 | VESUVIUS. The Italian sketch book |  |
VESUVIUS.
Under favourable auspices I commenced moving,
upon a donkey, from the village of Resina towards
Vesuvius, through a kind of lane choked up with
earth and stones. Two hours of slow riding brought
me to the first elevation, where stands a cottage,
called the Hermitage, inhabited by an old monk,
and affording shelter to the guards upon the mountain.
My course became then confined to a mule-path,
so much impeded by the heavy masses of lava,
that none but the experienced animal I bestrode
could have made a way along its rough and broken
surface. I was soon upon a vast plain of crude
black lava, thrown into a thousand accidental forms,
and presenting a wide scene of utter desolation. At
the foot of Vesuvius, properly so called, I left the
animal, and commenced climbing the steep ascent.
Being obliged to tread solely upon the craggy projections
or small fragments of the lava, and sometimes
upon ashes only, the process proved exceedingly
fatiguing. Although in part sustained by the
guide by means of the horse's bridle, I was several
times obliged to sit down upon some projecting
thus, I at length reached the comparatively
level space immediately below the uppermost elevation.
Here, as I advanced towards the new crater,
the crackling of the porous masses, and the bellowing
of the smoke-pouring summit, were sufficiently
appalling. Occasionally the boiling sulphur was
seen oozing from some little crevice, and the surface
which sustained my wayward footsteps, seemed
about to fall beneath them.
I approached near enough to the new crater to
inhale the sulphurous exhalations and become sensible
of its potent heat. In its immediate vicinity, where
the outer crust was broken, and the liquid flames roaring
and bursting through the aperture, several peasants
were moulding the glowing lava into coarse medallions,
as coolly as if at work over a forge. Having
breathed the suffocating air and roamed over the heated
scoriæ as long as prudence permitted, I began to
retrace my steps. My passage down the mountain
was wonderfully expeditious, as I almost slid upon
the fine ashes, and had only to guard against falling.
During the descent, and from the summit, the view was
surprisingly beautiful, comprising a complete panorama
of Naples, its unrivalled bay and adjacent
villages.
| VESUVIUS. The Italian sketch book | |