Summer Cruise in the Mediterranean on board an American frigate

by Nathaniel Parker Willis

Account of Vesuvius—The Hermitage—The famous Lagrima Christi—Difficulties of the Path—Curious Appearance of the Old Crater—Odd Assemblage of Travellers—The New Crater—Splendid Prospect—Mr. Mathias, Author of the Pursuits of Literature—The Archbishop of Tarento.

Mounted upon asses much smaller than their riders, and with each a bare-legged driver behind, we commenced the ascent of Vesuvius. It was a troublesome path worn through the rough scoria of old eruptions, and after two hours’ toiling, we were glad to dismount at “the hermitage.” Here lives a capuchin friar on a prominent rib in the side of the volcano, the red-hot lava dividing above his dwelling every year or two, and coursing away to the valley in two rivers of fire on either side of him. He has been there twelve years, and supports himself, and probably half the brotherhood at the monastery, by selling Lagrima Christi to strangers. It is a small white building with a little grass and a few trees about it, and looks like an island in the black waste of cinders and lava.

A shout from the guide was answered by the opening of a small window above, and the shaven crown of the old friar was thrust forth with a welcome and a request that we would mount the stairs to the parlour. He received us at the top, and gave us chairs around a plain board table, upon which he set several bottles of the far-famed wine of Vesuvius. One drinks it, and blesses the volcano that warmed the roots of the grape. It is a ripe, rich, full-bodied liquor, which “ascends me into the brain” sooner than any continental wine I have tasted. I never drank anything more delicious.

We remounted our asses and rode on, much more indifferent than before, to the roughness of the path. It strikes one like the road to the infernal regions. No grass, not a shrub, nothing but a wide mountain of cinders, black and rugged, diversified only by the deeper die of the newer streaks of lava. The eye wearied of gazing on it. We mounted thus for an hour or more, arriving at last at the base of a lofty cone whose sides were but slopes of deep ashes. We left our donkeys here in company with those of a large party that had preceded us, and made preparations to ascend on foot. The drivers unlaced their sashes, and passing them round the waists of the ladies, took the ends over their shoulders, and proceeded. Harder work could scarce be conceived. The feet had no hold, sinking knee-deep at every step, and we slipped back so much, that our progress was almost imperceptible. The ladies were soon tired out, although more than half dragged up by the guides. At every few steps there was a general cry for a halt, and we lay down in the warm ashes, quite breathless and discouraged.

In something more than an hour from the hermitage we reached the edge of the old crater. The scene here was very curious. A hollow, perhaps a mile round, composed entirely of scoria (like the cinders under a blacksmith’s window) contained in its centre the sharp new cone of the last eruption. Around in various directions, sat some thirty groups of travellers, with each their six or seven Italian guides, refreshing themselves with a lunch after the fatigue of the ascent. There were English, Germans, French, Russians, and Italians, each speaking their own language, and the largest party, oddly enough, was from the United States. As I was myself travelling with foreigners, and found my countrymen on Vesuvius unexpectedly, the mixture of nations appeared still more extraordinary. The combined heat of the sun and the volcano beneath us, had compelled the Italians to throw off half their dress, and they sat or stood leaning on their long pikes, with their brown faces and dark eyes glowing with heat, as fine models of ruffians as ever startled a traveller in this land of bandits. Eight or ten of them were grouped around a crack in the crater, roasting apples and toasting bread. There were several of these cracks winding about in different directions, of which I could barely endure the heat, holding my hand at the top. A stick thrust in a foot or more, was burnt black in a moment.

With another bottle or two of “lagrima Christi” and a roasted apple, our courage was renewed, and we picked our way across the old crater, sometimes lost in the smoke which steamed up through the cracks, and here and there treading on beautiful beds of crystals of sulphur. The ascent of the new cone was shorter, but very difficult. The ashes were so new and light, that it was like a steep sand-bank, giving discouragingly at the least pressure, and sinking till the next step was taken. The steams of sulphur as we approached the summit, were all but intolerable. The ladies coughed, the guides sneezed and called on the Madonna, and I never was more relieved than in catching the first clear draught of wind on the top of the mountain.

Here we all stood at last—crowded together on the narrow edge of a crater formed within the year, and liable every moment to be overwhelmed with burning lava. There was scarce room to stand, and the hot ashes burnt our feet as they sunk into it. The females of each party sunk to the ground, and the common danger and toil breaking down the usual stiff barrier of silence between strangers, the conversation became general, and the hour on the crater’s edge passed very agreeably.

A strong lad would just about throw a stone from one side to the other of the new crater. It was about forty feet deep, perhaps more, and one crust of sulphur lined the whole. It was half the time obscured in smoke, which poured in volumes from the broad cracks with which it was divided in every direction, and occasionally an eddy of wind was caught in the vast bowl, and for a minute its bright yellow surface was perfectly clear. There had not been an eruption for four or five months, and the abyss, which is, for years together, a pit of fire and boiling lava, has had time to harden over, and were it not for the smoking steams, one would scarce suspect the existence of the tremendous volcano slumbering beneath.

After we had been on the summit a few minutes, an English clergyman of my acquaintance, to our surprise, emerged from the smoke. He had been to the bottom for specimens of sulphur for his cabinet. Contrary to the advice of the guide, I profited by his experience, and disappearing in the flying clouds, reached the lowest depths of the crater with some difficulties of foothold and breath. The cracks, which I crossed twice, were so brittle as to break like the upper ice of a twice frozen pond beneath my feet, and the stench of the exhaling gases was nauseating beyond all the sulphuretted hydrogen I have ever known. The sensation was painfully suffocating from the moment I entered the crater. I broke off as many bits of the bright golden crystals from the crust as my confusion and failing strength would allow, and then remounted, feeling my way up through the smoke to the summit.

I can compare standing on the top of Vesuvius and looking down upon the bay and city of Naples, to nothing but mounting a peak in the infernal regions overlooking paradise. The larger crater encircles you entirely for a mile, cutting off the view of the sides of the mountain, and from the elevation of the new cone, you look over the rising edge of this black field of smoke and cinders, and drop the eye at once upon Naples, lying asleep in the sun, with its lazy sails upon the water, and the green hills enclosing it clad in the indescribable beauty of an Italian atmosphere. Beyond all comparison, by the testimony of every writer and traveller, the most beautiful scene in the world, the loveliest water, and the brightest land, lay spread out before us. With the stench of hot sulphur in our nostrils, ankle deep in black ashes, and a waste of smouldering cinders in every direction around us, the enjoyment of the view certainly did not want for the heightening of contrast.