XIII.
THE CAVERNS OF NAPLES.
EXCAVATIONS NEAR NAPLES.—POZZUOLI.—VISIT TO THE CAVE OF THE CUMEAN SIBYL.—ACCIDENT TO AN ENGLISH TRAVELLER.—HUMAN PACK-HORSES.—DARKNESS AND TORCHES.—THE LAKE OF AVERNUS.—DROWNED IN BOILING WATER.—A DANGEROUS WALK.—IN NERO’S PRISON.—INSTRUMENTS OF TORTURE.—USE OF THE RACK.—THE IRON BEDSTEAD.—BROILING A MAN ALIVE.—TREATMENT OF PRISONERS.—AN ANCIENT FUNERAL. —VIRGIL’S TOMB.—CONSTRUCTING WINE CELLARS.—NOVEL PLAN OF ROBBERY.
The traveller who visits Naples has abundant opportunities for making underground explorations in the neighborhood of that city. A few of the places he can examine are of natural origin—the Blue Grotto, for example; but by far the greater part of them are artificial. A most interesting journey can be made to Pozzuoli and its immediate neighborhood. With a longing desire to see some of the underground curiosities that have made that part of Italy famous, I arranged a tour in that direction before I had fairly settled myself at the hotel. We made a party of three, all Americans, and all as impatient and uneasy as our race is said to be when travelling on the continent. A skirmish with a horde of rapacious coachmen secured us a carriage, and we drove out of Naples by the road which skirts the bay in the direction of Rome.
Arriving in the vicinity of the famous places, we were beset by guides, who almost climbed into the carriage in their eagerness to secure an engagement. We picked out the cleanest of the lot, or rather the least dirty, and mounted him upon the box by the side of the driver, where he sat in all the dignity of an emperor. He spoke a confused jumble of English, French, and Italian, which was no language in particular, but might be anything in general. His first movement was to stop at a wayside house, from which a woman emerged bringing us half a dozen candles or torches of twisted rags and tallow, each of them as large as one’s wrist, and about three feet long. We objected to so many, but the guide assured us they would all be needed. I was inclined to doubt his statement, from my knowledge of the rascality of guides in general; but he met me with the promise, “Me them will pay for if not they be wanted, Si, signor. You verrez will.”
Of course we could not refuse after this guarantee. I paid for the torches with a silent resolution to make the fellow eat what were left over; and, as the tallow was bad, and the rags were worse, there was good reason to believe they would not make an agreeable dinner.
GOING TO POZZUOLI.
Soon after making this purchase, the work of sight-seeing began. Each place we visited had a man at the entrance, and not one of us could go inside without paying for the privilege. There were always a half dozen idle fellows hanging about ready to sell cameos and other curiosities which had been dug up in the vicinity, as they solemnly avowed; in reality the cameos were of modern manufacture, and made in Rome or Naples. The speculators would begin by asking fifty francs for a cameo which was worth about five, and which they would sell for five if they could not get any more. If we safely ran the gantlet through these avaricious tradesmen, we were beset by local guides who wanted to lead us, and we generally found it desirable to employ some of them in order to see what the place contained. In one instance these guides acted as pack-horses, and I can testify that one of them, at least, had all that he wanted to carry; and this is the way it happened.
