Page:Life in the Old World - Vol. II.djvu/326

336 Towards midnight we left the realms of Loke, but still visitors were arriving, driving, riding, walking, all on their way thither, and torches, the flames of which glimmered like blue points along the red-yellow lava-streams, became still more numerous. Most assuredly there were several thousands of people this night upon Vesuvius.

I am glad that I can spare you the horrible shouting and bawling of the drivers, and the boys at the Hermitage, beyond which the carriages could not proceed, as well as the throng, and the difficulty with the carriages in the narrow parts of the road, where the vehicles entangled themselves in a Gordian knot, and where we sat waiting a full three-quarters of an hour. There seemed to be neither watchmen nor police, and the Neapolitans are incomparable for their negligence, their noise, and their shouting. Every thing, however, went right in the end; splendid figures, and genre-pictures, were lit up by the light of the torches, the Gordian knot was untied; we began to proceed; the moon rose, to the right, far away from Vesuvius, and gently lit us on our way. Very beautiful, as beheld from the mountain, was the view of the shore of Naples, stretched out as in a silvery half-circle of lighted lamps. The night was clear, but very cold. I scarcely know whenever I experienced a more delightful sensation, than when, at half-past two in the morning, I again found myself in my quiet room, in company with cup of cold tea and a piece of bread, and within sight of my white bed; the light which burned so calmly, the peace, the solitude, the profound silence;—I seemed to myself to have come out of hell into paradise!