visit
to the amphitheatre. As he turned, his eye was arrested by a strange
and sudden apparition. From the summit of Vesuvius, darkly visible at
the distance, there shot a pale, meteoric, livid light--it trembled an
instant and was gone. And at the same moment that his eye caught it,
the voice of one of the youngest of the women broke out hilariously and
shrill:--

TRAMP! TRAMP! HOW GAILY THEY GO!
HO, HO! FOR THE MORROW'S MERRY SHOW!

BOOK THE FIFTH

Chapter I

THE DREAM OF ARBACES. A VISITOR AND A WARNING TO THE EGYPTIAN.
THE awful night preceding the fierce joy of the amphitheatre rolled
drearily away, and greyly broke forth the dawn of THE LAST DAY OF
POMPEII! The air was uncommonly calm and sultry--a thin and dull mist
gathered over the valleys and hollows of the broad Campanian fields.
But yet it was remarked in surprise by the early fishermen, that,
despite the exceeding stillness of the atmosphere, the waves of the sea
were agitated, and seemed, as it were, to run disturbedly back from the
shore; while along the blue and stately Sarnus, whose ancient breadth of
channel the traveler now vainly seeks to discover, there crept a hoarse
and sullen murmur, as it glided by the laughing plains and the gaudy
villas of the wealthy citizens. Clear above the low mist rose the
time-worn towers of the immemorial town, the red-tiled roofs of the
bright streets, the solemn columns of many temples, and the
statue-crowned portals of the Forum and the Arch of Triumph. Far in the
distance, the outline of the circling hills soared above the vapors, and
mingled with the changeful hues of the morning sky. The cloud that had
so long rested over the crest of Vesuvius had suddenly vanished, and its
rugged and haughty brow looked without a frown over the beautiful scenes
below.

Despite the earliness of the hour, the gates of the city were already
opened. Horsemen upon horsemen, vehicle after vehicle, poured rapidly
in; and the voices of numerous pedestrian groups, clad in holiday
attire, rose high in joyous and excited merriment; the streets were
crowded with citizens and strangers from the populous neighborhood of
Pompeii; and noisily--fast--confusedly swept the many streams of life
towards the fatal show.

Despite the vast size of the amphitheatre, seemingly so disproportioned
to the extent of the city, and formed to include nearly the whole
population of Pompeii itself, so great, on extraordinary