before me, sending up a column of white smoke, which 
 turns to a soft purple when the sun is going down. I 
 trust my young readers will find as much pleasure in 
 perusing this book, as I have found in writing it for 
 them. 
 
 NAPLES, March 8, 1856. 
 
CO!N TENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 PA OK 
 
 Mary's Arrival at Naples, and her Walk along the Bay, ... 9 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 Conversation with her Mot'ier about Pompeii and Herculaneum, . 28 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 Another Conversation, 88 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 The Drive to Pompeii, 53 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 Mary and her Mother walk through Pompeii, 66 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 The Ride to the foot of the Cone of Vesuvius, . . , . .92 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 Ascent of the Cone, 105 
 
 vii 
 
CONTENTS. 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 MM 
 
 Visit to the Bourbon Museum, : . 121 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 The Museum continued, 186 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 The Museum still continued, 153 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 Visit to Herculaneum, Drive to Sorrento, and Sail to Capri, . . 168 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 Visit to the Grotta Azzurra, or Blue Grotto, and Conclusion, . 188 
 
MARY BROWN 
 
 NAPLES, POMPEII AND HERCULANEUM. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 IT was on a bright day in February, 1856, that 
 Mary Brown and her mother arrived at the gay city 
 of Naples, and took rooms in the Albergo di Gene- 
 vra. This hotel amused Mary very much, because 
 the outside was painted a pale pink ; but she soon 
 saw that it was the fashion in Naples to paint the 
 houses pink and yellow, as well as white. After a 
 few days she would hardly have thought of noticing 
 it, had it not been that her attention was again 
 called to it by some things about which I shall tell 
 you. 
 
 Naples, as all my young friends know, is in Italy. 
 They know, also, that Italy is shaped something like 
 
10 MARY BROWN AT NAPLES. 
 
 a boot, and that Naples lies on the front of the 
 boot, just above the ankle. They have, perhaps, 
 heard that this noted city is situated on the shore of 
 one of the most beautiful bays in the world. Hills 
 rise all around the Bay, and between them and the 
 shore are several towns, made up of white houses. 
 Off at one side is Mount Vesuvius, which every 
 body knows, is a famous volcano. 
 
 Mary Brown had often heard her mother talk of 
 the Bay of Naples, and of her great desire to see it. 
 She was not much surprised, therefore, when her 
 mother said, " Mary, my dear, put on your bonnet 
 and we will take a walk and see the Bay before 
 dinner. 
 
 Mary was ready in a minute. They went down 
 the great stairway of the hotel, and out into the 
 street. They stopped to admire a fountain. It 
 was of bronze, and represented a man standing on 
 a large, flat basin, which was supported by several 
 bronze figures of women. The man held in his hand 
 a trident, from the prongs of which the water spouted 
 up above his head, and then fell into a great basin 
 far below. Mrs. Brown told her daughter that the 
 bronze man was Neptune, the god of the sea, who 
 
MAKY BEOWN AT NAPLES. 11 
 
 always carried a trident for a sceptre. Mary well 
 remembered that she had seen a picture of Neptune 
 in a little book she had left in' America, which told 
 about the ancient gods of Greece and Rome. 
 
 " The figures that hold up the basin are Nereids, 
 Mary," said Mrs. Brown. 
 
 " What are Nereids, mamma ?" 
 
 " Nereids were beautiful, fabulous maidens who 
 lived in the Mediterranean. They dwelt at the bot 
 tom of the sea, and were kind to sailors." 
 
 "And what are those little men in the basin 
 below? They are riding on some queer-looking 
 animals," said Mary. 
 
 " They are probably Tritons," replied her mother. 
 
 " But, mamma, I do not know what Tritons are." 
 
 " They, too, were inhabitants of the sea," said 
 Mrs. Brown. " They accompanied Neptune, the 
 great sea-god. They used shells for trumpets, and 
 when they blew on those shells the sea became 
 quiet." 
 
 Mary stood for some minutes, looking at this 
 pretty fountain. At last she said : " If those men 
 were really alive, mamma, I am sure they would 
 not like to stand so long in such a shower." 
 
12 MAKY BKOWN AT NAPLES. 
 
 "Oh, my dear," said Mrs. Brown, "ywi must 
 make befleve, as children say, that they really are 
 sea-gods, and then, you know, nothing could please 
 them so much as to be in the water." 
 
 Mary laughed, and they passed on. In a few 
 minutes they came to an iron railing, in front of 
 a beautiful garden. Before the gate a soldier was 
 slowly walking up and down ; and on the great 
 stone piers, on each side of the gate, was a horse, 
 with a slave holding him. The horses and the slaves 
 were of bronze. In the garden were palm trees 
 and pine trees. The Italian pine is not like ours. 
 The trunk is very tall, and the branches spread out 
 at the top, like a great umbrella. Behind the trees 
 of the garden Mary saw a long pink house, with 
 many windows. Her mother told her it was the 
 palace of Ferdinand II., King of Naples. Mary 
 wished that she could see the king, for she had never 
 seen a king or a queen, although she had read about 
 them in her story books, and had studied about 
 them at school. So she was delighted when her 
 mother said that, perhaps, some day she would see 
 hun ride past in his coach. 
 
 The street they went through had a great many 
 
MARY BROWN AT NAPLES. 13 
 
 jewellers' shops on one side of it, and Mary stopped 
 to look in at the windows. She saw there many 
 beautiful breast-pins, made of coral, cut into bunches 
 of flowers. She saw, also, a great many strings 
 of red coral beads, such as she wore on her neck. 
 She saw, besides, some breast-pins of grey, blue, 
 white, and red lava. 
 
 " There, mamma," she exclaimed, " are the lava 
 pins you told me I should see at Naples, are they 
 not ? How many there are ! Are they really made 
 out of the lava that comes from Mount Vesuvius ? 
 And when shall we see Mount Vesuvius, mamma ?" 
 
 Mrs. Brown smiled at her daughter's questions, 
 for she saw that the cnild was eager to see the 
 famous volcano, about which she had heard her 
 father talk in the long winter evenings at home. 
 
 " Perhaps we shall see Vesuvius to-day, my child," 
 she said, " and we must not stop here to look at 
 these pretty things, or we shall lose the sunset on 
 the Bay." 
 
 Mary and her mother entered a beautiful narrow 
 
 park, which lay along the beach. Its walks were 
 
 bordered with fine trees and bushes. The laurusti- 
 
 nus was just putting out its fragrant white flowers, 
 
 2 
 
14: MARY BROWN AT NAPLES. 
 
 roses were as reel and sweet as in summer at home, 
 and the light foliage of the pepper tree was gently 
 moving in the almost quiet air. 
 
 Crossing the park, Mrs. Brown and Mary reached 
 the shore of the Bay, and stood for a while silent, 
 delighted with the beautiful view. 
 
 " Oh, mamma," said Mary, at last, " is it not 
 beautiful ! The Bay is shaped like a horse-shoe, and 
 what a lovely pale blue that distant mountain is, 
 which lies in front of us. It shuts up the Bay, does 
 it not ?" 
 
 " From here, it does appear partially to shut up 
 the Bay, my love," replied Mrs. Brown. " It is an 
 island, the island of Capri ; and there is something 
 there you would greatly like to see." 
 
 " What is it, mamma ?" 
 
 "It is a cave, which people call the Grotta 
 Azzurra, or the Blue Grotto, because its walls and 
 roof are of a beautiful blue. The cave overhangs 
 the sea, so that it has no pavement but the water." 
 
 " Can you go into it, mamma ?" 
 
 " Yes, in a boat ; but the entrance is close down 
 at the water's edge, and you have to lie down in the 
 boat, to pass under the rocks v 
 
MAEY BEOWN AT NAPLES. 15 
 
 "And can you not stand up, at all ?" asked Mary, 
 eagerly. 
 
 "When you have once passed through the en 
 trance, you can/' replied her mother ; " the walls 
 are quite high within." 
 
 "And can we go there ?" 
 
 " I hope so, if we have good weather. When the 
 sea is rough, the grotto cannot be entered. The 
 waves dash up too high over the hole through which 
 you go in." 
 
 " I think I should be afraid," said Mary. 
 
 "There is no danger in a quiet sea, my dear," 
 replied Mrs. Brown. 
 
 " But what makes the grotto blue ?" asked 
 Mary. 
 
 " The water is shallow in the cave, and very clear. 
 The bottom is covered with white sand. People 
 think the blue color of the Bay is reflected through 
 the narrow doorway, up on the roof. Do you 
 understand, my dear ?" 
 
 "I think I do," replied Mary; "but are not the 
 rocks blue ?" 
 
 "No, my child, they are brown, like other rocks." 
 
 " Oh, how much I should like to go !" exclaimed 
 
16 MART BROWN AT NAPLES. 
 
 Mary, " how much I should like to go and see this 
 cave. I wish we could go to-morrow." 
 
 " There are many other things to see, my child, 
 which will, perhaps, interest you as much as the 
 Blue Grotto," said Mrs. Brown. " But how do you 
 like the Bay ?" 
 
 " Oh, so much, mamma ! What is that castle 
 that stands so like a picture in the water ?" 
 
 " It is the Castello dell' Ovo, or Castle of the Egg, 
 and has stood there seven hundred years. It is 
 built on a great rock ; and around on the other side 
 of the point, off to our right, is the little town of 
 Pozzuoli. It was formerly called Puteoli, and is the 
 place where Paul landed, on his way to Rome. 
 Towards the end of the Bay, on our left, is Sor 
 rento, another town, and a beautiful place in sum 
 mer." 
 
 "And what, mamma," asked Mary, "are those 
 two mountains, or great hills, on our left ? They 
 look like two peaks of one mountain, only the 
 mountain is not very large." 
 
 " The one towards Sorrento, my child," said Mrs, 
 Brown, "has a little cloud over it, as you see. 
 What do you think it is ?" 
 
MAKY BEOWN AT NAPLES. 17 
 
 "Why, mamma, I do not know. It is not, it 
 cannot be Mount Vesuvius !" And Mary's face 
 began to light up. 
 
 "And why not ?" asked her mother. 
 
 " It is not big enough. Is it, mamma, is it Vesu 
 vius ?" 
 
 "Yes, my child, it is Vesuvius," 
 
 " Oh, I am so sorry !" 
 
 "Why, Mary?" 
 
 " I thought Vesuvius was the largest mountain in 
 the world, and I have seen a great many larger. Is 
 it really Vesuvius ?" 
 
 " It is really Vesuvius, my child ; it is almost at 
 rest now. When there is an eruption, it is terrific 
 enough, although it is not so huge a mountain as 
 you thought. Look at the mountain, Mary, and 
 imagine streams of red hot lava rolling like rivers 
 down its side. Then imagine, besides, a great 
 cloud hanging over the top of the mountain, its 
 under surface all red with the glow from the hot 
 lava beneath. Then, think of showers of stones 
 flying up out of the volcano, and loud reports, like 
 great cannons. Think, too, of the earth trembling 
 every now and then, as if some great power shook 
 2* 
 
18 MARY BKOWK AT NAPLES. 
 
 it. Do you not think Vesuvius would seem grand 
 then ?" 
 
 " Yes, indeed, mamma. I am quite afraid of the 
 mountain. But I am so surprised I should not 
 have thought it was a volcano, at all. I thought 
 that smoke was just a little cloud stopping on the 
 top, a moment ; I did not think it belonged there. 
 Why, it looks like a little smoke from a chimney." 
 
 " When we ascend Vesuvius, my love as I hope 
 we shall do you will, perhaps, find enough to 
 surprise you." 
 
 " Shall we really go up the mountain, mamma ? 
 Oh, I am so glad !" And Mary clapped her hands, 
 and danced along the beach. 
 
 " Come," said Mrs. Brown, " we will walk along 
 and look at this wonderful mountain while the sun is 
 setting. See, the west is beginning to grow bril 
 liant, and the rays are shooting across the Bay to 
 Vesuvius." 
 
 "And see, mamma, how white the string of houses 
 looks, that lies along the water at the foot of the 
 mountain. They look like toy houses, do they not ? 
 and yet, I suppose, they are large enough for people 
 to live in." 
 
MA.RY BROWN AT NAPLES. 19 
 
 " Some of them are very large, my dear. That 
 line of houses extends almost from Naples to Sor 
 rento. It forms several small towns, one of which I 
 will point out to you. Just beyond Naples, lies 
 Portici. Do you see where I point ?" 
 
 "Yes, mamma." 
 
 " Next beyond it, lies Resina, another little town, 
 and the most interesting of all, because it is built 
 right over a buried city." 
 
 "Is that the city you told me about, when we 
 were on our way to Naples ?" 
 
 "No, Mary, that was Pompeii.* The city under 
 Resina is Herculaneum." 
 
 "And was it buried at the same time that Pom 
 peii was ?" 
 
 " Yes, my dear,, by the same eruption." 
 
 " I do not quite understand about it, mamma ; 
 will you not tell me again ?" 
 
 "Certainly, my dear, when I have time, I will 
 tell you about it." 
 
 " Where is Pompeii, mamma ?" 
 
 "Beyond Resina lies the village called Torre del 
 
 * Pronounced Pom-pay-ye. 
 
20 MARY BROWN AT NAPLES. 
 
 Greco, and beyond that the one called Torre del? 
 Annunziata. Behind Torre dell' Annunziata, and 
 out of sight from where we stand, is Pompeii. 
 
 " And why cannot we go to see it, mamma ?" 
 
 "We can, my child, some day." 
 
 " Oh, I could walk there for the sake of seeing 
 it. How long does it take to go there from Na 
 ples ?" 
 
 " About three hours in a carriage, and the Neapo 
 litans drive very rapidly. But see the houses now. 
 What color are they, Mary ?" 
 
 " Why, they are a real rose color. I never saw 
 anything so beautiful. And see, mamma, Vesuvius 
 is a lovely violet color, and the little cloud above is 
 rosy and purple. Oh, how fine it is ! And see the 
 water, mamma ; what a beautiful deep blue. And 
 Capri looks just like fairy land ; I do believe it is 
 fairy land." 
 
 " Then you can visit fairy land, Mary," replied 
 Mrs. Brown, smiling ; " for it is not difficult to go 
 to Capri." 
 
 " Well, mamma," said Mary, laughing, " that 
 pleases me ; for I have always wanted to go to fairy 
 land. All the stories about it are so beautiful 
 
MAKY BROWN AT NAPLES. 21 
 
 But I do not think it can be more delightful than 
 Capri looks from here, do you ?" 
 
 " No, my dear. When I was of your age, I used 
 to think a good deal about fairy land, and since 
 then I have seen many places which at a distance 
 looked as if they might be part of it. Capri is, 
 indeed, such a place." 
 
 " And we shall go there, mamma ? Oh, how 
 glad I am !" And Mary again danced along the 
 beach. 
 
 " Now, my dear," said her mother, " the sky has 
 faded. Let us pick up a few shells and a little sea 
 weed, and go home. The shells you can keep as a 
 memento of the Mediterranean." 
 
 " Yes, mamma, and the sea-weed too. You know 
 cousin Elizabeth brought some from the sea-side, all 
 put on paper and pressed. It was beautiful, just 
 like flowers. I can make some pictures like hers 
 with mine ;" and so eagerly did Mary search for 
 bits of the weed, that before her mother could warn 
 her of its approach, a wave came up and swept 
 over her feet, wetting them very thoroughly. She 
 screamed, but in a moment the wave had left the 
 sand, and she saw she was safe, She had, however, 
 
22 MARY BKOWN AT NAPLES. 
 
 dropped her shawl in her surprise, and she thought 
 it was carried away, when she saw her mother, who 
 had sprung forward to catch it, hold it up in her 
 hand. 
 
 " You had a narrow escape, my dear child," she 
 said, kissing her ; " but there are many persons 
 older than you who forget how treacherous the 
 waves are. I have seen many people go home with 
 wet feet from the beach. Now," she continued, 
 taking her hand, " we will hasten to the hotel, that 
 you may bathe and rub your feet, put on dry shoes 
 and stockings, and be ready for dinner." 
 
MARY BROWN AT NAPLES. 23 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE next morning, Mary awoke late, for her jour 
 ney and ramble had fatigued her. Her first thought 
 was where she should go that day, for there were so 
 many places to visit that she knew her mother would 
 go somewhere every pleasant day. 
 
 Mrs. Brown was sitting by the table reading, 
 when her daughter awoke. " Good morning, mam 
 ma," cried Mary, " or, as the Italians say, * Buon 
 giorno.' Where shall we go to-day, mamma ?" 
 
 " Nowhere, I think, my dear ; it rains." 
 
 " Rains ? Oh, I am so sorry !" 
 
 Mrs. Brown smiled, and said, " My dear Mary, we 
 can pass the day pleasantly together in this room." 
 
 " Oh, I know we can, but I was hoping to go up 
 Vesuvius, or to go to Pompeii, or Herculaneum, or 
 Capri to-day, and I am so impatient to see every 
 thing." 
 
24 MAKY BROWN AT NAPLES. 
 
 "If you see these wonderful places too soon, 
 Mary, you will not understand much about them. 
 I am glad it rains to-day, for we will sit here to 
 gether, and I will tell you something about them, 
 and you can ask me any questions you please. You 
 can look out on the map all the places we talk about, 
 and the day will be pleasantly and usefully spent." 
 
 "Thank you, dear mamma ; I know it will be 
 pleasant. I always love to have you tell me about 
 things better than to read about them." 
 
 " But by and by,* Mary, you must read about 
 these things. There are several fine works about 
 them, which you will enjoy when you are older." 
 
 " I ought not to have come here until I had read 
 them, ought I, mamma ?" 
 
 " Perhaps you will come again after you have 
 read them ; and, in any case, what you see now 
 will help you to understand them." 
 
 After breakfast, Mary sat down to hem a hand 
 kerchief, and Mrs. Brown took her portfolio and 
 pencils and seated herself by the window, to make 
 a sketch of one of the opposite houses. She 
 sharpened one of her pencils and began the sketch, 
 and as she drew the first lines, she said : 
 
MARY BROW!* AT NAPLES 25 
 
 " Mount Vesuvius, Mary, did not always look as 
 it now does. Once on a time there stood on the 
 southeastern coast of the Bay of Naples a great 
 mountain, called Mons Summanus. On its top was 
 a temple dedicated to Jupiter Tonans." 
 
 " I have heard about Jupiter, mamma ; he was 
 the chief of all the gods, and carried a thunder 
 bolt, and had an eagle beside his throne. But who 
 was Jupiter Tonans ?" 
 
 " Jupiter Tonans was another name for Jupiter. 
 It means Jupiter the Thunderer, and was given 
 him because, he was supposed to make the thun 
 der." 
 
 " Well, mamma, Jupiter the Thunderer, then, 
 had a temple on the top of Mons Summanus." 
 
 " Yes, my dear, but that temple fell into ruins long, 
 long ago, and no trace remains. The mountain 
 was also called Vesuvius, and at its foot sprang up 
 cities, where people lived and cultivated the soil and 
 built themselves beautiful houses. The country 
 around the mountain was very fertile, and was 
 called Campania Felix, or the Happy Country, 
 because it yielded so many fine fruits and such good 
 grab, and all without much labor. 
 3 
 
20 MARY BROWN AT NAPLES. 
 
 I 
 
 " Do not people call part of Arabia, Arabia Felix, 
 for the same reason ?" 
 
 " Yes, Mary. Would you like to know the names 
 of some of the cities of which I am speaking ?" 
 
 " Indeed, I should ; but I think I know one or 
 two of them already Pompeii and Herculaneum ?" 
 
 "Yes, my love. Another one was named Stabiae ; 
 it stood where Castel-a-mare now stands. You can 
 look out Castel-a-mare on your map." 
 
 " Here it is, mamma." 
 
 " Pompeii you will find farther to the north, near 
 Torre dell' Annunziata." 
 
 " I have found it." 
 
 " Herculaneum, which lies under Resina, is about 
 half way between Pompeii and Naples. Do you see 
 them all ?" 
 
 " Yes, mamma ; this is a nice little map. I shall 
 try to learn it by heart, while we are at Naples. I 
 am studying Geography, am I not ?" and Mary 
 laughed. 
 
 "You are studying Geography in a very good 
 way, my dear, and I hope you will remember all you 
 learn. These cities Herculaneum, Pompeii, and 
 Stabia? were full of streets and houses. The streets 
 
MAEY BKOWN AT NAPLES. 27 
 
 were paved, and there were fountains in them where 
 the people could get water. You know, now-a-days, 
 here at Naples, the people get water from the 
 fountains. On the walls of the houses there were 
 beautiful pictures. I do not mean, my child, that 
 pictures were framed and hung on the walls, but 
 that the walls themselves were covered with bright 
 colors, and with landscapes and figures of men, 
 women, animals and flowers. Even the columns in 
 the courts of the houses were painted in brilliant 
 colors. In these cities there were theatres, orna 
 mented with marble and paintings ; and there were 
 beautiful temples dedicated to the gods. All was 
 life and merriment in those cities, for the people 
 were fond of gaiety, just as many people now are." 
 
 "And did they ever go up on the mountain, 
 mamma ?" 
 
 " Oh, yes but the mountain was not easy to 
 ascend. There was only one road up The top of 
 the mountain was very singular ; it looked as if a 
 great basin had been sunk in the top, and this basin 
 was full of green vines, that grew luxuriantly in that 
 sheltered spot. Once on a time, a little army en 
 camped in this hollow, as you will read, one of these 
 
28 MART BEOWN AT NAPLES. 
 
 days, when you study more of the history of the 
 Romans." 
 
 "Did the people climb over into this basin, 
 mamma ?" 
 
 " There was a kind of ravine or crack in the side, 
 through which they went in ; but the little army of 
 which I spoke to you, got out by making long 
 ladders of the vines, on which they climbed to 
 the top." 
 
 " Why did they not go out through the ravine ?" 
 
 " Because their enemies, the Romans, had placed 
 themselves in front of it." 
 
 "And did the Romans know that the little army 
 could get out ?" 
 
 " No ; they were very much surprised when the 
 little army, under its general, Spartacus, came 
 round, and attacked them." 
 
 " That was very strange, mamma." 
 
 " I think it was, my dear. Pompeii and Hercula- 
 neum, as you see on your map, lay quite near the 
 foot of this singular mountain. The ground they 
 stood on was not like ordinary ground it was lava. 
 You know what lava is, Mary ?" 
 
 " Yes, mamma ; it is rock that came red-hot out 
 
MAKY BROWN AT NAPLES. 29 
 
 of a volcano. And I have seen some here in Naples, 
 have I not ? When I read about lava in my Gea 
 graphy, I did not think I should see any so soon." 
 
 "You saw lava in America, my dear. Cousin 
 Elizabeth's bracelet was of lava, you know." 
 
 " Yes, mamma ; but it did not seem so like real 
 lava as the bracelets and pins here do. I think it is 
 because we are where we can see Vesuvius. But 
 how does lava look, before they carve it ?" 
 
 " The kind they carve is a solid, hard stone ; but 
 there are several forms of lava, as you will see 
 when we go up Vesuvius. As I was saying, Pompeii 
 and Herculaneum were built on ground that was 
 made up of lava. It is supposed that this lava 
 flowed down, ages ago, in great streams, from the 
 mountain. There is no record of any eruption from 
 Mons Summanus or Vesuvius, before the great one 
 that destroyed the cities." 
 
 " How do people know, then, that the mountain 
 was a volcano so long, long ago ? I don't see how 
 they can tell, if they never saw it on fire." 
 
 " They know it was always a volcano by its 
 peculiar shape, and by the sort of rock of which it 
 is composed, as well as by the kind of rock of which 
 3* 
 
30 MARY BROWN AT NAPLES 
 
 the country around is made. The basin full of 
 vines, I spoke about, was the old crater, which had 
 stopped sending out fire." 
 
 "But I don't see how vines could grow in it, 
 mamma ?" 
 
 " They probably did not, my dear, until a great 
 deal of time had elapsed after the mountain had 
 sent out fire and lava. The holes through which 
 the lava came out, gradually filled up ; and, finally, 
 after a great many years, moss grew over the stony 
 basin, and made a sort of soil. Then, seeds were 
 carried up there by the winds, and sprang up and 
 made the whole basin beautifully green." 
 
 " Oh, how I should like to see such a basin, 
 mamma ! Can you see it now ?" 
 
 " It has greatly altered, my dear, but a little of it 
 can be seen yet. What there is left of its edge is 
 called Monte Somma, but it is not green now. Only 
 bare rocks and a little moss are to be seen. You 
 have studied, in your History, about the Roman 
 Emperors. Can you tell me in whose reign Christ 
 was born ?" 
 
 " In the reign of Augustus, mamma, and Augus 
 tus came next after Julius Caesar." 
 
MAKY BKOWN AT NAPLES. 31 
 
 " Well, Mary, sixty-three years after the birth of 
 Christ, a great earthquake took place in the country 
 at the foot of Mount Vesuvius, and threw down a 
 great part of Pompeii and Herculaneum. The in 
 habitants of Pompeii were so much alarmed, that 
 they deserted the city. After a time, they took 
 courage to return to it, and they attempted to repair 
 the injuries done by the earthquake. During the 
 next sixteen years, earthquakes were not unfre- 
 qucnt ; one of them reached as far as Naples, and 
 threw down a theatre there." 
 
 " Why, mamma, was Naples here so long ago ? 
 I can hardly believe it." 
 
 " Naples is a very ancient city, my dear. Most 
 of the Italian towns are exceedingly old. But to 
 come back to my story: Sixteen years after the first 
 earthquake, the first eruption that we know any 
 thing about took place from Vesuvius. In what 
 year would that be, Mary 1" 
 
 " The earthquake began in the year 63 It would 
 be the year 79, mamma." 
 
 "Seventy-nine years after Christ, in the reign of 
 the Emperor Titus, Pompeii and Herculaneum still 
 stood, although the earthquakes had greatly dam- 
 
32 MABY BROWN AT NAPLES. 
 
 aged them. The people were rebuilding some tem 
 ples which had been injured, and they probably did 
 not dream of any further danger to their city. In 
 August of that year, there were several earthquakes, 
 but the inhabitants were somewhat accustomed to 
 them, and did not think the mountain had any 
 thing to do with them. One day, towards the 
 middle of the month, a cloud of vapor rose from 
 the mountain. It was in shape like an Italian 
 pine tree, which is not at all like our pine tree, but 
 spreads out at the top like an umbrella, as we saw 
 yesterday. This cloud was bright in some parts, 
 and dark in others ; for part of it was flame, and 
 part cinders and ashes." 
 
 " Oh, mamma, it must have been terrible ! How 
 frightened the people who lived about the mountain 
 must have been !" 
 
 " Stones and rocks fell upon the earth from this 
 mass of cloud ; these stones were hot, and fell so 
 thickly and fast that it was a shower of rocks." 
 
 " It was like a great hail-storm, mamma." 
 
 11 Far worse, my child. The stones broke in the 
 roofs of the houses, and shattered the statues and 
 marble ornaments. The land shook, and the houses 
 
MARY BKOWN AT NAPLES. 33 
 
 tottered. Lightnings of various colors flashed from 
 the cloud. The inhabitants did not know where to 
 go to escape the danger. They did not dare to 
 stay in their houses, and in the open air it was 
 worse yet. The shore was altered by the swelling 
 of the land, and the sea fell back from it, so that 
 the beach was broader than it was before. Many 
 great fishes were left upon the shore by the water 
 when it rolled away.' 7 
 
 " Why, mother, I should suppose the people 
 would have thought the last day had come." 
 
 " They did, my dear. There were but few Chris 
 tians then. The people of Italy, for the most part, 
 still worshipped the gods about whom you have read. 
 They prayed to these gods, and exclaimed that the 
 last hour was come ; that the earth was to be 
 burnt up ; and that they and their gods, and the 
 earth, would all be destroyed together. The cloud 
 from Vesuvius came down and covered the land and 
 the sea, and made it dark at mid-day. The moun 
 tain kept showering down stones and fire, and 
 finally, great showers of ashes fell. They looked 
 like thick flakes of snow, and lay white on the 
 ground, in some places. Hot water, too, fell from the 
 
34 MAKY BROWN AT NAPLES. 
 
 mountain, and this water mixed with the ashes in the 
 air, and came clown in great splashes of thick mud." 
 
 " That must have been dreadful, mamma." 
 
 " Yes, my child, with this mud Pompeii and Her- 
 culaneum, these great cities, were deluged. Stones, 
 and ashes, and cinders also fell upon them in thick 
 showers. Stones fell at a great distance in the 
 country around, and people who went into the fields 
 put pillows on their heads to protect them. 
 
 " How long did it continue dark, mamma ?" 
 
 " More than two days, my child ; and these 
 showers were falling all the time." 
 
 " Was it as dark as night ?" 
 
 " Darker than it is at night out of doors. The 
 author who describes it, and who was all that time 
 in the neighborhood, says it was a darkness like 
 that of a room when all the light is excluded. You 
 know, if you shut all the light out of a room, it is 
 darker than it is out of doors at night. When you 
 go into a dark room you have to feel your way, you 
 cannot see anything ; but out of doors at midnight 
 you can see something." 
 
 " What did the people do, mamma ? I don't see 
 how they could find their way at all." 
 
MARY BROWN AT NAPLES. 35 
 
 " That was the great difficulty, Mary. They, of 
 course, had to move slowly. They tried to carry 
 torches, but the sudden gusts of wind blew them 
 out. The earth, too, was trembling and rocking 
 under them, and even, several miles away, it was 
 so unsteady that the carriages the people had 
 brought out, and prepared for their flight, rocked 
 so that they could hardly get into them. The 
 darkness kept people from seeing each other, and 
 shrieks and cries were heard on every side. Parents 
 were calling for their children, husbands for their 
 wives, for if they once got separated, there was little 
 hope that they would find each other again." 
 
 " How awful it must have been, mamma." 
 
 " Awful, indeed, my child ; we cannot imagine 
 how terrible it was." 
 
 " How did it end, mamma ?" 
 
 " On the third day, the cloud gradually scattered 
 and faded away ; and there lay Pompeii and Her- 
 culaneum, all in ruins and buried beneath the stones 
 and mud, and ashes. The streets had gradually 
 become filled with these substances ; the houses were 
 blocked up : even the rooms were partly full of fine 
 dust and ashes, and the cities were really under, the 
 
36 MARY BROWN AT NAPLES. 
 
 surface of the ground ; they were entirely bu 
 ried." 
 
 " Were they really all buried up, dear mamma ? 
 But the people were not buried too ?" 
 
 " Many of them were, my dear." 
 
 " Were they buried alive, mamma ?" 
 
 " Some were probably buried alive ; others were 
 killed by blows from heavy stones, or from the 
 roofs and columns that fell down ; but most were 
 probably suffocated by the poisonous vapors that 
 came from the volcano, and then they were buried 
 by the ashes and stones that fell into the streets. 
 The fine ashes, too, sifted through the doors and 
 crevices into the houses, and buried those that had 
 died in the rooms." 
 
 " How strange it was, and how terrible ! Were 
 any of the people ever found, mamma ?" 
 
 " It was by finding their skeletons, my daughter, 
 that people ever knew anything about them. The 
 city was dug out about seventeen hundred years 
 after it was buried." 
 
 "And were the bodies there then, mamma? 
 Seventeen hundred years is a very great while 1" 
 
 "It is a great while, my love. The bodies had 
 
MARY BEOWN AT NAPLES. 37 
 
 gone to decay, but the skeletons were fouml. They 
 were in many different positions ; some were sitting; 
 some standing ; some seemed to have been knocked 
 down by a heavy blow. One skeleton was dis 
 covered with a great marble column lying across it, 
 and, without doubt, the column fell on the man 
 while he was alive. But about these things I will 
 tell you more another time, for now you have 
 hemmed your handkerchief, and I have finished my 
 drawing. The rain, too, has ceased, and although 
 the sun does not shine, we will go out and take a 
 walk." 
 
38 MABY BEOWN AT NAPLES. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 MRS. BROWX and Mary came in late from their 
 walk, and while they were dressing for dinner, Mary 
 said, "Please, mamma, tell me more about the 
 buried cities." 
 
 " With pleasure, my dear," replied Mrs. Brown. 
 
 " Well, mamma, how did Vesuvius look after the 
 great eruption ?" 
 
 " One side of the basin I told you about, was 
 broken off, and the old crater was left like a plain ; 
 and in the middle of it stood a great cone, which 
 was not there before. This cone was made up of 
 stones and ashes, and was Mount Vesuvius as you 
 now see it, only the cone has been growing lower 
 and lower ever since." 
 
 " A cone is the shape of a sugar loaf, is it not, 
 mamma ?' 
 
MAKY BKOWN AT NAPLES. 39 
 
 " Yes, and Vesuvius has, you see, something of 
 that shape, only it is not so steep." 
 
 "How strange it must have looked to see a 
 new peak on the top of the mountain." 
 
 " No doubt it did seem strange. It was a great 
 and terrible monument of the change the country 
 had undergone." 
 
 " And, mamma, what did the people at Rom, and 
 Naples, and all over Italy, think of this eruption ?" 
 
 " That we do not know, my love ; few books 
 were written in those days, and none were printed, 
 you know. Of those that were written, few have 
 come down to us. Almost all we know about this 
 eruption we learn from the letters of one man, 
 named Pliny. The barbarians from Germany over 
 ran all Italy, as you have read at school, and they 
 destroyed almost all records of those days." 
 
 " But everybody knew about the cities, mamma ; 
 everybody knew they were under the ground ?" 
 
 " It is supposed that the people gradually forgot 
 where they were. It is true, that after the eruption 
 was over, and the deposits from the mountain had 
 cooled, the common people came and built huts 
 above the ruins. Their descendants lived here for 
 
40 MARY BROWN AT NAPLES. 
 
 about four hundred years, and then another erup 
 tion drove them away, and they never dared occupy 
 the place again. Then the barbarians came into 
 Italy, and the Italians lost trace of these cities, as 
 they did of many other things." 
 
 "But, mamma, did not the people, when they 
 came and built above the old houses, try to dig 
 down and see if anything could be got out of the 
 ruins ?" 
 
 "It is thought that they did, for some houses, 
 when opened in modern times, bear traces of having 
 been excavated before, long, long ago." 
 
 " How long were those cities unknown, mam 
 ma ?" 
 
 " In the little town of Resina, which you saw on 
 your map, more than sixteen hundred years after 
 the great eruption, a man began to dig a well. As 
 he descended, he found in the earth pieces of marble, 
 which seemed to have belonged to some beautiful 
 pavement. A prince, who was building a palace 
 not far off, hearing what the man had found, bought 
 the well, and set men to work to dig farther. They 
 dug into the earth at the side of the well, near the 
 bottom, and found that they came against walls. 
 

 
MARY BROWN AT NAPLES. 41 
 
 They kept on excavating, and found that they were 
 penetrating into a buried city. Marble and bronze 
 statues were found, and beautiful pieces of carving, 
 and these were brought up out of the well, and put 
 into the house of the Prince, or sent away to other 
 countries. After awhile they gave up digging ; 
 but, thirty years later, Charles III., King of Naples, 
 had a great many things dug up to put in his palace 
 at Portici." 
 
 "And was Pompeii discovered by accident, too, 
 mamma !" 
 
 " Pompeii, also, was discovered by means of a 
 well. Some small remnants of houses still projected 
 above the ground, and one man had suggested that 
 they might belong to the city of Pompeii, which had 
 been so long lost. No one, however, had thought 
 of examining the ground, and if the well had not 
 been dug, no one can tell how much longer the city 
 would have remained unexplored." 
 
 " Was it found after Herculaneum 1" 
 
 " Yes, my child, and for a number of years many 
 
 men were at work digging there. Then there was a 
 
 war ; for Napoleon Bonaparte took Naples, and 
 
 made his general, Murat, king. Murat was greatly 
 
 4* 
 
MARY BROWN AT NAPLES. 
 
 interested in Pompeii, and had the great amphi 
 theatre, at one end of the town, uncovered. You 
 know what an amphitheatre was, Mary ?" 
 
 " Yes, mamma, you told me about it. It was a 
 great oval building, without a roof. All round the 
 inside were rows of seats, which slanted from the top 
 to the bottom, so that those who sat high up could 
 see over the heads of those who sat low down. And 
 there were stairs leading up to the rows of seats. 
 The floor in the middle of the house was covered 
 with sand. The amphitheatre was a great theatre, 
 only built differently from theatres now-a-days." 
 
 " You are right, my dear. The Romans, and all 
 the people of Italy, were very fond of the amuse 
 ments of the amphitheatre. You know that lions, 
 and tigers, and elephants, and other animals were 
 brought from a great distance, and made to tear 
 each other to pieces, for the diversion of the spec 
 tators." 
 
 "And, mamma, sometimes men were made to 
 fight with each other, instead of wild beasts." 
 
 "They fought with each other and with wild 
 beasts, too, my love. Men who fought were called 
 gladiators." 
 
MAEY BROWN AT NAPLES. 43 
 
 " And the people of Pompeii liked to look at such 
 things, mamma ? Why, I think it was a great deal 
 worse than the bull-fights in Spain. I have seen 
 pictures of the bull-fights." 
 
 "The shows in the amphitheatre were more 
 cruel. The loss of life was far greater. .Some 
 times hundreds of animals were killed at once. It 
 seems strange to us that it can be any amusement 
 to people to see animals kill each other." 
 
 " I am sure, mamma, it is bad enough to know 
 that they must be killed for us to eat." 
 
 "Yes, Mary. As I was saying, the French unco 
 vered the amphitheatre at Pompeii, and we can see 
 it when we visit the city." 
 
 " How strange it will seem, to sit on the seats the 
 people of Pompeii sat on so many, many years ago 1" 
 
 " Indeed it will, Mary ; and to walk along the 
 streets where the Pompeiaus used to walk, e,nd to 
 see the houses where they lived, and the shops 
 where they bought bread, and wine, and oil. It is 
 now more than a hundred years since people began 
 to uncover the city. It was, of course, a difficult 
 task. Just think, if New York were all buried, how 
 difficult it would be, and how much time it would 
 
44 MARY BKOWN AT NAPLES. 
 
 take to dig the earth out of the streets and houses. 
 Pompeii was a small town, compared with New 
 York, and the houses were not so high as New York 
 houses, yet it took a great many men, and a great 
 deal of patience to do what has been done ; and 
 even now, only one fourth of the city has been 
 uncovered." 
 
 " And did they find houses just like ours, mamma, 
 and were there things in them ?" 
 
 " One question at a time, my child. The houses 
 in those days were not built like ours. There was 
 one great square room or hall, and from this room 
 branched off the bedrooms and dining-room and all 
 the principal rooms of the house. This great square 
 room was called the atrium. In the middle of its 
 roof was a large hole." 
 
 " Uncovered, mamma ?" 
 
 " Yes, open to the sky." 
 
 " I should think the rain would have fallen in." 
 
 "So it did, my dear. In the middle of the room 
 was a square or oblong basin, paved with marble. 
 This basin was sunk into^tlie floor, and from a small 
 hole in the bottom, a jjflpe led down, through the 
 ground, into a cistern. The rain fell through the 
 
MAKY BEOWN AT NAPLES. 4:5 
 
 hole in the roof into this basin, and was carried 
 away by the pipe." 
 
 " What was the use of the cistern, mamma ?" 
 
 " It had the same use that any cistern has, my 
 child. Its top was enclosed by a round curb cut 
 out of a single piece of marble. This curb stood in 
 the atrium at one end of the basin that caught the 
 water. The basin was called the impluvium." 
 
 "Impluvium, mamma? I don't know that I can 
 remember that word. It is so long." 
 
 "It is no longer than many words which you 
 remember easily. Say it over several times, and 
 spell it once or twice, and you will not forget it. It 
 comes from two Latin words in, which means into, 
 and pluvium, which means rain. So it means a place 
 for the rain to fall into" 
 
 " I will say it now, mamma : impluvium, implu 
 vium, impluvium" 
 
 " And can you tell me the name of the room in 
 which the impluvium was ?" 
 
 "At . I forget it." 
 
 " Atrium, my dear." 
 
 "Atrium, atrium. Now I shall remember it, 
 mamma." 
 
46 MARY BROWN AT NAPLES. 
 
 " The bedrooms which branched off from the 
 atrium were generally small. The walls of the 
 atrium, and of the rooms which branched from it, 
 were covered with plaster or stucco, and this was 
 painted red, or yellow, or some other brilliant 
 color." 
 
 " How pretty they must have "been, mamma !" 
 
 " Little columns were sometimes painted on the 
 walls, and then the red and yellow were sometimes 
 put on, as if they were curtains or pieces of cloth 
 hanging by two corners from these columns. In the 
 middle of these painted curtains was usually a pic 
 ture of a cupid, or a dancing girl, or a landscape, or a 
 picture taken from some story about the gods, or 
 the heroes of old times. These pictures are very 
 graceful, and are almost the only paintings we have 
 that were made at that time." 
 
 " How I should like to see them. Can we see 
 them still, mamma ?" 
 
 " Some of the houses are left as they were found, 
 Mary ; and we shall see the pictures on them when 
 we go to Pompeii ; but the walls of a great many 
 of the houses were carefully taken down and brought 
 to Naples." 
 
MARY BROWN AT NAPLES. 47 
 
 " Where are they, mamma ?" 
 
 "In the great museum, my child. It is called 
 the Museo Borbonico, or Bourbon Museum." 
 
 " And shall we go there, mamma ?" 
 
 " I hope so ; for besides the pictures, there are a 
 great many statues, and other interesting things 
 there from the buried cities. The walls and ceilings 
 of the houses at Pompeii were richly ornamented, as 
 I have said. Some of the houses were two stories 
 high, others but one. The upper part of many 
 of them was destroyed by the hot stones and 
 ashes that fell upon them. The pavement of the 
 Louses was of mosaic ; you know what that is, 
 Mary ?" 
 
 " Oh, yes, mamma ; different colored stones and 
 little pieces of marble laid together in patterns, 
 sometimes making birds and animals, sometimes men 
 and women and many pretty things. I wish we had 
 uch pavements at home, mamma." 
 
 " Labor costs too much, my child. When these 
 beautiful things were made, workmen earned but 
 little. The rich spent vast sums of money on their 
 houses, and they employed a great many people at 
 low prices. But we must not forget that we are 
 
48 MAKY BROWN AT NAPLES. 
 
 talking about Pompeii. How do you think the din 
 ing-rooms were arranged ?" 
 
 " Why, like ours, mamma, were they not ?" 
 
 " No, my dear. All round the room were broad 
 benches, and in front of them was a table which 
 also extended round^the room. On the broad 
 benches were placed cushions, and the people lay 
 down on them to take their meals." 
 
 " How queer, mamma." 
 
 " In the middle of the room the servants stood, to 
 wait upon the table." 
 
 11 1 am sure, mamma, it was a very lazy way of 
 taking their meals, was it not ?" 
 
 " The libraries were also singular. There were 
 no books like ours. The art of printing was not 
 known. Everything was written with a pen made 
 of a reed. They had no paper, but used, instead, 
 sheets of papyrus. These sheets were fastened 
 together so as to make a very long piece, and this 
 was rolled up, after it had been written on, and was 
 put into a box." 
 
 " And they had to unroll them, when they read 
 them, mamma." 
 
 " Certainly, Mary. A large library of such books 
 
MAKY BEOWN AT NAPLES. 49 
 
 or scrolls, was found at Herculaueum ; but no 
 thing of the kind has yet been discovered at 
 Pompeii." 
 
 " Could those that were found at Herculaneum be 
 read, mamma ? I should think they would have 
 been spoiled." 
 
 " They were very much injured by the fire, Mary; 
 they were like rolls of burnt paper." 
 
 " Why then, they must have fallen all in pieces, 
 mamma." 
 
 " They had to be handled with great care to pre 
 vent their crumbling away, and it was a long tune 
 before any one found out how to unroll them with 
 out breaking them into powder." 
 
 " How did they do it at last, mamma ?" 
 " They took long strips of a very thin but strong 
 substance, called ' goldbeater's skin.' This skin was 
 covered with a kind of glue, and then the scroll was 
 laid upon it. The scroll was then slowly unrolled, 
 and it stuck to the skin." 
 
 " And could people read what was on the scrolls, 
 mamma ?" 
 
 "Yes,' by perseverance they could. We shall 
 see the scrolls in the museum." 
 5 
 
50' MART BROWX AT NAPLES. 
 
 " How nice it is, inamma, to have all these things 
 kept for us to see. I shall be so delighted to look 
 at them " 
 
 " Many skeletons were found in Pompeii, Mary. 
 In one building, which had been the barracks of 
 soldiers, sixty-three skeletons were found. Most of 
 them were men, but there were some women too, 
 and the bones of one little baby were discovered. 
 It is supposed, therefore, that some of the officers 
 had their wives and children with them. Pieces of 
 rich dresses, and golden ornaments were found in 
 the upper rooms of the barracks, as well as weapons 
 which had belonged to the officers." 
 
 " But, mamma, what made so many soldiers stay ? 
 Why did they not run away ?" 
 
 " The discipline of the Italian soldiers was very 
 severe in those days. They were taught to stay at 
 their post until the last moment, and not to be 
 afraid of anything, not even of death. This is 
 thought to account for so many skeletons being 
 found together in these barracks." 
 
 " It was too bad, mamma. They might as well 
 have 'saved themselves, for they could not defend 
 the city against the eruption." 
 
MARY BEOWN AT NAPLES. 51 
 
 " In some of the dwelling-houses, too, skeletons 
 were found, and in the streets also, and in the 
 gardens and temples. In one very large and hand 
 some house, on the street of Tombs, eighteen skele 
 tons were found, crowded together in a long arched 
 vault or cellar under the house. It is supposed 
 that they were ladies who hid themselves there to 
 escape the stones and ashes that were falling all 
 round." 
 
 " But they were killed all the same, mamma." 
 
 " Yes, my love. They were either suffocated by 
 the vapor and gases from Vesuvius, or else by 
 the fine powder which sifted in through the win 
 dows ; for this vault was found full of fine dust, 
 which had hardened. Great jugs for wine were 
 discovered in this vault, and they, too, were full of 
 ashes. These ashes gathered all around the un 
 happy people who hid in this cellar, and buried 
 them. 
 
 " Were they found by the people who were dig 
 ging, mamma ?" 
 
 " Yes, and the earth which had buried them up, 
 had hardened in just the shape of the bodies. It 
 formed moulds around the trinkets the ladies wore, 
 
2 MAKY BROW.S" AT NAPLES. 
 
 and some of these moulds are still kept in the 
 museum." 
 
 " But where were the men of the house, mamma ? 
 Did they get away, do you suppose ?" 
 
 " One of them was found near a gate which 
 opened from the garden into a street. The key of 
 the gate was beside him. Near him was another 
 skeleton, probably that of a servant, which had in 
 its bony hand a bag containing golden coins and 
 some valuable vases." 
 
 " They were trying to get away, were they not ?" 
 
 "No doubt, my dear. The house near which 
 they were found is called the Villa Diomedes." 
 
 " Was the man named Diomedes, mamma ?" 
 
 " No one knows, my dear. He is called Dio 
 medes, because a tomb near this villa has that name 
 upon it. Many of the houses and streets in Pom 
 peii have received their names from something found 
 in them, or near them j but we do not know what 
 the Pompeians called them. There, Mary, is the 
 dinner-bell I Are you ready ?" 
 
 " Oh yes, quite ready, but I am sorry dinner has 
 come so soon. I want to hear more." 
 
 " Another time, Mary." 
 
MAKY BEOWN AT POMPEII- 53 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE next morning, Mary looked with delight at 
 the clear sky and at the bright beams of the sun on 
 the opposite houses. 
 
 " Now, mamma," she exclaimed, " we have a 
 beautiful day." 
 
 " We have a beautiful morning, Mary. Have 
 you never heard the song : 
 
 ' Many a bright and sunshiny morning 
 Turns to a dark and dismal day ' ?" 
 
 "But surely, dear mamma, such a morning as 
 this can never turn into a rainy day. And in Italy 
 they have such clear skies and such fine weather." 
 
 " Even in Italy, at this season of the year, the 
 skies are changeable, Mary. However, we will 
 trust them this time and go to Pompeii, for I know 
 my daughter is very anxious to see the strange 
 city." 
 
 5* 
 
54: MARY BKOWN AT TOMPEH. 
 
 " Oh, thank you, mamma," cried Mary, " I am so 
 happy I" 
 
 No sooner was breakfast over, than Mrs. Brown 
 and her daughter started on their expedition. 
 In front of the hotel they engaged one of the 
 little one-horse wagons, so common in Naples, and 
 drove rapidly out of the city. They passed along 
 the quay, or wharf, which affords a fine view of the 
 blue Bay of Naples and the distant island of Capri. 
 Mary was greatly interested by what she saw in the 
 streets. Everybody seemed to be out of doors. 
 Wagon-makers, cobblers, tinkers, cooks, and almost 
 all kinds of trades-people were doing their work out 
 side of their shops. In one place, women were fry 
 ing hasty-pudding, which men stopped to buy and 
 eat for breakfast, as they went to their work. Not 
 far off, a man was boiling snails, which the men ate 
 with their pudding. Beautiful golden ' oranges were 
 piled up in great heaps in the shops aud on tables 
 in the street, and dried figs were hanging outside of 
 the doors, and were also heaped up on tables for sale. 
 
 " Why, mamma," exclaimed Mary, " I never saw 
 so many oranges and figs in my life. What do the 
 people do with them all ?" 
 
MARY BKOW3T AT POMPEII. 55 
 
 " They eat them, Mary." 
 
 " I should not like to eat the figs, mother. They 
 do not look nice, and they have sticks stuck through 
 them.' 7 
 
 " Some of them have, my dear. They are put on 
 those sticks when they are first picked, and then 
 they are hung up to dry. Some are dried without 
 sticks, and some are packed into boxes." 
 
 " Is sugar put with them to make them so sweet, 
 mamma ?" 
 
 " No, Mary ; nothing is put with them. All the 
 sweetness is in the fig itself. As the juice dries 
 out, it leaves the sugar you sometimes see on the 
 outside." 
 
 . " The figs we had after dinner yesterday, mamma, 
 were the sweetest I ever tasted." 
 
 " Those, Mary, were skinned before they were 
 dried. The figs we usually have are dried with 
 their skins on." 
 
 " The Neapolitans must live on them, mamma, 
 they have so many. I should like to live on them 
 myself." 
 
 "A diet of oranges and figs seems very agreeable 
 to us, Mary ; and it is delightful to see the oranges 
 
56 MARY BROWN AT POMPEII. 
 
 and lemons hanging ripe upon the treeJ. How 
 fragrant the air must be when they are in blossom." 
 
 " Oh, mamma, it would be lovely to be in Italy 
 then 1 But see those women busy at work ; what 
 are they doing ?" 
 
 " They are making nets for the fishermen." 
 
 " How rapidly they do it. But why do they sit 
 out here among the boats, with the sun shining on 
 their heads ?" 
 
 " They like to be in the open air, my daughter. 
 The Neapolitans have always been noted for living 
 out of doors." 
 
 " I do not wonder at it, do you, mamma ? It is 
 so pleasant here." 
 
 Everything Mary saw delighted her. Her tongue 
 was constantly in motion, and she kept her mother 
 busy answering questions. Mrs. Brown was very 
 willing to listen to all her daughter's inquiries, for 
 she was desirous to have her learn as much as pos 
 sible about everything she saw in Europe. 
 
 A continuous line of houses leads out from Naples 
 to Portici. You would not think that you had 
 gone out of the city, if you did not find that the 
 people call the place Portici, instead of Naples. 
 
MAKY BROWN AT POMPEII. 57 
 
 Many of the houses have their names painted beside 
 the doors, and each one is called a " Villa," which 
 is the Italian for " country-seat." Many people go 
 out from Naples in summer and spend a few weeks 
 in these villas, because it is cooler there than in the 
 thickly-settled city. 
 
 The carriage soon drove into a great court, which 
 had a high building all around it. At the doors 
 were soldiers, who walked up and down and watched 
 every one that passed in and out. Mary asked her 
 mother what the building was, and she told her 
 that it was the king's palace. 
 
 " Why, mother, his palace is in Naples," said 
 Mary. 
 
 " That is only one of his palaces ; he has several," 
 replied Mrs. Brown. 
 
 " I should think he would never feel at home in 
 any of them, mamma. I am sure I should not like 
 so many homes." 
 
 "He probably is not very happy* my dear," re 
 plied Mrs. Brown, " for the people of this country 
 dislike him because he is tyrannical, and no king is 
 happy when his people do not love him." 
 
 "Why, mamma, we are going out of the palace 
 
58 MARY BROWN AT POMPEII. 
 
 again !" exclaimed Mary. " The street goes right 
 through it. How funny I" 
 
 "It does seem singular. But you know, Mary, 
 that in European cities the streets often pass under 
 houses." 
 
 "Almost everything seems queer in Europe^ 
 mamma. The houses are not built like ours ; the 
 people do not dress as we do, they eat different 
 things, and they live differently." 
 
 " True, my love. There are many who dress as 
 we do ; all the wealthier people do ; but the coun 
 try people and the poorer classes wear costumes 
 that have been worn in the same country for cen 
 turies." 
 
 "See, mamma," cried Mary, "do look at those 
 queer glass bottles and earthen pots." 
 
 " Such glass bottles, or flasks, are in common use 
 here for water, and milk, and wine, and when Pom 
 peii was discovered, Mary, bottles of exactly the 
 same shape were found buried there." 
 
 "How strange, mamma." 
 
 " The people who lived in those old times, used, 
 for the most part, the same sort of dishes that we 
 do now, only they were made of earthen-ware or 
 
MARY BROWN AT POMPEII. 59 
 
 glass. They seem to have known little about finer 
 kinds of crockery. No china dishes have been 
 found." 
 
 " Were many dishes found, mamma ?" 
 
 " A great many, my child ; cups, bottles, plates, 
 baking-dishes, bowls, strainers and other things which 
 I cannot think of now." 
 
 " Are they preserved, mamma ?" 
 
 " They are in the Museo Borbonico. I hope we 
 shall see them some day." 
 
 " Can you not think of something else they found ?" 
 
 "They found great wine jugs of earthenware. 
 These jugs had a short neck, with a handle on each 
 side of it, and the bottom, instead of being flat, was 
 pointed just like a sharpened pencil." 
 
 " I should not think the jugs would stand up," 
 said Mary. 
 
 "The sharp end," replied Mrs. Brown, "was 
 thrust into the sand, and that held them up. When 
 the wine was going to be used, water was poured on 
 the sand, and that cooled the wine." 
 
 " Did they drink a great deal of wine ?" asked 
 Mary. 
 
 " Yes," replied Mrs. Brown ; " and they used it as 
 
60 MARY BROWN AT POMPEII, 
 
 an offering to their gods. "When they sat down to 
 their meals, they poured out a little wine on the 
 ground as a libation." 
 
 " What is a ' libation ?' " asked Mary. 
 
 "An offering, my love. This libation was con 
 sidered a token of respect to the gods, and it was 
 thought they would look with favor upon those who 
 offered it." 
 
 Conversing in this way, Mrs. Brown and her 
 daughter drove on through Resina and Torre del 
 Greco. Beyond, for a space, there were but few 
 houses along the road. To their left, they saw 
 plainly the smoky peak of Vesuvius. 
 
 " Oh, mamma, there is the great hill," said Mary, 
 laughing, " I really cannot make up my mind to call 
 it a mountain." 
 
 " You will call it a mountain," replied her mother, 
 also laughing, " when you come to ascend it." 
 
 " Is it very hard to go up ?" asked Mary. 
 
 " I believe it is, my child. Does it not look as 
 though you could take a good many steps from the 
 bottom to the top ?" 
 
 " Yes," said Mary, thoughtfully ; " but must we 
 walk up r 
 
MARY BROWN AT POMPEII. 61 
 
 " Not all the way," replied Mrs. Brown ; " we 
 can go 011 horseback up to the Hermitage, that 
 small house you see half way up the mountain. 
 Beyond that, we must walk or be carried by 
 men." 
 
 "Why? mamma." 
 
 " Because the rest of the mountain, that is, the 
 cone, is very steep. Horses or donkeys could not 
 go up it." 
 
 " I am glad, mamma !" 
 
 "Why? Mary." 
 
 " Oh, I shall be so proud to say I have walked 
 i 
 
 up Vesuvius. It will seem odd, when I go home 
 and go to school, to study geography again, and 
 learn about Vesuvius. I shall know so much about 
 it already, and I shall tell the other girls about it, 
 and about Pompeii too. How nice that will be at 
 lunch time." 
 
 " Datemi qualche com, datmi quaV cosa .'" cried a 
 voice beside the wagon. It came from a little girl, 
 who was running along trying to keep up with the 
 vehicle. " Sono povera ; morta di fame / signorina, 
 signorina, quaP cosa ;" and she moved her hand fre 
 quently and rapidly to her mouth. 
 6 
 
62 MARY BROWN AT POMPEII. 
 
 " "What does she say ?" asked Mary, " I cannot 
 understand her." 
 
 " She says," replied her mother, " give me some 
 thing ; I am dying of hunger ; my little lady, give 
 me something." 
 
 " May I give her some money ?" asked Mary. 
 
 " If you wish, my dear," replied Mrs. Brown, and 
 she handed Mary a small coin. 
 
 The little girl still ran along, and held on by one 
 hand to the carriage. When she saw the coin in 
 Mary's hand, her face became very eager, and she 
 called out louder than before : 
 
 " Eccellen\ morla difame, Ecccttcn', Eccellen'." 
 
 Mary dropped the coin to her. It missed her 
 hand and fell upon the road. The child called out, 
 " grazia,; grazia, Excelled," and stooped to hunt it 
 up in the dirt. Having found it, she ran off con 
 tented. 
 
 " Why," said Mary, " she said ' thank you, Excel 
 lency.' How cousin Elizabeth would laugh if she 
 could hear her call me ' Excellency.' " 
 
 " ' Your Excellence, is a common form of address 
 with beggars in Italy. There comes another. It is 
 a poor, blind man," said Mrs. Brown. 
 
MAKY.BROWX AT POMPEH. 63 
 
 " May I give him something, too ?" asked Mary. 
 
 "Yes, my daughter," answered Mrs. Brown, " and 
 then we must not give to any more. There are so 
 many beggars in Italy, that we cannot think of help 
 ing all." 
 
 The blind man came rapidly up to them. He was 
 led by a little boy, and both of them cried out, 
 although they were almost breathless with run 
 ning : 
 
 " Mario di fame ; quaP cosa per il povero deco, 
 signora, signorina, morto difame." 
 
 Mary gave them a piece of money, and they 
 turned away. 
 
 " Did not they say, mamma, that they were 
 dying with hunger ?" asked Mary, earnestly. 
 
 " They did," replied Mrs. Brown. 
 
 "Well," said Mary, "this time, it could not be 
 true, for the boy had a large piece of bread in his 
 hand." 
 
 Mary sat thoughtful awhile. At last she said, 
 " There is a piece of bread in our satchel ; may I 
 give it to the next beggar who says he is dying of 
 hunger ?" 
 
 "Certainly," answered her mother, and Mary 
 
64 MABY BKOWN AT POMPEII. 
 
 took the bread from the bag. She did not wait 
 long for a chance to give it away. A boy came 
 running after them, crying out as the others had 
 done. She threw him the piece of bread. He 
 caught it made a face at Mary, and spitefully 
 threw the bread after the carriage." 
 
 " Oh, mother," said Mary, " how can he be so 
 naughty ? He says he is dying of hunger, and yet 
 he throws away good bread." 
 
 They now entered another little village, and, driv 
 ing rapidly through it, saw, not far off, a long bank 
 of earth. 
 
 " Pompeii is under that bank, signora," said the 
 driver, addressing Mrs. Brown, and pointing with 
 his whip. 
 
 " Oh, mamma," cried Mary, her eyes sparkling 
 with pleasure, " we have really got to the city. 
 How delighted I am. But we cannot see anything 
 but earth." 
 
 " Have a little patience, Mary," said her mother, 
 slniling. 
 
 " In a few minutes the carriage stopped at the 
 door of a house, and Mrs. Brown and her daughter 
 alighted. 
 
MAEY .BKOWN AT PCMPEH. 65 
 
 11 This house, Mary," said her mother, " is partly 
 built of one of the old houses of Pompeii, and 
 through it we enter the city." 
 
 Several men were standing at the door, and Mrs. 
 Brown told her daughter that they were guides, who 
 went with travellers through the city to show them 
 the way, and to keep them from stealing or injuring 
 anything. 
 
 "Many people would like to have something from 
 Pompeii," she said ; "but if each one carried away 
 something, in a few years the houses would be 
 greatly defaced, and travellers would no.t enjoy com 
 ing here nearly so much as they do now." 
 
66 MARY BROWN AT POMPEII. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE guide led Mrs. Brown and her daughter, 
 through several doorways, into a large square 
 enclosure, surrounded by columns. The columns 
 looked old, and they were partly broken, but it was 
 easy to see that the lower part of them had once 
 been of a bright red, while the upper part was of a 
 bright yellow. 
 
 " What queer columns, mamma !" said Mary ; 
 "are they painted?" 
 
 " Yes," answered Mrs. Brown. " The people of 
 Pompeii were fond of bright colors, and you will see 
 a great many such columns in different parts of 
 the city. You will also find the outside of the 
 houses covered with red stucco. But look at this 
 place we are in, my child. It was once the barracks 
 for soldiers to live in." 
 
MAKY BEOWN AT POMPEII. 67 
 
 " Oh," cried Mary, " it is the one you told me of, 
 mamma, where they found the skeletons of the men, 
 and women, and children, and the weapons, and the 
 pieces of cloth, and the golden ornaments. And 
 there was an up-stairs to it, was there not ?" 
 
 " Yes, my child. Come into this little room ;" 
 and Mrs. Brown stepped into a small apartment. 
 
 I must here tell my young readers, that all 
 around the court, which is in the middle of the bar 
 racks, there are small rooms, supposed to have been 
 the bed-rooms of the soldiers. 
 
 Mrs. Brown pointed to a piece of furniture in one 
 of the rooms, and asked Mary what she thought it 
 was. 
 
 " I am sure I cannot imagine," answered Mary, 
 after having attentively examined it. 
 
 " It was an instrument of punishment," said her 
 mother. " It is what we call ' stocks/ and the same 
 kind of thing is used at the present day. The feet 
 of the man who was considered deserving of this 
 punishment, were thrust between the little partitions 
 you see here, and then the rod at the end was run 
 through these holes in the partition and held his feet 
 fast." 
 
68 MARY BROWN AT POMPEII. 
 
 ' And how long was he left with his feet in the 
 stocks ?" asked Mary, anxiously. 
 
 "That 1 cannot tell," replied Mrs. Brown, " more 
 or less time, according to the crime he had com 
 mitted. When these barracks were uncovered, two 
 skeletons were sitting here with their feet in the 
 stocks." 
 
 " In these very stocks, mamma ?" asked Mary. 
 
 " Not in these," answered Mrs. Brown, " for these 
 are of wood. The skeletons were found in this 
 little room, with their feet in stocks made of iron, 
 and we shall see the original stocks in the museum 
 at Naples ?" 
 
 " And are the skeletons' feet in them still ?" 
 asked Mary. 
 
 " No, my dear." 
 
 " Why did they not leave the things all here ?" 
 said Mary. 
 
 " They feared that another eruption might cover 
 the city again, and they also feared that the weather 
 would injure them," replied Mrs. Brown, " for many 
 of them are very easily spoiled. In the museum, 
 they are kept with the greatest care. They are 
 old, very old, my dear, nearly two thousand years 
 
MARY BROWN AT POMPEII. 69 
 
 old. This room," continued Mrs. Brown, "was the 
 prison ; that one is the room where they ate. Here 
 is the stable, in which was found the skeleton of a 
 horse, as well as some of his harness. In the upper 
 rooms were skeletons, and also two beautiful golden 
 bracelets, with emeralds in them ; ear-rings, too, 
 and hair-pins^ and chests full of clothes were found. 
 But we must not linger long here, for there are so 
 many things to see that we cannot stay as long as 
 we might like in each house." 
 
 They left the barracks and walked a little way, to 
 another ruined building. It was a half-circle in 
 shape, and round the inside were rows of seats 
 from the bottom to the top. In front of tliese seats 
 was a long platform, behind which were small 
 rooms. 
 
 " What do you think this is, Mary ?" asked Mrs. 
 Brown. 
 
 " It looks- like a lecture room, mamma." 
 
 " It is a theatre," said Mrs. Brown, " and it was so 
 situated that the spectators could look out on the 
 Bay while they sat on the seats." 
 
 "But, mamma, how could they see when they 
 were in "the house ?" 
 
70 MARY BKOWN AT POMPEII. 
 
 "It had no roof, my child. When the sun 
 was hot, an awning of cloth was drawn over the 
 top. The walls, and seats, and stairs were all 
 covered with beautiful white marble." 
 
 " It looks just like a ruin, mamma," said Mary, 
 " and yet we can sit down here, if we choose, and 
 imagine that we are Pompeians. I think it would 
 have looked like a ruin to me when it was new, if it 
 had no roof." 
 
 " That is only because you are not accustomed to 
 such buildings," replied her mother. " There is, 
 however, another little theatre near here, which has 
 a roof." 
 
 They left the theatre and went up a flight of 
 steps which led to some elevated ground, from 
 which they could look down upon the two theatres. 
 
 "Mamma," said Mary, "it is very much like look 
 ing out of our windows at home into our neighbors' 
 gardens. The walls of the buildings stand for the 
 fences, and as their roofs are gone, the houses look 
 more like open yards than anything else. When I 
 get home, I shall tell the girls at school how ttey 
 looked. And I can tell you what else these ruined 
 houses look like, mamma ; like houses partly 
 
MARY BROWN AT POMPEII. 71 
 
 built and left a good while, till they have grown 
 old." 
 
 They passed into another enclosure, which the 
 gnide said was a temple of Isis. 
 
 " Who was Isis ?" asked Mary. 
 
 " Isis was, an Egyptian goddess, my love," replied 
 her mother. 
 
 " Why, then, did they have a temple here, mam 
 ma ? The Pompeians were not Egyptians." 
 
 " No, Mary," said Mrs. Brown, " but the worship 
 of foreign gods and goddesses was common in Italy. 
 Most of their deities were of Greek origin, as you 
 will learn by and by." 
 
 Mary could not understand the whole arrange 
 ment of the temple, but her mother showed her the 
 large altar, with a gutter at one side, by means of 
 which the blood of the victim offered on the altar 
 ran off into a basin placed below. Around the prin 
 cipal altar were many smaller ones, placed at differ 
 ent distances about the court. She saw, also, the 
 lofty platform on which the statue of Isis used to 
 stand, and she went up the steps that led to it. 
 Her mother showed her, at the top, the little room 
 where the priests used to hide when the goddess 
 
72 MARY BROWN AT POMPEII. 
 
 was going to utter an oracle. Mrs. Brown told her 
 daughter that the people who were gathered in the 
 temple to hear what the goddess had to say, 
 thought that the statue itself spoke, but in reality 
 the priests spoke for it." 
 
 " Then the priests deceived the people, mamma," 
 said Mary. 
 
 " Yes," replied Mrs. Brown ; " and it is remark 
 able that this little nook, in which the priests of Isis 
 hid in order to deceive the people, should have 
 been discovered so many hundred years after it was 
 used, while at the time that the priests deluded 
 the people, its existence was not known at all. 
 There is in the Museum a statue of a goddess with 
 a hole between her shoulders, to which the priest, 
 standing behind her, applied his mouth, and made 
 the sound pass through her chest and come out at 
 her lips. Perhaps he used a tube, which communi 
 cated with this aperture, and so spoke from a dis 
 tance. Look down this hole in the ground, Mary. 
 Do you see the water at the bottom ? It is a cis 
 tern. Just think I It was used centuries ago by 
 the priests of Isis, when they offered sacrifices to 
 their goddess." 
 
MAKY BROWN AT POMPEII. 73 
 
 From this temple they passed into a long street, 
 paved with stones. Along its sides were houses, 
 and Mrs. Brown told Mary that they had been 
 shops. 
 
 " Many of them were jewelers' shops," she said, 
 " and this street is called the Street of Abundance. 
 It receives it name from a fountain that stands in it, 
 for a little stone figure of the goddess of Plenty 
 was found on the fountain." 
 
 Mary was interested in looking at the shops. 
 They were empty, their roofs were gone, but the 
 paint on the walls 'was still bright, though in many 
 places the stucco was very much broken. Her 
 mother called her attention to some names painted 
 on the outside of the houses. Of course she could 
 not read them, for they were in a language she 
 did not understand, but Mrs. Brown told her that 
 they were the names of the people who once kept 
 the shops. Sometimes it looked as if one name had 
 been painted over another, probably because one 
 person had moved out of the shop and another had 
 moved in. In one house she saw a little painting of 
 a monkey playing on a pipe. 
 
 The guide said that a skeleton was dug out 
 T 
 
74: MAHY BROWN AT POMPEII. 
 
 in this street, with a puise full of gold coin in his 
 hand. He also took them into a house, called the 
 " House of the Physician," because a great many 
 pills and surgical instruments were discovered in it. 
 
 I cannot tell you about all the houses that Mary 
 went into, but all of them interested her very much. 
 She never was tired of admiring the brightly painted 
 walls, and she kept saying what a pity it was that 
 so many pieces were broken out of them. She was 
 delighted to see that the outsides of the houses were 
 brightly painted too. 
 
 "Oh, mamma 1" she exclaimed, " I should have 
 liked to live in Pompeii. The walls are so beautiful. 
 They look as if they had just been painted ; and as 
 for the floors, they are the handsomest I ever saw. 
 I did not think there were such wonderful things 
 anywhere out of fairy land." 
 
 What Mary so greatly admired in the floors, was 
 the pavement of mosaic. This mosaic is made up of 
 a great many little square pieces of marble, some 
 black, some white, some red, yellow, or blue. These 
 pieces are arranged in such a way that they form 
 birds, or fishes, or other animals ; sometimes they 
 represent men fighting or fishing. Sometimes they 
 
MAKY BROWN AT POMPEII. 75 
 
 are arranged in squares, or lines, without represent 
 ing animals or people at all. At Pompeii, these beau 
 tiful mosaics are kept covered with sand, and when 
 visitors come to see the city the sand is swept off. 
 They are kept covered because the houses are with 
 out roofs, for the roofs were burnt off or fell in 
 when the city was destroyed, and the rain falling 
 upon the pretty mosaics would perhaps spoil them 
 by loosening the stones. 
 
 Mrs. Brown showed her daughter the Forum, or 
 great public square, where business was transacted. 
 Around it were ranged blocks of marble, on which 
 statues once stood. A temple, dedicated to Jupiter, 
 and one to Venus, opened on this square. Some of 
 the columns which surrounded the Forum were 
 new, but unfinished ; and Mrs. Brown told Mary 
 that the old ones had probably been thrown down 
 and broken by the earthquakes which occurred a few 
 years before the eruption, and that the workmen 
 had not finished the new ones, when the lava caine 
 and buried the city. 
 
 The streets through which Mrs. Brown and Mary 
 had already passed, were without sidewalks. This 
 is also the case in many of the streets of Naples, and 
 
76 MARY BROWN AT POMPEII. 
 
 one must always be on the look-out, when walking 
 in them, not to be run over by the little one-horse 
 wagons which are driven through the city with 
 great rapidity. 
 
 Mary and her mother next entered a street which 
 had sidewalks similiar to those our streets have. It 
 was called the Street of Fortune. The guide showed 
 them a house where a skeleton was discovered in 
 the attitude of getting out of a window. It had in 
 its hand a purse full of money and ornaments. 
 
 " How many skeletons had purses full of gold I" 
 said Mary. 
 
 " Yes," replied Mrs. Brown ; "when the inhabi 
 tants found that they must leave the city, each one, 
 of course, tried to take his treasures with him. 
 Some, probably, succeeded in doing so, others died 
 with their treasures in their hands." 
 
 11 And their money lay here almost two thousand 
 years," said Mary, " and other people got it at 
 last." 
 
 " Yes, my love," said Mrs. Brown, " the spirits 
 that once lived in the skeletons went away, but they 
 could not take with them the gold they had thought 
 so much of. It makes us think about what the 
 
MARY BEOWN AT POMPEII. 77 
 
 Bible says of laying up our treasure in Heaven, 
 which means, my dear, that it is far better and 
 wiser to love God, and live in a way that is pleas 
 ing to Him, than to be rich in money and in the 
 things of this world." 
 
 They now went into a large building, which was 
 called a bath. 
 
 " The ancients," said Mrs. Brown, " were very 
 fond of bathing, and some of the most luxurious 
 among them bathed three times every day. The 
 government built public bathing houses for the peo 
 ple, and made them very handsome. Follow me, 
 and I will tell you what the different rooms were 
 used for. In this room are holes in the walls, in 
 which pegs were once put to hang the clothes of the 
 bathers upon. In this next room are shelves where 
 pots of ointment stood, for the bathers used to rub 
 their bodies all over with ointment before they went 
 into the water. In this next room was the warm 
 bath, and you see, under the floor, the furnace fof 
 heating it. In the room beyond, we shall see a 
 round basin of marble, which was for cold baths." 
 
 " Why, the pavement heie, too," said Mary, 
 " was of marble and mosaic work ; and see what 
 1* 
 
78 MAKY BKOWN AT POMPEII. 
 
 beautiful ceilings ; see, mamma, the ceilings are per 
 fect yet. See the paintings of dolphins, and lyres, 
 and pretty vines. How beautiful it all must have 
 been before Pompeii was overthrown. How I wish 
 I could have looked in here then." 
 
 " In these rooms were found some of the instru 
 ments the ancients employed to cleanse the skin. 
 One curious instrument that is not used among us, 
 I will mention. It is called the strigil. It is in 
 shape something like a knife. The edges, however, 
 are thick and dull, and it was used to scrape the 
 skin, and take off the little rolls of the external 
 skin, such ^s you have noticed on your arms when 
 you have rubbed them hard after bathing." 
 
 " I should like to see a strigil. Is there one here 
 now, mamma ?" asked Mary. 
 
 " There is none here," replied her mother, "but 
 we shall see some in the great Museum. And now 
 we must go on, for there is still a great deal to be 
 seen." 
 
 The next house they entered was the finest in 
 Pompeii. It is called the House of the Faun, be 
 cause a beautiful little bronze statue of a dancing 
 faun was discovered in it. 
 
MARY BROWN AT POMPEII. 79 
 
 "And shall we see the little statue?" asked 
 Mary. 
 
 "Yes, in the Museum m Naples," replied her 
 mother. 
 ." Has it long horns, mamma, like a deer ?" 
 
 " No, my, child," replied Mrs. Brown, " the faun 
 was not a deer at all. It was a god who lived 
 in 'the woods. The name is spelled f-a-u-n, not 
 f-a-w-n." 
 
 " I will remember that," said Mary, laughing, 
 " for I do not like to make such mistakes." 
 
 "You must not mind making mistakes," replied 
 her mother. " If you learn something every day, 
 by and by you will not make so many ; but you 
 must always ask questions about things when you 
 do not understand them In this house, too, was 
 found, my dear Mary, a very large piece of mosaic 
 work, forming the largest picture in mosaic that 
 was discovered in Pompeii. It represents a battle, 
 and is now in the Museum." 
 
 " Oh, that Museum !" exclaimed Mary. " It 
 seems to me that everything is in the Museum." 
 
 Her mother smiled, and said, " The Museum is 
 full of wonderful things. You will see there silver 
 
80 MAEY BROWN AT POMPEII. 
 
 stew-pans found in this very house, as well as 
 jewelry, and a great many other things that were 
 discovered on this spot ; for this house had in it 
 more beautiful things than any other." 
 
 "Oh, mamma," cried Mary, "I feel almost im 
 patient to go away from here to see the Museum." 
 
 " And," answered her mother, " when you are in 
 the Museum, you will wish you were here again, to 
 see the spots where the things were found." 
 
 " I suppose I shall," said Mary, laughing in reply 
 to her mother's smile, and they went on their 
 way. 
 
 In the curb-stone of the street, the guide pointed 
 out to them some small holes, which he said were used 
 instead of horse-posts to fasten the horses to, and 
 he explained to Mary how the bridle was passed 
 through the holes and tied. They saw also, at the 
 corners of the street, three great flat stones laid 
 across between the sidewalks ; and the guide told 
 Mary that they answered the same purpose as step 
 ping-stones in a brook, that they were intended for 
 people to cross the street on. Mary ran across on 
 them to the opposite sidewalk, and then returning, 
 said to her mother : 
 
MAKY BROWN AT POMPEII. 81 
 
 " How nice it would be to have such stones in 
 Broadway ! We should not get our shoes muddy." 
 
 " But how," asked her mother, u could the omni 
 buses and carts, and carriages pass ?" 
 
 " Why," said Mary, thoughtfully, " I do not know. 
 Were there no carriages in Pompeii ?" she asked, 
 turning towards the guide. 
 
 " There were chariots," he replied ; " and if you 
 will look between these stepping-stones, you will see 
 the deep ruts made in the pavement by the wheels. 
 You see, Miss, the wheels passed between the 
 stones." 
 
 " And," asked Mary, " did the horse go right 
 over the middle stone ?" 
 
 " I suppose he did, Miss," answered the guide, " I 
 don't see that there was any other place for him to 
 go." 
 
 Mary called her mother's attention to a cart 
 drawn by oxen, which was crossing the street, not a 
 great way off. In the cart was earth that had 
 been taken from some building which was being 
 excavated. 
 
 11 Oh, mamma," cried she, " we can almost 
 imagine that we are among the old Pompeians, 
 
82 MAKT BKOWX AT POMPEII. 
 
 when we see a cart rolling through the street. It 
 seems as if people were busy here, as they used to 
 be. Does it not ?" 
 
 " It does, Mary," answered her mother, " and it 
 would be pleasant to spend several hours sitting in 
 one of these door-ways, dreaming and talking about 
 the people who once lived in the houses around us, 
 and of the children who once played on these side 
 walks. "VVe could imagine the sound of the work 
 men's carts to be the noise of the vehicles of old 
 Pompeii, and when visitors went by, we could 
 imagine them to be strangers on a visit to the city 
 when it was in its prime." 
 
 " Could we not imagine them to be Pompeians, 
 mamma ?" asked Mary. 
 
 " No, my dear," answered her mother, " their cos 
 tume is too different. In the days before Pompeii 
 was buried, no nation in the world dressetj as we do. 
 But we could make believe, as children say, that they 
 were strangers from some distant and unknown land." 
 
 " The land we come from, mamma," said Mary, 
 "was an unknown land to the Pompeians. If they 
 could wake up and see us here I wonde^ what they 
 would think of us." 
 
MAKY BROWN AT POMPEII. 83 
 
 " America was not dreamed of until fourteen hua- 
 di'ed years after Pompeii was buried," said Mrs. 
 Brown. 
 
 " How hard it is to believe that," said Mary. 
 
 It would tire my young readers to tell them about 
 all the houses Mrs. Brown and Mary visited, so I 
 shall pick out one more of the most interesting. It 
 is called the " House of the Tragic Poet," because 
 there was on one of its walls a picture of a man 
 reading from a scroll, and he was supposed to be a 
 poet. As Mrs. Brown and Mary entered the large 
 central hall, the former said : 
 
 " Now, my daughter, can you tell me the name of 
 the room in which we stand ?" 
 
 "Oh," replied Mary, " it is at , I forget mamma." 
 
 " It is the atrium, my clear," said her mother. 
 
 " Oh, yes," said Mary, eagerly, "and this basin 
 in the pavement is the impluvium, into which the 
 rain fell that came in through the hole in the roof. 
 I remembered that name, did I not ? And here," 
 she continued, stepping down into the now dry im- 
 pluvium, " here are little snail shells, and some other 
 very, very small shells of a different kind. How 
 pretty they are. May I take some home ?" 
 
84 MART BEOWN AT POMPEII. 
 
 " Yes," said her mother, " but I am afraid they 
 will break. Perhaps, however, if you wrap them 
 up very carefully in your handkerchief, they will go 
 safely in your pocket." 
 
 Mary did as her mother suggested, and said that 
 it would be so pleasant to show the girls at school 
 snail shells that had really come from Pompeii. 
 
 " Do you see, Mary," said Mrs. Brown, " how the 
 rooms open from the atrium ? These doors all 
 around us, you see, lead into small rooms." 
 
 " I see, mamma," replied Mary, " and how prettily 
 the walls are painted. They are all covered with 
 stucco, are they not? and then the stucco is 
 painted ;" and she went to the wall and carefully 
 examined a part that was broken. " If I can find 
 a piece of broken stucco on the ground, may I pick 
 it up ?" she asked. 
 
 " If the guide will allow you to do so," said her 
 mother. 
 
 Mary immediately began to hunt around among 
 the fragments of mortar that had fallen from the 
 wall ; at last she found a beautiful piece, one sur 
 face of which was covered with bright red paint. 
 She showed it to the guide, who said that it had 
 
MARY BKOWN AT POMPEII. 85 
 
 crumbled from the wall and could not be replaced, 
 so she might put it into her pocket, which she did 
 with great delight. 
 
 " My dear," said her mother, " we can pass from 
 this atrium into another court, which was entirely 
 open to the sky. In it there was once a garden. 
 This court was called a peristyle, and the most private 
 rooms of the house opened on it. Many of the 
 houses . had no peristyle, and their bedrooms opened 
 upon the atrium ; but when there was a peristyle, 
 the bedrooms usually opened upon that. You must 
 understand, my child, that these houses are very 
 interesting, for before Pompeii was discovered we 
 knew but little of the way in which private houses 
 were arranged among the ancients." 
 
 " I am very much interested in everything, mam 
 ma; but I am afraid that I cannot remember it all," 
 said Mary. 
 
 " You will remember a great deal, my dear," said 
 Mrs. Brown, encouragingly, " and when you read 
 and study, you will constantly recall something you 
 thought you had forgotten." 
 
 " I hope so, I am sure," said Mary ; " it would 
 be too bad to see so much and forget it all in a few 
 8 
 
86" MAKT BROWN AT POMPEII. 
 
 weeks I have noticed one tiling in almost all 
 the houses of Pompeii, mamma, which I think is 
 very pretty." 
 
 "What is it, Mary?" 
 
 " That on the wall, around, just above the ground, 
 there are almost always plants and little shrubs 
 and flowers painted, just as if they grew up out of 
 the ground." 
 
 " Yes, my dear, they look very much as plants 
 would look, growing along the base of the wall ; 
 and I suppose they are imitations of flowers that 
 grew and were admired in Pompeii, or its neighbor 
 hood." 
 
 As they left the house, Mrs. Brown said : " In the 
 house we are leaving, Mary, there was found a 
 singular mosaic. It represented a great dog, chained, 
 and at its feet were the words, ' cave canem,' which 
 means, ' Beware of the Dog.' The dog was of 
 course intended to represent a watch-dog,, which 
 kept guard at the door of the house, for the mosaic 
 was in the pavement close by the door. The dog, 
 as well as a great many beautiful pictures which 
 made this house ve^y celebrated when it was first 
 uncovered has been Carried away to Naples." 
 
MAEY BKOWN AT POMPEII. 87 
 
 " And put into the Museum, I suppose," said Mary > 
 laughing ; " everything goes into that Museum." 
 
 " Yes," answered her mother, " they are all in 
 the Museum." 
 
 Continuing their walk, they saw a baker's shop, 
 with the oven where he baked bread, and the 
 great stone mills in which he ground grain. Mary 
 picked up in this shop another piece of red wall, 
 which she put into her pocket with the other. Then 
 they went into the shops where wine and oil were 
 sold, and saw the great jars made of earthenware, 
 in which the wine and oil were kept for sale. These 
 jars were still embedded in the earth. 
 
 Finally, they came out on a broad street, called 
 the Street of Tombs, because on each side of it 
 there are graves and marble monuments. This 
 street leads to a gate, by which visitors may pass in 
 and out of Pompeii. It was one of the entrances to 
 the ancient city, and the ruins of a large inn stand 
 near it, in which, it is supposed, strangers just 
 arrived at Pompeii lodged. 
 
 On this street, just before they left the city, they 
 went up a flight of steps into a large house, which 
 Mrs. Brown said was once the house of Diomedes. 
 
88 MAEY BEOWN AT POMPEII. 
 
 " In it," said she, " you remember there were 
 found a number of skeletons of people who had 
 sought refuge in the cellar." 
 
 They went down into this cellar, which was a 
 very long apartment with an arched roof. On one 
 side, high up in the wall, were small windows, through 
 which the ashes that destroyed the people gathered 
 there, had sifted. Mrs. Brown pointed out to Mary 
 a line on the wall, and told her that that was the 
 height to which the ashes reached. 
 
 "Ob, mamma, it is far, far above our heads," 
 said Mary, seriously. 
 
 " And here," added her mother, " along the wall, 
 are jars for wine. Look into them, and you will see 
 that they are full of black earth. It is the ashes 
 which filled the cellar when the city and the people 
 who hid here were all buried together." 
 
 The guide showed them some marks on the wall 
 near the door. " Here," said he, " you see where 
 the people, who took refuge in this cellar, leaned 
 against the wall. The ashes settled all around them 
 and discolored the wall, but where the shoulders of 
 the people rested the wall is not altered." 
 
 Mary felt frightened as she looked at these fciarks 
 
MAEY BKOWN AT POMPEII. 89 
 
 " Oh, mamma," she said, in a whisper, " if Vesuvius 
 should burst out now, and bury us, also, in this vault 1" 
 
 " The mountain will not burst out without giving 
 some warning," replied her mother, quietly; "and 
 now we will go up stairs and look at the rooms." 
 As they passed up, they saw in the garden the spot 
 where Diornedes and his servant were discovered, try 
 ing to escape by the garden gate, about which Mrs. 
 Brown had told Mary in their conversation at the 
 hotel. 
 
 Up stairs, they saw a large number of rooms, one 
 of which was a ladies' dressing-room, and in it was 
 found a little box of rouge. 
 
 " Ladies had vanity in old times as well as now- 
 a-days, signora," said the guide, addressing Mrs. 
 Brown ; " indeed, I think people were pretty much 
 the same then as now." 
 
 "Were there any Christians in Pompeii, mam 
 ma ?" asked Mary, thoughtfully. 
 
 "We do not know, Mary; our Saviour died forty- 
 six years before Pompeii was destroyed, and it is 
 possible that some of his followers may have been in 
 the city at the time of its destruction, but we know 
 nothing about it." 
 
90 MARY BROWN AT POMPEII. 
 
 Besides the spots I have mentioned, Mrs. Brown 
 and Mary went to the amphitheatre, which was still 
 very perfect. Mary ran up the steps, and sat down 
 on the seats, and tried to think that she was wait 
 ing, with a great crowd of people, to see the wild 
 beasts come into the arena and fight together. 
 
 " When do you suppose the last show took place 
 here ?" she asked her mother. 
 
 " It is said," answered Mrs. Brown, " that the 
 people were assembled in this amphitheatre when 
 the strange eruption from the mountain began." 
 
 " That was a greater show than they had expected 
 to see, when they left their houses to come here. 
 How frightened they must have been." 
 
 Mary picked a few leaves from the plants which 
 grew on the walls of the amphitheatre, and laid 
 them in a little book she had with her. " It will 
 seem so strange to me when I get home, to look at 
 these little leaves and think that I really picked 
 them in Pompeii. I shall hardly believe it," she 
 said. 
 
 By this time, Mary and her mother were very 
 tired, and I am afraid my readers are also. They 
 were glad to say good-bye to Pompeii, and though 
 
MARY BKOWN AT POMPEII. 91 
 
 they left the city by the Street of Tombs, which was 
 far from where they had entered, they found their 
 driver waiting for them. He had driven round to 
 this gate from the one where they had left him. 
 
 The sky had become cloudy, and although they 
 drove rapidly, large drops of rain fell before they 
 came into Naples. 
 
 " There !" said Mary, as she drew her shawl up 
 over her shoulders, " a large drop of rain has hit 
 me on my nose ; and see how fast the rain begins to 
 fall ! It is just as you said, mamma : a bright and 
 sunshiny morning, has turned into a dark and dis 
 mal evening." 
 
92 MAEY BEOWN AT VESUVIUS. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 WE left Mary and her mother to come into 
 Naples in the rain. No sooner had they reached 
 the hotel, than a heavy shower drove everybody 
 within doors. Nor did the rain cease that night. 
 The next day, and the day after, it rained, but 
 finally a beautiful sunset gave promise of a pleasant 
 morrow. 
 
 When Mary looked out of the window, early in 
 the morning, she clapped her hands. " Where shall 
 we go to-day, mamma, where shall we go to-day ?" 
 she exclaimed. " The sun is coming up, and the sky 
 is all pink and gold. Oh, mamma, such a lovely 
 sunrise 1" and while Mary dressed, she ran every 
 minute to the window to look out at the sky, and 
 to exclaim how beautiful it was. And I hope, if 
 any of my young readers ever go to Naples, they 
 will remember to get up in time to see the sun rise, 
 
MARY BKOWN AT VESUVIUS. 93 
 
 for it is a glorious sight. Nor must they forget to 
 walk or drive along the Bay in the afternoon, for 
 the sunsets are very different from sunsets in our 
 country. The sky and the mountains are more rosy; 
 the smoke from Vesuvius makes a soft haze along 
 the horizon, and this haze changes color as the sun 
 sinks. The water in the Bay, too, is of a deep and 
 peculiar blue, and the island of Capri changes from 
 azure to amethyst in the sunset light. 
 
 "How does Vesuvius look, Mary?" asked Mrs. 
 Brown, who had not yet left her bed. 
 
 " Oh, mamma, it shows so plainly. There is a 
 large cloud of smoke over it, and the cloud rises 
 right up, like a tree." 
 
 " That is a sign of clear weather," said Mrs. 
 Brown, " and I am glad Vesuvius looks well, for we 
 shall try to go to the top of it to-day. We mus ; <; 
 take advantage of the fine weather." 
 
 This information was all that was necessary to 
 make Mary hasten with her toilet ; but she found 
 that in her hurry she mislaid everything, and her 
 mother was ready before her. 
 
 " Do not hurry so, Mary," said Mrs. Brown, laugh 
 ing ; " it is only seven o'clock ; we need not start 
 
94: MAEY BKOWN AT VESUVIUS. 
 
 before eight. Here are your ribbons," and she 
 helped her daughter tie up her hair. 
 
 " Oh, mamma," cried Mary, " I have broken my 
 shoestring." 
 
 " You cannot wear the shoes you are putting on, 
 my child," replied Mrs. Brown ; " put on your old 
 leather boots. The stones are rough, and you 
 would tear the others. And put on your old brown 
 dress. You see that I have on my oldest clothes." 
 
 " Why," said Mary, " shall we tear everything to 
 pieces ?" 
 
 "We may, my dear, and it is best to be pre 
 pared," replied Mrs. Brown. 
 
 In about an hour, Mrs. Brown and Mary were on. 
 their way to Vesuvius. They drove to Resina, and 
 there engaged horses and a guide to take them up 
 to the Hermitage. Mary was delighted at the idea 
 of having a ride on horseback. The guide helped 
 her get up on the saddle, and telling her that her 
 horse was gentle, he proceeded to assist Mrs. Brown 
 to mount. 
 
 In the meantime, Mary's horse, which knew the 
 road, walked slowly on, and though Mary was a 
 little frightened at going off alone, she did not call 
 
MAET BROWN AT VESUVIUS. 95 
 
 to her mother, but kept perfectly quiet. Her horse 
 turned into a narrow path, arched overhead. Upon 
 this arch a house was built. Under the shadow of 
 the arch the horse stopped, greatly to the relief of 
 his young mistress, and Mary sat wondering why 
 people so often made the roads and lanes run under 
 houses, when her mother and the guide overtook 
 her. 
 
 Mary's horse still kept ahead. The lane through 
 which they went was very narrow, and there were 
 high walls on either side of it. The children they 
 met, stopped and stood close to the wall, lest the 
 horses might hit them, and one of the largest girls 
 called out : 
 
 " Bravo, signorina, Iravo /" 
 
 A woman who passed said to Mrs. Brown, " La 
 signorina ha molto coraggio" 
 
 " What did she say, mamma ?" asked Mary. 
 
 " She said," replied her mother, " ' that the little 
 lady has a great deal of courage.' " 
 
 " Did she mean me, mamma ? I do not think it 
 takes much courage to ride on this horse." 
 
 As they now came into a broader road, she tried 
 to make her horse fall back and walk beside her 
 
96 MAKY BEOWN AT VESUVIUS. 
 
 mother's. The animals were in the habit of follow 
 ing each other in a single line up the mountain, 
 and they refused to go side by side. This disap 
 pointed Mary, but she laughed and said, " The horses 
 like to have their own way, mamma." 
 
 " Yes, my child, and they perhaps know what is 
 best this time." 
 
 The road soon became smooth, and the animals 
 began to trot. Mary tried her best not to be 
 frightened, and to keep her seat, but suddenly she 
 found herself slipping down, saddle and all, toward 
 the ground. 
 
 "Oh, mamma !" she cried ; but in a moment the 
 guide had sprung from his horse and was at her 
 side. 
 
 " Your saddle turned, my love," said her mother, 
 who was a little frightened, "but do not be afraid 
 The guide will set yon on the ground and tighten 
 the girth so that the saddle will not turn again." 
 
 Mary trembled a good deal when the guide took 
 her in his arms, but as soon as she touched the 
 ground she felt safe, and she went to her mother, 
 who still sat on her horse. 
 
 " Do not come too near my horse, my dear child," 
 
MARY BROWN AT "VESUVIUS. 97 
 
 she said ; "sit down on that stone until the girth 
 is fastened." 
 
 Mary did so, and tried not to be afraid to mount 
 again. 
 
 " It does take some courage to ride a horse, 
 mamma, I think," she said at last. 
 
 " Oh, you have enough courage," saicl her mother. 
 " Now your saddle is ready, and we can go on 
 safely." 
 
 The guide lifted her up, and in a few minutes 
 she felt quite secure on the horse. She leaned for 
 ward and patted the animal on his neck. 
 
 " You are a good horsey," she said, " and did not 
 mean to let me get hurt, I know. It was not your 
 fault that the saddle slipped, but please don't trot 
 any more." 
 
 On each side of the road were vineyards. The 
 grape-vines were trained on trees. These? trees had 
 but few leaves ; only enough to keep them alive, 
 and Mary said she thought it was too bad to keep 
 them trimmed so, "for," said she, "they do not 
 have any enjoyment at all." 
 
 " Perhaps it gives them pleasure to hold up the 
 vines, Mary," said Mrs. Brown, smiling. 
 9 
 
98 MAKY BROWN AT VESUVIUS. 
 
 " I hope it does, mamma," answered Mary, " but 
 for my part, I doubt it. I think they would rather 
 have leaves and fruit of their own." 
 
 They were now ascending a steep, winding road, 
 and the guide told them to look back and see Naples 
 and the Bay. The city and Bay were far below them, 
 for they had 'been gradually climbing ever since they 
 left Resina, and a broad brown descent lay between 
 them and the plain on which Naples stood. The 
 houses of the city were dazzlingly white, for the sun 
 shone on them, and the Bay was of a deep, bright 
 blue. The suburbs of Naples enclosed the Bay, so 
 that it looked as if it lay within a half-ring of white 
 houses. Beyond the houses, a semi-circle of hills 
 rose, and these were of a paler and more delicate 
 blue. Mrs. Brown and her daughter looked with 
 delight at this beautiful map spread out below 
 them. 
 
 Soon they came in sight of the Hermitage. It is 
 a large building, standing alone half way up 
 Vesuvius. The road ascends until it reaches the 
 Hermitage, and then for some distance the ground 
 is almost level. From this plain, the cone of Vesu 
 vius rises. Mary looked up at the Hermitage. 
 
MAKY BEOWN AT VESUVIUS. 99 
 
 " Does it not look lonely ?" she said. " I would 
 iiot like to live there, so near Vesuvius. I could 
 not trust the volcano." 
 
 "Look, my child," said Mrs. Brown, "at the 
 ground over which we are passing. The vineyards 
 are far below us, and all around us we see no 
 plants at all. The ground is almost black, and 
 covered with irregular masses of stone." 
 
 " What queer looking stone, mamma ; it is all 
 full of holes, and yet it looks very hard." 
 
 " It was thrown out from the mountain, Mary," said 
 her mother. " The ground here is made of the ashes 
 that fell from the volcano, and the great heaps of 
 sponge-like stone were also thrown out. What a 
 fearful shower it must have been, when they fell 
 here." 
 
 " And were they hot, mamma ? I can hardly 
 believe it, it seems so strange." 
 
 " It does indeed seem strange, Ma:y. Do you 
 see that wall beside you ?" 
 
 " Yes, mamma." 
 
 " That," said Mrs. Brown, " is the end of a great 
 stream of lava. You see it runs up in a continuous 
 line along the ground, until you lose it among the 
 
100 MAKT BEOWN AT VESUVIUS. 
 
 rocks, in the direction of the cone of the volcano. 
 It ran over the top of the cone, and came on until it 
 reached this spot. It kept cooling all the time, of 
 course, and by the time it arrived here, it was so 
 cool that it would not : un any longer." 
 
 " But how suddenly it stopped, mamma. It is, 
 as you said, just like a wall. The lava must have 
 been thick even when it was melted." 
 
 " Yes, Mary ; it is melted rock, you know. The 
 stream sometimes, as it runs along, cools on the top 
 while it is still very hot below, and when it is at 
 rest you can walk over this cool upper surface just 
 as you walk on the crust of snow." 
 
 " Is it not at all hot on top ?" asked Mary, " I 
 should think it would burn one's feet." 
 
 " It would probably burn your shoes a little even 
 then, but it would not swallow you up. See how 
 desolate all this region looks ; there is no grass, no 
 plant, only a bare waste of brown rocks and black 
 ashes." 
 
 " See, mamma, how my horse picks his way among 
 the rough stones. lie keeps in front of yours all 
 the time. Just now, when yours tried to pass, he 
 bit at him. I cannot see where the path lies ; 
 
MART BROWN AT VESUVIUS. 101 
 
 all things look alike, and yet he seems to know all 
 about it." 
 
 "Our eyes," said Mrs. Brown, " could not tell the 
 path ; and if we were alone here, we might wander 
 about all day among these masses of spongy rock. 
 It is only now and then that we can see a trace of 
 the path." 
 
 " Oh, mamma," cried Mary, as they approached 
 a steep ascent, " how will my horse go up here ? 
 It is just like stairs. I'm afraid he cannot do it." 
 
 "Oh, yes he can," said her mother ; "lean for 
 ward a little when he goes up, and then lean back 
 ward when he goes down on the other side." 
 
 Mary followed her mother's directions, and went 
 over the place easily. In a little while they came 
 where several large stones were piled together in 
 such a way that they were like a little flight of 
 steps, and she was surprised to see her horse pick 
 his way carefully up them. He went down on the 
 other side very slowly, but his motions were so sud 
 den that Mary was jolted a good deal. She saw, 
 however, that he was in no danger of falling, and she 
 began to feel a real affection for the faithful animal. 
 
 After passing the broad, desolate region I have 
 9* 
 
102 MAHY BROWN T VESUVIUS. 
 
 described, they came to a steep bank, on the top ol 
 which stood the Hermitage. The guide shouted to 
 the horses to make them go up this bank. The 
 patient beasts obeyed, but they showed plainly that 
 it was a difficult task. Mary felt sorry for her horse, 
 and talked to him to encourage him. She told her 
 mother that although he did not understand Eng 
 lish, he must know that she liked him. 
 
 They passed the Hermitage, in front of which 
 were several dther travellers, who were resting a few 
 minutes before going up the cone of the mountain. 
 The road was now on the top of a long bank, like 
 the banks heaped up for railroads to run over in our 
 country, and which all my young readers have seen. 
 On one side of this bank was a plain full of black 
 ashes and cinders, and Mary could see smoke rising 
 from it here and there. There were many large, 
 yellow spots upon its surface, as if some one had 
 poured out a quantity of bright yellow paint on the 
 dark ground. 
 
 " What is that smoke ?" asked Mary. 
 
 " It rises from the lava which has not yet lost all 
 its heat, for the plain is covered with lava that ran 
 down there last year," replied Mrs. Brown. 
 
MART BEOWN AT VESUVIUS. 103 
 
 " Last year 1" cried Mary. " Oh, I wish I had 
 sjen it running. And what is the yellow, mam 
 ma ?" 
 
 " It is sulphur," said her mother. 
 
 " It looks just the color of rolls of brimstone," 
 said Mary. 
 
 " Yes, my dear, brimstone is sulphur, you know." 
 
 " I wish my horse would not go so near the edge 
 of the bank, mamma." 
 
 " There is no danger, my child," said her mother, 
 encouragingly ; "he knows the path, and he would 
 be quite as unwilling to fall down the bank, as you 
 would be to have him. Have you noticed the trees 
 that grow down the side of the bank ?" 
 
 " Why, they are all dead, 1. think," said Mary, 
 surprised. 
 
 " What do yon suppose killed them ?" asked her 
 mother. 
 
 "I am sure I do not know. Was it the lava, 
 mamma ?" 
 
 " It was probably the heat and sulphurous vapor 
 from that great bed of lava in the plain just below," 
 said Mrs. Brown. 
 
 " It seems cruel, does it not ?" asked Mary. 
 
104 MAET BKOWBT AT VESUVITJS. 
 
 " I suppose the lava thinks that all this mountain 
 is its own, and that the trees have no right to grow 
 here." 
 
 They rode on, enjoying the novelty of the scene,, 
 and before long came to a spot where the guide 
 asked them to dismount. He said the horses could 
 go no farther, and they must proceed on foot or else 
 be carried. 
 
MARY BKOTVN AT VESUVIUS. 105 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 WHEN Mrs. Brown had alighted, she turned to 
 look about her. "There, on our left," said she to 
 Mary, " stands Monte Somma." 
 
 Mary looked at the mountain, which shut off all 
 view of the country and sky on their left. It was 
 brown ; only a little yellow moss grew upon its 
 stones. Its side was rough and seamed with narrow 
 fissures. It rose abruptly from the plain where 
 they stood. 
 
 " You see, my child," said Mrs. Brown, pointing 
 along the course of the mountain, " that Monte 
 Somma curves a good deal, and partly encloses the 
 plain on which we are standing. This plain is the 
 old crater where the vines used to grow." 
 
 " And did Spartacus and his little army climb 
 such a height as Monte Somma, to get out ?" in 
 quired Mary, in surprise. 
 
106 MARY BKOWN AT VESUVIUS. 
 
 ft 
 
 " I suppose so," replied her mother. 
 
 " I am glad I was not one of his soldiers. 
 long ago was it that he did it, mamma ?" 
 
 " It was seventy-three years before the birth of 
 Christ." 
 
 " Oh, mamma, suppose the eruption had taken 
 place while he was here," said Mary, quite excited 
 by the thought. 
 
 " How long was it after he was here that the 
 eruption did take place ?" asked her mother. 
 
 " Let me see," answered the little girl, slowly. 
 lt Spartacus was here seventy-three years before 
 Christ was born, and the eruption was seventy-nine 
 years after the birth of Christ. I must add the 
 numbers together. It was one hundred and fifty- 
 two years. That is a great while. You said, 
 mamma, that one side of the old crater fell away 
 during the great eruption ; which side was it ?" 
 
 "It was on our right, Mary. It is entirely gone 
 now. It ran around the spot now occupied by the 
 cone of Vesuvius, and enclosed the plain on which 
 we stand. The cone of Vesuvius, you know, rose 
 right out of this plain. It came up just in the mid 
 dle of it, that is, just in the middle of the ancient 
 
MARY BEOWN AT VESUVIUS. 107 
 
 crater. We cannot see the whole plain now, be 
 cause the cone is in the way." 
 
 All this time Mrs. Brown was preparing her 
 self and Mary to walk up the mountain. She 
 fastened her own skirt up around her waist by 
 means of a strap, so that she need not be obliged 
 to hold it up with her hands, for she wanted them 
 free in order to help herself up the steep path. She 
 also tied Mary's shawl around her in such a way 
 that she could freely use her arms. 
 
 The guide gave each of them a pole or long cane, 
 and told them to follow him. As they went along, 
 several men followed them with broad belts and 
 with chairs. They urged Mrs. Brown to get into 
 one of the chairs, and let them carry her up. Find 
 ing she would not do this, they wanted to put one 
 of the belts around her waist, and draw her up by 
 a leathern strap, fastened to the belt. Mrs. Brown 
 preferred to help herself up, but she hired the men 
 to carry Mary in a chair, for she was afraid her 
 daughter would fall and hurt herself. 
 
 Mary laughed very much at the idea of being 
 carried up the mountain. Mrs. Brown told the men 
 to go very slowly, so that she could keep up with 
 
108 MART BROWN AT VESUVIUS. 
 
 them, for when people walk up a steep hill or moun 
 tain they ought to walk very slowly indeed, in order 
 not to get out of breath. 
 
 " Why, mamma, how you slip in the sand," said 
 Mary, looking down from her seat at her mother ; 
 " you slide back as fast as you walk up." 
 
 " Not quite, my child," said Mrs. Brown, smiling, 
 " but it is pretty difficult to walk, even with the 
 help of this pole. I shall, however, get used to it 
 in a few minutes." 
 
 Their guide now left the sand and walked among 
 and upon the masses of rock which covered one side 
 of the cone. These masses are of various sizes, and 
 sometimes offer a secure footing. Occasionally, 
 however, they slip away from under one's feet, and 
 roll down the mountain-side. They would slip much 
 oftener were it not that they are so rough and 
 irregular, that they fit into each other something 
 like the parts of a dissected map. 
 
 " Mamma," said Mary, " these stones, too, look 
 just like great pieces of hard sponge, only they are 
 dark red and brown. They look, too, like the 
 spongy clinker that comes out of a stove in which 
 coal has been burned. I shall never see clinker again 
 
MARY BROWN AT VESUVIUS. 109 
 
 without thinking of Vesuvius. And it is not strange 
 the stones should look so, for Vesuvius is like a 
 great stove with a fire in it. But," she added, 
 looking up towards the top of the cone, " how white 
 the mountain is above us ; what makes it so ?" 
 
 " It is snow," answered Mrs. Brown ; "snow falls 
 on mountains, you know, when it does not fall in 
 the valleys. When rain fell in Naples yesterday, 
 snow fell on Vesuvius." 
 
 " Shall we pass over the snow ?" asked Mary. 
 
 "Probably, for a short distance," replied her 
 mother ; "the snow does not appear to be deep." 
 
 " There ought to be snow on the ground," said 
 Mary, " for it is February ; at least, there would be 
 enow on the ground at home. I shall feel as if I 
 were in New York, when I get up there in the 
 snow." 
 
 " Not if you look up and see the smoke resting 
 above you on the top of the mountain," returned 
 Mrs. Brown. 
 
 " No, indeed, mamma, I did not think of that. 
 But may I not get out of the chair and try to walk 
 up behind you ? I would like to try it a little 
 while." 
 
 10 
 
110 MARY BKOWN AT VESUVIUS. 
 
 " If you wish, you may, my dear ;" and Mrs. 
 Brown told the men to stop, and help Mary down 
 from the chair. 
 
 " The little lady wishes to be as brave as her 
 mother," said one of the men; " that is well, but the 
 walking is difficult. I will follow close behind her, 
 and catch her if she falls.' 7 
 
 Mrs. Brown thanked the man. He gave Mary a 
 stick to walk with, and she joined her mother. 
 
 " Why, mamma," she exclaimed, after she had 
 taken a few steps, " it is just like going up stairs, is 
 it not ? Only the steps are very rough." 
 
 " It is much like it, my dear, but we should think 
 it hard if we could have no better stairs than these 
 in our houses. I think, moreover, you have rarely 
 been up stairs as steep as these." 
 
 " I can go up more easily if I take hold with my 
 hands, like a monkey," said Mary, and she leaned 
 forward and grasped the stones with her hands. 
 
 " Oh, this goes nicely," she said, " I feel as if I 
 were climbing up a great stone wall. Is it not like 
 a stone wall, such as we see around meadows in the 
 country at home ?" 
 
 " Very much, my dear," said Mrs. Brown, laughing. 
 
MAKY BEOWN AT VESUVIUS. Ill 
 
 " How little our horses begin to look," said Mary, 
 partly turning round to look down the cone to the 
 spot where they had left the a-uimals. " It makes 
 me feel as if I should fall when I look down," she 
 added ; " I believe it makes me dizzy." 
 
 " It is better not to look back, Mary ; for it is 
 quite as much as you can do to keep your footing 
 on these stones." 
 
 " I am so warm," said the little girl. " May I 
 take off my shawl ?" 
 
 " Yes, but you must put it on the moment we get 
 to the top, or you will take cold," replied her 
 mother. 
 
 Mary took off her shawl, and the man behind her 
 offered to carry it. He also took Mrs. Brown's 
 shawl, for the exercise made any warm clothing very 
 uncomfortable. After they had been climbing half 
 an hour, they reached the snow. It was not so 
 deep but that the ragged stones projected through 
 it. Neither was it slippery. The only inconveni 
 ence that they felt from it was that it made their 
 feet very cold. 
 
 Mrs. Brown told the men to help Mary into the 
 chair again, and to put her shawl closely around her, 
 
112 MAHY BKOWN AT VESUVIUS. 
 
 for she did not like her daughter to walk in the 
 snow ; and she was so heated with exercise, 
 that she would soon* have taken a severe cold, had 
 she sat still without her shawl about her. Mrs. 
 Brown saw that Mary was very tired. The little 
 girl made no objection to being put into the chair, 
 for the stones had hurt her feet. She had also lost 
 her footing once and fallen forward upon her hands, 
 but the guide had helped her up, and she had not 
 hurt herself. 
 
 The last half of the journey did not seem so long 
 as the first. There was no snow on the summit of 
 the cone, for the warm vapor from the crater rolled 
 down over it and melted it. 
 
 Mrs. Brown and Mary forgot all the fatigue of 
 the ascent as soon as they reached the top. The 
 great column of smoke which they had seen before 
 they reached the Hermitage looked enormous now 
 that they stood near it. They sat down a mo 
 ment to rest, but could not breathe without cough 
 ing. 
 
 " Mamma, what makes us cough, and what is it 
 that smells so queer ?" asked Mary. 
 
 "It is the sulphurous vapor from the volcano that 
 
MARY BKOWN AT VESUVIUS. 113 
 
 smells so, and it is also that which makes you 
 cough," said her mother. 
 
 " But I can't breathe ugh, mamma, ugh," 
 coughed out Mary. " Ugh, ugh it stops ugh 
 my breath ugh all the time." 
 
 " In a little while," said her mother, who was 
 coughing too, "you will be able to breathe freely. 
 You are partly exhausted by the effort of getting 
 up here. Turn your back upon the smoke and 
 walk off towards the edge of the cone." 
 
 Mary did so, and soon recovered her breath. 
 
 "Now, my little lady," said the guide, "if your 
 mother and you are ready, we will go on." 
 
 Mary wondered where they were going. The 
 earth around them was almost covered with huge 
 stones, and where the guide stuck his stick into the 
 earth and turned it up, Mary saw bright yel 
 low lumps of sulphur, which crumbled when he 
 struck them. The thick cloud that was constantly 
 rolling up out of the crater, like smoke from a 
 chimney; kept between them and the sun, and Mary 
 found this pleasant, for she was still warm with 
 exercise ; but the sulphur made her cough, and the 
 smell was disagreeable. 
 
 10* 
 
114: MARY BKOWN AT VESUVIUS. 
 
 They went down a bank into a great hollow, and 
 Mary felt her feet begin to grow warm. 
 
 " I do believe that the ground is warm/' she said, 
 and she stooped down and put her hand upon it. 
 
 " It is warm !" she exclaimed. " It is really 
 quite hot. Do feel of it, mamma, do feel of it I" 
 
 Mrs. Brown stooped and felt of it, and then 
 pointed out a little round hole in the ground not 
 larger than a cup. From it a stream of vapor was 
 rising. 
 
 " What is it, mamma ?" asked Mary. 
 
 "It is vapor from below, my dear, and without 
 doubt it is quite hot." 
 
 Mary ran to the spot, and stooping, held her 
 hand down over the hole. She instantly drew it 
 back, and exclaimed, " oh, mamma, it is just like 
 steam from the spout of a kettle ! I cannot bear 
 my hand over it." 
 
 " It will do for a little kitchen," said Mrs. Brown. 
 " After a while, a man will cook us some eggs at 
 such a hole, and you will see that the vapor is really 
 as hot as it seems." 
 
 Mary turned up the ground with her stick j when 
 she saw the bright lumps of sulphur below, she said 
 
MAKY BKOWN AT VESUVIUS, 115 
 
 she would like to carry some home. She picked one 
 up in her hand, but let it fall very quickly. 
 
 "It is so hot I cannot hold it, mamma," she 
 cried. " How strange 1 How afraid I should be to 
 stay up here long. I should be afraid the fire 
 would come out and burn me up. And see, there is 
 another place where it smokes, and yonder is still 
 another. What a very strange place this is." 
 
 She again picked up the lump of sulphur ; finding 
 it cooler, she put it into her pocket. They came up 
 out of the hollow ; on the edge of the bank stood a 
 man with a basket of eggs. He asked Mrs. Brown 
 whether she would like the eggs boiled soft or hard. 
 She laughed, and said she would like to have them 
 boiled hard to-day, for she wanted to see how good 
 a fire there was in his kitchen. He laughed in return, 
 and proceeded to put the eggs into a little hole in 
 the ground. He did not cover them up, and Mary 
 said she did not see how they could cook there. 
 
 They did not wait, however, but went up to a 
 high point, from which they could look down upon 
 the plain. The guide pointed out Pompeii ; Mary 
 looked with much interest at the spot, though she 
 could not see the town very plainly. 
 
116 MAEY BROWN AT VESUVIUS. 
 
 In a few minutes, the man came running after 
 them with the eggs. They took them, and after 
 letting them cool a little, broke off the shells and 
 found them cooked perfectly hard. In eating hers, 
 Mary touched her tongue against a piece of the 
 shell which still clung to the egg. 
 
 " Oh, mamma," she cried, " the shell is very bit 
 ter ; it really bit my tongue." 
 
 " Something settled on its surface from the vapor 
 that cooked it," replied her mother. 
 
 " The eggs are really well done, are they not ?" 
 asked Mary. "We shall think of Vesuvius when 
 we eat eggs at home." 
 
 " Look at your dress, Mary," said Mrs. Brown. 
 
 "I declare!" said Mary, "something has taken 
 the color out. It has changed from brown to red." 
 
 " What have you in your pocket ?" asked Mrs. 
 Brown, smiling. " The piece of warm sulphur you 
 put in has changed the color of your dress." 
 
 Mary pulled out the yellow stone. " So it has, 
 mamma," she said, aiid she turned her pocket inside 
 out. " And see my pocket 1" she exclaimed, " there 
 is a big hole in it ! What a hungry piece of stone, 
 to eat up my pocket. I will throw it away." 
 
MAEY BROWN AT VESUVIUS. 117 
 
 She threw the sulphur down the side of the moun 
 tain. The guide saw her do so, and thought she 
 wanted to watch it ran down the long slope. He 
 therefore took up a great stone, and, having called 
 Mary's attention, threw it down the mountain. The 
 little girl was delighted to see it go leaping from 
 spot to spot down the long descent, till at last it 
 was lost to her sight. 
 
 " I should not like to be in the place of that 
 stone," she said, stepping back from the edge of the 
 path, for the path was very narrow ; " and I am so 
 afraid I shall fall, that I will run on to yonder 
 broad spot." 
 
 Her mother followed her, and the guide led them 
 around to the edge of the great cloud of smoke. 
 They came -quite near to it. The sun was just be 
 hind it. The cloud of vapor looked as if it were 
 full of fire, and it rolled up in enormous masses from 
 the crater. The earth was hot, and a low, growl 
 ing sound came all the time from the great pit out 
 of which the smoke issued. 
 
 "Oh, mamma, it frightens me," said Mary, in a 
 low voice, after they had contemplated this grand 
 sight in silence for a few minutes. " It seems just 
 
118 MARY BROWN AT VESUVIUS. 
 
 as if the ground under our feet were hoflW, and 
 might fall in and swallow us. And the cloud looks 
 all red and yellow inside, just as if there were fire 
 in it." 
 
 " And see, my child," said Mrs. Brown, " when 
 the cloud sweeps a little away from the edge, you 
 can see that the crater is lined with sulphur." 
 
 "Yes, I do see it, mamma ; how yellow it is. 
 Can we not go a little nearer ?" 
 
 The guide heard Mary ask this question ; he 
 hastened to Mrs. Brown and pointed out to her that 
 there was a great crack in the ground near the edge 
 of the crater. 
 
 " The earth is all the time cracking off and falling 
 in, and it is not safe to approach very near the 
 crater. You know, my little lady," he continued, 
 turning to. Mary, "that the crater is a great pit 
 full of steam and smoke, and melted lava, and if you 
 fell in you would be killed in a moment. I do not 
 wonder that you want to go nearer, for the cloud of 
 smoke is very beautiful, but it is very terrible too." 
 
 While they stood looking, the piece of earth that 
 was cracked fell into the crater. Mary started and 
 appeared frightened. 
 
MAEY BEOWN AT VESUVIUS. 119 
 
 " Let us go away, mamma," she said, " I am 
 afraid of the volcano.' 7 
 
 " You need not be alarmed, my dear," said her 
 mother, taking her hand. " While we look at this 
 fearful scene we think of the great power of our 
 Heavenly Father, and yet His power is just as 
 wonderful in the creation of a rose, or a violet, as 
 in the formation of this volcano. We will now 
 leave this spot and turn our faces homeward." 
 
 They then walked to that part of the mountain 
 where they had come up. The guide told them 
 that they could not go down over the stones by 
 which they had ascended, but must take an easier 
 path through a line of ashes that reached from the 
 top of the cone to the bottom. 
 
 Mary walked down with her mother, instead of 
 being carried in a chair. It had taken them an hour 
 to go up the cone. It did not take them half that 
 time to descend. The ashes were deep, and their 
 feet went far down into them. It was very much 
 like walking down a hill in deep, soft snow. 
 Wherever they put down their feet they slipped, and 
 sometimes Mrs. Brown and Mary slid together quite 
 a distance. Several times Mary fell on her back, 
 
120 MAEY BEOWN AT VESUVIUS. 
 
 because her feet slid away from under her. At 
 last, slipping, and sliding, and jumping, they came 
 near the foot of the cone, and then they ran the 
 rest of the way. 
 
 Mary's shoes were quite full of ashes and little 
 stones, and she was out of breath with running 
 and laughing. After a few moments' rest at the 
 foot of the cone, she was lifted on her horse, and 
 her mother and she, followed by the guide, rode off 
 to the Hermitage, and went past it down the moun 
 tain. 
 
 At Resina, they took a carriage and drove to 
 Naples, and little Mary was glad to dine and go to 
 bed. That night she dreamed about Vesuvius, 
 and thought she was a butterfly, and rode not only 
 up to the Hermitage, but also up the cone and 
 down into the crater, on the back of a beautiful 
 yellow horse, just the color of sulphur. 
 
MARY BEOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 121 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 " MAMMA," said Mary, when her mother awoke 
 the next morning, " I have been looking at the 
 walls of this room ever since I opened my eyes, and 
 do you not see that they are painted to look like the 
 walls of the rooms at Pompeii ? They are painted 
 in large panels, and in the middle of each panel is 
 a little picture of a cupid, or a girl dancing, or 
 else carrying fruit. And on the wall opposite the 
 window, there is a picture of a faun kneeling down 
 to feed a goat. Is it not pretty, mamma ?" 
 
 "It is pretty, Mary," said her mother. " Over 
 head, too, you see little ropes made of flowers 
 stretched across the ceiling, and in among them are 
 little griffins and strange animals. In the centre of 
 the ceiling you see a boy carrying a great basket 
 of grapes." 
 
 "Did the man who owns this house have this 
 11 
 
122 MART BKOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 room painted so, just to make it look like the 
 rooms at Pompeii ?" asked Mary. 
 
 " No doubt, rny dear," replied her mother. " The 
 pictures and decorations of the rooms at Pompeii 
 are very much admired, arid a great many rooms in 
 Naples are painted . in imitation of them. The 
 mosaic pavements are also often imitated." 
 
 " How, mamma ?" 
 
 " Tiles, about a foot square, are made to look as 
 if they were made up of a great many little square 
 pieces, and different parts of the pavement are 
 copied on a great many different tiles ; when these 
 tiles are laid together, they look like the beautiful 
 mosaics." 
 
 " I should like to see them, mamma," said Mary. 
 " Where are we going to-day ?" 
 
 "To-day we will go to the Museum, Mary," 
 answered her mother, " for I want you to see the 
 pictures and mosaics that really came from Pom 
 peii." 
 
 "How glad I am, mamma. And what a pleasant 
 visit we are having at Naples. I feel as if I were 
 learning a great deal. Oh, how much I shall have 
 to tell the girls at school when I get home ;" and 
 
MARY BROWN Al THE MUSEUM. 123 
 
 Mary flew to dress herself as speedily as pos 
 sible. 
 
 As Mrs. Brown and Mary drove through the 
 streets, on their way to the Museum, the latter 
 said : 
 
 " Mamma, the outsides of the houses here are 
 painted pale pink and yellow those at Pompeii 
 are deep red and yellow, but I do believe these 
 houses are painted in this way to remind people of 
 those ancient houses. I thought the color of the 
 houses very funny, when we first came to Naples, 
 but I got used to it, and should not have thought 
 of it again, had I not seen Pompeii. I wonder how 
 Vesuvius is this morning." 
 
 " Vesuvius has not altered much since yesterday 
 morning," said her mother. "I saw it from the 
 window before we came out, and the smoke was ris 
 ing straight up." 
 
 " Did you tear your clothes yesterday, mam 
 ma ?" 
 
 "Not my dress," said Mrs. Brown, "for that you 
 know I fastened up around my waist, but the hem 
 of one of my petticoats was partly torn off, and 
 what was not torn off was full of ashes " 
 
124: MAET BROWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 " How could the ashes get into the hem ?" asked 
 Mary. 
 
 " They are so fine that they sift through the 
 cloth, and get in between the stitches," said her 
 mother. 
 
 " I did not examine mine, mamma. You told me 
 to put on clean clothes this morning, and I never 
 looked at the others." 
 
 They stopped in front of the Museum, and Mary 
 was delighted to see that it was very large. 
 
 "Oh, mamma, there is room here for a great, 
 great many things," she cried. 
 
 The hall was very broad, and there were some 
 great statues in bronze and marble in it. At the 
 end of the hall was a wide, handsome staircase, and 
 on each side of the hall there were rooms, in which 
 curiosities were kept. The doors of these rooms 
 were open, but a little iron railing ran across the 
 doorway to keep people from passing in. In this 
 railing there was a gate, and in each room was a 
 man, whose business it was to open the gate and 
 let people in and out. 
 
 They went into the first suite of rooms. The 
 walls were covered with the pieces of wall brought 
 
MAKY BROWN J.T THE MUSEUM. 125 
 
 from the cities of Herculaneum, Pompeii, and Sta- 
 bia3. They were, for the most part, the pictures 
 which had been in the middle of the panels, and 
 they were now placed in narrow wooden frames. 
 
 " Oh," cried Mary, as she glanced about her, 
 " these are the pictures I How old and faded many 
 of them look, and some look quite new. Why, 
 mamma, there is a rooster ; is it not natural ? And 
 there, beyond, is a picture of a girl dancing, and 
 there is another, and why, there are ever so many 
 of them ; are they not pretty ?" 
 
 "They are very graceful, my dear," answered 
 Mrs. Brown. 
 
 " There is a picture of a town on the edge of 
 a bay. Is it not queer, mamma ? It does not 
 look right. It looks like the pictures on our 
 china plates at home. What a queer ship that is 
 on the water !" and Mary ran rapidly from picture 
 to picture, talking all the time of the strange things 
 represented. 
 
 Mrs. Brown called her attention to a small paint 
 ing which she had passed by without noticing. 
 " Look at it attentively," she said, " and tell me 
 what it is." 
 
 11* 
 
126 MAKY BKOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 " Oh, how funny !" cried Mary, laughing ; " it is 
 a green bird drawing a little carriage." 
 
 " And who drives the carriage ?" 
 
 "I do believe it is a grasshopper," exclaimed 
 Mary, looking closely at the picture. "Is it not a 
 grasshopper, mamma ?" (See Plate, page 40.) 
 
 "Yes, my dear." 
 
 " It looks just as if it were made to be put in a 
 picture book," said Mary. " If I could draw and 
 paint, I should like to copy that picture to take 
 home with me." 
 
 " See that chariot drawn by a griffin, and a but 
 terfly is driver," said Mrs. Brown ; " would you not 
 like to copy that too ?" 
 
 " Oh," cried Mary, delighted with the odd pic 
 tures, " I would like to have them all ; but if I had 
 to choose among them I should certainly take the 
 bird. But do you see, mamma, those pretty little 
 babies ?" 
 
 " They are little cupids, my dear," said her 
 mother, " or perhaps they are wine genii" 
 
 " What are wine genii, mamma ?" 
 
 " They are little winged boys who are represented 
 as being very fond of grapes and wine. One of 
 
MARY BKOWJST AT THE MUSEUM. 127 
 
 them, you see, has a wine bottle ; the other is play 
 ing upon a lyre." 
 
 " That is a queer wine bottle," said Mary. 
 
 " It is an amphora," replied her mother. " You 
 see it is shaped like the wine jugs we saw in the 
 cellar of the villa of Diomedes, at Pompeii. Such 
 jugs were called amphorae." 
 
 " I thought," said Mary, " that such a jug was 
 called an amphora, but j ou say amphora." 
 
 "Amphora is the plural of amphora" said Mrs. 
 Brown. " You see this bottle is sharp at one 
 end." 
 
 " Oh, yes, mamma, that is the end that is thrust 
 into the ground to make the jug stand up. I 
 remember all you told me about it the other day." 
 
 " Yonder," said Mrs. Brown, " is another cupid." 
 
 " Why yes, mamma. He is flying up to a grape 
 vine, and another little cupid below, picks up the 
 grapes he drops, and puts them into a basket. How 
 pretty it is. And there, mamma do look is a 
 little fellow with wings going up a ladder to pick 
 grapes, and his little brother holds up his hands to 
 catch them. That is just like pictures in a story 
 book." 
 
128 MAKY BEOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 " That long picture, Mary," said her mother, 
 " represents a sacrifice to Ceres, the goddess of the 
 earth. She was supposed to make grain and all the 
 fruits of the earth grow. You see the altar and 
 the priest, and on that little pedestal is a statue of 
 the goddess. The pig, which a man is leading 
 towards the altar, is the victim." 
 
 " It takes a great while to understand these pic 
 tures," said Mary, "so many of them are about 
 things that I am ignorant of." 
 
 " You cannot understand them all, my love," re 
 plied her mother, " but you can learn a great deal from 
 them. Yonder is a picture of Venus, floating on a 
 shell in the sea. You know who Venus was, Mary?" 
 
 " Venus was the goddess of beauty," answered 
 Mary, promptly ; " and she was always made very 
 beautiful in statues and pictures." 
 
 " Look at this pretty picture, Mary. A little 
 girl with wings is flying along with a cupid who has 
 a basket of fruit in his hand," said Mrs. Brown. 
 (See Frontispiece.) 
 
 11 How pretty that is," said Mary. " See that 
 little branch she holds. Who is that little girl, 
 mamma ?" 
 
MAEY BROWN AT THE MUSEUM. 129 
 
 " She is called Psyche, my dear. She and Cupid 
 were playmates, and were very fond of each other. 
 You will learn about them when you study more 
 about the ancient Greek and Eoman stories." 
 
 " There are two green animals that look like 
 dogs," said Mary. " They are standing on their 
 hind legs, and have got a long twig in their fore- 
 paws. They look just as if they were turning a 
 rope for somebody to jump." 
 
 "And see, my dear, how yellow the wall is 
 behind them. Jugt beyond them is a pretty stag, 
 on a green ground." 
 
 " See those birds, mamma, walking along to meet 
 each other. There is a mask between them ; how 
 pretty they are." 
 
 " All these pictures, Mary, were, as I have said, 
 taken from the middle of the panels, or from the 
 borders of the walls. We will go now and see 
 some of the walls themselves, for a great many 
 whole walls have been brought from the buried 
 cities." 
 
 Some of the walls were very broad and high, and 
 Mary said that she would like to make a room by 
 putting four of them together. 
 
130 MAKY BEOWN AT T1IE MUSEUM. 
 
 " That would be like making houses with cards, 
 as I used to do at home." she said, " only it would 
 take a giant to handle these walls. Each of them 
 was the whole side of a room, I think ; how very 
 ornamental they are." 
 
 " They are indeed," returned her mother. " Look 
 yonder, Mary, and tell me what is represented on 
 that wall opposite us." 
 
 " Well, mamma, the wall is dark, and on it is 
 painted a long rod with a knob at each end. The 
 rod is held up by a rope made of flowers that comes 
 from above to each end. The rope hangs down in 
 pretty festoons all along the rod. And two bows 
 are made in the rope where it is tied to the rod, 
 and from the bows two little baskets hang down. 
 Why, how very pretty it is ! I think the Pom- 
 peians must have known how to make pretty baby- 
 houses." 
 
 " You have forgotten to say anything about the 
 man who is dancing on the rod. He holds a long 
 pole in his hand to balance himself, just as rope- 
 dancers do now-a-days. Do you notice what a 
 bright deep red he is painted ?" 
 
 " Yes, mamma, it is a beautiful color." 
 
.ALARY BKOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 131 
 
 "The pictures of Pompeii are noted for their 
 bright colors," said Mrs. Brown. " The people were 
 very fond of seeing rope-dancers perform. Beyond, 
 you see another picture that probably came from 
 the same room, for it, also, has a rod held up by a 
 rope of flowers, while a man dances upon it." 
 
 " And little baskets hang down from that, too," 
 said Mary. " How many masks and festoons there 
 are in these pictures, and how many pillars, too." 
 
 " Yes, my love, the Pompeians seem to have been 
 very fond of making their rooms look larger by intro 
 ducing painted columns, and niches, and recesses 
 into the decorations of their walls. Sometimes it 
 seems as if you could look on from room to room, 
 through open doors and arches. There, my child, 
 is a painted niche, and on the wall of the niche is 
 a lion." 
 
 " I should be afraid of him if he were alive", he 
 looks so ferocious. And see that long-legged bird, 
 mamma, with a long neck. And beyond is a foun 
 tain, with the water dashing up, and behind the 
 fountain is a little fence, which looks just like any 
 cross-barred fence. There is a bird walking on the 
 top of it." 
 
132 MAEY BEOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 " And see, Mary, what a bright, bright red that 
 is on the next wall. It looks as if it were not yet 
 dry, and against it is painted a pillar with a broad 
 yellow ribbon fluttering about in the air." 
 
 " And there, mamma, is a wall which is made to 
 represent the entrance to some great palace. And 
 yonder is a woman selling little Cupids ! How cun 
 ning, mamma ! They look like little birds. 
 
 Mary was delighted with these walls, for she felt as 
 if she were again in Pompeii. I know no better 
 way of showing my young readers how they looked 
 than to insert in this book a picture of one. 
 
 It is, as you see, divided into panels. Along the 
 bottom are plants and two swans. The middle 
 panel is yellow, and on each side of it is a slen 
 der twisted column, with a mask hanging on it. On 
 the top of each column is a basket of flowers. A 
 little cross-barred fence is at the foot of the columns, 
 and looks as if it stood in front of them. In the 
 middle of the yellow panel is the picture of a sea 
 horse. The panels at the side are red. In the 
 middle of one are two fishes tied together ; in the 
 middle of the other are two doves. 
 
 I cannot tell you about all the pictures Mary saw 
 
MABY BKOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 133 
 
 that day. She could hardly remember them separ 
 ately when she got home. That night she dreamed 
 of flying boys and girls, of swans and doves, and 
 grasshoppers, and of beautiful houses and airy rope- 
 dancers. 
 
 The next day, Mrs. Brown and Mary went to the 
 Museum again, and saw some bronze statues which 
 came from the buried cities. There was one small 
 statue of a faun dancing, that came from the House 
 of the Faun at Pompeii. 
 
 " Oh, we went into that house," cried Mary ; 
 " and a faun is not a kind of deer. It is a wood- 
 god, and it is not spelled f-a-w-n, but f-a-u-n ; is it 
 not, mamma ?" and Mary laughed, for she remem 
 bered the mistake she made at Pompeii. 
 
 They saw, too, the statue of the goddess, with a 
 hole between her shoulders for the priest to speak 
 through. Mary's attention was also attracted to a 
 little statue which had a singular mark on its 
 neck. 
 
 " It looks as if a piece of cloth had been laid on 
 it when the bronze was soft," said Mary. 
 
 " You are not far from the truth," replied Mrs. 
 12 
 
134: MARY BROWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 Brown. ' These statues were buried in the lava and 
 ashes ; some of them, as you see, were partly melted 
 by the heat. This little statue was found carefully 
 wrapped up in a piece of cloth ; the heat had melted 
 the statue a little, so that the cloth stuck to it. 
 When the cloth was taken off, it left the mark of 
 the threads." 
 
 " How strange, mamma ; but why was it wrap 
 ped up r 
 
 " Probably, in order to carry it away. It was 
 found in a large pot ; it is supposed that its owner 
 hoped to transport it in safety, but found that he 
 had not time to do more than save his own life." 
 
 They saw, also, a great many fine statues in mar 
 ble, and spent nearly a whole day among them. 
 Mrs. Brown told her daughter that the first speci 
 mens of statuary were found at Herculaneum. She 
 showed her four statues that looked alike, and told 
 her that they were the likenesses of four sisters. 
 She said also that the statues of their father, and 
 mother, and brother were found in the same house 
 with them. 
 
 There are, in the great Museum, so many things 
 
MAKY BROWN AT THE MUSEUM. 135 
 
 from the buried cities, that I am afraid my young 
 readers will be tired of hearing about them. If, 
 however, they are not, I will tell more about them 
 in the next chapter. 
 
136 MARY BROWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE great Museum contains not only many rooms 
 filled with pictures and statues, but also several 
 large apartments full of household articles taken 
 from the dwelling-houses in Pompeii. Into these 
 rooms Mrs. Brown and Mary went, on their next 
 visit to the famous Museum. 
 
 "Oh, mamma," cried Mary, as they entered,- " did 
 these things really come from Pompeii and Hercu- 
 laneum ? I should think they were new, or else that I 
 was in somebody's kitchen. See, how many sauce 
 pans there are of all sizes, little and big, and they are 
 hung up on the wall, just as they would be in the 
 closet at home. Do tell me, are they all old ?" 
 
 " Yes, my love. Little by little, they have been 
 dug up out of the ruined cities. Some, as you see, 
 are quite burnt ; others look, as you say, almost 
 new." 
 
MARY BEOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 137 
 
 " But were there so very many found buried ?" 
 asked Mary. 
 
 " Oh, yes, and no doubt a great many more will 
 be found. You know that only about one fourth of 
 Pompeii has been uncovered." 
 
 "What are these pots, and pans, and kettles 
 made of, mamma ? They look black, and blue, and 
 green." 
 
 " Some of them are of bronze, and others are of 
 copper. Their natural color has been changed by 
 the heat and vapors to which they were exposed." 
 
 " What is bronze, mamma ? I wanted to ask 
 you when we were looking at the statues." 
 
 " Bronze is a mixture of copper and tin. Look 
 at this little cooking-stove, Mary. It was probably 
 intended to stand on a table, and is made in the 
 form of a square castle, with a tower at each corner. 
 These towers and the walls of the castle are hol 
 low, and you can pour water into them by opening 
 the little lids in the top of the towers. The place 
 you see in the middle of the castle, is to hold the 
 coals. On these coals you may cook your meat and 
 vegetables. In the towers and walls you always 
 have hot water." 
 
 12* 
 
138 MARY BEOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 " How do you get the water out, mamma ?" 
 
 " On the other side is a stopcock in the wall, 
 through which you can let it out when you want to 
 .use it." 
 
 " Is this little stove old, mamma ?" 
 
 " Yes, my love, it came from Herculaneum." 
 
 " We have not been to Herculaneum yet," said 
 Mary. 
 
 " No, my dear. There is but little to see there, 
 compared with Pompeii, but we shall go there some 
 day, I hope." 
 
 " What is this pan with four holes in it ?" asked 
 Mary. 
 
 " It is a pan to boil eggs in, my love. You put 
 an egg in each hole, and pour water around them. 
 Hold the pan over the fire and they will soon be 
 cooked." 
 
 " You could cook eggs in it now, mamma, for it 
 still looks new." 
 
 " See this animal, Mary," said Mrs. Brown. " It 
 is a mould for baking cake, and is made of bronze. 
 It represents a hare, as you see by its shape and 
 long ears." 
 
 " And there is another like a pig," cried Mary, 
 
MAEY BKOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 139 
 
 " and another like a shell ; just such a pan, I do 
 declare, as we bake cake in at home." 
 
 " It is exactly such a one, my dear ; and see, in 
 this corner are little stamps to cut out cake with. 
 They, too, are like those we use now-a-days." 
 
 "There is nothing new under the sun, ma'am," 
 said the guide, who was standing near ; " everything 
 in these rooms is just like what we use now in 
 Naples, or else similar. Here are steel-yards, 
 
14:0 MAKY BROWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 ma'am. They are like those used in the shops 
 here, only these have the head of a goddess for a 
 weight." 
 
 " And there, mamma," cried Mary, " is a cullen 
 der with a handle." 
 
 "See, my child, what a pretty pitcher," said 
 Mrs. Brown ; " they used such pitchers for oil in 
 Pompeii." 
 
 "Oh, it is lovely," said Mary ; "and there is 
 another pretty pitcher with an angel for a handle ; 
 I like that." 
 
 " Now I will show you something singular," said 
 Mrs. Brown. " In this glass case are a great many 
 weights to weigh things with. Here is one that 
 
MARY BROWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 came out of a store where pork was sold. You see 
 it is shaped like a pig." 
 
 " Oh, mamma, how funny 1" 
 
 11 And here, my little lady," said the guide, " is 
 one that came from a store where they sold cheese. 
 It is just the shape of a cheese." 
 
 " So it is," said Mary, delighted. 
 
 "A great many beautiful lamps came from Pom 
 peii," said Mrs. Brown ; " they are very different in 
 shape from those which we have. Here is one with a 
 boy holding a swan, on the top of it. Is it not 
 pretty ?" 
 
 " Oh, mamma, I would like to have that I" 
 
 "And that tall stand is called a candelabrum, 
 my dear. It is flat on the top and was used to place 
 a little lamp on. And there you see a candelabrum 
 
14:2 MARY BROWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 in the shape of a tree, with five lamps hanging from 
 it." 
 
 " It looks like a hat stand," said Mary. 
 
 " When the people of the house went to bed," 
 said the guide, ' each one took a lamp off the tree 
 
iMAKY BROWN AT THE MUSEUM. 143 
 
 and brought it back in the morning, and hung it up 
 again." 
 
 " What is the tree made of ?" asked Mary. 
 
 " Of bronze also, my dear," said her mother. 
 
 How very many pretty lamps there are here," 
 said the little girl. " There is one with a horse's 
 head for a handle, and see that next one has on it a 
 boy riding on a dolphin. Are they not beautiful ?" 
 
 " Yes, indeed, my child ; and look at this 
 pitcher." 
 
 "It is intended for milk, and you see two little 
 goats just in front of the ' handle. They are put 
 there because in old times goats' milk was princi 
 pally used in this region." 
 
 " Just as it is now in Naples, mamma. I love to 
 
MAKY BKOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 watch the herds of goats going about the streets to 
 be milked at morning and at evening. These little 
 goats ought to have bells on their necks to make 
 them look just like those we see now-a-days in 
 Naples. But what is that deer's head ?" 
 
 11 It is a cup, Mary." 
 
 " But it cannot stand up, and everything that was 
 in it would run out." 
 
 " That is just why it is made so, my daughter. It 
 is called a sacrificial cup, and from it the priest 
 drank wine during the religious ceremonies. It was 
 against the law for the priest to leave any wine in 
 the cup, and so the cups were made of such a shape 
 that they could not stand except with the mouth 
 downward." 
 
 " Here is another pretty pitcher, mamma ; see the 
 two doves on it. That, too, is of bronze, is it not ?" 
 
MARY BROWN AT THE MUSEUM. 145 
 
 "Yes, Mary, and it has kept its color well. 
 Some of the things, you see, have become changed 
 in color. They have become green or deep blue, 
 from the effects of heat and water when Pompeii 
 was destroyed, for all that are green and blue came 
 from Pompeii." 
 
 "Why, mamma?" 
 
 " At Pompeii," replied Mrs. Brown, " you know 
 showers of water fell. These made everything wet 
 before the city was buried, and the heat and the 
 moisture together caused the surface of the bronze 
 to corrode. The iron things that you see here are 
 quite ruined by rust." 
 
 " Yes, indeed," said Mary ; " you can hardly tell 
 what they were. For instance, that thing, which 
 the guide says was a plane, does not appear like one 
 until you have looked at it a long time." 
 
 " Look at these small bronze figures, Mary," said 
 her mother, pointing to some little ones in the shape 
 of men and women. 
 
 " They look like little dolls, mamma." 
 
 " They are images which the Pompeians kept in 
 their houses to worship. Here is an image of For 
 tune ; in 'one hand she holds a cornucopia or horn 
 13 
 
14:6 MARY BROWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 of phnty. This cornucopia is full of flowers and 
 fruit, to signify that she brings good things and 
 pours them out for the use of man." 
 
 " And what is that she holds in her other hand ?" 
 asked Mary. 
 
 "It is a rudder," replied her mother. "These 
 little images of gods and goddesses that were kept 
 in the houses and were held in reverence by the 
 ancients, were called penates, or household gods." 
 
 " Across the room is a great bronze bathing tub, 
 mamma, just the shape of the one we have at 
 home." 
 
 They now looked into a case where were some 
 old combs that were found in a lady's dressing case 
 at Pompeii. 
 
 " One of these combs would not be of much use 
 now," said Mary, " its teeth are all broken." 
 
 " The one next to it is still whole," said her 
 mother, " and looks quite new." 
 
 
MAKY BEOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 14:7 
 
 " So it does, mamma ; I wonder who used it last. 
 And do look at this thimble. It is just like mine, 
 only larger." 
 
 " That long pin you see below, Mary, 
 is of ivory or bone, and was used to hold up 
 the hair. On the top is a little figure of 
 Venus." 
 
 " That little figure of the Goddess of 
 Beauty was put there, no doubt, because 
 the lady who wore it was beautiful," said 
 the guide. " It may have been a present 
 from some admirer. Next to it, in a little 
 glass box, is the rouge with which the lady 
 painted her cheeks." 
 
 " It is just the color of a rose," said 
 Mary. " Does it not seem strange to see 
 it?" 
 
148 MART BROWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 " It does, indeed," replied her mother, ; " the 
 lady who used it died almost eighteen hundred years 
 ago." 
 
 "See that bodkin, mamma. It is of bone, I 
 think. Perhaps the same lady used it. It is just 
 like the one in your work-box, only it is sharp like a 
 needle." 
 
 " Here is a mirror, Mary," said Mrs. Brown, 
 pointing to a round plate of dull metal. 
 
 "Why, I thought that was a pan," said Mary. 
 " Is it glass ?" 
 
 " Nx>, my dear. There were no glass mirrors in 
 those days. They were all of metal, as this is." 
 
 " Here are ever so many keys, mamma. I won 
 der what doors they unlocked." 
 
 "Many of them were found in the hands of 
 skeletons, my daughter. Here is a curious one. 
 
 Its handle is a ring, and it was worn on the finger. 
 No doubt it opened some precious box." 
 
MARY BROWN AT THE MUSEUM. 149 
 
 " And there, mamma, is a door-knocker ; at least 
 it looks like one. And here, I do believe, are 
 the stocks that were in the barracks at Pom 
 peii ; at least they are like the wooden ones there 
 now." 
 
 
 The guide drew out the rod and motioned to 
 Mary to put her feet in between the little pieces of 
 iron. He then shoved back the rod, and she could 
 not move. 
 
 " My little lady is held fast," said he, and then he 
 drew out the rod again and released Mary, saying, 
 " In these very stocks, miss, the feet of two skele 
 tons were found fastened." 
 
 " There are many more things here from Pom 
 peii than from Herculaneum," said the guide, as 
 they walked slowly through the rooms. " The reason 
 is, that it is far more difficult to dig the things 
 out of the latter city than out of the former. Pom- 
 12* 
 
150 MARY BKOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 peti was buried in a kind of mud made of ashes and 
 water, but Herculaneum was covered by a stream of 
 lava, which became solid stone when it cooled. I 
 will show you a saucepan which is still partly em 
 bedded in the lava, and then you will understand 
 me." 
 
 He led Mary to a shelf, from which he took down 
 a large saucepan. It seemed very heavy, and he 
 had to take both hands to lift it. When he had 
 set it upon a table, so that Mary could look into 
 it, she saw that it was full of lava, and that some 
 of the lava still clung to the outside. 
 
 " The saucepan could not be separated from this 
 stone," said he, tapping the lava with his finger, 
 " without considerable labor. Many of the articles 
 found in Herculaneum were embedded in this way, 
 and the expense of clearing the stone away from 
 them is very great. Herculaneum furnishes more 
 beautiful things than Pompeii, and therefore the 
 government of Naples has sometimes been blamed 
 by visitors for digging more things out of the latter 
 city than out of the former. We kee.p this saucepan 
 in its original state, to show people the difficulty of 
 excavation in Herculaneum." 
 
MAJRT BKOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 151 
 
 The lava in the saucepan was of a light grey 
 color, and Mary laid her hand upon it, and found 
 that it was, indeed, solid stone. 
 
 " I only wonder," said she, " that so much has 
 been dug out of Herculaneum, and I am sure we 
 ought to thank the government for taking so much 
 trouble." 
 
 " It was very much like digging in a stone quarry 
 to work there," said the guide. " But you have not 
 yet seen all our curiosities," and he led Mary into 
 another room. 
 
 Here she saw armor that was found in the buried 
 cities, and little bells that the horses wore on their 
 necks, and also a singular kind of bell which the 
 guide said was carried in the chariots, and was rung 
 to warn people to get out of the way. They saw, 
 also, some playthings which had belonged to children 
 in Pompeii ; one of them was a little chariot. 
 
 "What is that strange-looking thing?" asked 
 Mary, pointing to something on one of the shelves. 
 
 "It is a helmet," answered her mother, "and 
 within it is the skull of one of the sentinels of Pom- 
 pen'. The skull was found in it, and you know the 
 
152 MAKY BEOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 skeleton of one of the sentinels was found in his box 
 at one of the gates of the city." 
 
 " Oh, those poor sentinels !" cried Mary. " It 
 makes me feel sad whenever I think of them. I 
 cannot help wishing that they had run away." 
 
 " They considered it their duty to stay," said 
 Mrs. Brown, " and no doubt they preferred losing 
 their lives, to having their sense of honor doubted. 
 
 By this time Mary was tired, and although she 
 was greatly interested in all that she saw, she was 
 glad to say good-bye to the Museum until the next 
 day. 
 
MAKY BROWN AT TIIE MUSEUM. 153 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 " ONE more day at the Museum, Mary," said 
 Mrs. Brown the next morning, " and we shall be 
 through. Are you tired of seeing the things ?" 
 
 " No, mamma, while I look at them I keep think 
 ing all the time how they looked when they were in 
 the cities, before the eruption came. How difficult 
 it must have been to get the things out of Hercu- 
 laneurn !" 
 
 " The labor of digging there," said her mother, 
 " was so severe that as soon as Pompeii was dis 
 covered Herculaneum was abandoned, although the 
 things found in the latter place were the more 
 valuable. There was another reason for abandoning 
 it. Resina -and Portici stand right over it, and the 
 houses would fall down if the earth under them 
 were dug out. As the workmen dug, they had to 
 build up pillars and buttresses to support the 
 
154: MAKY BKOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 houses above, and this took a great deal of time. 
 At Pompeii, you know, there are no buildings 
 above the old city." 
 
 " What shall we see to-day at the Museum ?" 
 asked Mary, as they drove toward it. 
 
 "We shall see the paints that were found in the 
 shop of a painter, and the bread, and flour, 
 and the figs, and nuts that were dug out of the 
 houses." 
 
 " Oh, that will be delightful, mamma. I would 
 rather see those than anything else. But is the 
 bread really almost eighteen hundred years old ? 
 I suppose if I should try to eat a piece it would 
 break my teeth." 
 
 " The olives that were preserved in oil are said to 
 be fit to eat yet," said Mrs. Brown. 
 
 " I think I should feel very old if I ate one of 
 them," replied Mary. " But here we are at the 
 Museum, mamma," and she jumped out of the car 
 riage. They went up the broad staircase at the 
 end of the hall, and her mother called her attention 
 to the floor of the room they entered. 
 
 " The mosaic under your feet," she said, " is the 
 one that was taken from the House of the Tragic 
 
MARY BEOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 155 
 
 Poet. You see here the great black dog and the 
 words, ' cave canem.' Do you remember what ' cave 
 canem ' means, Mary ?" 
 
 " It means ' Beware of the dog ;' but I am not 
 afraid of him, although he looks so ferocious, for 
 he is made of little pieces of stone, and he cannot 
 bite." 
 
 All around the room were glass cases full of 
 shelves, in which were the things of which Mrs. 
 Brown had told Mary. 
 
 " Oh, mamma, what are all these lumps ? Some 
 are red and some blue, and such f beautiful blue," 
 cried Mary, as she stood before the first case. 
 
 " Those are paints," replied her mother. " There, 
 you see, is yellow, and there, too, is a beautiful 
 delicate pink." 
 
 " Yes, mamma, it is like the rouge we saw in the 
 other room." 
 
 Each color was laid upon a separate plate or else 
 was left in the little earthen pot in which it had 
 been found. Mary liked to look at the paints 
 because they were so bright. 
 
 " Do paints look just so in the shops now-a- 
 days ?" she asked. 
 
156 MARY BEOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 " Yes, my dear ; these are dry lumps. When they 
 are to be used, they are ground up with oil. On 
 the shelf below/you see the great round stone on 
 which they were ground." 
 
 " What are these white balls, mamma ?" 
 
 " They are white lead, and you see a name 
 stamped on them, just as a name is stamped on 
 crackers. That is the name of the man who made 
 them." 
 
 " And has it kept all this time ?" i 
 
 "Yes, my dear. The man who made that paint 
 little thought ^hat two thousand years after he 
 was dead people would read his name on these 
 lumps." 
 
 " I think that pink is such a pretty color. It is 
 just the color of roses, mamma." 
 
 " It is, my child. And the shell that lies beside 
 it has had that pink paint rubbed upon it." 
 
 " The Pompeian lady who owned that shell, kept 
 it to rub her rouge on before she painted her 
 cheeks," said the guide. 
 
 "Was it found with paint upon it?" asked 
 Mary. 
 
 " Yes, miss," answered the guide. 
 
MAKY BEOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 157 
 
 " The rouge is rubbed upon it just as I rub my 
 paints on a plate. I shall think of this whenever 
 I rub them, mamma, and I shall say to myself, ' this 
 is the way the ladies at Pompeii rubbed their rouge 
 on shells before they painted their cheeks.' But 
 what are those white lumps all twisted up ?" 
 
 " They are clothes, Mary. They were probably 
 wet when the eruption came. They look as if they 
 had just been squeezed to get the water out, before 
 they were hung up to dry, when the showers of ashes 
 and stones came and covered them up. Next to 
 them, on another plate, are colored clothes." 
 
 "Why, mamma, I can see the threads ; but what 
 makes them so black ?" 
 
 " They are burnt, Mary. In that dish you see 
 pieces of rope. They, also, are perfectly black, and 
 yet you can plainly see what they are. On the 
 next shelf is a straw mat." 
 
 " That is all black and burnt too," said Mary. 
 "Almost all the things are black. At first I can 
 not tell what they are, but after a while they begin 
 to look like something." 
 
 "You can tell what these long pieces are, I 
 think." 
 
158 MARY BROWX AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 " They look like sticks of wood, mamma." 
 
 " They are sticks of wood. To bo sure they look 
 like charcoal, but charcoal is only burnt wood, you 
 know." 
 
 " Here is something that looks like a ball of silk," 
 said Mary. " I can see the separate threads as they 
 run around ; they are wound on a little piece of stone." 
 
 " It is a ball of silk, my daughter," replied Mrs. 
 Brown, "and was found in the shop of a sewing- 
 woman. Under it, in the same cup, are some little 
 pieces of cloth." 
 
 " I see something now, mamma, that looks like a 
 loaf of cake, and there is a name on it." 
 
 " That loaf of cake has the baker's name on it, 
 Mary." 
 
 " Why, mamma, we could put it on our table, 
 and people would only think the crust was burnt. 
 I suppose the baker put his name on the cake 
 because he was proud of it." 
 
 " No doubt ; and it looks as if it had been a very 
 good one," said Mrs. Brown. 
 
 " Perhaps it was made for a party, mamma, and 
 the invitations were all sent out. We cannot tell 
 what it was made for ?" 
 
MARY BKOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 159 
 
 " Only that it was made to be eaten, Mary/' 
 
 " And after all nobody ate it, mamma. I wonder 
 how much it cost. I see some money there in that 
 little cup. There is a little piece of burnt paper 
 under it." 
 
 " That ' burnt paper/ as you call it, is the purse 
 the money was found in. Next to it is a net, 
 probably a fishing net. It is black, like most of the 
 other things. They have put a piece of white paper 
 under part of it, to show the mesh more plainly." 
 
 "It is black because it is burnt, is it not ?" 
 
 " Yes, Mary. On the next plate you see black 
 masses of twine, or coarse thread. It is such thread 
 as they made the nets of, and there are the netting- 
 needles." 
 
 " They are just like cousin Elizabeth's, only larger. 
 It seems to me they had things just like ours in 
 those old times. What is that white stone upon 
 that plate ?" 
 
 " It is what do you think ?" 
 
 " Perhaps it is soap, mamma." 
 
 " No, Mary ; it is flour, all hardened in a mass." 
 
 " Well, I am astonished. There is anc ther white 
 lump, is that flour too ?" 
 14 
 
L60 MARY BKOWX AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 " No, that is wax. The ancients used to cover 
 tablets, or flat pieces of ivory, or metal, with wax, 
 and when the wax had become hard, they scratched 
 upon it with a sharp pen. This was one of their 
 ways of writing. This pen was made of metal, and 
 was called a stylus. They also wrote on papyrus, 
 with ink and a pen made of a reed." 
 
 " What is papyrus, mamma ?" 
 
 " Papyrus is the inner bark of a tree that grows 
 in Egypt." 
 
 " We saw yesterday the inkstands that were 
 taken from the buried cities, mamma, and they 
 look just like the round wooden ones we use at 
 school." 
 
 " You know," said Mrs. Brown, " that a library 
 of papyrus was found at Herculaneum. We will go 
 and see it after we have looked at the things in this 
 room. Here are the olives that were preserved in 
 oil," and she pointed to a glass bottle, in which lay 
 the little black fruit. 
 
 My young readers must bear in mind that almost 
 all the fruits, and nuts, and seeds, etc., brought 
 from the cities, are so much injured by the heat to 
 which they were expose I during the burial of the 
 
MARY BROWN AT THE MUSEUM. 161 
 
 cities, that they have lost their color and become 
 black, just as cloth and nuts and cake become black 
 by burning. Notwithstanding this, it is not difficult 
 to tell what the things are, and Mary was delighted 
 when she cast her eyes upon some figs. 
 
 " Oh, mamma I" she exclaimed, " are not those 
 figs just as natural as if they had never been buried. 
 I've got a fig in my pocket ; I will put it beside 
 them and see if they do not look just like it." 
 
 Mary took a fig from her pocket and put it 
 against the glass which was between her and the 
 Pompeian figs. "They are just alike, except in 
 color," she said. " When I look at them, I almost 
 forget that they are old. And these nuts, are they 
 not Madeira nuts, mamma ?" 
 
 " They are what we call Madeira nuts in America," 
 replied Mrs. Brown j "in Europe they are called 
 walnuts." 
 
 "Our walnut is very different," said Mary. 
 
 "Yes, my child," replied her mother, "but in 
 Europe there are no black walnut nor hickory trees. 
 Some people, you know, call the hickory nut a wal 
 nut." 
 
 "What are those little stones?" asked Mary, 
 14* 
 
162 MARY BROWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 pointing to some little irregularly shaped pieces that 
 lay on one of the shelves. 
 
 " I do not know, my dear ; I will ask the guide," 
 said her mother. 
 
 " Those, madam," said the guide, " are little bones 
 that were used to play the game called jackstones, 
 for at Pompeii the boys and men, and even the 
 ladies, played the game. Perhaps the young lady 
 remembers a picture in one of the rooms down 
 stairs, which represents some ladies playing jack- 
 stones." 
 
 In one of the cases Mary saw some hen's eggs. 
 
 " Why, mamma," she cried, " I do declare there 
 are some eggs ; one, two, three, four, five. They 
 look just as if they were in a nest. They are not a 
 bit black. Indeed, they are just like any eggs. 
 There are five whole ones and some broken 
 shells." 
 
 " Up in that glass pot is some bird seed," said the 
 guide, " so they probably kept pet birds in Pom 
 peii." 
 
 " I hope they flew away when the city was 
 buried," said Mary. 
 
 " And here, miss, are beans such as they feed 
 
MAKY BKOWK AT THE MUSEUM. 163 
 
 horses with in Naples. That is barley, and this is 
 wheat," and he pointed to different dishes full of 
 blackened grain. 
 
 " What are those great shells ?" asked Mary. 
 " They are like some we have at home on the sitting- 
 room mantel-piece." 
 
 " They were found in the shops, and were used to 
 ornament them," said the guide. 
 
 " And here, Mary, is a piece of sponge," said Mrs. 
 Brown, pointing to a lump that looked like any 
 sponge, only darker. 
 
 "Well, mother," said Mary, "there is almost 
 everything here that we have now-a-days." 
 
 They next looked at some bracelets, which were 
 found on the skeletons, and in the houses of Pom 
 peii. Many of them were serpents of gold, and, when 
 they were worn, were wound two or three times around 
 the arm, above the elbow. Some of them were worn 
 upon the ankle. There were also a great many 
 beautiful gold rings, and many of these, too, were in 
 the form of serpents. There were handsome ear 
 rings, and necklaces, and chains ; and Mary looked 
 with great interest at one chain which was found on 
 the neck of Diomedes, who, my readers will remem- 
 
164: MARY BEOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 ber, was trying to escape through the g&te of his 
 garden when he was buried by the ashes. 
 
 Mary lingered long among these tasteful orna 
 ments of the wealthy Pompeians. She admired their 
 shape, and the rich yellow color of the gold, and she 
 was sorry to leave the room, although her mother 
 said they would go and see the papyrus from Her- 
 culaneum. 
 
 " When the library at Herculaneum was dis 
 covered," said Mrs. Brown, " nobody knew what it 
 was. It was evidently a public building, for there 
 were busts and statues in a long saloon, and it 
 had not the appearance of a private house. Some 
 black lumps were found arranged in rows, but no 
 one dreamed that they were scrolls, until a man 
 chanced to espy some little lines on one, which he 
 thought looked somewhat like letters. It was soon 
 found that these scrolls fell in pieces when any one 
 tried to unroll them. At last a gentleman in 
 Naples discovered a way of unrolling them, and 
 since that time a great many have been opened 
 and read." 
 
 " And what were they, mamma ?" 
 
 " They were works in Greek that had not 'been 
 
MAKY BKOWN AT THE MUSEUM. 165 
 
 known before. Some of them have been pub 
 lished." 
 
 Mary and her mother now entered several rooms 
 in which the blackened scrolls were kept. They 
 were framed and had glass over them, and were 
 hung up all around the rooms, like pictures. They 
 looked just like long narrow pieces of burnt paper. 
 
 " They are a great deal smaller than I thought 
 they were," said Mary. 
 
 " They are not quite a foot wide," replied Mrs. 
 Brown, " but some of them are very long. Here is 
 the longest one. I should judge that it is nearly 
 twenty feet long. There are forty columns of writ 
 ing on it." 
 
 " How black it is, mamma. I do not see how 
 people can read it at all. The letters look as if 
 they were cut into it. I am sure I should never 
 learn to read, if I had to read such letters as 
 these." 
 
 At some desks in the rooms sat men, engraving 
 copies of the scrolls. One man was copying a piece 
 about twice as large as a page of this book, and 
 Mary ventured to ask him how long it would take 
 him to do it. 
 
166 MARY BROWN AT THE MUSEUM. 
 
 " One month, signorina," he replied. " It is very 
 slow work." 
 
 " And do you read the words on the black scrolls 
 yourself ?" she asked. 
 
 "No, signorina. I copy from this paper, on 
 which some learned man has copied with a pen the 
 letters and words that are on the papyrus. After I 
 have finished my engraving, it is published. A good 
 many of these engravings' make a book such as you 
 see on yonder table." 
 
 Mary went to the table, and the guide opened 
 the books, and showed her on one page an exact 
 copy of a part of the scroll, and on the opposite 
 page a translation of it. 
 
 They saw, in a great glass case, like a bookcase, 
 some scrolls that had not yet been unrolled. They 
 looked like short, thick sticks of charcoal, and were 
 quite as hard. Mary wondered that any of them 
 had ever been opened and read. 
 
 They left the rooms where the papyrus scrolls 
 were kept, and went into those which contain the 
 earthen dishes taken from Pompeii. They were 
 very much like those we use now-a-days, and Mary 
 
MAKY BROWN AT THE MUSEUM. 167 
 
 pointed out to her mother some dishes with covers 
 full of holes, to put flower stems through. 
 
 " I do not see that these are any different from 
 the ones we have at home, mamma/' she said ; " I 
 feel as if I were in a shop, and I cannot believe that 
 these things are two thousand years old." 
 
 When she went back to the hotel, she took a little 
 book and wrote down the names of many of the 
 things she had seen, for she was afraid she should 
 forget some of them. 
 
168 MABY BROWN AT HERCULANEOI. 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 THE next day Mary and her mother went to Her- 
 culaneum, but as its ruins resemble those of Pompeii, 
 I shall not trouble my readers with a long descrip 
 tion of them. 
 
 The only part open to daylight is about as large 
 as a block of buildings in New York. The rest is 
 underground, and it is necessary to have torches in 
 order to see it. To go through it, is like wandering 
 in a great dark cellar, and as the town of Resina is 
 above it, it is full of pillars to hold up the founda 
 tions of the houses. 
 
 In the part that is open to daylight, there are 
 some houses painted in bright colors, like those at 
 Pompeii, and in the peristyle or inner court of one 
 of them, there is a garden of flowers just where the 
 old garden used to be eighteen hundred years ago. 
 
MARY BROWN AT HEECULANEUM, 169 
 
 An old man picked from this garden a fragrant nose 
 gay of pink roses and rosemary, and said, smilingly, 
 as he handed them to Mary : 
 
 " These are ancient flowers, my little miss. They 
 grew in old Herculaneum." 
 
 When Mary reached home she put them carefully 
 away, to look at when she went back to New 
 York. 
 
 " Everything in Herculaneum was not so pleasant 
 as flower gardens are," said the guide, "for here, 
 miss, is the ruin of a prison. In the dungeon into 
 which we look down, some skeletons of prisoners 
 were discovered, and you can still see the iron grat 
 ings that covered the windows." 
 
 " How dreadful it must have been," said Mary, 
 " to lie in a prison and feel the ground shake under 
 you when the earthquakes came." 
 
 " It is not unlikely," added Mrs. Brown, " that 
 the poor prisoners did not know what killed them j 
 but they must have/known by the cries of the people 
 outside of their place of confinement, that some 
 unusual excitement was prevailing. It is doubtful 
 whether the jailer went to tell them what had 
 occurred." 
 
 15 
 
170 TRIP TO CASTEL-A-MARE. 
 
 " If he had been a very good man he would have 
 gone to release them, mamma, I think." 
 
 " Perhaps he had no opportunity to do so, Mary ; 
 he may have been killed before he had time to go 
 to them." 
 
 Mrs. Brown and Mary soon left Herculaneum, and 
 took the railroad to Castel-a-niare. The road lies 
 along the Bay, and the prospect from it is beauti 
 ful. 
 
 " Oh, mamma," cried Mary, " I do not know where 
 to look ; everything is so novel and charming. Off 
 there in the distance stands the fairy-land, that 
 people call Capri, and between us and it how many 
 different colors the water has. Do look !" 
 
 "I see," replied Mrs. Brown. "It is a beautiful 
 view. The water is a pale, bluish white near the 
 coast, and beyond there is a strip of apple-green, 
 and beyond that a strip of purple, and then apple- 
 green again, and then more purple." 
 
 " Yes, mamma, and then, beyond the purple, 
 there is a great patch of sunlight, and it is just at 
 the foot of Capri. How queer it is that the sun 
 shines there when it does not here." 
 
 " There is a great mass of clouds between us and 
 
TEIP TO CASTEL-A-MAKE. 171 
 
 the sun, but the bright sunlight still falls in streaks 
 on the water in the distance." 
 
 " And, mamma, the clouds are white and laven 
 der color. All along the horizon there are no clouds, 
 and the sky is a pale salmon color. Oh, mamma, 
 what lovely skies we see here at Naples !" 
 
 " And look at the beach along which we are rid 
 ing. It looks as if it were made of ashes from 
 Vesuvius. See the sudden projections and little pro 
 montories formed by streams of lava stopped in mid- 
 course by cooling." 
 
 " The side toward the water looks just like the 
 flat perpendicular surfaces, that we said looked like 
 stone walls up on Vesuvius," said Mary. " How 
 dark the rooks are, almost black. The waves dash 
 up against them as if they did not like them. Per 
 haps the waves wish the lava had stayed up in 
 Vesuvius." 
 
 "What a beautiful scene we are looking at, 
 Mary ; I hope you will always remember it. The 
 sky, the Bay, the boats with their lateen sails, the 
 hills, the islands, Vesuvius itself, the trees, the 
 shores, the people, remind us of beautiful pictures. 
 See those men pulling the boats to the shore. Theii 
 
172 TRIP TO CASTEL-A.-MARE. 
 
 trowsers are tucked up high on the thigh, and they 
 wade deep in the water ; others are carrying bur 
 dens to the boats that are waiting to be laden. 
 Everything here looks like a picture." 
 
 " But, mamma, I should be afraid to live here, for 
 though everything is so beautiful, there stands grim 
 old Vesuvius, looking down on all the little towns, 
 and at all the coast, and at the people who are at 
 work, or enjoying themselves, and he says to him 
 self, ' If I only chose, how quickly I could run over 
 everything and kill everybody.' " 
 
 " You speak of him as if he had all the power in 
 his own hands. It is true that he sits like a king- 
 on his throne, with a circlet of clouds for a crown, 
 and it is really a golden crown set with rubies and 
 amethysts at sunset ; and it is true that the grasp of 
 his fiery hand would destroy man and his fields, and 
 his home, but Vesuvius is only a servant of God, 
 and can only do His bidding." 
 
 " Oh, I know that, mamma. But would you like 
 to live in one of the little towns at the foot of the 
 volcano ? I should not." 
 
 " Neither should I, my child. Nor would I like 
 to live in Switzerland, where the terrible land- 
 
THE DRIVE TO SOKBENTO. 173 
 
 slides take place, and yet people become accustomed 
 to living in these dangerous places. But see the 
 little stream we are crossing. It is the Sarno. 
 Where do you think it comes from ?" 
 
 " Oh, I do not know, mamma. It looks like a 
 canal, it is so narrow, and the sides are so straight. 
 What a full little river it is." 
 
 " It flows through Pompeii, Mary. Perhaps you 
 remember a cistern in the temple of Isis. This 
 stream fills that cistern." 
 
 An hour's ride in the rail car brought Mrs. Brown 
 and her daughter to Castel-a-mare, and* when they 
 alighted from the cars they were surrounded by 
 hordes of men and boys, who offered to carry their 
 satchels and bundles, to furnish them with a car 
 riage to take them to a hotel or to convey 
 them to Sorrento, or, in short, to do anything 
 they desired. Donkeys, wearing saddles covered 
 with pink calico, stood along the road, and 
 their keepers asked Mrs. Brown and Mary whether 
 they would take a ride among the hills. Mary 
 looked up the steep ascent and thought how much 
 she should like to accept their invitation, but it was 
 the middle of the afternoon, and her mother said 
 
174: THE DKIVE TO SOKKENTO. 
 
 they must hasten on to reach Sorrento before 
 night. 
 
 They soon engaged a coachman to take them to 
 Sorrento, and drove through the little town of 
 Castel-a-uiare at a brisk rate. The driver cracked' 
 his whip, and seemed in good spirits at having 
 obtained employment, but his companions, who had 
 not been so fortunate, ran after him, and tried to 
 beat his horse. In the doorways of the houses stood 
 women and girls, spinning with the old fashioned 
 distaff, holding it aloft in one hand while they 
 twirled the^ spindle with the other. Signs, hung out 
 along the street, advertised mineral baths, or told 
 that donkeys could be hired for a ride among the 
 mountains. Up behind the road, rose the hills, and 
 villas nestled in among them, commanding a fine 
 view of the beautiful blue Bay. Hither foreigners 
 come to pass the summer months. 
 
 They drove at a rapid pace out of Castel-a-mare, 
 and along the shore, the road winding around the 
 rocks, and looking down upon the steep banks that 
 descended to the water. The slanting rays of the 
 declining sun brightened the cliffs above and the 
 banks below. The eye knew not where to rest, 
 but roved from mossy bank to tree, from tree to 
 
THE DRIVE TO SORRENTO. 175 
 
 sky, to wave, to isle, and to the amber West. Every 
 spot was full of beauty. Upon the wide, still Bay, 
 where the sunlight fell broadly, one great cloud 
 threw a violet colored shadow, which looked strange 
 in the midst of such a sea of light. The promon 
 tories that jutted out into the Bay were covered 
 with fresh green grass. Below them, the blue waters 
 crept to the coast and dashed themselves into snowy 
 foam. 
 
 " Oh, mamma," cried Mary, " do look at every 
 thing 1 See how green the moss is ; look at those 
 trailing vines, and those creeping plants, and see 
 what a deep brown the earth is where it shows 
 through. How smooth the stones are, and how they 
 are all overgrown with vegetation. See that pine 
 tree with ivy running up its trunk, and the trees 
 that are bare of leaves look beautiful, too, for the 
 sunlight makes one side of them so yellow." 
 
 " Yes, replied Mrs. Brown," the trunks and 
 branches, and twigs of the leafless trees look as if 
 inlaid on one side with gold. But look up, Mary, 
 see that rope !" 
 
 " From the cliffs above them a rope was stretched 
 to the cliff on the top of which their road lay, and 
 down this rope sped a basket, laden with hay. On 
 
THE SAIL TO CAPRI. 
 
 the cliff stood a group of peasants who had been 
 mowing on the high meadows, and they sent their 
 load of hay down the rope to a group of fellow- 
 laborers, waiting beside the road to receive it. In a 
 moment another load went down. 
 
 " How pretty/' said Mrs. Brown, " the green 
 basket-load looks against the blue sky and brown 
 cliffs." 
 
 Many carriages dashed by them or followed in 
 their rear, for this beautiful road from Castel-a-mare 
 to Sorrento is a favorite drive. They passed 
 through several little towns, and finally approached 
 Sorrento. The town is a collection of white houses, 
 sprinkled over a plain. 
 
 Seated at the window of their hotel, Mary looked 
 across the Bay over at. Vesuvius, but the day had 
 been a fatiguing one, and her eyes soon drooped. 
 She gladly followed her mother's advice, and went 
 to bed, where she dreamed of the afternoon's drive, 
 the nosegay from the old town of Eerculaneum and 
 the Blue Grotto of Capri. 
 
 In the morning, Mrs. Brown and Mary took a 
 sail-boat to go to Capri, for they wished to see the 
 Blue Grotto, so famous for its beautiful color, about 
 
THE SAIL TO CAPRI. 177 
 
 which Mrs. Brown told Mary in the first chapter of 
 this book. 
 
 The sea tossed a good deal, and threw up white 
 caps, but the wind was favorable, and in a little 
 more than an hour they landed at Capri. 
 
 As I said, the sea was rough, and it rolled up in 
 great waves along the shore of the island. When 
 the boat approached the land, the boatmen took 
 down the sail and rowed gently with their oars. 
 They were trying to get on the top of a wave, so 
 that when it rolled upon the shore, it might carry 
 the boat up with it, and land it on the sand. At last 
 they succeeded, and rode swiftly along upon the surf. 
 
 A number of men and women and children 
 gathered on the beach to see them land. Before 
 Mary knew what he was going to do, a man plunged 
 from the shore into the water and picked her out of 
 the boat. Another one followed him, and took her 
 mother in his arms, and they found themselves, at 
 last, standing safe and sound on a dry part of the 
 beach. The boat, too, was high up on the shore, 
 for several men had caught a rope, which the boat 
 men threw from it, and had drawn it up out of the 
 water. 
 
178 MARY BBOWN AT CArKI. 
 
 The women brought papers full of shells and little 
 bits of coral, which they had picked up on the beach, 
 and offered them to Mrs. Brown for sale, while the 
 children gathered about Mary and her mother, and 
 looked at them, crying out, " forestieri ! forestieri 1" 
 which means " strangers ! strangers !" 
 
 As they walked up to the hotel, which is on a 
 cliff just above the beach, four women followed 
 them, leading two little donkeys with saddles upon 
 them. 
 
 " Perhaps," said one of the women to Mrs. Brown, 
 " perhaps when the ladies have rested they would 
 like to take a ride up on the hills, for to-day the 
 sea is too rough for them to go to the Grotto." 
 
 " Oh," said Mary in a whisper to her mother, 
 " how pleasant that would be !" 
 
 " The hill is very steep, my dear, and it would 
 doubtless tire us very much to walk," said Mrs. 
 Brown. Then, turning to the woman she added, 
 "we will hire the donkeys, and go when we have 
 rested about an hour." 
 
 " We shall be ready at any moment," they 
 replied ; and Mary and her mother entered the 
 
 totel: 
 
MAKY BKOWN AT CAPKI. 179 
 
 The women dropped the bridles of the donkeys, 
 and seated themselves on a stone in front of the 
 house, while the animals ate the scanty herbage 
 which grew along the roadside. 
 
 A great wood fire was burning in the broad 
 chimney of the dining-room of the hotel, and Mary 
 and her mother stood before it and dried their 
 dresses, which were quite damp with spray. They 
 then lay down and slept for an hour, and after they 
 had dined went to the door to see if the donkeys 
 had come. They were surprised to see the women 
 and the animals just where they had left them. 
 
 " How long have you been waiting ?" asked Mrs. 
 Brown. 
 
 " Oh, signora, we have been here all the time ; 
 we have riot been away since you entered the hotel," 
 answered one of the women. " Is my little lady 
 ready ?" she added. 
 
 Mary and Mrs. Brown put on their bonnets, and 
 one of the women, whose name was Giuseppina, 
 lifted Mary up on the back of one of the donkeys. 
 " Do not be afraid, signorina," she said, " the donkey 
 is very gentle, and I shall lead him by the bridle." 
 
 " I do not think I shall be afraid," said Mary, 
 
180 MAKY BROWN AT CAPEI. 
 
 but she cast a laughing glance towards her 
 mother, for she remembered how frightened she 
 was when the saddle turned on her way up 
 Vesuvius. 
 
 Giuseppina seized the donkey's bridle, and another 
 woman named Annina went behind him with a stick. 
 Instead of beating the donkey, she poked him with 
 the end of the stick when she wanted him to hasten 
 his pace. Mrs. Brown went in front of Mary, and 
 there were also two women with her donkey. 
 
 Capri is a very singular island. It is made up of 
 a number of hills, and there is not a level spot to be 
 found on the whole eastern end of it. There is no 
 use for carriages on the island, for there are no 
 broad roads. Only little narrow paths for the don 
 keys are made on the steep hillsides. These paths 
 are very stony, and Mary thought that riding here 
 was very much like riding up stairs. 
 
 "But it is not so steep as the cone at Vesuvius," 
 she added ; "and I am sure I would rather go up 
 on the donkey's back than tire myself out by going 
 on my feet." 
 
 " Do you see those ruins on the top of the hill we 
 are going up ?" asked her mother. 
 
HAKY BEOWN AT CAPEI. * 181 
 
 " Oh, yes, mamma ; what are they ?" 
 
 " They are the ruins of a castle that belonged to 
 Tiberius, my child. The Emperor Tiberius is said 
 to have built twelve castles on this island ; and 
 there are ruins of two more of them on the two hills 
 yonder." 
 
 " I cannot imagine what he wanted so many 
 castles for," said Mary. 
 
 " He was a very cruel man," said Mrs. Brown, 
 " and there is a precipice here, overhanging the sea, 
 from which, it is said, he threw those persons he did 
 not like." 
 
 " Did it kill them, mamma ?" 
 
 " Oh yes, my child. The precipice is very 
 lofty." 
 
 " What a wicked man 1" 
 
 " Can you tell me when he lived, Mary ?" 
 
 " Let me see ; Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula 
 he was the successor of Augustus, mamma, and 
 it was during his reign that Christ was cruci 
 fied." 
 
 "I am glad to see that you have so good a 
 memory, my daughter." 
 
 Just then they came to a very steep ascent, and 
 16 
 
182 MARY BKOWN AT CAPEI. 
 
 Mary's donkey stopped. Giuseppina pulled hard 
 at the bridle, and Anuina poked him with her stick. 
 They both shouted to him at the top of their voices 
 to go on, but all in vain. He would not move. 
 The women who were with Mrs. Brown left her, and 
 ran back to give assistance. They doubled up 
 their fists, and running at the patient animal, dealt 
 him blows in the ribs. They pulled his ears, but he 
 still stood firm, bracing himself against all their 
 efforts to drag him forward. Mrs. Brown stopped 
 her donkey and sat looking Iback to watch the sin 
 gular scene. Mary was so much amused by the 
 exertions of the women, and the obstinacy of the 
 donkey, that she almost fell off her seat with 
 laughter. 
 
 "They do not seem to hurt him at all, mamma/' 
 she said, as soon as she could speak. " If they did 
 hurt him, I am sure he would go on, and besides, if 
 they hurt him I should feel very sorry for him, 
 instead of laughing as I do." 
 
 " He seems to have made up his mind not to 
 move," said her mother ; but just at that moment 
 his obstinacy gave way, and he started on. 
 
 " I thought when we left the hotel," said Mary, 
 
MARY BROWN AT CAPRI. 183 
 
 " that there was no use in having two women to 
 take care of each donkey, but I begin to think they 
 understand their own business better than I." 
 
 Gradually ascending, they came to a little stone 
 hut, where the women lifted Mary from her donkey, 
 and said that the animals would rest while the ladies 
 walked up to the summit of the hill. 
 
 " Up there, signorina," said Giuseppina, pointing 
 upwards, "you will see the ruins of one of the 
 palaces of the great Emperor Tiberius, and, still 
 farther up, there lives an old hermit, who is very 
 fond of visitors." 
 
 " Oh, mother," cried Mary, " can we go and see 
 the hermit ? How strange it will seem to see one. 
 I have read about them in my books, but I never 
 thought I should see one." 
 
 Giuseppina and Annina accompanied Mrs. Brown 
 and Mary up to the ruins. They could trace where 
 the different rooms of the palace had been, and 
 Mary picked up some little pieces of marble that 
 had formed part of the mosaic pavement. She put 
 them into her pocket and said, laughingly, " I 
 shall have a little museum when I get home, mam 
 ma." 
 
184 MARY BROWN AT CAPRI. 
 
 f 
 
 After leaving the ruins, they climbed higher up 
 the hill and came into a pretty little garden where 
 there were many flowers in blossom. Mary asked 
 whose flowers they were. 
 
 11 They belong to the good hermit," replied 
 Giuseppina, and looked up to a rock which over 
 hung the garden. Mary followed the direction of 
 her eyes and saw, standing on the rock, an old man, 
 dressed in a long black gown. He had a staff in his 
 hand, and sandals on his feet. A long white beard 
 fell down over his breast, and reached almost to his 
 waist. On his head he wore a small black skull 
 cap, and only a few grey hairs were visible about his 
 temples. He smiled kindly at Mary as she looked 
 up, and she made a courtesy to him and said, 
 " Buon giorno" 
 
 He came down from the rock and gathered some 
 flowers out of his garden, and gave them to Mary. 
 
 " Will you and your mother, my daughter, come 
 up and look at the old hermit's home ?" he asked ; 
 " I live in a small house, it is true, but I love to 
 see strangers who have come from foreign lands. 
 What is your native land, my child ?" 
 
 " We come from America, sir," said Mary. 
 
MARY BROWN AT CAPRI. 185 
 
 " From America !" he repeated, in surprise. 
 " You have made a long journey for so young a 
 lady. Do you like Italy ?" 
 
 " Very much indeed," replied Mary, with bright 
 ening eyes. 
 
 They soon reached the hermit's hut. It was of 
 stone ; he led them into it, and showed them the 
 little kitchen where he cooked his food, and the 
 little bedroom where he slept. 
 
 "Do you never get lonely?" Mary ventured to 
 ask. 
 
 " Not in pleasant weather, my daughter," he 
 replied, " for then I can sit out of doors and look 
 down on the Bay and enjoy myself. But when it is 
 stormy, it is cold up on this high hill, and I am 
 obliged to keep within doors." 
 
 " And how do you occupy yourself ?" asked Mrs. 
 Brown. 
 
 " Oh," he answered, smiling, " I say my prayers 
 and read some holy books, and then I have a little 
 box of paints, and I paint flies, and flowers, and 
 children. I will show you some of them ;" and he 
 took them into his bedroom, and asked them to sit 
 down on the bed, for there were no chairs in the 
 
186 MART BEOWN AT CAPKI. 
 
 room. He then took a small portfolio from a box, 
 and showed them a great many pictures. They 
 were not well painted, but they had served to amuse 
 the hermit in his lonely hours. Some of them were 
 pictures of little girls and boys, holding roses in 
 their hands. Others represented butterflies and 
 bees, hovering over flowers. There were also draw 
 ings of flies and worms. The hermit gave Mary a 
 little picture of a girl reading a book. He took them 
 out to the rock in front of his house, and showed 
 them what a Ibeautiful view he had of Vesuvius and 
 all the shore of the Bay of Naples. 
 
 Mary and her mother were delighted with the 
 blue waters and the distant shores. When they 
 left the hermit, Mrs. Brown slipped some coins into 
 his hand, and thanked him for his hospitality. He 
 brought out a large book and a pen, and asked 
 them to write their names in it, for, he said, he kept 
 the names of all the people who visited him. 
 
 Mary and her mother went down the hill to the 
 place where they had left their donkeys. They saw 
 the terrible precipice from which Tiberius threw 
 those who had offended him. 
 
 " Oh, mamma," said Mary, as she looked from its 
 
MARY BROWN AT CAPRI. 187 
 
 top, " do let me take hold of your hand, for it 
 makes me dizzy to look so far down. Those who 
 were thrown from here must have fallen on the 
 rocks that stick up out of the water and have been 
 dashed to pieces. And then, I suppose, the waters 
 swept their bodies away and drowned them." 
 
 "It is terrible to think of it, my dear," said Mrs. 
 Brown. " Tiberius was a heathen, and had no fear 
 of offending God by his cruelties. He knew nothing 
 about the Christian law which teaches us to love 
 one another." , 
 
 " See, mamma, what pretty blue flowers there 
 are growing on the edge of the precipice. There is 
 something pretty about it, after all." 
 
 Giuseppina saw Mary look at the flowers, and 
 she went carefully to the edge, and, stooping, 
 picked some for her. They were intensely blue. 
 Mary put them into the little book she carried in 
 her pocket. 
 
 " I wonder, mamma, whether the ' Blue Grotto ' 
 is as blue as these flowers," she said. 
 
 " I hope we shall see to-morrow," replied her 
 mother, and they went back to the hotel. 
 
188 VISIT TO THE BLUE GROTTO. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THE next morning the sky was overcast. 
 
 " No Blue Grotto to-day, I fear," said Mary ; 
 " and, oh," she added, looking out of the window, 
 " the sea is quite rough. What shall we do ?" 
 
 " We will wait till the weather becomes pleasant 
 enough for us to see the grotto," replied Mrs. 
 Brown. " We should not like to leave Capri with 
 out seeing it. It is now only six o'clock. You can 
 run down to the beach, and gather shells till break 
 fast time, and after breakfast, perhaps, the sea will 
 become smooth, and the sun will shine." 
 
 On the beach Mary met several little children, 
 who were busy gathering very small, transparent 
 fishes, which the waves cast up on the sand. 
 
 " Do you eat them ?" she asked. 
 
 "No, signorina," they replied, laughing; "we 
 
VISIT TO THE BLUE GROTTO. 189 
 
 gather them for the men to use as bait. They catch 
 big fishes with them." 
 
 " What pretty little things they are," said Mary ; 
 " I can almost see through them." 
 
 She could not talk much with the children, 
 because she did not speak Italian very well, and 
 they did not pronounce in the way she was accus 
 tomed to hear. They did not speak pure Italian, 
 but a kind of dialect, or incorrect form of the lan 
 guage. 
 
 She found some very pretty little shells, but all 
 the larger ones were broken by being* ground up 
 with the pebbles on the beach. She looked at the 
 broken shells with a great deal of interest, for she 
 could see by them how shells were made in the 
 inside, and she had always wanted to know. She 
 put a great many into her pocket to carry home to 
 New York, for she meant to make a little museum 
 of the things she gathered in Europe for her school 
 mates to look at. She found also some pieces of 
 the bone of cuttle-fish, such as we give to canary 
 birds to sharpen their bills on. Now and then she 
 discovered a very small bit of red coral lying 
 among the pebbles. It surprised her to find a 
 
190 VISIT TO THE BLUE GROTTO. 
 
 fragment of white or colored marble here and 
 there, but on showing them to the children she 
 learned that they came from the ruins along the 
 shore, and had been washed about in the water, 
 and ground up with the pebbles and shells until 
 they had become round and smooth. 
 
 At breakfast she gave her mother an animated 
 account of her ramble, and showed her the shells 
 and stones she had gathered. Before they left the 
 table the keeper of the hotel came into the room, 
 and said that the wind had gone down, and that 
 the sun was beginning to shine. 
 
 " And," he added, " I have ordered the boatmen 
 to be ready in an hour to take you to the Grotto." 
 
 When Mary and her mother were seated in the 
 boat, Mary asked why they had not taken a large 
 boat like that in which they came from Sorrento. 
 
 " You know, my dear," replied her mother, " that 
 the entrance to the Grotto is very low and narrow. 
 The water dashes up into it all the time. There is 
 not room for a large boat to enter." 
 
 " I do not see," said Mary, " how the Grotto was 
 ever found, if the entrance is so small. I should 
 not suppose any one would have thought of going in." 
 
VISIT TO THE BLUE GROTTO. 191 
 
 "There is a tradition that a German artist, in 
 the beginning of this century, while swimming, 
 entered the Grotto by accident, and being charmed 
 by its beauty, reported it to others. But it is pro 
 bable that it was known to the inhabitants of the 
 island long before. It is possible that its existence 
 may have been forgotten for a time. There are 
 some traces of its having been used for a bath in 
 ancient times." 
 
 Mary was delighted with the motion of the boat 
 as it rose and fell on the unquiet sea. They passed 
 between little rocks which she said would make 
 pretty islands for dolls to live on and, keeping close 
 to the shore, made their way along the northern 
 side of Capri. Precipitous rocky heights rose on 
 their left, and Mary said that the rock looked as if 
 it had been lava, and had cooled. 
 
 " But are we not near the Grotto ?" she asked. 
 " See that hole close to the water's edge ; is not 
 that its entrance ?" 
 
 "Oh, no, signorina," said one of the boatmen, 
 who saw her point to the hole ; " there are a great 
 many such holes as that along this shore, but the 
 Grotta Azzurra is some distance from us yet." 
 
192 VISIT TO THE BLUE GROTTO. 
 
 " Why, mamma !" called out Mary, suddenly, 
 " do look at the foot of these precipices. All along 
 where the water washes their base, there is some 
 thing so beautifully red. I do believe it is coral. 
 Does coral grow all along on the rocks under the 
 water ?" 
 
 Mrs. Brown looked where Mary pointed, and saw 
 just under the water's edge a line of red, much the 
 color of coral, only more brilliant. In contrast 
 with the deep blue waves and the brown rocks, it 
 looked beautiful indeed. 
 
 " What is that ?" asked Mrs. Brown of the boat 
 men. 
 
 " It is a weed that clings to the rocks, signora. 
 It looks like coral, but it falls to pieces in your 
 hand if you gather it. Moreover, it is not easy to 
 detach it from the rocks, and our boat could not 
 approach near enough to them to get any without 
 danger of being dashed against them." 
 
 Mary was sorry that she could not get some of 
 the beautiful weed. " If I cannot carry any of it 
 home with me," she said, " I can at least remember 
 about it. It is easy to recollect that it was the 
 color of red coral, only a good deal more brilliant." 
 
VISIT TO THfc BLUE GKOTTO. 193 
 
 Mary sat gazing at the lofty rooks and the blue 
 sky above, and the coral-like weed and the dashing 
 waves below. Suddenly, one of the boatmen turned 
 to her, and said : 
 
 " Yonder is the opening to the Grotto, signorina. 
 You must crouch down in the boat, and you, sig- 
 nora," he added, addressing Mrs. Brown, " will 
 please lie quite down on the floor." 
 
 Mary and her mother did as they were directed, 
 but they kept their eyes open and looked up to see 
 how they passed into the Grotto. A few strokes of 
 the oars brought the boat to the entrance ; then the 
 men threw the oars down and, stooping low, in 
 order that their heads might not strike against the 
 stony doorway, seized on the rocks with their 
 hands, and so guided the boat under the low open 
 ing. The waves that dashed up through the en 
 trance, bore the boat gently in. 
 
 Mary felt a thrill of terror when she saw how- 
 narrow and low the rocky doorway was ; but in a 
 moment she forgot her fears and sat erect, breath 
 less with astonishment. They had glided into a 
 vast chamber, whose floor was of calm, blue, trans 
 parent water, and whose arching roof was upheld 
 11 
 
194: VISIT 10 TIIK BLUE GKOTTO. 
 
 by natural columns of stone. Below them, the 
 water was a light, bright blue ; above them, the 
 ceiling was tinged with the same beautiful color. 
 Around the base of the chamber, where the water 
 met the walls, there was a line of deep, bright red 
 sea-weecl. No sound disturbed the stillness of the 
 place, save the murmur of the waves that dashed 
 from without against the narrow entrance. 
 
 For a time no one spoke. At last Mary said in a 
 whisper : " Is it not beautiful, mamma ?" 
 
 " Beautiful indeed," replied her mother. " Is it 
 not like fairy-land, Mary ?" 
 
 " That is just what I was thinking, mamma. 
 What does make it so blue ?" 
 
 " It is probable that the deep blue of the water 
 outside of the Grotto is reflected in here through 
 the little doorway, just as a buttercup, held under 
 your chin, will make your chin look yellow." 
 
 " Who built the columns that reach up to the 
 roof, mamma ?" 
 
 " They are natural formations of the rock, Mary. 
 No human hand built them. God made them when 
 He made this Grotto. Though it looks so much 
 like a work of man, it was entirely built by God." 
 
VISIT TO THE BLUE GKOTTO. 195 
 
 " No wonder it is so beautiful then," said Mary, 
 in a low voice. 
 
 The rowers now took their oars and rowed the 
 boat around the walls of the chamber and into the 
 distant parts of the cave. There one could discern 
 columns and arches which opened the way into 
 rooms beyond, and Mary said she would like to 
 explore them. 
 
 " That we cannot do," said her mother. " There 
 are several apartments adjoining the large room we 
 are in. It is supposed that this beautiful Grotto 
 was used for a bath in ancient days, and it is sur 
 mised that there was once a passage from it up 
 through the earth to the upper part of the 
 island." 
 
 The boatmen motioned to Mary to put her hand 
 into the water. She did so, and it became a beau 
 tiful light blue. She was surprised and delighted, 
 and she bared her arm and thrust it in up to the 
 elbow. 
 
 " Oh, what a lovely color," she cried. " This is a 
 fairy place indeed." 
 
 She dipped her handkerchief into the water, 
 and that, too, grew blue, and Mary said as she drew 
 
196 VISIT TO THE BLUE GKOTTO. 
 
 it out, that she wished it would keep its color till 
 she got back to New York. 
 
 " The water does not really dye it, you know, my 
 dear," said her mother ; " it only looks so while it is 
 in the water." 
 
 " I know it, mamma. And do look there ! 
 There goes a fish, and he is as blue as my arm was. 
 I wonder if he knows how pretty he looks. What 
 a pretty place this must have been to bathe in, 
 though I think I should have been afraid that I 
 should some day really turn blue and stay so. Does 
 not the ceiling look as if it had been painted ?" 
 
 " It does, my dear ; but you see its hue varies a 
 little when the waves dash up and fill the opening. 
 You can see, if you watch, that the rocks are 
 really brown, though most of the time they look 
 blue." 
 
 "I am almost afraid that we cannot get out 
 again," said Mary. " Just see how the spray breaks 
 into the doorway." 
 
 Already the boatmen gave them notice that it 
 was time to leave, for they feared the sea might rise 
 and detain them. 
 
 11 This is a beautiful place, signorina," they said 
 
KETUKN TO CAPRI. 197 
 
 to Mary, " but we do not want to stay here all 
 night." 
 
 The boat shot out of the Grotto in the same way 
 that it had entered, and in a moment Mrs. Brown 
 and Mary found themselves in the open air, with 
 the blue vault of the sky above their heads, instead 
 of the blue, rocky roof of the cave. As they rowed 
 homeward, Mary kept her eyes fixed on the preci 
 pices that rose from the water's edge, and on the 
 brilliant red moss which grew along their base. She 
 said not a word until they were half way back to 
 their hotel. Then, turning to her mother, she ex 
 claimed : 
 
 " It does not seem as if we had ever been in the 
 Grotto. I begin to think it was all a beautiful 
 dream. I wish I could always dream as beautiful 
 dreams as the Grotta Azzurra." 
 
 The boatmen sang cheerily as they plied their oars, 
 and Mary and her mother listened in silence to the 
 pleasant strain. As they neared the beach, they 
 saw several fishing boats, and Mary said : 
 
 " I do not see how people can enjoy killing inno 
 cent fishes." 
 
 It* 
 
198 THE LONG, STEEP FLIGHT OF STAIRS. 
 
 "My dear child," replied her mother, "these 
 people do not fish for amusement, I think, but 
 because they want something to eat." 
 
 "In that case I can forgive them," said Mary, 
 laughing ; " but I would rather go hungry one day 
 than catch fishes myself." 
 
 An early dinner was ready for them when they 
 returned from the Grotto. During the meal, Mary 
 talked a great deal about the wonderful place they 
 had seen. 
 
 " I like Capri altogether," she said at last. " I 
 shall really be sorry to go away. I wish we could 
 stay another day. But since we must go to-mor 
 row, I want to go out this afternoon and take a 
 walk." 
 
 " There is a wonderful walk you can take, 
 Mary, if you are fond of going up stairs," said Mrs. 
 Brown. 
 
 " Why, what do you mean, mamma ?" asked 
 Mary, opening her eyes very wide. "I do not 
 understand you." 
 
 " Well, my daughter, there is a part of this island 
 where you have not yet been. It is a very lofty 
 plain, and can only be reached by a long flight of 
 
VISIT TO ANA-CAPRI. 199 
 
 stairs. These stairs are so steep that even donkeys 
 cannot go np them, so all the burdens are carried 
 up and down on the heads of men and women." 
 
 " Why do they want to carry burdens up there, 
 mamma ?" 
 
 " Because there is a town up there, my child." 
 
 " How funny, to put a town up on such a high 
 place. What is it called ?" 
 
 " It is the town of Ana-Capri." 
 
 " Who made the steps up to it ?" 
 
 " It is not known who made them. They were 
 made long, long ago. They are, for the most part, 
 cut out of the solid rock, and there are five hun 
 dred and thirty steps." 
 
 " I do not think I could go up so many, mamma, 
 if there is nothing to see at the top." 
 
 " Let us go and look at them, Mary, and see how 
 we would like to be poor people and have to carry 
 burdens up and down them." 
 
 They put on their bonnets, and after walking a 
 few minutes reached the foot of the steps. These 
 steps led up the side of a very steep mountain ; all 
 the way there were men, and women, and children 
 going up and down, carrying great baskets of 
 
200 VISIT TO ANA-CAPRI. 
 
 clothes and other articles upon their heads. They 
 held themselves very erect, and went slowly up the 
 steep stairs. Mary and her mother began to ascend 
 quite rapidly, but before long they felt tired, and 
 slackened their pace. 
 
 Mary felt sorry for the women, but she felt still more 
 sorry for the little boys and girls, whose limbs trem 
 bled under the heavy loads they bore on their heads. 
 She saw before her one little girl, who carried a 
 basket full of different things, among which was a 
 sword. Mary overtook her and said : 
 
 "Let me carry that sword for you, my little 
 girl," and she took it carefully out of the basket 
 and put it across her own shoulder. Her mother 
 smiled encouragingly at her, for she liked to see her 
 daughter do little acts of kindness. Oh, how tired 
 Mary was when she reached the top ! The little 
 girl thanked her for carrying the sword. She then 
 asked them if they were going to Ana-Capri. " I 
 will show you the way," she said. 
 
 She led them on through narrow roads, walled 
 in on either side by stone fences, and before long 
 they came to the little town. The church was 
 closed, for which Mary was sorry, for she would 
 
VISIT TO ANA-CAPRI. 201 
 
 have liked to see how the inside looked. The 
 streets were many of them steep and narrow. 
 
 "It is only a little town, mamma," she said, "we 
 should call it a village at home. Let us take this 
 little street and see where it leads to. I wish we 
 could find a fountain, I am so thirsty." 
 
 The little Italian girl, having deposited her bur 
 den at a house, led the way for them. " This road 
 leads only into the fields," she said, " there is no- 
 ing to see." Still Mary wanted to go on ; but after 
 roaming about in the fields awhile, she was glad 
 enough to turn back toward the town. 
 
 Mrs. Brown asked the little Italian whether they 
 could procure anything to eat, for the exercise of 
 climbing up the stairs had given them an appetite. 
 The little girl took them to her mother's house, 
 who set on the table, figs, bowls of milk, and a kind 
 of grey bread. 
 
 "If the signora would like oranges," she said, 
 " there are some in the garden and I will run and 
 pick them." 
 
 Mrs. Brown said they would like some ; and the 
 woman, took a basket and went out. In a few 
 
202 VISIT TO ANA-CAPKI. 
 
 minutes, she returned with a number of large 
 oranges, banging on stems and shaded by large 
 green leaves. 
 
 "It seems a shame to eat them," said Mary. 
 " How I wish we could carry them home." 
 
 Still Mary was not long in taking the beautiful 
 leaves from an orange, and in a minute more she 
 was enjoying the ripe sweet juice. " Oh, mamma, 
 oranges are so good right from the tree," she 
 said. 
 
 The woman soon brought in several sticks of dried 
 figs. The figs had been split and stuck upon a long 
 stick. She offered them to Mrs. Brown to take 
 away with her. 
 
 " If you will carry two sticks, Mary, I will buy 
 four," said Mrs. Brown. " You know that as soon 
 as we return to Naples, we must pack up our trunk 
 and start for Venice. We shall go by carriage as 
 far as Ancona, and as that will probably take us 
 a week, we shall be glad to have some figs with us. 
 When we lunch on them they will remind us of 
 Capri." 
 
 Mrs. Brown and her daughter took their leave of 
 
CONCLUSION. 203 
 
 the woman, each carrying away two sticks of figs. 
 Mary bade the little girl good-bye, and slipped into 
 her hand a little piece of money to remember her by. 
 
 " She will remember her without any money," 
 said the Italian woman. " We poor people remem 
 ber those who are kind to us. She told me how 
 you carried the sword for her." 
 
 The little Italian girl smiled and asked Mary 
 what her name was. When she heard it, she 
 repeated it, but instead of calling it "Mary," she 
 called it "Maria," for that is the Italian of 
 " Mary." 
 
 Mrs. Brown and her daughter walked slowly back 
 to the steps and went down. People were still 
 clambering up them with heavy burdens, or return 
 ing down them without any loads. Sunset was 
 flushing the sky, and Mary was not sorry that the 
 hours of rest were approaching. 
 
 When they arrived at their hotel, she was glad 
 to take her supper and go to bed. Her limbs ached 
 after her unusual exertion. The next morning they 
 went in a row-boat back to Sorrento. 
 
 From Sorrento Mrs. Brown and Mary took a car 
 riage to Castel-a-mare, and thence returned by cars 
 
204 CONCLUSION. 
 
 to Naples. That afternoon they packed their 
 trunk, and the next morning started for Venice. 
 As they drove out of Naples, Mary exclaimed : 
 
 " After all, mamma, I never saw the king, and I 
 thought the day that we went past his palace, 
 when we first came to Naples the day, you remem 
 ber, when we first saw the beautiful Bay that I 
 would rather see the king than anything else." 
 
 " And what do you think now, my love ?" asked 
 her mother. 
 
 " Oh, mamma, I would rather have seen the great 
 Museum, and Pompeii, and Vesuvius, and Capri, 
 and the Grotto Azzurra, than King Ferdinand II. of 
 Naples." 
 
 THE END. 
 
 
PS