f, she said, her
age and corpulence rendered all attempts of that sort impossible.
However, she would willingly meet death if she could have the
satisfaction of seeing that she was not the occasion of mine. But I
absolutely refused to leave her, and, taking her by the hand, I led her
on; she complied with great reluctance, and not without many reproaches
to herself for retarding my flight.

"The ashes now began to fall on us, though in no great quantity. I
turned my head, and observed behind us a thick smoke, which came rolling
after us like a torrent. I proposed, while we yet had any light, to turn
out of the high-road, lest she should be pressed to death in the dark by
the crowd that followed us. We had scarce stepped out of the path when
darkness overspread us, not like that of a cloudy night or when there is
no moon, but of a room when it is shut up and all the lights extinct.
Nothing then was to be heard but the shrieks of women, the screams of
children, and the cries of men; some calling for their children, others
for their parents, others for their husbands, and only distinguishing
each other by their voices; one lamenting his own fate, another that of
his family; some wishing to die from the very fear of dying; some
lifting their hands to the gods; but the greater part imagining that the
last and eternal night was come, which was to destroy the gods and the
world together.

"Among these were some who augmented the real terrors by imaginary ones,
and made the frightened multitude falsely believe that Misenum was in
flames. At length a glimmering light appeared, which we imagined to be
rather the forerunner of an approaching burst of flames, as in truth it
was, than the return of day. However, the fire fell at a distance from
us; then again we were immersed in thick darkness, and a heavy shower of
ashes rained upon us, which we were obliged every now and then to shake
off, otherwise we should have been crushed and buried in the heap. I
might boast that during all this scene of horror not a sigh or
expression of fear escaped from me, had not my support been found in
that miserable, though strong, consolation, that all mankind were
involved in the same calamity, and that I imagined I was perishing with
the world itself.

"At last this dreadful darkness was dissipated by degrees, like a cloud
of smoke; the real day returned, and even the sun appeared, though very
faintly, and as when an eclipse is coming on. Every