Pompeii was originally situated close to the sea, although, owing to the gradual elevation of the land, it is now at some distance inland. Shells and sea-sand have been found by digging on the side adjoining the coast; and it is even said that rings have been found close to the ruins, intended, as is supposed, for the mooring of vessels. The authority of Strabo has been quoted to confirm this, but his words go at least equally to prove that the trade of the place was carried on by the river Sarnus, which ran past the city. If so, this stream has shrunk among the other physical changes which have occurred in the country ; for it now is nothing more than a rivulet, entirely unsuited to any purposes of trade, which runs at some distance from its ancient course, and falls into the sea between Pompeii and Stabiae. From the position of the town and the discoveries made by the excavators, it is clear that only three principal roads could have led to it. The first, which was on the western side, led to Naples along the coast through Oplontis, Retina, and Herculaneum; the second joined the Popilian way at Nola; and the third crossed the Sarnus, and afterwards divided into two branches, of which the principal led to Nocera, and the other to Stable.

The city stood on an insulated spot formed by lava which seems to have burst from the ground in that place, as in others around the foot of Vesuvius; for this country has been affected by subterranean fires from the remotest antiquity. Thus situated, it appeared to possess all local advantages that the most refined taste could desire. Upon the verge of the sea, at the entrance of a fertile plain, on the bank of a navigable river, it united the conveniences of a commercial town with the security of a military station, and the romantic beauty of a spot celebrated in all ages for its pre-eminent loveliness. Its environs, even to the heights of Vesuvius, were covered with villas, and the coast all the way to Naples was so ornamented with gardens and villages, that the shores of the whole gulf appeared as one city; while the prodigious concourse of strangers who came here in search of health and recreation, added new charms and life to the scene. But these advantages were dearly purchased. An enemy, at that time unknown, was silently working its destruction : an enemy which from time to time still desolates the modern towns which stand upon the buried and longforgotten cities of antiquity.

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