“When my uncle had started, I spent such time as was left on my studies—it was on their account, indeed, that I had stopped behind. Then followed the bath, dinner and sleep, this last disturbed and brief. There had been noticed for many days before a trembling of the earth, which had caused, however, but little fear, because it is not unusual in Campania. But that night it was so violent, that one thought everything was being not merely moved, but absolutely overturned. My mother rushed into my chamber; I was in the act of rising, with the same intention of awaking her, should she have been asleep. We sat down in the open court of the house, which occupied a small space between the buildings and the sea. And now—I do not know whether to call it courage or folly, for I was but in my eighteenth year—I called for a volume of Livy, read it as if I were perfectly at leisure, and even continued to make some extracts which I had begun. Just then arrived a friend of my uncle, who had lately come to him from Spain; when he saw that we were sitting down—that I was even reading—he rebuked my mother for her patience, and me for my blindness to the danger. Still I bent myself as industriously as ever over my book. It was now seven o’clock in the morning, but the daylight was still faint and doubtful. The surrounding buildings were now so shattered, that in the place where we were, which though open was small, the danger that they might fall on us was imminent and unmistakable. So we at last determined to quit the town. A panic-stricken crowd followed us.... We saw the sea retire into itself, seeming, as it were, to be driven back by the trembling movement of the earth. The shore had distinctly advanced, and many marine animals were left high and dry upon the sands. Behind us was a dark and dreadful cloud, which, as it was broken with rapid zig-zag flashes, revealed behind it variously shaped masses of flame; these last were like sheet lightning, though on a larger scale.... It was not long before the cloud that we saw began to descend upon the earth and cover the sea. It had already surrounded and concealed the island of Capreae, and had made invisible the promontory of Misenum. My mother besought, urged, even commanded me to fly as best I could; ‘I might do so,’ she said, ‘for I was young; she, from age and corpulence, could move but slowly, but would be content to die, if she did not bring death upon me.’ I replied that I would not seek safety except in her company; I clasped her hand and compelled her to go with me. She reluctantly obeyed, but continually reproached herself for delaying me. Ashes now began to fall—still, however, in small quantities. I looked behind me; a dense dark mist seemed to be following us, spreading itself over the country like a cloud. ‘Let us turn out of the way,’ I said, ‘whilst we can still see, for fear that, should we fall in the road, we should be trodden under foot in the darkness by the throngs that accompany