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Show 354 OBJECTS PRESERVED IN - filled up with rubbish as the workmen proceeded, owing to the difficulty of removing it from so great a depth below ground. Even the theatre is only seen by torch-light, and the most interesting information, perhaps, which the geologist obtains there, is the continual formation of stalactite in the galleries cut through the tuff; for there is a constant percolation of water charged with carbonate of lime mixed with a small portion of magnesia. Such mineral waters must, in the course of time, create great changes in many rocks : and we cannot but perceive the unreasonableness of the expectations of ~orne geologists, that volcanic rocks of remote eras should accord precisely with those of modern date; since it is obvious that many of those produced in our own time will not long retain the same aspect and composition. Both at Herculaneum and Pompeii, temples have been found with inscriptions commemorating their having been rebuilt after they were thrown down by an earthquake*. This earthquake happened in the reign of Nero, sixteen years before the inhumation of the cities. In Pompeii, one-fourth of which is now laid open to the day, both the public and private buildings bear testimony to the catastrophe. The walls are rent, and in many places traversed by fissures still open. Columns are lying on the ground only half hewn from huge blocks of travertin, and the temple for which they were designed is seen half repair~d. In some few places the pavement had sunk in, but in general it was undisturbed, consisting of great flags of lava, in which two immense ruts have been worn by the constant passage of carriages through the narrow street. When the hardness of the stone is considered, the continuity of these ruts from one end of the town to the other is not a little remarkable, for there is nothing of the kind in the oldest pavements of modern cities. A very small number of skeletons have been dis~overe.d in either city ; and it is clear that the great mass of mha?ltants not only found time to escape, but also to carry w1th them the principal part of their valuable effects. In .the barracks at Pompeii were the skeletons of two sold1ers chained to the stocks, and in the vaults of a country-house * Swinburne and Lalande-Paderni, Phil. Trans., 1758, vol. 50, P• 619. ' . ' HERCULANEUM AND POMPEII. "355 . in the suburbs, were the skele appear to have fled tll . t tons of seventeen persons who They were found incel tc d o. escape . ft·o m t 11 e sh ower of ashes. . ose m an md l t d LJ' • m.a trix was preserved a p er1~e ct cast ofu a c tun' and m this mistress of the house with . i' • a woman, perhaps the h i' ' an ID1ant m her a AI h er lOrm was imprinted h rms. t ough remained. 'J:'o these a cl ~n t f e rl~k, nothing but the bones with jewels were on the ~am o g~ was suspended, and rings sides of the same vault ngers o the skeleton. Against the amphora>. was ranged a I ong Im' e of earthen The writings scribbled b th ld' barracks, and the names ofyth e so Iers on the walls of their e owners of each h · over the doors are still f, 1 . ouse written fresco paintings' on the stu!c~:;ct yllle~Iblr . Th.e colours of ings are almost as vivid as if ;:e s m t le. mterlO~ of buildthese artificial colours, therefore y were J~S~ fimshed. If ful that those of shells sho ld h' have st?od, It Is not wonder-hi . u ave remamed unfad d Th ~re pu IC fountains decorated with sh II 1 'd e. • ere m the same fashion as those n .e s al out m patterns and in the room of a pai'nt owh seen m the town of Naples; I er w o was perh I' arge collection of shells was found . ~ps a natura Ist, a of Mediterranean s ecies in , comprismg a great variety they had remained ~or th' as good ab state of preservation as if e same num er of · A comparison of these remains with t years m a museum. a fossil state would not assist u . ~o~e found so generally in the time required to P. d s m ob~ammg the least insight into • I o uce a certam degre f d . . or mineralization; for althou h und f. eo .ecompositlon much greater alteration mi~h~ d e~t;vou~able Circumstances, about in a shorter eriod ou ess ave been brought an inhumation ofp t' yet the ex~mple before us shows that seven een cen tunes · nothing towards th d . may sometimes effect to the state in whic~ r; u~ltlon of shells and several ot~er bodies Th ossi s are usually found e wooden beams in th 1 . ?n the exterior, but when c~e;touses at Herculaneum are black Ill the state of ordina d op~n they appear to be almost whole mass towards , ry woo 'a~ ~he .progress made by the Some animal and the state of hgmte IS scarcely appreciable. have of course su;;~~table ~ub~tances of more perishable kinds of conservation of th m~c c alnge and decay' yet the state ese IS tru y rema k bl F' . are very abundant in b th . . f r .a e. . Ishmg-nets o Cltles, o ten quite entire ; and their 2A2 |