VESUVIUS. 197 



monly assigned to the earthquake which happened in 

 63, but it seems far more likely that most of them 

 belong to the days immediately preceding the great 

 outburst in 79. " In Pompeii," says Sir Charles Lyell, 

 " both public and private buildings bear testimony to 

 the catastrophe. The walls are rent, and in many 

 places traversed by fissures still open." It is probable 

 that the inhabitants were driven by these anticipatory 

 throes to fly from the doomed towns. For though 

 Dion Cassius relates that "two entire cities, Hercu- 

 laneum and Pompeii, were buried under showers of 

 ashes, while all the people were sitting in the theatre," 

 yet " the examination of the two cities enables us to 

 prove," says Sir Charles, " that none of the people were 

 destroyed in the theatre, and, indeed, that there were 

 very few of the inhabitants who did not escape from 

 both cities. Yet," he adds, " some lives were lost, and 

 there was ample. foundation for the tale in all its most 

 essential particulars." 



We may note here, in passing, that the account of 

 the eruption given by Dion Cassius, who wrote a 

 century and a half after the catastrophe, is sufficient 

 to prove how terrible an impression had been made 

 upon the inhabitants of Campania, from whose descend- 

 ants he in all probability obtained the materials of 

 his narrative. He writes that, " during the eruption, 

 a multitude of men of superhuman stature, resembling 

 giants, appeared, sometimes on the mountain, and 



