take a nearer view of it. He ordered a light vessel to be got ready, and gave me the liberty, if I thought proper, to attend him. I preferred to continue my studies.... As he was coming out of the house, he received a note from Rectina, the wife of Bassus, who was in the utmost alarm at the imminent danger which threatened her; for her villa being situated at the foot of Mount Vesuvius, there was no way to escape but by sea; she earnestly entreated him, therefore, to come to her assistance. He accordingly changed his first design, and what he began with a philosophical turn of mind he pursued with heroic purpose. He ordered the galleys to put to sea and himself went on board, with an intention of assisting not only Rectina, but several others, for villas stand extremely thick upon that beautiful coast." In this design he was unsuccessful; so he went to what is now called Castellamare, in the Gulf of Naples. While there he was suffocated by the poisonous gases which accompanied the eruption. In a second letter, Pliny describes his mother and himself seeking to escape from the effects of a "black and dreadful cloud, bursting with an igneous, serpentine vapor, darting out a long train of fire, resembling flashes of lightning, but much larger.... Soon the cloud seemed to descend, and cover the whole ocean, as indeed it entirely hid the island of Caprese and the promontory of Misenum. My mother strongly conjured me to make my escape, at any rate, which, as I was young, I might easily do; as for herself, she said, her age and corpulency rendered all attempts of that sort impossible. However, she would willingly meet death, if she could have the satisfaction of seeing that she was not the occasion of mine. But I absolutely refused to leave her, and taking her by the hand I led her on, she complying with great reluctance, and with many reproaches to herself for retarding my flight.... Darkness overspread us, not like that of a cloudy night, or when there is no moon, but of a room when it is shut up and all the lights are extinct. Nothing was then to be heard but the shrieks of women, the screams of children, and the cries of men. Some calling for their children, others for their parents, others for their husbands, and only distinguishing each other by their voices; one lamenting his own fate, another that of his family; some wishing to die from the very fear of dying; some lifting their hands to the gods; but the greater part imagining that the last and eternal night was come, which was to destroy the gods and the world together.... Heavy showers of ashes rained upon us, which we were obliged every now and then to shake off, otherwise we should have been crushed and buried in the heap." The mother and the son escaped, however, and returned to Misenum, where in the midst of still threatening danger they awaited news of the intrepid and fated naturalist.