Fiction · 1834
The Last Days of Pompeii
Pompeii in the summer of AD 79: the Athenian Glaucus loves Ione; the Egyptian priest Arbaces, who is Ione's guardian and has other plans for her, works to separate them through a love philtre, a murdered kinsman and a false charge; and the blind flower-girl Nydia, a slave who loves Glaucus without hope, moves through it all with the one advantage that blindness confers when the ash comes down and the city goes dark at midday.
Edward Bulwer-Lytton published the novel in 1834, after visiting the excavations and seeing Karl Bryullov's painting of the eruption in Milan. He built the book on the dig itself, fitting his characters into houses, streets and inscriptions that had actually been uncovered, which is why it fixed the popular picture of a Roman town for a century.
This Bibliomancer edition presents the complete text in its five books.
Contents
- Book the First
- Chapter I — The Two Gentlemen of Pompeii
- Chapter II — The Blind Flower-Girl, and the Beauty of Fashion. The Athenian’s Confession. The Reader’s Introduction to Arbaces of Egypt
- The Blind Flower-Girl’s Song
- Chapter III — Parentage of Glaucus. Description of the Houses of Pompeii. Classic Revel
- Chapter IV — The Temple of Isis. Its Priest. The Character of Arbaces Develops Itself
- Chapter V — More of the Flower-Girl. The Progress of Love
- Chapter VI — The Fowler Snares Again the Bird That Had Just Escaped, and Sets His Nets for a New Victim
- Chapter VII — The Gay Life of the Pompeian Lounger. A Miniature Likeness of the Roman Baths
- Chapter VIII — Arbaces Cogs His Dice with Pleasure and Wins the Game
- Book the Second
- Chapter I — A Flash House in Pompeii, and the Gentlemen of the Classic Ring
- Chapter II — Two Worthies
- Chapter III — Glaucus Makes a Purchase That Afterwards Costs Him Dear
- Chapter IV — The Rival of Glaucus Presses Onward in the Race
- Chapter V — The Poor Tortoise. New Changes for Nydia
- Chapter VI — The Happy Beauty and the Blind Slave
- Chapter VII — Ione Entrapped. The Mouse Tries to Gnaw the Net
- Chapter VIII — The Solitude and Soliloquy of the Egyptian. His Character Analysed
- Chapter IX — What Becomes of Ione in the House of Arbaces. The First Signal of the Wrath of the Dread Foe
- Book the Third
- Chapter I — The Forum of the Pompeians. The First Rude Machinery by Which the New Era of the World Was Wrought
- Chapter II — The Noonday Excursion on the Campanian Seas
- The Song of Glaucus
- Chapter I
- Chapter II
- Chapter III — The Congregation
- Chapter IV — The Stream of Love Runs On. Whither?
- Chapter V — Nydia Encounters Julia. Interview of the Heathen Sister and Converted Brother. An Athenian’s Notion of Christianity
- Chapter VI — The Porter. The Girl. And the Gladiator
- Chapter VII — The Dressing-Room of a Pompeian Beauty. Important Conversation Between Julia and Nydia
- Chapter VIII — Julia Seeks Arbaces. The Result of That Interview
- Chapter IX — Storm in the South. The Witch’s Cavern
- Chapter X — The Lord of the Burning Belt and His Minion. Fate Writes Her Prophecy in Red Letters, but Who Shall Read Them?
- Chapter XI — Progress of Events. The Plot Thickens. The Web Is Woven, but the Net Changes Hands
- Book the Fourth
- Chapter I — Reflections on the Zeal of the Early Christians. Two Men Come to a Perilous Resolve. Walls Have Ears, Particularly Sacred Walls
- Chapter II — A Classic Host, Cook, and Kitchen. Apaecides Seeks Ione. Their Conversation
- Chapter III — A Fashionable Party and a Dinner a la Mode in Pompeii
- Chapter IV — The Story Halts for a Moment at an Episode
- Chapter V — The Philtre. Its Effect
- Chapter VI — A Reunion of Different Actors. Streams That Flowed Apparently Apart Rush Into One Gulf
- Chapter VII — In Which the Reader Learns the Condition of Glaucus. Friendship Tested. Enmity Softened. Love the Same, Because the One Loving Is Blind
- Chapter VIII — A Classic Funeral
- Hymn to the Wind
- Salve Eternum
- Chapter IX — In Which an Adventure Happens to Ione
- Chapter X — What Becomes of Nydia in the House of Arbaces. The Egyptian Feels Compassion for Glaucus. Compassion Is Often a Very Useless Visitor to the Guilty
- Chapter XI — Nydia Affects the Sorceress
- Chapter XII — A Wasp Ventures Into the Spider’s Web
- Chapter XIII
- Invocation to the Spectre of the Air
- Chapter XIV — Nydia Accosts Calenus
- Chapter XV — Arbaces and Ione. Nydia Gains the Garden. Will She Escape and Save the Athenian?
- Chapter XVI — The Sorrow of Boon Companions for Our Afflictions. The Dungeon and Its Victims
- Chapter XVII — A Chance for Glaucus
- Book the Fifth
- Chapter I — The Dream of Arbaces. A Visitor and a Warning to the Egyptian
- Chapter II — The Amphitheatre
- Chapter III — Sallust and Nydia’s Letter
- Chapter IV — The Amphitheatre Once More
- Chapter V — The Cell of the Prisoner and the Den of the Dead. Grief Unconscious of Horror
- Chapter VI — Calenus and Burbo. Diomed and Clodius. The Girl of the Amphitheatre and Julia
- Chapter VII — The Progress of the Destruction
- Chapter VIII — Arbaces Encounters Glaucus and Ione
- Chapter IX — The Despair of the Lovers. The Condition of the Multitude
- Chapter X — The Next Morning. The Fate of Nydia
- Chapter the Last
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About this edition
The text is free of copyright. This edition was prepared from an authoritative digitisation, processed by Bibliomancer under its own review protocol; every automated correction is recorded in its transformation log. Rights assessed for CA, EU, GB, US.
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