Every one knows what kind of summer we had in Naples in 1884.

The newspapers of all lands teemed with the story of its horrors.

The cholera walked abroad like a destroying demon; under its withering touch scores of people, young and old, dropped down in the streets to die.

The fell disease, born of dirt and criminal neglect of sanitary precautions, gained on the city with awful rapidity, and worse even than the plague was the unreasoning but universal panic.

The never-to-be-forgotten heroism of King Humbert had its effect on the more educated classes, but among the low Neapolitan populace, abject fear, vulgar superstition, and utter selfishness reigned supreme.