Page:Great Neapolitan Earthquake of 1857.djvu/410

26 line of the cathedral; the east and west walls stand 120° west of north. It is about 90 feet in height and 22 feet square at the base. The walls, 3 feet 8 inches thick at bottom, and only 12 inches at the summit (Photog. No. l88$1⁄2$ and Fig. 180) are very well built, with large, long-bedded, heavy ashlar quoin stones, 3 to 4 feet bed along the face and 16 to 24 inches deep; cut limestone jamb linings and string courses; and the filling in between these, well-laid coursed rubble. At each of two points of its height—viz. the first and second string courses—the walls are counected by four slender chain bars of 1$1⁄2$ in. $$\times$$ $3⁄4$ in. iron, with transverse cotters outside the wall faces. This has stood uninjured, without even a crack, in the midst of surrounding ruin, a clear proof of what sound and good building would do, in securing the safety of the inhabitants of the towns, in earthquake countrie. High up upon the rocky hill side above the town also, are many summer lodges (scaffœ) which are very well built, and of recent date; and although probably a thousand feet above the town level, they have suffered very little: they are chiefly buildings of a single story, and owe their safety to this and to their good construction.

A large portion of the ancient walls of the town remain, probably of mediæval construction. At one part of these a large cylindrical tower existed, which for ages had been used as a cemetery. From the side of this, overhanging the precipitous face of the hill, a large mass had been thrown, and had exposed to view, the surface of a solid cylinder of human bones, of several feet in depth, those at the bottom reduced almost to crumbled bone-earth, while those on the surface at top, were still perfect, and some not quite