came unendurable.
They mounted their horses, and descended to the port--to see and
perish. A fearful spectacle awaited them. The ships in the harbour
had broken their moorings, and were crashing helplessly together.
The strand was strewn with mutilated corpses. The breakwaters were
submerged, and the sea seemed gaining momently upon the solid land.
A thousand watery mountains surged up into the sky between the shore
and Capri; and these massive billows were not black or purple, but
hoary with a livid foam. After describing some picturesque
episodes--such as the gathering of the knights of Naples to watch
the ruin of their city, the procession of court ladies headed by the
queen to implore the intercession of Mary, and the wreck of a vessel
freighted with convicts bound for Sicily--Petrarch concludes with a
fervent prayer that he may never have to tempt the sea, of whose
fury he had seen so awful an example.

The capital on this occasion escaped the ruin prophesied. But Amalfi
was inundated; and what the waters then gained has never been
restored to man. This is why the once so famous city ranks now upon
a level with quiet little towns whose names are hardly heard in
history--with San Remo, or Rapallo, or Chiavari--and yet it is still
as full of life as a wasp's nest, especially upon the molo, or
raised piazza paved with bricks, in front of the Albergo de'
Cappuccini. The changes of scene upon this tiny square are so
frequent as to remind one of a theatre. Looking down from the
inn-balcony, between the glazy green pots gay with scarlet
amaryllis-bloom, we are inclined to fancy that the whole has been
prepared for our amusement. In the morning the corn for the
macaroni-flour, after being washed, is spread out on the bricks to
dry. In the afternoon the fishermen bring their nets for the same
purpose. In the evening the city magnates promenade and whisper.
Dark-eyed women, with orange or crimson kerchiefs for headgear,
cross and re-cross, bearing baskets on their shoulders. Great lazy
large-limbed fellows, girt with scarlet sashes and finished off with
dark blue nightcaps (for a contrast to their saffron-coloured
shirts, white breeches, and sunburnt calves), slouch about or sleep
face downwards on the parapets. On either side of this same molo
stretches a miniature beach of sand and pebble, covered with nets,
which the fishermen are always mending, and where the big boats lade
or unlade, trimming for the sardine fishery,