In rose and purple for the glories fled,
As early watchers note th' encroaching flush
From proud Ravello to Atrani spread,
And curse the cruel arm that once did crush
This sea-sprung Niobe, and leave her dead."

[Illustration: AMALFI]

Dead, alas! For the old liberties of the great Republic of Amalfi have
been extinct for more than half a thousand years, and it is in consequence
difficult for us to realise that the quaint noisy squalid picturesque
little city by the sea-shore, huddled into the narrow gorge of the
Canneto, is that self-same Amalfi whose navies rode triumphant over the
Mediterranean before the days of the Early Crusades. Yet Amalfi, which may
be reckoned amongst the first-born of that fair family of medieval cities
that their prolific parent the land of Italy brought forth in an age of
darkness, was also the foremost to droop and die, her glories scattered
and passed before Florence had ceased to be an obscure country town. In
this case History presents to us a most forcible, not to say an unique
example of the origin, rise and decline of a power, all occurring within a
short space of time. Amalfi springs, as it were, out of the void as a city
of importance, for no Roman colony occupied its site in antique times. Its
very nomenclature is a puzzle to scholars, and the usual statement that it
owed its name to Byzantine settlers coming hither from the ancient town of
Melfi in the Basilicata does not sound very convincing, though for want of
a better theory it must suffice. Why, when, and by whom the city was in
reality founded remains an enigma, yet we learn from a passage in one of
the letters of St Gregory the Great that the place was of sufficient size
to be governed by a bishop in the sixth century. By the tenth we find the
Republic of Amalfi already risen to a position of commanding importance,
and holding its own against the rival states between which its territories
were wedged; the dukedom of Naples to the west and the principality of
Salerno to eastward. Dexterously playing on the greed and prejudices of
the various tyrants who ruled Naples and Salerno, and occasionally allying
itself with them in order to repel the fierce attacks of their common
enemy, the Saracenic hordes who were then harrying the Lucanian coast,
Amalfi continued to uphold its political freedom and dignity in the face
of immense difficulties. And in gratitude for the vigour with which the
Amalfitani had waged war aga