sed in force, and before morning Pompeii and some
smaller towns were also buried under the glowing rivers of volcanic
rocks, ashes and mud.

The remarkable history of this place absorbed my mind as I passed
through the two thousand years-old streets of Pompeii, which, in the
course of this century have again been brought to light by the removal
of the petrified ashes and other volcanic matter. The ancient city now
looks a good deal as it did eighteen hundred years ago. It is situated
on a round knoll, and measures three miles in circumference. The houses
are built of stone, and only one story high, with roofs of brick and
floors of cut stone, just as the modern houses in that vicinity are
built to-day. Every house has an open court in the center, and all
aisles and doors lead to this. Glass windows were not used, but the
rooms received light from the open court, which could be covered by
canvass as a protection against the sun and rain. I measured the
streets. They proved to be twelve feet wide, with a four-foot-wide
sidewalk on either side. The paving consisted of boulders, with a flat
surface about twenty inches in diameter, and contained deep grooves made
by the chariot wheels. The houses were standing in their original
condition, with fresco paintings on the walls and statues in their
proper niches. The temples with their sacrificial altars, the theatres,
the court, the council-house, and all other public buildings were
adorned with marble pillars and choice works of sculpture. I saw a
barber-shop with chairs, niches for the soap and mugs, and the waiting
sofa. In a baker's house I saw the oven, the dough-trough, scales, and
petrified loaves of bread. In a butcher shop were a saw, a knife, and
other tools. There were also furniture, vessels for cooking, bowls,
grain, pieces of rope, and plaster of Paris casts of the human bodies
which had been found, generally prostrate, with the face pressed against
the ground. There lies a cast of a man with a pleasant smile on his
lips; he must have passed unconsciously from sleep to death. But it is
fruitless to try and describe this remarkable place which has no
parallel on the face of the earth. I heard the Swedish language spoken
in this city of the dead, and had the pleasure of making the
acquaintance of Alderman Toernquist and wife, from Wimmerby, and a Doctor
Viden and his daughter, from Hernoesand. Thus the living meet among the
dead, representatives of the new times stan