The Wonders of Pompeii | Page 5

Ferdinand IV. of the slight
degree of zeal and the small amount of money employed. The king
promised to do better, but did not keep his word. He had neither
intelligence nor activity in prosecuting this immense task, excepting
while the French occupation lasted. At that time, however, the
government carried out the idea of Francesco La Vega, a man of sense
and capacity, and purchased all the ground that covered Pompeii.
Queen Caroline, the sister of Bonaparte and wife of Murat, took a fancy

to these excavations and pushed them vigorously, often going all the
way from Naples through six leagues of dust to visit them. In 1813
there were exactly four hundred and seventy-six laborers employed at
Pompeii. The Bourbons returned and commenced by re-selling the
ground that had been purchased under Murat; then, little by little, the
work continued, at first with some activity, then fell off and slackened
more and more until, from being neglected, they were altogether
abandoned, and were resumed only once in a while in the presence of
crowned heads. On these occasions they were got up like New Year's
surprise games: everything that happened to be at hand was scattered
about on layers of ashes and of pumice-stone and carefully covered
over. Then, upon the arrival of such-and-such a majesty, or this or that
highness, the magic wand of the superintendent or inspector of the
works, caused all these treasures to spring out of the ground. I could
name, one after the other, the august personages who were deceived in
this manner, beginning with the Kings of the Two Sicilies and of
Jerusalem.
But that is not all. Not only was nothing more discovered at Pompeii,
but even the monuments that had been found were not preserved. King
Ferdinand soon discovered that the 25,000 francs applied to the
excavations were badly employed; he reduced the sum to 10,000, and
that amount was worn down on the way by passing through so many
hands. Pompeii fell back, gradually presenting nothing but ruins upon
ruins.
Happily, the Italian Government established by the revolution of 1860,
came into power to set all these acts of negligence and roguery to rights.
Signor Fiorelli, who is all intelligence and activity, not to mention his
erudition, which numerous writings prove, was appointed inspector of
the excavations. Under his administration, the works which had been
vigorously resumed were pushed on by as many as seven hundred
laborers at a time, and they dug out in the lapse of three years more
treasures than had been brought to light in the thirty that preceded them.
Everything has been reformed, nay, moralised, as it were, in the dead
city; the visitor pays two francs at the gate and no longer has to contend
with the horde of guides, doorkeepers, rapscallions, and beggars who

formerly plundered him. A small museum, recently established,
furnishes the active inquirer the opportunity of examining upon the spot
the curiosities that have already been discovered; a library containing
the fine works of Mazois, of Raoul Rochette, of Gell, of Zahn, of
Overbeck, of Breton, etc., on Pompeii, enables the student to consult
them in Pompeii itself; workshops lately opened are continually busy in
restoring cracked walls, marbles, and bronzes, and one may there
surprise the artist Bramante, the most ingenious hand at repairing
antiquities in the world, as likewise my friend, Padiglione, who, with
admirable patience and minute fidelity, is cutting a small model in cork
of the ruins that have been cleared, which is scrupulously exact. In
fine--and this is the main point--the excavations are no longer carried
on occasionally only, and in the presence of a few privileged persons,
but before the first comer and every day, unless funds have run short.
"I have frequently been present," wrote a half-Pompeian, a year or two
ago, in the _Revue des Deux Mondes_--"I have frequently been present
for hours together, seated on a sand-bank which itself, perhaps,
concealed wonders, and witnessed this rude yet interesting toil, from
which I could not withdraw my gaze. I therefore have it in my power to
write understandingly. I do not relate what I read, but what I saw. Three
systems, to my knowledge, have been employed in these excavations.
The first, inaugurated under Charles III., was the simplest. It consisted
in hollowing out the soil, in extricating the precious objects found, and
then in re-filling the orifice--an excellent method of forming a museum
by destroying Pompeii. This method was abandoned so soon as it was
discovered that a whole city was involved. The second system, which
was gradually brought to perfection in the last century, was earnestly
pursued under Murat. The work was started in many places at once, and
the laborers, advancing one after the other, penetrating and cutting the
hill,