The Cruise of the Branwen

CHAPTER III NAPLES 'AfJp yap 1rapa VT}VUL fjaBi,' ?jv, o-Mi (TfA~V1] Ovp6.vo0£ 1rpov<patv£, K.anlxuo a; VE<phuu,v. WE had arrived just in time to see the after-math of the eruption of Vesuvius, and very terrible it was. In Naples itself we found that things were not so bad as we expected. There was great discomfort, but no real danger as soon as the authorities discovered that some of the volcanic dust was so heavy that it broke through any flat roof which was insufficiently supported. Nearer the crater this heavy dust was more prevalent. In Naples not much fell after the worst activity had passed. But even on April I 6 the whole town was still a foot deep beneath a grey deposit of fine ashes which some– times shaded off into a reddish brown. The whole of the conical top of Vesuvius had been blown off, and its fragments were being dis– tributed for some weeks all over Italy. Our comrades travelling to Brindisi on the I 8th found the dust had spread eastward from sea to sea. On a previous day, when the wind changed suddenly, a brown fog descended upon Paris, 30