harbour used mainly for the coal trade, and piers such that the largest liner can lie alongside the jetty. The outer mole of this harbour runs out from the Castel del Carmine towards the south for some 1500 ft. and forms the inner side of the new steam basin, which when nearly completed in 1906 fell in on the farther side, and had to be reconstructed. The depth of this new harbour is from 25 to 30 ft. There are two projecting moles, one to the inner harbour and the second to the steam basin. In 1905 the total tonnage entering the port amounted to 4,698,872 tons, of which the Italians (including their coasting trade) carried 1,410,192 tons in 3687 vessels; the Germans 1,391,585 tons in 356 vessels; the British 1,136,345 tons in 402 vessels; and the French 245,206 tons in 161 vessels. Naples is the principal port for emigration, chiefly to North and South America; 281 emigrant ships sailed in 1905, carrying 216,103 emigrants. The total imports for that year reached the sum of £5,397,918, and the exports £3,367,805. The articles dealt in are wine, oil spirits, drugs, tobacco, chemicals, hemp, cotton, wool, silk, timber, per, leather and hides, metal, glass, cereals and live animals. The largest export was to the United States (£864,562), the next to Great Britain (£701,387), while the largest imports were from Great Britain (£1,233,410) and the United States (£807,564). The specialities of Naples are the manufacture of coral, tortoise-shell, kid gloves and macaroni, but it has been growing also as an industrial centre. The port of Naples is second in the kingdom, and owns no rival save Genoa.
Water Supply.—Since 1884 Naples has had as fine a water supply as any city in Europe. It is derived from the hills in the neighbourhood of Avellino, and is thought to be the effluent of an underground lake. It rushes out from the hillside and is received in a covered masonry canal, whence it flows in large iron pipes till it reaches five enormous reservoirs constructed just opposite to the entrance gates of the royal palace at Capodimonte. Hence it comes by natural gravitation into the town at a pressure of five atmospheres, so that it supplies the highest parts of the town with abundant water. The water is so cold that in the hottest summer perishable articles can be preserved by merely securing them in a closed vessel and allowing the water to drip upon it. The supply was brought into the town just after the terrible cholera outbreak of 1884, and as each new standpipe was erected in the streets every well within 200 yds. of it was closed, so that in a short time no well remained in the town; and thus a fertile source of infection was eliminated. Every house in the town and suburbs is now supplied with a constant supply of pure water. The effect on the health of the city has been extraordinary. Cholera epidemics, which used to be frequent, have become things of the past, and there is now abundant water for public fountains, washing the streets and watering gardens both public and private. The old sewers were found quite inadequate to carry off the large increase of water, and besides they all led directly into the bay, causing a terrible odour and rendering the water near the town unwholesome for bathing. This has been remedied by a system of sewers, which after passing by a tunnel through the hill of Posilipo cross the plain beyond and discharge their contents into the open sea on the deserted coast of Cumae, 17 m. from the city of Naples. The old aqueduct, which was constructed in the 17th century by Carnignano and Criminelli and taps the Isclero at Sant’ Agata dei Goti, is still available to a certain extent, but its water was never very wholesome, and as it was not laid on to houses but only supplied fountains and house cisterns which have since been filled up, no account need be taken of it. The solitary Leone fountain, a spring which supplied drinking water to the west end of the town, has been dry for many years.
Modern Growth.—Naples, the most densely peopled city in Europe, has increased in modern times at an enormous rate. On the large areas reclaimed from the sea, vast hotels and mansions let in flats have been erected. The gardens at the west end of the town are all built over. The Vomero, once merely a scattered village, is now an important suburb, and a large workmen’s quarter has sprung up beyond the railway station to house the populace which was turned out from the centre of the town when the works of the risanamento were undertaken. The increase in population between the census of 1881, when it was 461,962, and the census in 1901 was 85,521. The commune, which includes not only the urban districts (sezioni) of San Ferdinando, Chiaja, S. Giuseppe, Monte Calvario, Avvocata, Stella, San Carlo all’ Arena, Vicaria, San Lorenzo, Mercato, Pendino and Porto, but also the suburban districts of Vomero, Posilipo, Fuorigrotta, Miano and Piscinola, has been built over in every direction, one great incentive being the creation of an industrial zone to the eastward of the city. This zone has been set aside for the purpose of industrial development, and all persons or companies who set up industrial concerns on it have grants of land at a nominal price, are free of taxes for ten years and have electric force supplied to them at a very low figure. The law came into force in 1906, and was immediately followed by the erection of a large number of factories, for spinning silk, cotton, jute and wool, and the making of railway plant, automobiles, the building of ships, and in fact almost every kind of industry. After the cholera epidemic of 1884, M. Depretis, then premier, visited Naples, and in the course of a public speech gave vent to the famous dictum “Bisogna sventrare Napoli”—“Naples must be disembowelled!” Plans were at once made to pull down all the worst slums, and as these lay between the centre of the town and the railway station, a. wide street was constructed from the centre of the town to the eastward, and on each side of it wide strips of ground were cleared to afford building sites for shops and offices. The funds for this vast undertaking were found partly by the state, which voted £3,000,000, and as to the rest by the Risanamento Company, which had a capital of £1,200,000. Before beginning operations of demolition it was obviously necessary to provide homes for the poor people who would be turned out, and a large working-class quarter was erected to the north and beyond the railway station. This quarter has wide airy streets and lofty houses, and though perhaps the houses were let at prices which were beyond the purses of the lowest class, the result of their erection was to cause a number of the poorer houses in the old town to be vacated, thus giving an opportunity to the lowest class to be at any rate better housed than they were before. The quarter described above is known as the Rione Vasto. There are also new middle-class quarters at Santa Lucia, Vomero Nuovo and Sant' Efremo, and better houses in the Via Sirignano, on the Riviera di Chiaja, Via Elena and Via Caracciolo at Mergellina, Via Partenope near the Chiatamone, and an aristocratic quarter in the large extensions made in the Rione Amedeo. The narrow alleys of Porto, Pendino and Mercato have nearly all disappeared, and old Naples has been vanishing day by day. One notable result of the widening of the streets has been the spread of the electric tramways, which traverse the town in various directions and are admirably served by a Belgian company. The city is mainly lighted by electricity, which has also found its way into all the public edifices and most private houses.
Folk-lore.—The attention of antiquarians to the charms against the Evil Eye used by the inhabitants of the Neapolitan provinces was first drawn in 1888, when it was shown that they were all derived from the survival of ancient classical legends which had sprung from various sources in connexion with classical sites in the neighbourhood. These may be divided into three classes: first, the sprig of rue in silver, with sundry emblems attached to it, all of which refer to the worship of Diana, whose shrine at Capua was of considerable importance; secondly, the serpent charms, which formed part of the worship of Aesculapius, and were no doubt derived largely from the ancient eastern ophiolatry; and lastly charms derived from the legends of the Sirens. A special confirmation is given in this case, as the Siren is represented mounted on her sea-horse crossing the Styx upon the vase of Pluto and Proserpine in the collection of the Naples Museum. This vase dates about 250 B.C., and the Siren charms represent her in the same way, but usually mounted on two sea-horses. The sea-horse and the Siren alone are commonly found as charms; the Siren being sometimes in her fishtail form and sometimes in the form of a harpy.
History.—All ancient writers agree in representing Naples as a Greek settlement, though its foundation is obscurely and differently narrated. The earliest Greek settlement in the neighbourhood was at Pithecusa (Ischia), but the colonists, being driven out of the island by the frequent earthquakes, settled on the mainland at Cumae, where they found a natural acropolis of great strategic value. From Cumae they colonized Dikearchia (Pozzuoli) and probably subsequently Palaeopolis. The site of Palaeopolis has given rise to much discussion, but the researches by R. T. Günther open completely new ground, and seem to be the correct solution of the problem. He places Palaeopolis at Gaiola Point and has discovered the remains of the harbour, the town hall and various other rudiments of the ancient city. This site, moreover, corresponds with Livy’s testimony, and would account for his statement that the towns of Palaeopolis and Neapolis were near together. and identical in language and government. This opinion about the site of Palaeopolis has been based on the very considerable alterations which are known to have taken place in the level of the land, and the
