Before a small but neat house a garden was laid out, in the middle of which a pond was sunk. The empty receptacle of water was in good preservation. The stone borders of the compartments of the garden were likewise plainly discernible. The statues, however, with which the whole was decorated at the first discovery, had of course been removed to the Queen's Museum at Portici. But there were two short spans, on opposite sides of the garden, of a covered walk which had once been carried round it. We were commencing to look about, when the Prince called out--"Come and see the wine-cellar: 'tis the best in the city!" "No, thanks--not for me," said Will. I do not know whether he pictured to himself long rows of _amphoræ_--I think that's the name--of Falernian or Chian or whatever it was called, we used to learn about in Horace--ready to our choice and only awaiting the breaking of a seal. I myself could have endured any wine that was not rank vinegar; for October mornings in Naples are warmer than our English summer, and we had had a long dusty drive. "Nay, I am afraid that I have nothing to offer you but the sight of a number of fine jars," said the Prince, putting aside Will's refusal. "I will not call them empty, for they do contain a residuary crust--the coke of a burnt resinous substance. The people of this city were for the most part Greeks, and the Greeks, as you know, still resin their wine." Now, I was but a boy then, and I was all for having a piece of this petrified wine lees to keep in my sea-chest as what the Italians call a _curio_, and I hung behind the Prince for that purpose. But he had eyes, like the Queen's picture of Argus, in the back of his head, so I was compelled to take him into my confidence. At first he was very severe, and talked of Vandals and the Queen's orders; but I said,--"A loose piece, a very little loose piece: surely that would not matter." He gave a good-natured laugh, as if to say, "You are only a boy," and stooped to bury his arm in one of the great jars, almost the shape of an egg (just such, save for the lid, as those you may see as signs of the sellers of sugars and spices in London). But as his hand was about to touch the crust there was a sudden hollow rolling resembling that of thunder. It seemed to roll round and round the curved ceiling of the dismal vault in which we stood in almost total darkness.