nd _is dried up_
from the sea (desiccatum).[722]

The principal elevation, however, of the low tract unquestionably took
place at the time of the great eruption of Monte Nuovo in 1538. That
event and the earthquakes which preceded it have been already described
(p. 368); and we have seen that two of the eye-witnesses of the
convulsion, Falconi and Giacomo di Toledo, agree in declaring that the
sea abandoned a considerable tract of the shore, so that fish were taken
by the inhabitants; and, among other things, Falconi mentions that he
saw two springs _in the newly discovered ruins_.

The flat land, when first upraised, must have been more extensive than
now, for the sea encroaches somewhat rapidly, both to the north and
southeast of Puzzuoli. The coast had, when I examined it in 1828, given
way more than a foot in a twelvemonth; and I was assured, by fishermen
in the bay, that it has lost ground near Puzzuoli, to the extent of
thirty feet, within their memory.

It is, moreover, very probable that the land rose to a greater height at
first before it ceased to move upwards, than the level at which it was
observed to stand when the temple was rediscovered in 1749, for we learn
from a memoir, of Niccolini, published in 1838, that since the beginning
of the nineteenth century, the temple of Serapis has subsided more than
two feet. That learned architect visited the ruins frequently, for the
sake of making drawings, in the beginning of the year 1807, and was in
the habit of remaining there throughout the day, yet never saw the
pavement overflowed by the sea, except occasionally when the south wind
blew violently. On his return, sixteen years after, to superintend some
excavations ordered by the king of Naples, he found the pavement covered
by sea-water twice every day at high tide, so that he was obliged to
place there a line of stones to stand upon. This induced him to make a
series of observations from Oct. 1822 to July 1838, by which means he
ascertained that the ground had been and was sinking, at the average
rate of about seven millimetres a year, or about one inch in four years;
so that, in 1838, fish were caught every day on that part of the
pavement where, in 1807, there was never a drop of water in calm
weather.[723]

On inquiring still more recently as to the condition of the temple and
the continuance of the sinking of the ground, I learn from Signor
Scacchi in a letter, dated June 1852, that the downward moveme