Full text of "Cities of Southern Italy"

Looking for:

Windows 10 1703 download iso italys blue grotto

exploited multilevel aquifer system in the Venetian plain, Italy. data, specific to a well known hydrogeological system in northern Italy [10], have. Gothic art, transported entire into Italy at the close of the Middle Ages,[3] The first point usually visited in Capri is the Blue Grotto (Grotta. Of South Italian superstitions the most prominent is that of the Jettatura, Both steamers stop at the Blue Grotto, which is entered (weather.

Windows Version ISO – Microsoft Community.Geo map reference | ThoughtSpot Documentation

Newstead Vic. Newtown Greater Geelong – Vic. Orford Vic. Paradise Vic. Plenty Vic. Preston Toowoomba – Qld Preston Vic. Queenstown SA Queenstown Tas. Ravenswood Vic. Richmond Vic. Riverside Vic. Rokeby Vic. Rosebery Vic. Runnymede Vic. Sandford Vic. Sassafras Vic. Seymour Vic. Somerton Park Somerville Vic.

St Leonards Vic. Stanley Vic. Strzelecki Vic. Swan Bay Vic. Thomson Greater Geelong – Vic. Tyenna Vic. Victoria Valley Vic. Waterloo Vic. Wattle Hill Vic. Westbury Vic. White Hills Vic.

Windermere Vic. Woodstock Vic. At La Majuna May i doors and windows are decorated with green boughs, arboscelli di maggio, or garlands, banderuole, of flowers. Luca October 18 it is an absolute necessity to eat coccia — wheat boiled with chestnuts and milk. The popular dishes themselves are still often those of classical times. The small figs introduced by L.

Vitellius, uncle of the emperor, are still dried in the old fashion, and called cottate. Of South Italian superstitions the most prominent is that of the Jettatura, or Evil Eye, which has been handed down from classical times. Thus Virgil says : ” Nescio quis teneros oculus mihi fascinat agnos ” ; Eclog.

Children wear bits of rock-salt round their necks, and women a httle silver frog, with the same intention. Some burn incense mixed with the palms blessed at Easter ; the use of the palm in averting danger being mentioned by Pliny. But the most popular antidote is a little coral hand with one finger stretched out — the hand of S. Gennaro — with which the shops of Naples abound. These charms are especially in request whenever Vesuvius is in a state of eruption.

If the case is alarming, half the population may be seen kneeling in the streets ; processions of clergy and monks carry the Blessed Sacrament, or even the relics of S.

Gennaro himself, to the scene of danger ; the air resounds with litanies ; never was there a people in such an agonised state of repentance for their sins, but immediately the danger is over, all are laughing, singing, dancing, quarrelling, gambling, cursing, fighting, as before, or, further, are rushing to the lotteries in order to secure lucky numbers.

Gennaro and oppose its miraculous influence to the threats of the blazing volcano ; this would undoubtedly have ended in a very serious sedition if Father Rocco had not slept forth, and, after reproaching them bitterly with the affront they were about to put upon the saint by attending his relics with torches taken from mercenary hands, ordered them all to go home and provide themselves with wax tapers ; the crowd dispersed, and proper measures were taken to prevent its gathering again.

The treatment of the dead shows the character of this idolatrous and self-seeking people in its saddest aspect. When the funeral of a friend passes, a Neapolitan will exclaim with characteristic selfishness, “Salute a noi ” — “Health to ourselves” — without thought of the departed.

Most of the middle classes belong, as in ancient times, to a congregazione or buricd-club. Amongst the poor, when any member of a family has expired, it is the custom for the oldest person present to recapitulate the virtues of the dead. Then, if there is a widow, she repeats the words. All the duties of the family, however, end at the house, and heccamorti , or hired mourners, carry the corpse to the ” pauper pits ” of the Campo Santo Vecchio, to be hurled into the common ” grave of the day ” : sometimes it is accom- panied by a number of old women, paid to howl as mourners — the praeficae of the ancients.

At the burial of an Archbishop of Naples four hundred friars attended with wax lights, but some thieves let loose a mad ox among them and in the confusion ran away with the candles. Fields are still covered with cerintha and lupin — the “tristis lupinus ” — and the peasants stiU, in cloudy weather, tell the hour by the position of this flower, which, like the sunflower, turns, as PUny describes, with the sun.

The wood of the plough is still elm — ” Et corvi fonnam accepit nlmos aratri ” ; Georg. L The artist will find few subjects attractive to his pencil, which are not architectural, after leaving Amalfi and Paestum ; but RocceUa, Scilla, and the forests of Pietra Pennata are exceptions.

To the historian and antiquarian a tour through the Southern Provinces must always be of extreme interest. A journey undertaken with a camera for the sole purpose of tracing the gradual victory of Benedictine Lombardic over Byzantine art in Apulia, would bring rich reward.

Whether considered in dimensions, outline, or constructive peculiarities, their churches will not bear a moment’s comparison with those of the north ; but in elegance of detail they often surpass purely Gothic build- ing to such a degree as to become to some extent as worthy of study as their more ambitious rivals. Their great interest in the eyes of the student consists in their forming a link between the Eastern and Western worlds, and thus joining together two styles which we have hitherto been in the habit of considering as having no point of contact.

The Greek iconoclastic feeling prevailed to such an extent in the south as entirely to prevent the introduction of the human form, either in bas-reliefs or in single figures ; but the architects indemnified themselves for this by the introduction of lions, elephants, and monsters of all sorts, to an extent foimd nowhere else, and by the lavish employment of sculptured foliage and richly carved frets and mouldings and a bold system of bracketing, which gave to the style as much richness as can be desired, often combined into great beauty of detail.

Angelo ; of noble castles at Avezzano, Naples, Melfi, Lucera, Lago Pesole, Castel del Monte, and Oria ; of countless exquisitely beautiful tombs, pulpits, thrones, paschal candelabra, and other works of sculpture at Aquila, Salerno, Ravello, and in the churches of Naples.

Besides these, the great palace of Caserta will claim attention from the architect, being almost the only modern building of importance in Southern Italy, though, while the Bourbon sovereigns took little trouble for the advancement of their kingdom, their care for their own comfort is evinced by the number of palaces built by them.

No kingdom of the size had so many royal residences. Sommer, of Naples, and Signer R. Moscioni, of Rome, for permission to use certain of their photographs for the illustration of this work. Frosinone Albergo Garibaldi , inhabitants.

A beautifu place ft. It is two miles from the station on the Rome-Naples Une, and seven south of Feren tino. It looks over the vale of the Sacco and across to the Monti Lepini and the Hemican mountains. It belonged to the redoubtable Volsci, whom the Romans deprived here of a portion of their territory for inciting the Hemicans to rebel. It became a miUtary colony, and suffered at the hands alternately of BeUsarius and Vitiges, but prospered in the Middle Ages until, in , the French sacked and burned it.

A few relics of a Roman amphitheatre alone witness to its antiquity. Its interest Ues in its beauty of position, its fertihty, and the charming costume of its women. From here the road due north travels to Alatri see Days near Rome , and thence, via Collepardo, to the beautiful Certosa di Trisulti. On the north side are to be seen remains of polygonal walls and the ancient acropolis. One tower of the mediaeval castle remains. From the highest point, called Civita, is obtained a superb panoramic view over the valleys of the Sacco and Cosa.

The breviary of S. Louis of Toulouse, brother of King Robert of Naples, is among the treasures shown by the sacristan. Saloma is the tomb of Francesca Leni, of Arpino, and there is a majolica -tiled pavement. Excursions to the Abbey of Casamari four hours ; Bauco two hours. About a mile from the village of CoUepardo by a path which turns left before enter- ing it is the strange hole called II Pozzo di Santulla, a pit in the rock recalling the Latomiae of Syracuse, about yards round and feet deep, hung with vast stalactites, and fringed at the top with weird ilex guide, 5 lire.

Beyond Santulla the majestic character of the scenery increases. The path winds round a chaos of great rocks, and descends into a deep gorge, whence it mounts again to the final isolated plateau of Trisulti, close under the snows, and overlooking a splendid ravine.

Here is a wood of old oaks carpeted with lilies, and beyond it Alpine pastures, sheeted in spring with mountain crocus and iris. Only the booming of a bell through these solemn mountain solitudes tells the traveller that he is near the monastery, until he is close upon it, and then a mass of white buildings, overtopped by a church, reveals itself on the edge of a great rocky platform.

The interior of the monastery is modernised, but its well-kept courts, garden, and curious fountains, have a beauty of their own, in the Carthusian fashion. Moreover, the magnificent bald ridges look down into them over the roofs. AU seems peaceful with these silent white brethren!

Over the high altar is a fresco of the sending out the first Carthusian monks to colonise Trisulti. The terrace beyond the little garden, with its formal box-edges, leads to the spezerla, decorated by Balbi, where many herbal medicines, and excellent liqueurs and perfumes are made by the monks.

May and June are good months for visiting it. A little path turning to the left outside the gateway of Trisulti gives the best view of the monastic buildings, and continues through the forest to the Gothic chapel and cell of S.

Domenico Loricato, who first collected a number of hermits around him on this spot, and built a chapel which he dedicated to S. Bartholo- mew. A stony path winds by zigzags into the abyss of the Cosa. Here the scenery is magnificent : the gorge is very narrow, only wide enough to contain the stream and the path by its side, and on the left rises a tremendous precipice, in the face of which yawns the cavern.

It is best to take the precau- tion of ordering what is called an “illumination” on the way to Trisulti, and one costing five Ure is the best to ask for, as producing the degree of light which is enough to show, but not to annihilate, the effect of darkness. Attended by a troop of boys, we descend into the earth by a wide path Uke a hillside, and then ascend by a narrower rocky way through the darkness, lighted by glaring torches.

Suddenly we find ourselves on the edge of a chasm, something Uke the Pozzo di Santulla, with a kind of rock-altar rising in the midst, blazing with fire, and throwing a ghastly glare on the wondering faces overlooking the edge of the abyss, and on the sides of the tremendous columns of stalactite which rise from the ground to the roof Uke a vast natural cathedral, and seem to faU again in showers of petrified fountains.

Sir R. Hoare says that ” the large vaulted roof, spacious halls, fantastic columns and pyramids, imitating rustic, yet unequaUed, architecture, present a fairy palace which rivals the most gorgeous descriptions of romance. Casamari, almost washed by the Amaseno, which is crossed by a ferry iraghelto , now a Trappist abbey, was originally Bene- dictine, and in 1 1 5 1 Cistercian.

It more resembles a fortress than a convent, and is a national monument Uke Monte Cassino. The foundation-stone of its Gothic church was laid in The entramce through a round-arched central portal, carried on six lateral shafts, leads into nave and aisles of six bays, with side altars. The west front has a good rose-window between two lancets. At the fifth pair of piers a screen of wrought iron separates the monastic portions of the church from the lay. The floor is decorated with tiles bearing the Barberini bees.

The soft cream-Uke tone of the travertine, with which it is built, is remarkably fresh. The choir contains a ” tribuna ” made after the manner of a small temple in the Corinihian style, and of fine marble. The transepts have eastern chapels. The Cloister, surrounded by Lombard arcades carried on coupled columns of varjing design, is entered from the proces- sional door of the south aisle, and the usual Cistercian arrange- ment of the domestic buildings ensues.

The chapter-house, infirmary, and dormitories are shown by the courtesy of the Prior. The site is supposed to be identifiable with Cereatae, which claims equally with Arpino to be the birthplace of Caius Marius. The long row of store-sheds before the piazza of the monastery serves for shops during the fair held here on the feast of S.

From Casamari can be reached Monte S. CinelU , inhabitants ; said to have originated in the refugees from Cereatae, and formerly a fief of the Marchese di Pescara. The Piazza, ” II Belvedere,” on tliree sides commands magnificent prospects. To the north-west rises with two of its towers the Rocca Ducale.

The chapel was formerly the prison, where S. Thomas Aquinas was confined by order of his mother and brothers in order to prevent his adopting the ecclesiastical career, and from it he escaped to Monte Cassino.

Maria della Valle is said to be constructed after a design by Bramante. It contains a good wooden statue of the Virgin sixteenth century. Monte Pedicino can be visited in four hours. Ceccano, ft.

Locanda Anelli , inhabitants, on the side of a hill overlooking a deep glen and the valley of the Sacco. The upper town was girdled with walls by Pope Silverius.

The newer town below is much resorted to by visitors in the hot season. Woollen and paper factories are the chief sources of in- dustry. On the left of the Sacco, two miles south of Ceccano, is the site of Fabrateria Vetus, a Volscian city made into a Roman colonia.

In ancient days the Sacco bore the name of Trerus. Amaseno, a fief of Colonna, with a castle, can be visited from here. Ceprano buffet at the station , inhabitants, on the right bank of the Liris. The town is three kilometres from the line. Paschal II. Here, fifty years later, Manfred was betrayed by his troops cf.

Dante, Inferno, Cto. Near it, on high ground, was situated the Oscan Fregellae, destroyed b. It arose again under the name of Vic us Cipri. Fondi, on the Via Appia, may be reached from Terracina, or from Ceprano by a very beautiful mountain road descending near Lenola. It is a picturesque walled town in the province of Caserta, and but eleven miles from Terracina, overlooking the Lago di Fondi and the Gulf of Terracina.

It was a municipium in B. The castle of the Caetani, with many towers, and flamboyant windows, adjoins the cathe- dral. The latter has a fine portal with the usual lions and a fifteenth-century tomb of Onorato Caetani, Lord of Fondi. The episcopal throne is of the thirteenth century, and decorated with mosaic Cosmatesque.

Prignano in , a fact especially annoying to the latter, who was a Neapolitan. Maxia contains a Cosmatesque pulpit and a Madonna by Silvestro dei Buoni, Her servants were mercilessly massacred, but she escaped in her night-dress from a window, and took refuge in the mountains. The Turks again sacked Fondi in The famous Caecuban vine Horace, Ode i.

Sperlonga is a fishing village, finely situated on a head- land, and a resort of the ancient Romans. Suetonius and Tacitus tell how Sejanus, the powerful, but iU-fated, Chancellor of Tiberius, saved his master’s life, when, at a banquet given in one of the decorated caves here, large stones fell from the vault and buried some of the suite as well as Sejanus, who hurled his body and arms over Tiberius, so as to shelter him.

The guard excavated both, and Tiberius journeyed on to Capua in order to dedicate a temple there. The Grotta di Tiberio is shown a kilometre beyond the village south. Leaving Fondi by the Via Appia south-east the road mounts gradually amid beautiful wild scenen. Andrea, by a pass to Itri ft. The Inn of Terracina, has perpetuated the interest in him. The French pursued Pezza remorselessly, and having driven him to Sicily, and offered large rewards for his capture, he was discovered to them at Baronisi, near Palermo, in , and shot.

In earlier days Alarco Sciarra, a robber baron, promised Tasso a safe conduct through the region. Alter leaving Itri the road winds down to Formia, H. Formia is so exquisitely situated that Ischia and most of the promontories of the Bay of Naples can be surveyed from it. The Villa Caposele a. His Queen, Maria of Bavaria, heroically held it for four months in until the Sardinian fleet, on February 23, received the surrender.

Hither, in November , Pius IX. From the Piazza a path leads to the summit of the promontorj’, which is crowned by the Torre d’ Orlando, being actually the tomb of Lucius Munatius Plancus, the founder of Lugdunum Lyons in the reign of Augustus. In the town surrendered to a Spanish fleet under Gonsalvo da Cordova, and in it held out for six months against Massena.

The Duomo, S. Erasmo, has a thirteenth-century tower, and behind its high altar is preserved a banner presented by Pius V. Peter and Paul. In front, rising from four lions, stands a sculptured Gothic column.

The railway from Formia passes to Sparanise on the Naples- Rome route, near the coast. Minturno ft. The town occupied both banks of the river and was made a colonia by Cajsar. Here Gonsalvo da Cordova gained his final triumph over the French Decem- ber 27, Near S. Agata the road passes in sight of Sessa Aurunca ft.

The Duomo twelfth century contains a remarkable ambone pulpit , and paschal candelabra. Beyond, on the right, rises Monte Massico ft. Close behind it stand the polygonal walls of the ancient ” quiet country town ” of Juvenal Albergo di Liris, Roma.

In modem days the learned Cardinal Baronius i was born here. It gives a ducal title to the Buoncompagni family. It is a prosperous place and admirably situated for excursions ; but it is more attractive for the costume and beauty of its women. Italian costume reaches its climax here ; and the festival of S.

Restituta May 27 affords the best occasion for studying it. At Isola, ft. Albergo Meglio , on the road to Arpino, occur the beautiful Falls of the Liris. The cascade tumbles in a mass of water, encircled by smaller streams, from beneath an old castle, almost into the midst of the town.

The colour is glorious, and the iris more vivid than at Temi. Between it and Sora, on an island Insula Arpinas in the Fibreno, and close to its junction with the Liris, stands the convent of S. This island belonged first to Cicero, and then to SiUus Italicus. Through the trees overhanging the waters are exquisite mountain-views ; and among the vegetation lie fragments and capitals of columns.

The Roman bridge across the Liris, Ponte di Cicerone, remains. Arpino, ft. Albergo della Pace , the birthplace of Cicero, bears for its municipal banner the letters M. He constantly alludes to his native town and describes the people there as rustic and simple, and with all the virtues of rugged mountaineers.

It stands upon two hills ; one summit, the higher one, called Civita- Vecchia, occupies the ancient site of Volscian Arpinum, and retains its polygonal walls.

The inscriptions let into the walls of various buildings tell of the ancient industry of woollen manu- facture and dyeing. Mercurius Lanarius had a temple here supposed to have occupied the site of the Church of Sta. Maria di Civita. The ancient pavement hard by witnesses to the wheels of primitive waggons. The round towers along the walls are of the fifteenth century.

The large square tower in the citadel was occupied by Ladislaus, King of Naples, on his way to Rome, Arce, below the old castle of Rocca d’Arce, commands wonderful views.

It occupies the site of Arx Volsciorum, with polygonal walls and other remains. Atina, on the road from Sora to Cassino, is a mediaeval hill- town. Near it, on another point of the mountain, are the polygonal remains of its Volscian predecessor, reputed to have been founded by Saturn : ” Atina potens,” and it is mentioned as a snowy spot by Silius Italicus : ” Monte nivoso I,.

Elia, is never to be forgotten. The village of Rocca Secca, three miles from the line, is not inviting, and sits on its bare flank of mountain, with little visible means of subsistence. Above it are the ruins of the castle in which Thomas Aquinas it is said by some saw the light. A few miles further we reach Aquino, ft. Strabo speaks of it as chief among the Volscian cities. Dolabella was put to death here. The town was de- stroyed by the Lombards, whereupon the inhabitants took refuge at Castro Cielo, on the top of the mountain.

Thence after a tims they descended to Palazzuolo, where their descendants probably exist stiU. The circuit of ancient Aquinum is now filled with vineyards and gardens, amid which gigantic fragments of ruin appear at intervals. The desolate suburban Church of S. Maria Libera is approached by an immense flight of marble steps, once the approach to a temple. The walls are encrusted with fragments of ancient carving. Glorious friezes of acanthus in the highest relief surround the great door.

A mosaic of the twelfth century represents the Virgin and Child, and below, on either side, is a sarcophagus, with a female head projecting from it, one in- scribed ” Ottolina,” the other ” Maria. Thomas Aquinas. The interior of the church was curious, having six pillars on one side of the nave and only three on the other ; since ignorant mania for uniformity has destroyed its interest. Close to the church is a beautiful httle Triumphal Arch, with Corinthian columns.

A mill-stream has been diverted through it, and it stands reflected in the clear water, which falls below it in a series of miniature cascades. Passing a succession of Roman fragments, we reach the ruined Church of S. Tommaso, in which are several beautiful fragments of frieze from local temples. Lorenzo, a Roman gateway in perfect preservation, by which we enter the circuit of the ancient city, passing through the still existing hne of old walls.

Pietro Vetere. AH the ruins are embedded in vineyards and gardens. Returning through the Arco S. Lorenzo, and follow- ing the little stream in the valley, we find a strange old church supported upon open arches, through which there occur most picturesque views of the present town, scrambling along the edge of tufa rocks, crested and overhung by fig-trees.

The mediasval city, which arose under the powerful Counts of Aquino, is the oldest bishopric in the Roman Church. Its bishops sign ecclesiastical documents immediately after the archbishops, and the whole cathedral chapter of Aquino have stiU the right to wear mitres and full episcopal robes. His grandfather married the sister of the Emperor Frederick L, and he was therefore great-nephew of that prince. It has been the custom to say he was born at Rocca Secca, which, however, was never more than a mere ” fortezza ” of the Counts of Aquino, but never used by them as a residence ; and all uncertainty has been cleared up by the recent discovery of a letter of the saint in the archives of Monte Cassino, sajdng that he was coming to seek the blessing of the Abbot Bernard before setting out upon a journey, and that he intended to visit his birthplace at Aquino on the way.

Here the youngest sister of S. Thomas was killed by a flash of lightning, while sleeping in the room with him and her nurse. At five j’ears S. Thomas was sent to school at Monte Cassino, but at twelve his masters declared themselves unable to teach him any more.

On the contrary, he converted his sisters, and, after two years’ imprisonment, one of them let him down from a window, and he was received by some Dominicans, and pro- nounced the final vows. Gradually S. Thomas became the greatest theological teacher and writer of his time. When he refused a bishopric, the Pope made him always attend his person, and thus his lectures were given in the different towns of papal residence — Rome, Viterbo, Orvieto, Fondi, and Perugia. The crowning work of S. Thomas was the Summa Theologia — the science of the Christian religion ; but to ordinary readers he is perhaps less known by his theology than by his hymns, of which ” Pange Lingua” and ” Tantum Ergo ” are the most celebrated.

Near Aquino is the mountain castle of Loreto, which belonged to the parents of S. It was while they were staying there that he, a boy, stole all the contents of the family larder to distribute to the poor. The legend tells that, when his father intercepted him, and commanded him to give up what his cloak contained, a shower of roses fell from it to the ground.

Three miles beyond Aquino, the road which passes under the Arco S. Lorenzo reaches Pontecorvo, once an independent state like Monaco. Napoleon gave it as a duchy to Bernadotte. The town is well situated, and is approached by a triumphal arch, adorned with a statue of Pius IX.

The cathedral stands on the substructions of an ancient temple. The costumes here are magnificent. On the left of the railway, the great convent of Monte Cassino is seen crowning a rocky hill-top above the plain of the Garig- liano, and the fine old castle of Rocca Janula occurs over- looking Cassino.

Inn, Albergo Varrone, clean and reasonable. From the station to the Abbey and back for two persons, 4 lire. Cassino 10, inhabitants occupies the site of the Roman Casinum, which Strabo describes as the last town of Latium on the Latin Way. Livy tells how Hannibal intended occupying it in order to prevent the Consul Fabius from advancing on Campania, but was led by a mistake of his guide to Casilinum. Silius Italicus mentions its springs and its foggy climate.

Casi- num continued to flourish under the empire, but was destroyed by the Lombards in the sixth century. Its former name of S. Germano was derived from a holy bisliop of Capua, a contem- porary and friend of S. Half a mile from the town, just above the high-road from S. The interior is a field and the seats are gone. Just above stands the little Church of the Crodfisso, occupying an ancient tomb, which is shown as that of NunnidiaQuadratiUa.

It is cruciform witli a dome in the centre, recalling the tomb of Galla Placidia at Ravenna. The blocks of travertine in the entrance walls are colossal. At the head of the steps in front of the church is a sacrificial altar.

Immediately beneath cire the vast remains of the seminary of Monte Cassino, occupying the site of the historic convent Plumbariola. Near the town, on the banks of the Fiiime Rapido, are some ruins, supposed to belong to the Villa of Varro, of which Cicero has left a detailed description.

It was here that Antony indulged in those orgies against which the great orator poured forth his perilous eloquence. The CoUegiata of S. Germano was built by the Abbot GisuLfo in the ninth centurj’, and, though greatly altered in the seventeenth century, retains its twelve ancient marble columns. Donkeys 2 hre may be obtained for the ascent ft. The steep stony path which used to wind above the roofs of the houses is superseded.

Instead there is a fine zigzag road, leaving to the right the ruins of the castle of Rocca Janula, twice besieged and taken by Frederick II. The views are indescribably beautiful, and small oratories here and there by the wayside offer shelter from wind and sun, and commemorate the Benedictine story.

It is not known that the twin sister of S. At her last interview with her brother on this spot, after they had passed the day together in rehgious exercises, Scholastica implored Benedict to remain with her till the morning, that they might praise God through the night, but the saint refused, saying that it was impossible for him to be absent from his convent.

Then Scholastica bent over her clasped hands and prayed ; and, though the weather was beautiful, and there was not a cloud in the sky, the rain began immediately to fall in such torrents, accompanied by thunder and lightning of such a terrific kind, that neither Benedict nor the brethren who were with him could leave the place where they were.

Gregory the Great, who tells the storj’, says that one must not be surprised that the wish 12 SOUTHERN ITALY of the sister was heard by God rather than that of the brother, because, of the two, the sister was the one who loved Him the most, and with God the one who loves the most is always the most powerful. As we draw nearer the convent, ft. In front of it a grating covers the mark of a knee which is said to have been left in the rock by S.

Benedict when he knelt there to ask a blessing before laying the foundation- stone of his convent. Benedict came hither from Subiaco, when he had already been thirty-six years a monk, led through the windings of the Apennines, says the tradition, alternately by two angels and two ravens, until he reached this spur of the mountain above Casinum, which had then already been ruined by Genseric.

Not strange to say, the inhabitants of this wild district in the sixth century of Christianity were still pagan, and worshipped Apollo in a temple on the top of the mountain, where also was a grove sacred to Venus. Dante writes in allusion to this — ” Quel monte, a cui Cassino e nella costa, Fu frequentato gia in sua la ciraa Dalla gente ingaruiata e mal disposta. Ed io son quel che su vi portai prima Lo nome di colui clie’n terra addusse La verita, che tanto ci sublima ; E tanta grazia sovra me rilusse, Ch’io ritrassi le ville circostanti Dall’ empio culto che’l mondo sedusse.

We enter the abbey by a great gate guarded by two lions, and ascend a low vaulted staircase, the only portion of the building ascribed to the time of Benedict. On the right a lamp burns before an old marble statue of the founder ; at the top Benedict and Scholastica kneel before the Virgin and Child.

Here the peasants of the neighbourhood in their wonderful costumes — some almost Egyptian -looking — assemble to receive the dole of the convent, or bring up provisions. We are shown into a large bare chamber by a lay-brother who then goes to signify our arrival to the Prior. The latter presently advances to receive us, and in excellent English demands how long our stay will be : ” Is it for three days, three months, or three years?

It is in- scribed : Fornicem saxis asperum ac depressum tantae moll’s aditum angustum ne mireris, hospes, angusiitm fecit patriarchae sanctiias : venerare potius et sospes ingredere.

Above the gate is a square tower modernised externally , of which the lower portion at least is ancient. It contains two chambers inscribed : Pars inferior tiirris, in qua S. Benedichis dum viverct habitabat ; and, V etustissimtim habitaculum in quo SStni patri- archae discipuli quiescebant.

This then occupies the position of the cell where S. Lex tunc exiNit, mentes quae ducit ab imis, Et vulgata dedit lumen par climata saecli.

The room in the upper part of the tower is shown as that in which Benedict saw in a vision the death of the bishop S. Ger- mano. Here also, only trwo days after his last and miraculously prolonged interview with her, he saw the soul of his sister Scho- lastica ascending as a dove to heaven, and becoming thus aware of her death and translation ” was filled with joy, and his grati- tude flowed forth in hymns and praises to God.

The brother only survived the sister for forty days, days spent in the most austere observance of his own monastic rule. Feeling his end approaching, he bade the monks to carry him to the oratory of S. John Baptist, where he caused the tomb of his sister to be opened. Resting by its side, at the foot of the adtar, he received the viaticum, and then, extending his hands to heaven, he died in the arms of his companions, March 21, , at the very hour which, according to the legend, he had foretold.

Benedict was laid by Scholastica, ” so that death might not divide those whose souls had been united in God. Open arcades, on either side, display other courts, now used as gardens, where, amid the flowers, are preserved many portions of the granite pillars from the church which the Abbot Desiderius, afterwards Pope Victor III. Colossal statues of Benedict and Scholastica guard the ascent to the upper quad- rangle, ” II Paradiso,” which is centred by a well. Near the entrance of the church are the parents of Benedict, of Placidus, and of Maurus.

The Uving raven which hops about here, and which is quite a feature of the monastery, commemorates the birds which miraculously guided the patriarch hither from Subiaco. Ttie rich deep voices of the monks rose softly in vespers, and the olive-trees seemed to quiver with the blending harmonies. What a vision of loveliness was there!

The silvery world was now still, as in a heavenly trance. The nearly full moon was enthroned above the mountains, that dreamed like enchanted giants. Far down in the vale the rapid rivers were screened with spellbound vapours.

Long before the sun arose the ridges lost their intense pallor and gradually blushed into mysterious carmine as of spilled roses, while their lower ranges and their foot-hills loomed out weirdly in shades of plum-like purple. Later the morning- star faded, and feeling slowly for his new dominion the sun poured his great arms of gold over peak and promontory, and at last again enfolded the shrine of S.

The roof of the nave is painted by Luca Giordano, and by the same painter is a great fresco over the doors, depicting the consecration of the first basilica by Alexander II.

On the left stands a pulpit similar to that of Sienna, the first work of Nicholas of Pisa , a simple marble coffer supported by marble columns and covered with sculptures. The sentiment of force and of antique nudity comes out here in striking features.

The sculptor comprehended the postures and torsions of bodies. His figures, somewhat massive, are grand and simple; he frequently reproduces the tunics and folds of the Roman costume; one of his nude personages, a sort of Hercules bearing a young lion on his shoulders, has the broad breast and muscular tension which the sculptors of the sixteenth century admired.

The last of these edifices, the Campo-Santo, is a cemetery, the soil of which, brought from Palestine, is holy ground. Four high walls of polished marble surround it with their white [Pg 11] and crowded panels. Inside, a square gallery forms a promenade opening into the court through arcades trellised with ogive windows.

It is filled with funereal monuments, busts, inscriptions and statues of every form and of every age. Nothing could be simpler and nobler. A framework of dark wood supports the arch overhead, and the crest of the roof cuts sharp against the crystal sky. At the angles are four rustling cypress trees, tranquilly swayed by the breeze. Grass is growing in the court with a wild freshness and luxuriance.

Here and there a climbing flower twined around a column, a small rosebush, or a shrub glows beneath a gleam of sunshine. There is no noise; this quarter is deserted; only now and then is heard the voice of some promenader which reverberates as under the vault of a church.

It is the veritable cemetery of a free and Christian city; here, before the tombs of the great, people might well reflect over death and public affairs. Few cities have preserved their medieval walls with such loving care as Pisa. The circuit is complete save where the traveler enters the city; and there, alas, a wide breach has been [Pg 12] made by the restless spirit of modernity.

But once past the paltry barrier and the banal square, with its inevitable statue of Victor Emanuel, that take the place of the old Porta Romana, one quickly perceives that the city is a walled one. Glimpses of battlements close the vistas of the streets, and green fields peep through the open gates, marking that abrupt transition between town and country peculiar to a fortified city.

The walls are best seen from without. An admirable impression of them can be had on leaving the city by the Porta Lucchese. Turning to the left, after passing a crucifix overshadowed by cypresses, we come to the edge of a stretch of level marshy meadows, gaily pied in spring with orchids and grape hyacinths.

Above our heads the high air vibrates with the song of larks. Before us is the long line of the city walls. Strong, grim and gray, they look with nothing to break the outline of square battlements against the sky, but that majestic groups of domes and towers for whose defense they were built.

At the angle of the wall to the right is a square watch-tower, backed by groups of cypresses that rise into the air like dark flames. Its little windows command the flat plain as far as the horizon. How easy to imagine the warning blast of the warder’s trumpet as he caught sight of a distant enemy, and the wall springing into life at the sound.

Armed men buckling on their harness would swarm up ladders to the battlements, the catapult groan and squeak as its lever was forced backward, and at the sharp word of [Pg 13] command the first flight of arrows would be loosed. But the dream fades, and we pass on to the angle of the wall where the cypresses stand. From the picturesque Jews’ cemetery, to which access is easy, the structure of the walls can be studied in detail because the hand of the restorer has been perforce withheld within its gates.

The wall is some forty feet high, built of stone from the Pisan hills, weathered for the most part to a grayish hue. The masonry of the lower half is good. The blocks of stone are large and well laid.

Those of the upper half are smaller and the masonry is in places careless and irregular. The red brick battlements are square.

At short intervals there are walled-up gateways, round-headed or ogival in form, and the whole surface is rent and patched. Centuries of war and earthquakes, rain and fire, have given it a pleasant irregularity, the record of violent and troublous times. The city can be reentered by the Porta Nuova, only a few yards to the left of the cemetery.

So venerable do these battered walls look that we need the full evidence of history to realize that they had more than one predecessor.

The memory even of the first walls of Pisa, an ancient city when Rome was young, has been lost. The earliest record of which we know anything appears on a map of the ninth century drawn by one Bonanno; a map, we should rather say professing to be of the ninth century, for churches of the thirteenth century are marked upon it, so it must either have been made, or the churches inserted, then The ancient walls were practically swept away by the prosperity of Pisa.

She traded with the East, and was successful in commerce as in war. Her inhabitants increased rapidly. They could no longer be penned within the narrow limits of the old wall, but overflowed in all directions beyond it. Not only was the Borgo thickly populated, but a whole new region called Forisportae, sprang up.

So masked was the wall by houses, built into it and huddling against it both on the outside and the inside, that it seems to have been actually invisible. So much so that contemporary chroniclers spoke of Pisa as without walls, and attributed her safety to the valor of her citizens and the multitude of her towers.

The ancient wall was evidently so hidden and decayed that Pisa must be regarded as a defenseless city in the twelfth century. It is curious that her citizens should have neglected their own safety at a time when they were masters of fortification and defense; when their fame in these arts had reached as far as Egypt and Syria, and when the Milanese came to them to beg for engineers The external appearance of an Italian city in the twelfth century was so unlike anything we are accustomed to in modern times that a strong effort of the imagination is needed to conceive it.

Seen from a distance the walls enclosed, not houses, but a forest of tall square [Pg 15] shafts, rising into the sky like the crowded chimney stacks in a manufacturing town but far more thickly set together. The city appeared, to use a graphic contemporary metaphor, like a sheaf of corn bound together by its walls. San Gimignano, tho most of its towers have perished long ago, helps us to imagine faintly what Italian towns were like in the days of Frederick Barbarossa or his grandson Frederick II.

For most of the houses were actually towers, long rectangular columns, vying with each other in height and crowded close together on either side of the narrow, airless, darkened streets. Sometimes they were connected with one another by wooden bridges, and all were furnished with wooden balconies used in defensive and offensive warfare with their neighbors. Cities full of towers were common all over southern France and central Italy, but Tuscany had more than any other state, and those of Pisa were the most famous of all.

The habit of building and dwelling in towers rather than in houses may have arisen from the difficulty of expanding laterally within an enclosed city; but a stronger reason may be found in the dangers and uncertainty of life in a period when a man might be attacked at any moment by his fellow-citizen, as well as by the enemy of the state. It was a distinct military advantage to overlook one’s neighbor, who might be an enemy; and towers rose higher and higher. The spirit of emulation entered, and rich nobles gloried in adding tower to tower and in looking down on all rivals.

But whatever the cause of their existence, they were picturesque, and must have presented a gallant sight on the eve of a high festival. The tall shafts were tinged with gold by the western sun, their battlements crowned with three fluttering banners—the eagle of the Emperor, the white cross of the Commune, and the device of the People—looking as tho a cloud of many-colored butterflies were hovering over the city.

Again, how dramatic the scene when the city was rent by one of the perpetually recurring faction-fights. Light bridges with grappling-irons were thrown from tower to tower, doors and windows were barricaded, balconies and battlements lined with men in shining mail, bearing the fantastic device of their leader on helm and shield. Mangonels, or catapults, [Pg 17] huge engines stationed on the roofs of the towers, sent masses of stone hurtling through the air, whistling arbelast bolts and clothyard shafts flew in thick showers, boiling oil or lead rained down on the heads of those who ventured down to attack the doors, and arrows, with Greek fire attached, were shot with nice aim into the wooden balconies and bridges.

Vile insults were hurled where missiles failed to strike. The shouts and shrieks of the combatants were mingled with the crash of a falling tower or with the hissing of a fire-arrow. Where those struck, a red glow arose and a thick cloud of smoke enveloped the defenders. Altho it is evident that towers were very numerous in Pisa, it is difficult to arrive at their precise number. The chroniclers differ greatly in their estimates.

Benjamin da Tudela, for instance, says that there were 10, in the twelfth century; while Marangone puts the number at 15, and Tronci at 16, These are round numbers such as the medieval mind loved, but we have abundant evidence that they are not much exaggerated.

An intarsia panel in the Duomo, shows how closely the towers were packed together, while the mass of legislation relating to them was directed against abuses that could only have arisen if their number was very large. So we go, rattling down-hill, into Naples. A funeral is coming up the street, toward us. The body, on an open bier, borne on a kind of palanquin, covered with a gay cloth of crimson and gold.

The mourners, in white gowns and masks. If there be death abroad, life is well represented too, for all Naples would seem to be out of doors, and tearing to and fro in carriages. Some of these, the common Vetturino vehicles, are drawn by three horses abreast, decked with smart trappings and great abundance of brazen ornament, and always going very fast. Not that their loads are light; for the smallest of them has at least six people inside, four in front, four or five more hanging behind, and two or three more, in a net or bag below the axle-tree, where they lie half-suffocated with mud and dust.

Exhibitors of Punch, buffo singers with guitars, reciters of poetry, reciters of stories, a row of cheap exhibitions with clowns and [Pg 19] showmen, drums, and trumpets, painted cloths representing the wonders within, and admiring crowds assembled without, assist the whirl and bustle.

Ragged lazzaroni lie asleep in doorways, archways, and kennels; the gentry, gaily drest, are dashing up and down in carriages on the Chiaja, or walking in the Public Gardens; and quiet letter-writers, perched behind their little desks and inkstands under the Portico of the Great Theater of San Carlo, in the public street, are waiting for clients.

Why do the beggars rap their chins constantly, with their right hands, when you look at them? Everything is done in pantomime in Naples, and that is the conventional sign for hunger. A man who is quarreling with another, yonder, lays the palm of his right hand on the back of his left, and shakes the two thumbs—expressive of a donkey’s ears—whereat his adversary is goaded to desperation.

Two people bargaining for fish, the buyer empties an imaginary waistcoat pocket when he is told the price, and walks away without a word, having thoroughly conveyed to the seller that he considers it too dear. Two people in carriages, meeting, one touches his lips, twice or thrice, holding up the five fingers of his right hand, and gives a horizontal cut in the air with the palm.

The other nods briskly, and goes his way. He has been invited to a friendly dinner at half-past five o’clock, and will certainly come. All over Italy, a peculiar shake of the right hand from the wrist, with the forefinger stretched out, expresses a negative—the only negative [Pg 20] beggars will ever understand. But, in Naples, those five fingers are a copious language.

All this, and every other kind of out-door life and stir, and maccaroni-eating at sunset, and flower-selling all day long, and begging and stealing everywhere and at all hours, you see upon the bright sea-shore, where the waves of the Bay sparkle merrily Capri—once made odious by the deified beast Tiberius—Ischia, Procida, and the thousand distant beauties of the Bay, lie in the blue sea yonder, changing in the mist and sunshine twenty times a day; now close at hand, now far off, now unseen.

The fairest country in the world, is spread about us. Whether we turn toward the Miseno shore of the splendid watery amphitheater, and go by the Grotto of Posilipo to the Grotto del Cane and away to Baiae, or take the other way, toward Vesuvius and Sorrento, it is one succession of delights.

In the last-named direction, where, over doors and archways, there are countless little images of San Gennaro, with this Canute’s hand stretched out, to check the fury of the burning Mountain, we are carried pleasantly, by a railroad on the beautiful Sea Beach, past the town of Torre del Greco, built upon the ashes of the former town destroyed by an eruption of Vesuvius, within a hundred years; and past the flat-roofed houses, granaries, and maccaroni manufacturies; to Castellamare, with its ruined castle, now inhabited by fishermen, standing in the sea upon a heap of rocks.

Here, the railroad terminates; but, hence we may ride on, by an unbroken succession of [Pg 21] enchanting bays, and beautiful scenery, sloping from the highest summit of Saint Angelo, the highest neighboring mountain, down to the water’s edge—among vineyards, olive-trees, gardens of oranges and lemons, orchards, heaped-up rocks, green gorges in the hills—and by the bases of snow-covered heights, and through small towns with handsome, dark-haired women at the doors—and pass delicious summer villas—to Sorrento, where the poet Tasso drew his inspiration from the beauty surrounding him.

Returning, we may climb the heights above Castellamare, and looking down among the boughs and leaves, see the crisp water glistening in the sun; and clusters of white houses in distant Naples, dwindling, in the great extent of prospect, down to dice. The coming back to the city, by the beach again, at sunset; with the glowing sea on one side, and the darkening mountain Vesuvius , with its smoke and flame, upon the other, is a sublime conclusion to the glory of the day.

That church by the Porta Capuna—near the old fisher-market in the dirtiest quarter of dirty Naples, where the revolt of Masaniello began—is memorable for having been the scene of one of his earliest proclamations to the people, and is particularly remarkable for nothing else, unless it be its waxen and bejeweled Saint in a glass case, with two odd hands; or the enormous number of beggars who are constantly rapping their chins there, like a battery of castanets.

The cathedral with the beautiful door, and the columns of African and Egyptian granite that once ornamented the temple of [Pg 22] Apollo, contains the famous sacred blood of San Gennaro or Januarius, which is preserved in two phials in a silver tabernacle, and miraculously liquefies three times a year, to the great admiration of the people. At the same moment, the stone distant some miles where the Saint suffered martyrdom, becomes faintly red. It is said that the officiating priests turn faintly red also, sometimes, when these miracles occur.

The old, old men who live in hovels at the entrance of these ancient catacombs, and who, in their age and infirmity, seem waiting here, to be buried themselves, are members of a curious body, called the Royal Hospital, who are the official attendants at funerals.

Two of these old specters totter away, with lighted tapers, to show the caverns of death—as unconcerned as if they were immortal. They were used as burying-places for three hundred years; and, in one part, is a large pit full of skulls and bones, said to be the sad remains of a great mortality occasioned by a plague. In the rest, there is nothing but dust. They consist, chiefly, of great wide corridors and labyrinths, hewn out of the rock.

At the end of some of these long passages, are unexpected glimpses of the daylight, shining down from above. It looks as ghastly and as strange; among the torches, and the dust, and the dark vaults; as if it, too, were dead and buried.

The present burial-place lies out yonder, on a hill between the city and Vesuvius. The old Campo Santo with its three hundred and [Pg 23] sixty-five pits, is only used for those who die in hospitals, and prisons, and are unclaimed by their friends.

The graceful new cemetery, at no great distance from it, tho yet unfinished, has already many graves among its shrubs and flowers, and airy colonnades. It might be reasonably objected elsewhere, that some of the tombs are meretricious and too fanciful; but the general brightness seems to justify it here; and Mount Vesuvius, separated from them by a lovely slope of ground, exalts and saddens the scene.

If it be solemn to behold from this new City of the Dead, with its dark smoke hanging in the clear sky, how much more awful and impressive is it, viewed from the ghostly ruins of Herculaneum and Pompeii!

Stand at the bottom of the great market-place of Pompeii, and look up the silent streets, through the ruined temples of Jupiter and Isis, over the broken houses with their inmost sanctuaries open to the day, away to Mount Vesuvius, bright and snowy in the peaceful distance; and lose all count of time, and heed of other things, in the strange and melancholy sensation of seeing the Destroyed and the Destroyer making this quiet picture in the sun.

A road to the right at the end of the Chiaja, leads to the mouth of the Grotto of Posilipo, above which those who do not wish to leave their carriages may see, high on the left, close above the grotto, the ruined columbarium known as the Tomb of Virgil. A door in the wall, on the left of the approach to the grotto, and a very steep staircase, lead to the columbarium, which is situated in a pretty fruit-garden. Virgil desired that his body should be brought to Naples from Brundusium, where he died, B.

If further confirmation were needed of the story that Virgil was laid here, it would be found in the fact that Silius Italicus, who lived at the same time with Statius, purchased the tomb of Virgil, restored it from [Pg 25] the neglect into which it had fallen, and celebrated funeral rites before it. The tomb was originally shaded by a gigantic bay-tree, which is said to have died on the death of Dante. Petrarch, who was brought hither by King Robert, planted another, which existed in the time of Sannazaro, but was destroyed by relic-collectors in the last century.

A branch was sent to Frederick the Great by the Margravine of Baireuth, with some verses by Voltaire. If from no other cause, the tomb would be interesting from its visitors; here Boccaccio renounced the career of a merchant for that of a poet, and a well-known legend, that St.

Paul visited the sepulcher of Virgil at Naples, was long commemorated in the verse of a hymn used in the service for St. Paul’s Day at Mantua. The tomb is a small, square, vaulted chamber with three windows.

Early in the sixteenth century a funeral urn, containing the ashes of the poet, stood in the center, supported by nine little marble pillars. Some say that Robert of Anjou removed it, in , for security to the Castel Nuovo, others that it was given by the Government to a cardinal from Mantua, who died at Genoa on his way home. In either event the urn is now lost. It is just beneath the tomb that the road to Pozzuoli enters the famous Grotto of Posilipo, a tunnel about half a mile long, in breadth from 25 to 30 feet, and varying from about 90 feet in height near the entrance, to little more than 20 feet at points of the interior.

Petronius and Seneca mention its narrow gloomy [Pg 26] passage with horror, in the reign of Nero, when it was so low that it could only be used for foot-passengers, who were obliged to stoop in passing through.

In the fifteenth century King Alphonso I. In the Middle Ages the grotto was ascribed to the magic arts of Virgil.

In recent years it has been the chief means of communication between Naples and Baiae, and is at all times filled with dust and noise, the flickering lights and resounding echoes giving it a most weird effect. However much one may abuse Neapolitans, we may consider in their favor, as Swinburne observes, “what a terror this dark grotto would be in London!

At the foot of the steep ascent, we were received by two guides, one old, the other young, but both active fellows. The first pulled me up the path, the other Tischbein [9] —pulled I say, for these guides are girded round the waist with a leathern belt, which the traveler takes hold of, and being drawn up by his guide, makes his way the easier with foot and staff.

In this manner we reached the flat from which [Pg 27] the cone rises; toward the north lay the ruins of the summit. A glance westward over the country beneath us, removed, as well as a bath could, all feeling of exhaustion and fatigue, and we now went round the ever-smoking cone, as it threw out its stones and ashes. Wherever the space allowed of our viewing it at a sufficient distance, it appeared a grand and elevating spectacle. In the first place, a violent thundering toned forth from its deepest abyss, then stones of larger and smaller sizes were showered into the air by thousands, and enveloped by clouds of ashes.

The greatest part fell again into the gorge; the rest of the fragments, receiving a lateral inclination, and falling on the outside of the crater, made a marvelous rumbling noise. First of all the larger masses plumped against the side, and rebounded with a dull heavy sound; then the smaller came rattling down; and last of all, drizzled a shower of ashes. All this took place at regular intervals, which by slowly counting, we were able to measure pretty accurately.

Between the summit, however, and the cone the space is narrow enough; moreover, several stones fell around us, and made the circuit anything but agreeable. Tischbein now felt more disgusted than ever with Vesuvius, as the monster, not content with being hateful, showed an inclination to become mischievous also. As, however, the presence of danger generally exercises on man a kind of attraction, and calls forth a spirit of opposition in the human [Pg 28] breast to defy it, I bethought myself that, in the interval of the eruptions, it would be possible to climb up the cone to the crater, and to get back before it broke out again.

I held a council on this point with our guides under one of the overhanging rocks of the summit, where, encamped in safety, we refreshed ourselves with the provisions we had brought with us.

The younger guide was willing to run the risk with me; we stuffed our hats full of linen and silk handkerchiefs, and, staff in hand, we prepared to start, I holding on to his girdle. The little stones were yet rattling around us, and the ashes still drizzling, as the stalwart youth hurried forth with me across the hot glowing rubble. We soon stood on the brink of the vast chasm, the smoke of which, altho a gentle air was bearing it away from us, unfortunately veiled the interior of the crater, which smoked all round from a thousand crannies.

At intervals, however, we caught sight through the smoke of the cracked walls of the rock. The view was neither instructive nor delightful; but for the very reason that one saw nothing, one lingered in the hope of catching a glimpse of something more; and so we forgot our slow counting. We were standing on a narrow ridge of the vast abyss; of a sudden the thunder pealed aloud; we ducked our heads involuntarily, as if that would have rescued us from the precipitated masses. The smaller stones soon rattled, and without considering that we had again an interval of cessation before us, and only too much rejoiced to have outstood the danger, we rushed down and reached the foot of the hill together with the drizz [Pg 29] ling ashes, which pretty thickly covered our heads and shoulders The news [two weeks later] that an eruption of lava had just commenced, which, taking the direction of Ottajano, was invisible at Naples, tempted me to visit Vesuvius for the third time.

Scarcely had I jumped out of my cabriolet at the foot of the mountain, when immediately appeared the two guides who had accompanied us on our previous ascent. I had no wish to do without either, but took one out of gratitude and custom, the other for reliance on his judgment—and the two for the greater convenience. Having ascended the summit, the older guide remained with our cloaks and refreshment, while the younger followed me, and we boldly went straight toward a dense volume of smoke, which broke forth from the bottom of the funnel; then we quickly went downward by the side of it, till at last, under the clear heaven, we distinctly saw the lava emitted from the rolling clouds of smoke.

We may hear an object spoken of a thousand times, but its peculiar features will never be caught till we see it with our own eyes. The stream of lava was small, not broader perhaps than ten feet, but the way in which it flowed down a gentle and tolerably smooth plain was remarkable. As it flowed along, it cooled both on the sides and on the surface, so that it formed a sort of canal, the bed of which was continually raised in consequence of the molten mass congealing even beneath the fiery stream, which, with uniform action, precipitated right and left the scoria which were floating on its surface.

In this way a regular dam was at length thrown up, in which the glowing stream [Pg 30] flowed on as quietly as any mill-stream. We passed along the tolerably high dam, while the scoria rolled regularly off the sides at our feet. Some cracks in the canal afforded opportunity of looking at the living stream, from below, and as it rushed onward, we observed it from above. A very bright sun made the glowing lava look dull; but a moderate steam rose from it into the pure air.

I felt a great desire to go nearer to the point where it broke out from the mountain; there my guide averred, it at once formed vaults and roofs above itself, on which he had often stood. To see and experience this phenomenon, we again ascended the hill, in order to come from behind to this point.

Fortunately at this moment the place was cleared by a pretty strong wind, but not entirely, for all round it the smoke eddied from a thousand crannies; and now at last we stood on the top of the solid roof which looked like a hardened mass of twisted dough , but which, however, projected so far outward, that it was impossible to see the welling lava.

We ventured about twenty steps further, but the ground on which we stept became hotter and hotter, while around us rolled an oppressive steam, which obscured and hid the sun; the guide, who was a few steps in advance of me, presently turned back, and seizing hold of me, hurried out of this Stygian exhalation. After we had refreshed our eyes with the clear prospect, and washed our gums and throat with wine, we went round again to notice any other peculiarities which might characterize this peak of hell, thus rearing itself in the midst of a Paradise.

I again observed attentively some chasms, in ap [Pg 31] pearance like so many vulcanic forges, which emitted no smoke, but continually shot out a steam of hot glowing air.

They were all tapestried, as it were, with a kind of stalactite, which covered the funnel to the top, with its knobs and chintz-like variation of colors. In consequence of the irregularity of the forges, I found many specimens of this sublimation hanging within reach, so that, with our staves and a little contrivance, we were able to hack off a few, and to secure them. I saw in the shops of the dealers in lava similar specimens, labeled simply “Lava”; and I was delighted to have discovered that it was volcanic soot precipitated from the hot vapor, and distinctly exhibiting the sublimated mineral particles which it contained.

No matter that the snow and ice lie thick upon the summit of Vesuvius, or that we have been on foot all day at Pompeii, or that croakers maintain that strangers should not be on the mountain by night, in such unusual season. Let us take advantage of the fine weather; make the best of our way to Resina, the little village at the foot of the mountain; prepare ourselves, as well as we can, on so short a notice, at the guide’s house, ascend at once, and have sunset half-way up, moonlight at the top, and midnight to come down in!

At four o’clock in the afternoon, there is a ter [Pg 32] rible uproar in the little stable-yard of Signor Salvatore, the recognized head guide, with the gold band round his cap; and thirty under-guides who are all scuffling and screaming at once, are preparing half-a-dozen saddled ponies, three litters, and some stout staves, for the journey. Every one of the thirty quarrels with the other twenty-nine, and frightens the six ponies; and as much of the village as can possibly squeeze itself into the little stable-yard, participates in the tumult, and gets trodden on by the cattle.

After much violent skirmishing, and more noise than would suffice for the storming of Naples, the procession starts. The head guide, who is liberally paid for all the attendants, rides a little in advance of the party; the other thirty guides proceed on foot.

Eight go forward with the litters that are to be used by and by; and the remaining two-and-twenty beg. We ascend, gradually, by stony lanes like rough broad flights of stairs, for some time. At length, we leave these, and the vineyards on either side of them, and emerge upon a bleak, bare region where the lava lies confusedly, in enormous rusty masses; as if the earth had been plowed up by burning thunder-bolts.

And now, we halt to see the sunset. The change that falls upon the dreary region and on the whole mountain, as its red light fades, and the night comes on—and the unutterable solemnity and dreariness that reign around, who that has witnessed it, can ever forget!

It is dark, when after winding, for some time, over the broken ground, we arrive at the foot of the cone, which is extremely steep, and seems to rise, almost perpendicularly, from the spot where [Pg 33] we dismount. The only light is reflected from the snow, deep, hard, and white, with which the cone is covered. It is now intensely cold, and the air is piercing. The thirty-one have brought no torches, knowing that the moon will rise before we reach the top. Two of the litters are devoted to the two ladies; the third, to a rather heavy gentleman from Naples, whose hospitality and good-nature have attached him to the expedition, and determined him to assist in doing the honors of the mountain.

The rather heavy gentleman is carried by fifteen men; each of the ladies by half-a-dozen. We who walk, make the best use of our staves; and so the whole party begin to labor upward over the snow—as if they were toiling to the summit of an antediluvian Twelfth-cake. Pickle of Portici—suggests that, as it is freezing hard, and the usual footing of ashes is covered by the snow and ice, it will surely be difficult to descend.

But the sight of the litters above, tilting up, and down, and jerking from this side to that, as the bearers continually slip, and tumble, diverts our attention, more especially as the whole length of the rather heavy gentleman is, at that moment, presented to us alarmingly foreshortened, with his head downward.

The rising of the moon soon afterward, revives the flagging spirits of the bearers. Stimulating each other with their usual watchword, “Courage, friend! It is to eat maccaroni! From tingeing the top of the snow above us with a band of light, and pouring it in a stream through the valley below, while we have been ascending in the dark, the moon soon lights the whole white mountain side, and the broad sea down below, and tiny Naples in the distance, and every village in the country round.

The whole prospect is in this lovely state, when we come upon the platform on the mountain-top—the region of fire—an exhausted crater formed of great masses of gigantic cinders, like blocks of stone from some tremendous waterfall, burned up; from every chink and crevice of which, hot, sulfurous smoke is pouring out; while, from another conical-shaped hill, the present crater, rising abruptly from this platform at the end, great sheets of fire are streaming forth; reddening the night with flame, blackening it with smoke, and spotting it with red-hot stones and cinders, that fly up into the air like feathers, and fall down like lead.

What words can paint the gloom and grandeur of this scene! The broken ground; the smoke; the sense of suffocation from the sulfur; the fear of falling down through the crevices in the yawning ground; the stopping, every now and then, for somebody who is missing in the dark for the dense smoke now obscures the moon ; the intolerable noise of the thirty; and the hoarse roaring of the mountain; make it a scene of such confusion, at the same time, that we reel again.

But, dragging the ladies through it, and across another exhausted crater to the foot of the present volcano, we approach close to it on the windy side, and then sit down among the hot ashes at its foot, and look up [Pg 35] in silence; faintly estimating the action that is going on within, from its being full a hundred feet higher, at this minute, than it was six weeks ago.

Windows 10 1703 download iso italys blue grotto. SEEING EUROPE

Indian Ocean Ter. Mariana Is. Korea Dem. Minor Outlying Is. Virgin Is. Supported countries and subdivisions ThoughtSpot supports the following countries and their associated subdivisions:. Acton Park Tas. Alberton Vic. Apollo Bay Vic. Apsley Vic. Avoca Vic. Beaconsfield Vic. Beaufort River Beaumaris Tas. Beaumaris Vic. Bellfield Northern Grampians – Vic. Beulah Vic. Bridgewater Vic. Brighton Vic. Broadmeadows Vic. Brooklyn Vic.

Buckland Vic. Bungaree Vic. Bushy Park Vic. Carlton Vic. Christmas Hills Vic. Cremorne Vic. Cressy Vic. Derby Vic. Fairy Dell East Gippsland – Vic. Fingal Vic. Flowerdale Vic. Glengarry Vic.

Glenorchy Vic. Golden Point Mount Alexander – Vic. Gordon Vic. Guildford Vic. Hamilton Vic. Hastings Vic. Hillcrest Vic. Hillside Melton – Vic. Invermay Vic. Irishtown Vic. Jericho Vic. Killarney Qld Killarney Vic. Kimbolton Vic. Kingston Vic. Lillico Vic. Lilydale Vic.

Longford Vic. Macclesfield SA Macclesfield Vic. Mangalore Vic. Merrijig Mansfield – Vic. Molesworth Vic. Montrose Vic. Moonlight Flat Mount Alexander – Vic. Mornington Vic. Myall Gannawarra – Vic. Newstead Vic. Their great interest in the eyes of the student consists in their forming a link between the Eastern and Western worlds, and thus joining together two styles which we have hitherto been in the habit of considering as having no point of contact. The Greek iconoclastic feeling prevailed to such an extent in the south as entirely to prevent the introduction of the human form, either in bas-reliefs or in single figures ; but the architects indemnified themselves for this by the introduction of lions, elephants, and monsters of all sorts, to an extent foimd nowhere else, and by the lavish employment of sculptured foliage and richly carved frets and mouldings and a bold system of bracketing, which gave to the style as much richness as can be desired, often combined into great beauty of detail.

Sommer, of Naples, and Signer R. Moscioni, of Rome, for permission to use certain of their photographs for the illustration of this work. Frosinone Albergo Garibaldi , inhabitants. A beautifu place ft. It is two miles from the station on the Rome-Naples Une, and seven south of Feren tino. It looks over the vale of the Sacco and across to the Monti Lepini and the Hemican mountains. It belonged to the redoubtable Volsci, whom the Romans deprived here of a portion of their territory for inciting the Hemicans to rebel.

It became a miUtary colony, and suffered at the hands alternately of BeUsarius and Vitiges, but prospered in the Middle Ages until, in , the French sacked and burned it.

On the north side are to be seen remains of polygonal walls and the ancient acropolis. One tower of the mediaeval castle remains. From the highest point, called Civita, is obtained a superb panoramic view over the valleys of the Sacco and Cosa.

The Pozzo, says tradi- tion, was once a vast threshing-floor, on which the people im- piously threshed corn upon the fcsta of the Assumption, when the outraged Madonna caused it to sink into the earth, with all who were upon it, and it remains to this day a memorial of her wrath. Beyond Santulla the majestic character of the scenery increases. The path winds round a chaos of great rocks, and descends into a deep gorge, whence it mounts again to the final isolated plateau of Trisulti, close under the snows, and overlooking a splendid ravine.

The church, built in by Innccent HI. It is lined with precious marbles. In the sacristy is a good picture by the Cavalier e d’Arpino, and on either side of the church are two large pictures by the modern artist Balbi of Alatri, one representing Moses striking the rock, the other the same miracle as performed by S. Over the high altar is a fresco of the sending out the first Carthusian monks to colonise Trisulti. The terrace beyond the little garden, with its formal box-edges, leads to the spezerla, decorated by Balbi, where many herbal medicines, and excellent liqueurs and perfumes are made by the monks.

The country people come hither from a great distance to receive gratuitous medicine and advice, and in all respects the monks are considered the best friends and helpers of the poor of the neighbouring villages in sickness or trouble. May and June are good months for visiting it. A little path turning to the left outside the gateway of Trisulti gives the best view of the monastic buildings, and continues through the forest to the Gothic chapel and cell of S.

Attended by a troop of boys, we descend into the earth by a wide path Uke a hillside, and then ascend by a narrower rocky way through the darkness, lighted by glaring torches. Suddenly we find ourselves on the edge of a chasm, something Uke the Pozzo di Santulla, with a kind of rock-altar rising in the midst, blazing with fire, and throwing a ghastly glare on the wondering faces overlooking the edge of the abyss, and on the sides of the tremendous columns of stalactite which rise from the ground to the roof Uke a vast natural cathedral, and seem to faU again in showers of petrified fountains.

Casamari, almost washed by the Amaseno, which is crossed by a ferry iraghelto , now a Trappist abbey, was originally Bene- dictine, and in 1 1 5 1 Cistercian. It more resembles a fortress than a convent, and is a national monument Uke Monte Cassino. The foundation-stone of its Gothic church was laid in The entramce through a round-arched central portal, carried on six lateral shafts, leads into nave and aisles of six bays, with side altars.

The west front has a good rose-window between two lancets. At the fifth pair of piers a screen of wrought iron separates the monastic portions of the church from the lay. The floor is decorated with tiles bearing the Barberini bees. The soft cream-Uke tone of the travertine, with which it is built, is remarkably fresh. The choir contains a ” tribuna ” made after the manner of a small temple in the Corinihian style, and of fine marble. The transepts have eastern chapels.

The Cloister, surrounded by Lombard arcades carried on coupled columns of varjing design, is entered from the proces- sional door of the south aisle, and the usual Cistercian arrange- ment of the domestic buildings ensues.

The long row of store-sheds before the piazza of the monastery serves for shops during the fair held here on the feast of S. From Casamari can be reached Monte S. CinelU , inhabitants ; said to have originated in the refugees from Cereatae, and formerly a fief of the Marchese di Pescara. The Piazza, ” II Belvedere,” on tliree sides commands magnificent prospects.

To the north-west rises with two of its towers the Rocca Ducale. The chapel was formerly the prison, where S. Thomas Aquinas was confined by order of his mother and brothers in order to prevent his adopting the ecclesiastical career, and from it he escaped to Monte Cassino. Maria della Valle is said to be constructed after a design by Bramante. It contains a good wooden statue of the Virgin sixteenth century. Monte Pedicino can be visited in four hours.

Ceccano, ft. Locanda Anelli , inhabitants, on the side of a hill overlooking a deep glen and the valley of the Sacco. The upper town was girdled with walls by Pope Silverius. The newer town below is much resorted to by visitors in the hot season. Woollen and paper factories are the chief sources of in- dustry. On the left of the Sacco, two miles south of Ceccano, is the site of Fabrateria Vetus, a Volscian city made into a Roman colonia.

Paschal II. Here, fifty years later, Manfred was betrayed by his troops cf. Dante, Inferno, Cto. Near it, on high ground, was situated the Oscan Fregellae, destroyed b. It arose again under the name of Vic us Cipri. Fondi, on the Via Appia, may be reached from Terracina, or from Ceprano by a very beautiful mountain road descending near Lenola. It is a picturesque walled town in the province of Caserta, and but eleven miles from Terracina, overlooking the Lago di Fondi and the Gulf of Terracina.

Maxia contains a Cosmatesque pulpit and a Madonna by Silvestro dei Buoni, Her servants were mercilessly massacred, but she escaped in her night-dress from a window, and took refuge in the mountains. The Turks again sacked Fondi in The famous Caecuban vine Horace, Ode i. Sperlonga is a fishing village, finely situated on a head- land, and a resort of the ancient Romans.

Suetonius and Tacitus tell how Sejanus, the powerful, but iU-fated, Chancellor of Tiberius, saved his master’s life, when, at a banquet given in one of the decorated caves here, large stones fell from the vault and buried some of the suite as well as Sejanus, who hurled his body and arms over Tiberius, so as to shelter him.

The guard excavated both, and Tiberius journeyed on to Capua in order to dedicate a temple there. The Grotta di Tiberio is shown a kilometre beyond the village south.

Leaving Fondi by the Via Appia south-east the road mounts gradually amid beautiful wild scenen. Andrea, by a pass to Itri ft. The Inn of Terracina, has perpetuated the interest in him. The French pursued Pezza remorselessly, and having driven him to Sicily, and offered large rewards for his capture, he was discovered to them at Baronisi, near Palermo, in , and shot. In earlier days Alarco Sciarra, a robber baron, promised Tasso a safe conduct through the region.

Alter leaving Itri the road winds down to Formia, H. Formia is so exquisitely situated that Ischia and most of the promontories of the Bay of Naples can be surveyed from it.

The Villa Caposele a. His Queen, Maria of Bavaria, heroically held it for four months in until the Sardinian fleet, on February 23, received the surrender. Hither, in November , Pius IX. From the Piazza a path leads to the summit of the promontorj’, which is crowned by the Torre d’ Orlando, being actually the tomb of Lucius Munatius Plancus, the founder of Lugdunum Lyons in the reign of Augustus.

In the town surrendered to a Spanish fleet under Gonsalvo da Cordova, and in it held out for six months against Massena. The Duomo, S.

Erasmo, has a thirteenth-century tower, and behind its high altar is preserved a banner presented by Pius V. Peter and Paul. In front, rising from four lions, stands a sculptured Gothic column. The railway from Formia passes to Sparanise on the Naples- Rome route, near the coast. Minturno ft. The town occupied both banks of the river and was made a colonia by Cajsar. Here Gonsalvo da Cordova gained his final triumph over the French Decem- ber 27, Near S. Agata the road passes in sight of Sessa Aurunca ft.

In modem days the learned Cardinal Baronius i was born here. It gives a ducal title to the Buoncompagni family.

It is a prosperous place and admirably situated for excursions ; but it is more attractive for the costume and beauty of its women. Italian costume reaches its climax here ; and the festival of S. Restituta May 27 affords the best occasion for studying it. At Isola, ft. Albergo Meglio , on the road to Arpino, occur the beautiful Falls of the Liris. The cascade tumbles in a mass of water, encircled by smaller streams, from beneath an old castle, almost into the midst of the town.

The colour is glorious, and the iris more vivid than at Temi. Between it and Sora, on an island Insula Arpinas in the Fibreno, and close to its junction with the Liris, stands the convent of S.

This island belonged first to Cicero, and then to SiUus Italicus. Through the trees overhanging the waters are exquisite mountain-views ; and among the vegetation lie fragments and capitals of columns. The Roman bridge across the Liris, Ponte di Cicerone, remains. Arpino, ft. Albergo della Pace , the birthplace of Cicero, bears for its municipal banner the letters M. He constantly alludes to his native town and describes the people there as rustic and simple, and with all the virtues of rugged mountaineers.

It stands upon two hills ; one summit, the higher one, called Civita- Vecchia, occupies the ancient site of Volscian Arpinum, and retains its polygonal walls. The inscriptions let into the walls of various buildings tell of the ancient industry of woollen manu- facture and dyeing. Mercurius Lanarius had a temple here supposed to have occupied the site of the Church of Sta.

Maria di Civita. The ancient pavement hard by witnesses to the wheels of primitive waggons. The round towers along the walls are of the fifteenth century. The large square tower in the citadel was occupied by Ladislaus, King of Naples, on his way to Rome, Arce, below the old castle of Rocca d’Arce, commands wonderful views.

Elia, is never to be forgotten. The village of Rocca Secca, three miles from the line, is not inviting, and sits on its bare flank of mountain, with little visible means of subsistence.

Above it are the ruins of the castle in which Thomas Aquinas it is said by some saw the light. A few miles further we reach Aquino, ft. Strabo speaks of it as chief among the Volscian cities. Dolabella was put to death here. The town was de- stroyed by the Lombards, whereupon the inhabitants took refuge at Castro Cielo, on the top of the mountain. Thence after a tims they descended to Palazzuolo, where their descendants probably exist stiU.

The circuit of ancient Aquinum is now filled with vineyards and gardens, amid which gigantic fragments of ruin appear at intervals.

The desolate suburban Church of S. Maria Libera is approached by an immense flight of marble steps, once the approach to a temple. The walls are encrusted with fragments of ancient carving. Glorious friezes of acanthus in the highest relief surround the great door. A mosaic of the twelfth century represents the Virgin and Child, and below, on either side, is a sarcophagus, with a female head projecting from it, one in- scribed ” Ottolina,” the other ” Maria. Thomas Aquinas.

The interior of the church was curious, having six pillars on one side of the nave and only three on the other ; since ignorant mania for uniformity has destroyed its interest. Close to the church is a beautiful httle Triumphal Arch, with Corinthian columns. A mill-stream has been diverted through it, and it stands reflected in the clear water, which falls below it in a series of miniature cascades. Passing a succession of Roman fragments, we reach the ruined Church of S.

Tommaso, in which are several beautiful fragments of frieze from local temples. Lorenzo, a Roman gateway in perfect preservation, by which we enter the circuit of the ancient city, passing through the still existing hne of old walls.

Farther down the Via Latina is a succession of buildings in ruins — a theatre ; some colossal blocks, shown as having belonged to a temple of Diana, and now called S. Maria Madda- lena ; and a huge mass of wall, beheved to have belonged to a temple of Ceres, afterwards converted into the beisihca of S. Pietro Vetere. AH the ruins are embedded in vineyards and gardens. Returning through the Arco S. Lorenzo, and follow- ing the little stream in the valley, we find a strange old church supported upon open arches, through which there occur most picturesque views of the present town, scrambling along the edge of tufa rocks, crested and overhung by fig-trees.

Domenico at Naples. His mother, the Countess Teodora, tried to prevent his taking the final vows, and he fled from her toward Paris. Here his mother met him, and finding her entreaties vain, shut him up, and allowed him to see no one but his two sisters, whose exhortations she hoped would bend him to her will. On the contrary, he converted his sisters, and, after two years’ imprisonment, one of them let him down from a window, and he was received by some Dominicans, and pro- nounced the final vows.

Gradually S. Thomas became the greatest theological teacher and writer of his time. When he refused a bishopric, the Pope made him always attend his person, and thus his lectures were given in the different towns of papal residence — Rome, Viterbo, Orvieto, Fondi, and Perugia. The crowning work of S. Thomas was the Summa Theologia — the science of the Christian religion ; but to ordinary readers he is perhaps less known by his theology than by his hymns, of which ” Pange Lingua” and ” Tantum Ergo ” are the most celebrated.

The views are indescribably beautiful, and small oratories here and there by the wayside offer shelter from wind and sun, and commemorate the Benedictine story.

First we have that of S. Placidus, the favourite disciple of the patriarch ; then that of S. Scholastica, his beloved sister ; then a triple-chapel, where one of the Benedictine miracles occurred. Beyond these, a cross marks the final meeting-place of Benedict and Scholastica. It is not known that the twin sister of S. At her last interview with her brother on this spot, after they had passed the day together in rehgious exercises, Scholastica implored Benedict to remain with her till the morning, that they might praise God through the night, but the saint refused, saying that it was impossible for him to be absent from his convent.

As we draw nearer the convent, ft. In front of it a grating covers the mark of a knee which is said to have been left in the rock by S. Benedict when he knelt there to ask a blessing before laying the foundation- stone of his convent. Benedict came hither from Subiaco, when he had already been thirty-six years a monk, led through the windings of the Apennines, says the tradition, alternately by two angels and two ravens, until he reached this spur of the mountain above Casinum, which had then already been ruined by Genseric.

Ed io son quel che su vi portai prima Lo nome di colui clie’n terra addusse La verita, che tanto ci sublima ; E tanta grazia sovra me rilusse, Ch’io ritrassi le ville circostanti Dall’ empio culto che’l mondo sedusse. We enter the abbey by a great gate guarded by two lions, and ascend a low vaulted staircase, the only portion of the building ascribed to the time of Benedict.

On the right a lamp burns before an old marble statue of the founder ; at the top Benedict and Scholastica kneel before the Virgin and Child. Here the peasants of the neighbourhood in their wonderful costumes — some almost Egyptian -looking — assemble to receive the dole of the convent, or bring up provisions. We are shown into a large bare chamber by a lay-brother who then goes to signify our arrival to the Prior. The latter presently advances to receive us, and in excellent English demands how long our stay will be : ” Is it for three days, three months, or three years?

It is in- scribed : Fornicem saxis asperum ac depressum tantae moll’s aditum angustum ne mireris, hospes, angusiitm fecit patriarchae sanctiias : venerare potius et sospes ingredere. Above the gate is a square tower modernised externally , of which the lower portion at least is ancient. It contains two chambers inscribed : Pars inferior tiirris, in qua S.

Benedichis dum viverct habitabat ; and, V etustissimtim habitaculum in quo SStni patri- archae discipuli quiescebant. This then occupies the position of the cell where S. Lex tunc exiNit, mentes quae ducit ab imis, Et vulgata dedit lumen par climata saecli. The room in the upper part of the tower is shown as that in which Benedict saw in a vision the death of the bishop S.

Ger- mano. Here also, only trwo days after his last and miraculously prolonged interview with her, he saw the soul of his sister Scho- lastica ascending as a dove to heaven, and becoming thus aware of her death and translation ” was filled with joy, and his grati- tude flowed forth in hymns and praises to God. The brother only survived the sister for forty days, days spent in the most austere observance of his own monastic rule.

Feeling his end approaching, he bade the monks to carry him to the oratory of S. John Baptist, where he caused the tomb of his sister to be opened. Resting by its side, at the foot of the adtar, he received the viaticum, and then, extending his hands to heaven, he died in the arms of his companions, March 21, , at the very hour which, according to the legend, he had foretold.

Near the entrance of the church are the parents of Benedict, of Placidus, and of Maurus. The Uving raven which hops about here, and which is quite a feature of the monastery, commemorates the birds which miraculously guided the patriarch hither from Subiaco. Ttie rich deep voices of the monks rose softly in vespers, and the olive-trees seemed to quiver with the blending harmonies.

What a vision of loveliness was there! The silvery world was now still, as in a heavenly trance. The nearly full moon was enthroned above the mountains, that dreamed like enchanted giants. Far down in the vale the rapid rivers were screened with spellbound vapours.

The existing church was built after in the form of a Latin cross. It is of the most extreme magnificence — and rivals S. Martino at Naples in the richness and ostentation of its marbles. The doors have plates of the original bronze gates of the church of Desiderius, inlaid with silver letters containing a list of all the possessions of the abbey in , when they were made at Constantinople. The roof of the nave is painted by Luca Giordano, and by the same painter is a great fresco over the doors, depicting the consecration of the first basilica by Alexander II.

The stalls of the choir are splendid specimens of Renaissance carving : in the centre of each is a Benedictine saint. Here hang four pictures by Solimcna. In the left transept is the tomb of Pietro de’ Medici, who was drowned in the Garigliano, December 27, , by the overcrowding and sinking of a boat, in which he was taking flight after the defeat of the French by Gonsalvo da Cordova.

The bas-reliefs are by Sangallo. In the opposite transept is the tomb of Guidone Fieramosca, last Prince of Mignano. In the side chapels are several works of Marco Mazzaroppi, the best representing S. Gregory the Great, and the Martyrdom of S. Beneath the high altar, and surrounded by a chain of lamps, repose Benedict and Scholastica, with these words only over their grave, ” Benedictum et Scholasticam, Uno in terris partu editos, Una in Deuin pictate coelo redditos, Unus hie excipit tumulus Mortalis deposit!

In the sacristy a number of magnificent old copes are preserved. Here are a curious old brazier and a stone lavatory. The services are four daily. The refectory contains an immense picture by Francesco and Leandro Bassano. In the upper part, Christ is represented performing the Miracle of the Loaves and Fishes; in the lower, S. Benedict is distributing the symbolical bread of the Benedictine rule. The Library, built in the sixteenth century, by the Abbot Squarcialupi, contains about 20, volumes.

Its origin mounts up to the foundation of the abbey, for S. Benedict mentions it in one of the rules of his Order. Eight hundred original diplomas remain, containing the charters and privileges accorded to the abbey by popes, emperors, and kings.

The collection of Lombard charters deserves especial notice on account of the miniatures placed at the head of each, a contemporary portrait-gallery rudely executed, but at least interesting, as displaying the costume of the time. The earUest charter, bearing date , is of a Prince of Beneventum, and begins — ” Ajo Dei providentia Lx ngobardorum gentis princeps.

Amongst the MSS. Most of the pictures at Mont Cassino were stolen to form the gallery at Naples. A few sketches, by old masters, which remain, are collected in the cell of S.

It requires more than a passing visit to Monte Cassiuo in order reaUy to appreciate it. The views are such as grow upon one daily, and are full of interest. The highest peak is Monte Cairo, near the foot of which is the patriarchal fortress of the family of S. Through the valley winds the Garigiiano. In the plain between it and the sea the great battle was gained by Gonsalvo da Cordova, from Pietro de’ Medici, who was drowned in crossing the GarigUano, and to whom his uncle, Clement VII.

Between the mountains the Mediterranean may be descried, gUttering in the Bay of Gaeta. The services which Jlonte Cassino has rendered to Uterature have exempted it from the entire confiscation which has fallen upon other religious houses in Southern Italy since its incorpora- tion in the kingdom.

But the monks have a bare subsistence allowed them, and times are indeed changed since the Abbot of Monte Cassino, ” Abbas Abbatum,” was the first baron of the kingdom of Naples, administrator of a diocese created composed of 37 parishes ; while amongst the dependencies of the abbey were 4 bishoprics, 2 principahties, 20 countships, castles, towns and villages, manors, 23 seaports, 33 islands, mills, tracts of land, and churches.

Its revenues at the end of the sixteenth century were valued at , ducats. The abbot is bishop during his spiritual rule, which is hmited to six years, after which he becomes a simple monk again, only retaining the right of wearing the abbatial cross, and of precedence in rehgious ceremonies. The town, several miles to the right, at the foot of Rocca Monfina, ft. It has stabling for a hundred horses. In the cloister of a suppressed convent is the efhgy of Marino Marziano, Duke of Sessa, who married a sister of Ferdinand I.

He was seized and im- prisoned in the dungeons of the Castel Nuovo at Naples, where he died, some say was strangled. The mineral springs of Teano had a very early celebrity and are mentioned by Pliny. The chalybeate spring, called Acqua delle Canterelle, is the source of the Savone, stigmatised by Statius as ” piger,” or lazy. There is an exquisitely beautiful view toward the sea and islands from the neighbourhood of Teano.

Sparanise miles from Rome. Hence there is the line toGaeta. The cathedral is dedicated to its first bishop, S. Traversing the plain of the Volturno, and crossing the river, we reach — Capua Inn, Lo:anda della Posta , a walled city 15, inhabi- tants , founded , by Count Lando and his brothers, on the site of the ancient Casilinum, which so stoutly resisted Hannibal. The Duomo is approached by a quadrangular court surrounded by twenty ancient columns.

The interior eleventh century is a three-aisled basilica. Its twenty-four granite columns have newly gilt capitals. The black marble font is supported on lions.

At the third altar on the right is a Madonna, between SS. Stephen and Lucy, of , by Antoniazzo. The Norman crjrpt has twenty-two ancient columns, and contains a sarcophagus with a relief of the Hunt of Meleager, and a Holy Sepulchre by Botti- glieri.

Until recent times the Archbishop of Capua was one of the greatest ecclesiastical dignitaries in Italy. In the Piazza de’ Giudici is the modern Arch of S. Eligio, and many inscriptions. In front of the Church of S. Eligio are two ancient columns. The Torre Mignana still exists, to which the women fled when male inhabitants of Capua were massacred during the sack of the town by Caesar Borgia in The Cappella de’ Morti, outside the town, is the place where mass was said for their souls.

The Museo Campano contains many objects of interest, especially statues in tufo. There are also some portrait-corbels from the Castello of Frederick II. Maxia di Capua or S. Five years later it was taken by the Romans, who degraded it to the position of a third-rate provincial town ; but it rose again to prosperity under the Caesars, and continued to flourish till the invasion of Genseric, from which time it fell into ruin, being totally destroyed by the Saracens in a.

Of late years S. Maria has had a revival, chiefly owing to a small trade in leather. The magnificent ruins of the Amphitheatre on the road to modern Capua, carriage thither i lira : entrance 50 c. The measurements, by ft. It was from the gladiatorial schools of Capua that Spartacus broke out with seventy companions in 73 B. Not far distant are the remains of a Triumphal Arch, crossing the road.

The Mens Tifata ft. Maria, turning right beyond the amphitheatre , is S. Angelo in Formis , a very interesting church, which is mentioned in records of the tenth, and is adorned with remarkable Byzantinesque frescoes of the eleventh century, illustrating entire sacred history.

In the apse is seen the enthroned Saviour. The name in Formis is derived from the remains of an ancient aqueduct in the neighbour- hood. The railway proceeds through the richly planted Terra di Lavoro, level, and intersected with lines of poplars, with vines festooning from tree to tree, to — Caserta 19, inhabitants , ft.

In its vastness and desolation it recalls the Escurial. It was considered by Valery and others to be the noblest con- ception of a palace in Europe. It forms a rectangle. Its fa9ade is ft. It depends on no accessories, nor tricks of the picturesque ; it challenges inspection near or remote ; it demands an immense plain and solitude. To visit the interior a permesso obtained either here, or at the Palazzo Reale at Naples is demanded custode i lira, sacristan of chapel 25 c.

The apartments have the usual mixture of splendour and gloom, which is the characteristic of great palaces, but here the gloom predominates, and the sove- reigns seem to have thought so, for they have scarcely ever inhabited Caserta. The columns of the theatre were plundered rom the temple of Serapis at Pozzuoli. The chapel contains a Presentation in the Temple by Mengs.

The stairs are formed of single blocks of the marble of Trapani, in Sicily, called LumacheUa, and at each landing are lions exquisitely sculptured, with numerous statues of allegorical figures. The sides are of the finest marbles, among which you see the choicest breccias of Dragoni, and the marbles of Vitulano in Principato Ulteriore. There are twenty-four Ionic pillars adorning the centre of the vestibule made of the red breccia of Mous Garganus in Apulia, and sixteen of the portico are of the yellow breccia of the same mountain.

The Gardens open to the public till Ave Maria , which trench upon the mountains, are of three kinds ; the Italian garden with its waterfalls and mythological statues ; the wood of the ancient Dukes of Caserta, which formed the feudal park ; and the English garden of Queen Caroline, with its greenhouses, cedars, tulip-trees, and magnolias.

The magnificent waterworks are supplied by a winding aqueduct twenty-one miles in length called Ponte Maddaloni, which brings the water from the foot of Monte Taburno, near Airola. Chacun d’eux des lors qu’il fut parfait, sentait deja son antique quant a la beaute.

In the basins are kept gigantic bull-trout. The largest of the springs which supply the aqueduct is called Fizzo, the more abundant Fontana della Duca. Above Caserta is the little Palace of S. Leucio or Belvidere, with a pretty park, and an ilex forest full of game is beyond it.

It is worth while to make an excursion from Caserta into the beautiful district of the Matese. The road crosses the Volturno to Cajazzo 8 miles , a considerable town with a large castle of the Florentine Corsi, which perhaps occupies the site of Calatia.

A tomb near the high-road is shown as that of A. Attilius Calatinus, a general distinguished in the First Punic War, whose epitaph is given by Cicero. The road again crosses the Volturno before reaching 11 miles Alife, on the site of AUifae of the Samnites, of which there are considerable remains.

The walls AVERSA 19 form a rectangular parallelogram with gates in tlie centre of each side protected by bastions, and the lower portions of the walls are ancient. Two miles farther is Piedimonte, in a pictur- esque situation at the foot of the Matese, with a fine castle of the Dukes of Lorenzano.

In the neighbouring Val d ‘Inferno is the source of the Torano beneath a low natural arch. Piedi- monte is the best point for the ascent of the Matese, of which the highest peak, Monte Mileto is ft. In the plain at the summit is a lake, said to be fathomless in the centre. Maddaloni 20, inhabitants is a clean town with balustrades and orange groves, and the ruins of three feudal castles on the hill above it.

The brother of a Caraffa Duke of Maddaloni fell a victim during the Masaniello Revolution, and his carriage was used by Masaniello’s wife and mother when they paid their first visit of ceremony to the vice-queen.

The palace of dukes is now a college. Maddaloni is the best point from whence to make an excursion in search of the disputed site of the Caudine Forks Furculae Caudinae , which some place between S. Agata dei Goti cind Airola, a narrow tract watered by the brook Isclero, which fadls into the Voltumo a romantic little valley quite incapable of containing the 30, men of the Roman army ; and for which others indicate a vaUey three miles wide, which is entered close to Arienzo.

Here, when the Roman army, on its march from Calatia to Luceria, had entered, it is said that they found the passage of exit filled up by stones and trunks of trees. Return- ing, they found their retreat blockaded in the same way, and, after being pent up for two days, were obhged to submit to the conditions of the Samnites, and stripped, scourged, and insulted, were let out one by one, being made to pass under a yoke to mark their disgrace.

Cancello mUes , at the foot of a castle-crowned hill, whence the line to Xola diverges on the left, and another is being made to Benevento. Purple-grey Vesuvius is seen on the left before reaching Naples. Aversa, 23, inhabitants Albergo dell’ Aurora can be best reached from Naples by electric tramway. It was the earliest settlement made by the Normans in Italy Here, while spending the hot months out of Naples at a royal castle, Andrew, the wretched Hungarian husband of Queen Joan I.

Prince Louis of Taranto. The object of the King of Hungary was to punish Naples for the murder : but he was unable to produce proofs of the queen’s alleged complicity.

All was com- phcated by the fact that the kingdom of Naples was then a vassal to the Holy See, which favoured the anti-Hungarian circle at Naples. Here, also, in January , King Louis of Hungary arraigned and executed Duke Charles of Durazzo, his cousin, and Joan’s brother-in-law, on the same spot where Andrew had been murdered.

The execution, however, was universally condemned, and it is believed that the duke was not a party to the murder. He had no trial. Parker’s, good in all resjjects. Pension Britannique, in the same situation, inferior, but convenient for solitary persons spending some time at Naples. Edeti Hotel, with garden. Hotel Washington, good, and esteemed healthy, but lackinj; outlook.

Hotels d’Amerique, De la Ville, on the Chiaja, clean and comfortable. Hotel de Londres, Piazza del Municipio. In all these hotels rooms free from smells and with a free circulation of air before the windows should be chosen back rooms should be avoided. Persons especially liable to fever should visit the sights of the town from the Hotel Quisisana at Castellamare, or the Hotel d’Angleterre near Pozzuoli, unless they can obtain good sunny, airy rooms at Naples in a healthy situation.

Lodgings may easily be found in Rione Principe Amadeo with good views : lire monthly. Carriages in the town. With two horses, the course i Ura 20 c, night i lira 50 c. These prices hold good to and from the railway station, or for any distance within the barriers ; each box is 30 c. The porters at the railway station may charge 25 c. Carriages to the Neighbourhood.

Cook and Son, 52 Piazza dei Martin. Steamship Offices. Cycles and Motor-cars are to be hired at Casati and Co. Symons, Riviera di Chiaja. Atkinson, 61 Via Medina ; Dr. Kessel, 19 Piazza dci Martiri. Sea baths at Bagnoli and Temie. Bnglish Church. Presbyterian, 2 Via Cappella Vecchia. American Consulate. Byington, 4 Piazza Municipio first floor. British Consulate. Turner, 64 Strada S.

Museo Nazionale, open from 9 to 4, entrance i lira ; free on Sundays and Thurs- days from 9 to Direttore degli Scavi del Regno, at the museum, must be asked for a ticket to draw at Pompeii. The Churches are almost aU closed after midday, except the cathedral, and before that time are often inconveniently crowded for sightseeing. They are oppressive from the scarcity of ventilation and the fumes of incense, which, however, is most desirable in this country, being in itself a relic of paganism.

An Artist will seek his work rather at Baiae and Cumae or on the islands than at Naples. But the lover of architectural subjects may find them in S. Giovanni a Carbonara, the ambulatory of S. Lorenzo, and the cloisters of Monte Oliveto. Naples N. But Athenian colonists came later and built a city close by toward the Sebeto, which they called Neapolis, after which the western and older part of the town was known as Palaeopolis, until B.

As a Roman municipal town, Neapolis continued to flourish, retaining, however, its Greek culture and institutions. Under the empire, the beauty and salubrity of the neighbour- hood made it the favourite summer resort of the Roman aristo- cracy, and it formed a perpetual theme of the Latin poets.

After suffering sieges from Belisarius and Totila, Naples became a dependency of the Exarchate of Ravenna, under a duke ap- pointed by the Eastern Emperors, but, at length, throwing off their yoke, it established a republican government which lasted for years under the nominal sovereignty of a duke. Roger de Hauteville taking it in 1 , founded the kingdom of Naples. Its walls may in part be traced built up amongst the modem houses of the most crowded part of the town, also its four gates — Porta Nolana, Porta Capuana, Porta S.

Gennaro, and Porta S. Maria di Con- stantinopoli. In Alfonso V. In Philip V. In the kingdom was in- vaded by an army sent by Napoleon, who established the short- lived reigns of Joseph Bonaparte, soon transferred to Spain, and of Joachim Murat, who was driven out in 18 15 by the Austrians. The Bourbon rule was restored in the person of Ferdinand I. Naples has always been fond of change : there is an Italian book which gives the history of the twenty-seventh revolt Mas- aniello’s of ” the very faithful town of Naples.

Almost everybody in Naples cheats, but cheats in as lively and pleasant a manner as is compatible with possibilities. Nearly all the officials peculate, and perhaps not more than two-thirds of the taxes ever reach the public exchequer. If the traveller is robbed, he wUl never secure redress, for, as in Ireland, it would be impossible to obtain witnesses, or to find a jury sufficiently fearless to convict.

The Neapolitan nobility are somewhat numerous, but few are of earlier date than that of Murat : the families of Pignatelli, Filangieri, StigUano, San Severino, Caraffa, Del Balzo, and Caracciolo, are, of course, exceptions.

Certain Neapolitan nobles are also Roman princes and grandees of Spain, but few others, except the Caraccioli, have much left except their titles ; the extinction of primogeniture has, for the most part, robbed them of their palaces and fortunes. They almost all gamble — in the public lottery, if nowhere else.

Scarcely any of the young men have professions ; they spend their nights in dancing or cards, get up at midday, and perhaps take a turn in the Villa Nazionale in the afternoon. As it is the universal custom amongst the lower orders to marry at seventeen, and Neapolitan women are proverbially prolific, the tall, narrow houses in the back streets swarm with children, and are like rabbit-warrens ; whole families live huddled together, but not without cleanliness or decency, though the air sometimes resounds at once with blows and cries, singing and laughter.

Since the enormous increase of taxation, poverty has been more felt, though the town has suffered less than the country.

Formerly also, though want often existed, starvation was unknown, as every thoroughly needy person could obtain help at the convents. Little, however, is needed to sustain life at Naples, and there are thousands who consider a dish of beans at midday to be sumptuous fare, while the horrible condiment called pizza made of dough baked with garlic, rancid bacon, and strong cheese is esteemed a feast. The English are apt to talk a great deal about the idleness of Neapolitans, either from legends which they have heard of the Lazzaroni, or because they are only acquainted with the natives as they are seen in the English quarter.

But no European town presents a busier or more industrious aspect than Neapolitan Naples, and if the country people are not at work it is because they have nothing to do, for the land is so rich that for the greater part of the year it takes care of itself. Every one in the town who is not working, and as many as possible of those who are, spend the day in the open air, encumbering the narrow streets with their chairs, lathes, or carpenters’ tables, or cobblers’ stalls.

Windows 10 1703 download iso italys blue grotto

Havana loca download, Dl concepts shoes, 10abvus psref, Ankhe to kholo swami Misery imdb trivia, Update windows 10 home to pro, Sasanki ciastka cena. Spring valley apartments pa, Sukumarudu songs free download, Iso oil? The wubbulous world of dr. seuss, Hera mythology, Tw windows

Full text of “Cities of Southern Italy”

Looking for:

Windows Version ISO – Microsoft Community.Geo map reference | ThoughtSpot Documentation

Windows 10 1703 download iso italys blue grotto. SEEING EUROPE

Windows 10 1703 download iso italys blue grotto

Similar Posts

Template PPT Keren + Link Downloadnya (Gratis) – Pinhome.�� + FREE Creative PowerPoint Templates to Download【 Best PPT Presentation 】

Free ms powerpoint exe download (Windows)

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

About | U T

” Link House “

Contact US