he city in the sea.

The believers in astrology will find their faith re-enforced by the fact
that a bishop, who was also an astrologist, had read in the stars that
in December of 1343 a terrible disaster would occur on the Naples coast.
It arrived on schedule time. Petrarca, writing of it to Giovanni
Colonna, states that in consequence of the prediction of the bishop, the
people were in a condition of wild terror, endeavoring to repent of
their sins and aspiring to a purer moral life. In this tide of religious
emotion, ordinary occupations were neglected. On the very day of the
calamity people were crowding the churches and kneeling in prayer. At
night, after the people were in bed, the shock came. The sunset had been
fair, the evening quiet, and the people were reassured. But they were
awakened from sleep by the violence of falling walls and the terror of
the tempest. Petrarcha was lodging in a convent, and he heard the monks
calling to one another as they rushed from cell to cell. They hastily
gathered crosses and sacred relics in their hands, and, preceded by the
prior, sought the chapel, where they passed the night in prayer while
the tempest raged outside. The sea broke against the rocks with a fury
that seemed to tear the very foundations of the earth. The thunder
pealed, and mingled with it were the shrieks of the frightened
populace. The rain fell in torrents, deluging the city as if the sea
itself were pouring on it. When the morning came the darkness still
continued. In the harbor broken ships crashed helplessly together. The
sands were strewn with mutilated dead bodies. Between Capri and the
shore the sea ran mountains high. Amalfi was completely destroyed, and
has never regained her prestige.

The cathedral at Ravello has traces of the rich art it once enshrined,
and the rose gardens of the Palazzo Rufolo might enchant Hafiz himself.
The terrace on the very crest of the mountain commands one of the
wonderful views of the world. The cloistered colonnades of this old
Saracenic palace reveal views even to the plains of Paestum. There are
rare mosaics and fragments of bronzes and marbles yet remaining.

The noble Greek ruins at Paestum--the three temples--stand in all the
majesty of utter desolation. They are overgrown with flowers, however,
and they stand "dewy in the light of the rising dawn-star."

"The shrine is ruined now, and far away
To east and west stretch olive groves, whose shade,
Eve