ch he never reached alive. His daughter, two children,
and other members of his family and household sought protection in the
subterranean vaults, which, by the help of the wine-jars already
stored there, and the provisions which they brought down with them,
they probably considered as sufficient refuge against an evil of which
they could not guess the whole extent. It was a vain hope; the same
fate awaited them all by different ways. The strong vaults and
narrow openings to the day protected them, indeed, from the falling
cinders; but the heat, sufficient to char wood, and volatilize the
more subtle part of the ashes, could not be kept out by such means.
The vital air was changed into a sulphurous vapor, charged with
burning dust. In their despair, longing for the pure breath of heaven,
they rushed to the door, already choked with scoriae and ruins, and
perished in agonies on which the imagination does not willingly dwell.

[Illustration: WALL PAINTING AT POMPEII.]

This the reader will probably be inclined to think might do very well
for the conclusion of a romance, but why invent such sentimental
stories to figure in a grave historical account? It is a remarkable
instance, perhaps the strongest which has yet occurred, of the
peculiar interest which the discoveries at Pompeii possess, as
introducing us to the homes, nay, to the very persons of a
long-forgotten age, that every circumstance of this tale can be
verified by evidence little less than conclusive. Beside the garden
gate, marked P, two skeletons were found; one presumed to be the
master, had in his hand the key of that gate, and near him were about
a hundred gold and silver coins; the other, stretched beside some
silver vases, was probably a slave charged with the transport of them.
When the vaults beneath the room, D, were discovered, at the foot of
the staircase, H, the skeletons of eighteen adult persons, a boy and
an infant were found huddled up together, unmoved during seventeen
centuries since they sank in death. They were covered by several feet
of ashes of extreme fineness, evidently slowly borne in through the
vent-holes, and afterwards consolidated by damp. The substance thus
formed resembles the sand used by metal founders for castings, but is
yet more delicate, and took perfect impressions of everything on which
it lay. Unfortunately this property was not observed until almost too
late, and little was preserved except the neck and breast of a