THE ISLAND OF CAPRI. tex of the volcano the universal forge empties its melted metals. The roar of Etna has been the knell of thousands, when it poured forth its cataract of fire over one of the fairest portions of the earth, and swept into ruins ages of industry. In the reign of Titus Vespasian, A. D. 79, the volcano of Vesuvius dashed its fiery billows to the clouds, and buried in the burning lava the cities of Herculaneum, Stabice, and Pompeii, which then flourished near Naples. The streets of Pompeii were paved with lava, and it has been discovered that its foundation is composed of the same -proving that the spot had been deluged previous to the birth of Christ. In the streets once busy with the hum of industry, and where the celebrated ancient walked, the modern philosopher now stands and ruminates upon fallen grandeur. While the inhabitants were unmindful of the danger which awaited them-while they were busied with schemes of wealth and greatness-the irresistible flood of fire came roaring from the mountain, and shrouded them in the eternal night. Seventeen hundred years have rolled over them, and their lonely habitations and works remain as their monuments. They are swept away in the torrent of time; the waves of ages have settled over them; and art alone has preserved their memory. Great God, how sublime are thy works! How grand are thy operations! How awful thy wrath! Nations can not stand against thee-a world is but an atom in thy sight! 65 ; is distant about two and a half miles from Cape Campanella, which terminates the bold promontory where Sorrento, Amalfi, and other towns of old fame, are situated it is about twelve miles from Cape Miseno on the other side of the bay, and rather more than twenty from the city of Naples at the end of the bay. It is composed of hard, calcareous rocks, which are disposed in two picturesque masses with a considerable break or hollow between them. The highest of these two masses, which is to the west, and is called Anacapri, rises between sixteen and seventeen hundred feet above the level of the sea. The whole of the island, when seen at a little distance, looks so precipitous and inaccessible, that the stranger is disposed to wonder how the little towns and white villages he sees on the face of its cliffs ever got there. The color of the masses of rock, when not affected by the glow of sunset, is a pale, sober gray. Tracing all the indents and sinuosities of the rocks, the circumference of the island does not exceed nine miles; yet within this narrow space is crowded an astonishing variety of scenic beauties, remains of antiquity, and historical recollections. The entire surface of Capri is wild, broken, and picturesque. The ancient name of the island was Capreæ, and it is said it was so called from being inhabited by wild goats. According to antiquaries, its first human inhabitants were a colony of Greeks from Epirus, who, after inany ages, were dispossessed by the citizens of Neapolis (Naples), which then formed part of Magna Græcia, and which, like all the places of note in that portion of Italy, owed its origin to the Greeks. The Roman emperor Augustus seems to have taken entire posHIS most picturesque session of the island for himself, and to of islands is situated have given the Neapolitan citizens lands under the same me- in the neighboring island of Ischia as an ridian as the city of equivalent. Suetonius, the historian, has Naples, which it im- recorded a visit to Capri made by Augusmediately faces, and tus at the close of his life. With a shatfrom almost all parts tered constitution and broken spirits, the of which it is visible. world's master left Rome to find a place It is, indeed, one of the finest and most of quiet rest. Having recruited his spirstriking features of the rich and varied its a little at Astura, on the shores of the scenery which surrounds that capital. It Tyrrhenian sea, and near the mouth of stands at the entrance of the Neapolitan the Tiber, he coasted Campania Felix, gulf, almost on the line of the horizon; it and, with a few chosen friends, arrived at THE ISLAND OF CAPRI. THE ISLAND OF CAPRI. Baiæ. Here he took shipping for Capreæ. | tribute every ancient building or fragment As his galley shot across the Puteolan bay, found on the island to "Tiberio Cesare," it was met by a trading-vessel from Alex- whom they amusingly call "emperor of andria in Egypt, the crew of which, aware Capri, and king of Rome." It is also very of the monarch's approach, had dressed amusing to hear how they talk traditionthemselves in white, and crowned their ally of the tyrant, and of the deeds and heads with chaplets; and, when he was vices recorded by Tacitus, Suetonius, and still nearer to them, they burned incense Juvenal. before him, swearing to live for him, and These tesfor him to navigate the seas. timonials of affection-or this adulationcheered for a moment the dying emperor. He distributed money among his followers, desiring them to spend it in purchasing the Alexandrian merchandise. At Capri, Augustus, determining to forget the cares of government, gave up his whole soul to ease and affable intercourse; but this secession from toil, and the enjoyment of the tranquillity and the balmy atmosphere of the place, and the magical scenery around him, could not restore the old and wornout man, who died shortly after at the town of Nola in Campania, and almost within sight of the island. The sail from Naples to Capri on a fine summer evening, when favored by the vento di terra, or land breeze from the main, is one of the most delightful that can be imagined. The only accessible point in the island is called the Sbarco di Capri, or the landing-place. This is below the town of Capri, to which there is an ascent by means of a rude Cyclopean flight of steps, steep and rugged in the extreme. A few fortifications might render the island altogether inaccessible to an enemy, and entitle Capri to the name that was commonly given to it during the last war of Napoleon, viz., the Little Gibraltar. During a certain part of that long struggle, when the French arms had driven the king of the Two Sicilies from Naples to Sicily, the English held the island for that sovereign. They kept possession of it during the whole of the short reign at Naples of Joseph Bonaparte; but when he went to Spain, and Murat replaced him in Italy, it was attacked with an imposing force, and, being most absurdly defended, it fell into the hands of the French. Capri is, however, much more memorable as being the constant retreat for several years of Augustus's successor, the For the honor of huexecrable Tiberius. man nature, it is to be hoped that those who have described the life and impurities of this systematic tyrant and debauchee, have in some instances sacrificed truth to eloquence and effect: but still enough will The principal town, or, as it is pompremain to excite our abhorrence, and our regret that his name should be associated ously called, the "metropolis of Capri," with so beautiful a spot of earth. Shut up stands on a shelving rock toward the east with the infamous ministers of his tyranny of the island. It consists of a group of and lust in this rocky, inaccessible island, some two or three hundred small but tolTiberius ruled the vast Roman empire. It erably neat houses, five or six churches was here he committed or ordered some and chapels, with a confined piazza, or of the most atrocious of his cruelties; it square, in the midst. It is surrounded by was here he wrote the "verbose and grand vineyards and orchards, and some small epistle" to the senate at Rome, immortal- olive-groves stand on ledges of the cliffs ized in its infamy by Juvenal; it was here above it. There is only one more town the arbiter of the fate of millions trembled in the island. This is called Anacapri, in his old age at what might be his own and is situated high up, on a narrow ledge The fishermen, sailors, destiny, and sat on "the august rock of of the western mass of rock that goes by Caprea with a Chaldean band"-a band the same name. of astrologers and impostors-to consult and traders, live in the chief town, and the He here built twelve palaces lower parts of the island and Anacapri are the stars. or villas, which were all strongly fortified, almost solely inhabited by frugal, indusand erected many other works, the ruins trious peasants. It is one of the cleanest The poor places that eye can behold. Its inhabitof which still bear his name. islanders of the present day, indeed, at-ants communicate with the other town and all the east of the island by means of a flight of five hundred and thirty-eight steps, which zigzags in a curious manner down the face of a precipice. On a still loftier precipice, in the rear of the town of Anacapri, are the picturesque ruins of a castle of the middle ages. The villages-if groups of three or four vine-dressers' houses may be so calledare nestled here and there in little hollows, or are perched on steps in the cliffs, chiefly on the eastern half of the island. Wherever it has been possible to make them grow, they are surrounded by trees and vineyards. The persevering industry of the islanders is very admirable. By hewing out rocks here-by piling them up to form terraces and retain the scanty soil there-by removing the earth from places where it was exposed to be washed away, and depositing it in well-defended, secure places they have covered considerable patches of the northern front of Capri with beauty and fertility. The back of the island is so precipitous, that it is altogether impracticable. The cultivable parts produce most kinds of vegetables and fruits, a small quantity of excellent oil, and wine in abundance. The wine, which is well known to all who have resided at Naples, is of two sorts-Capri rosso and Capri bianco-or red and white Capri. The quality of both is very good, being devoid of that volcanic, sulphurous flavor common to most of the wines produced near Naples. Quails form another important article of export. These birds of passage, which come in countless flights from the coast of Africa in spring, and return thitherward in autumn, are caught on the island in large nets spread out in hollows on the tops of the rocks, through which, season after season, the quails are sure to pass. In some years, as many as one hundred thousand of these delicate birds, without counting those consumed at home, have been sent to the Neapolitan market Capri, which is now united to the see of Sorrento, once had a bishop of its own; and, in former days, that dignitary's revenue was derived almost entirely from the trade in quails. In 1826, the whole population of the island amounted to about four thousand souls. There were two or three schools established by government. The people seemed very healthy, contented, and cheerful-free and equal in their intercourse with one another—and, like most islanders, much attached to the place of their birth. None of them could be called rich, even according to the low scale of that part of the world, but then very few were abjectly poor. Like the inhabitants of the contiguous peninsula, the Sorrentini, the Amalfitani, &c., the people of Capri invariably leave an agreeable recollection in the mind of the traveller. The bold, perpendicular cliff at the eastern extremity of the island, which is correctly represented in our engraving, is the the too-celebrated Saltus Caprearum, over which, if history speaks truly, Tiberius was accustomed to have his tortured victims driven. The cliff still retains its name, Italianized, the islanders always calling it "Il Salto," or the leap. It rises seven hundred feet above the level of the sea. Not far from the brow of this cliff are very considerable remains of the Villa Jovis, one of the tyrant's twelve mansions, which all stood on this half of the island. The guides assure the stranger that some arched subterranean chambers, communicating with one another, that are found here, were the torturing dungeons of Tiberius. A fine mosaic pavement, some columns of giallo antico, a Greek statue of a nymph, with many cameos and intaglios, were found at the Villa Jovis many years since. Indeed, this small island and these Tiberian villas, of which we need not give a minute description, as little remains of them but sub-structures and dismal cells, have contributed largely to modern museums, churches, and palaces. The four magnificent columns of giallo antico-and all of one piece-that now decorate the chapel of the king of Naples in the palace of Caserta were dug up in one of the villas A splendid mosaic, which Murat's wife, Caroline Bonaparte, caused to be removed and laid down as a flooring to her own boudoir in the palace at Portici, was found in another; and each of the villas, from amid their crumbling ruins, have furnished rosso, giallo, and verde antico, lapis lazuli, other beautiful stones, and a peculiar sort of marble called Tiberian, in |