M’imbarcai su di un vaporetto; era elegante, era vasto, ma il suo
contenuto era enormemente superiore al contenente; il vaporetto
rigurgitava di uomini, di donne, e di ragazzi.
Il commandante, un fiero giovanotto, gridava: Montate! Montate! e
la calca si faceva sempre più fitta, ed appena si poteva respirare.
Tutto ad un tratto un sensale di piazza si sentì venir male, e
gridò; io soffoco! Il commandante si accorse che si soffocava
davvero, ed ordino; basta!
Il vapore allora si avv ò (sic) ed io rimasi stipato fra la folla
per diciotto minuti, in capo ai quali ebbi la buona ventura di
sbarcare incolume sul pontile dello stabilimento la Favorita—Il
pontile è lunghissimo, ma elegante e coperto. Il sole per
conseguenza non dà nessuna noia.
Una strada che, fino a quando non sia migliorata, non consiglierei
di percorrere a chi non abbia i piedi in perfetto stato, conduce al
parco della Stabilimento Bagni del signor Delahant.—E qui i miei
occhi si aprirono per la meraviglia. E diffati, solo una
rispettibile forza di volontà ed operosita poté riuscire a
trasformare quel luogo, pochi mesi fa ancora deserto ed incolto, in
un sito di delisie.—Lunghi viali, tappeti erbosi, montagnole,
banchine, châlet, strade solitarie e misteriose, lumi, spalti, e
poi un interminabile pergolato che conduce allo stabilimento bagni,
ed in questo inservienti vestiti alla marinara, comodissima vasca,
biancheria finissima, e servizio regolare e premuroso.
Sorpreso e contento, mi tuffo allegramente nel mare.
Dopo il bagno è prescritta una passeggiata. Ossequiente ai dettami
dell’ igiene, riprendo la via e lungo la piacevole spiaggia del
mare ritorno alla Favorita.
Un châlet, o piuttosto una sala immensa, addobbata con origi nalità
e ricchezza, è divenuta una sala di concerto. Diffatti una
eccellente orchestra sta eseguendo pezzi sceltissimi.
Gli artisti indossana tutti la marsina e la cravatta bianca.
Ascolto con delizia un potpourri del Faust e poi torno a girare per
il vastissimo parco e visito il Restaurant.
Concludeno, il Lido non ha più bisogno di diventare un luogo di
delizie; esse lo è in verità diggià diventato, e fra breve i comodi
bagni del Lido di Venezia saranno fra i più famosi d’Italia.
Onore ai bravi che hanno operata la meravigliosa trasformazione!
‘Ii Rinnovamento,’ Gazetta del Popolo di Venezia; (2nd July, 1872).
This following part of a useful letter, dated 19th March, 1873, ought
to have been printed before now:—
“Sir,—Will you permit me to respectfully call your attention to a
certain circumstance which has, not unlikely, something to do with the
failure (if failure it is) of your appeal for the St. George’s Fund?
“At page 22 of Fors Clavigera for May, 1871, your words were, ‘Will any
such give a tenth of what they have and of what they earn?’ But in May
of the following year, at page 8, the subject is referred to as the
giving of ‘the tenth of what they have, or make.’ The two passages are
open to widely differing interpretations. Moreover, none of the sums
received appear to have any relation to ‘tenths’ either of earnings or
possessions.
“It is not probable that the majority of your readers understood you
either to mean literally what you said, or to mean nothing but jest?
They would naturally ask themselves, ‘Must it be a tenth of both, or
nothing?’ ‘A tenth of either?’ Or, ‘After all, only what we feel able
to give?’ Their perplexity would lead to the giving of nothing. As
nobody who has a pecuniary title to ask for an explanation appears to
have called your attention to the subject, I, who have no such title,
do so now,—feeling impelled thereto by the hint in this month’s ‘Fors’
of the possible ‘non-continuance of the work.’
“May I presume to add one word more? Last Monday’s ‘Times’ (March 17th)
gave a report of a Working Men’s Meeting on the present political
crisis. One of the speakers said ‘he wanted every working man to be
free.’ And his idea of freedom he explained to be that all workmen
should be at liberty ‘to leave their work at a moment’s notice.’ This,
as I have reason to know, is one of the things which working men have
got into their heads, and which the newspapers ‘get their living by
asserting.’
“Lastly, the present English notion of civilizing China by inches, may
be worth keeping record of.
“We have Philistines out here, and a Philistine out here is a perfect
Goliath. When he imagines that anything is wrong, he says—let it be a
Coolie or an Emperor—‘Give him a thrashing.’ The men of this class here
propose their usual remedy: ‘Let us have a war, and give the Chinese a
good licking, and then we shall have the audience question granted, and
everything else will follow.’ This includes opening up the country for
trade, and civilizing the people, which according to their theories can
be best done by ‘thrashing them.’ The missionaries are working to
civilize the people here in another way, that is by the usual plan of
tracts and preaching; but their system is not much in favour, for they
make such very small progress among the 360,000,000, the conversion of
which is their problem. The man of business wants the country opened up
to trade, wants manufactures introduced, the mineral wealth to be used,
and generally speaking the resources of the country to be developed,
‘and that sort of thing you know—that’s the real way to civilize them.’
This, of course, implies a multitudinous breed of Mr. Ruskin’s demons,
or machinery, to accomplish all this. I am here giving the tone of the
ideas I hear expressed around me. It was only the other day that I
heard some of these various points talked over. We were sailing on the
river in a steam launch, which was making the air impure with its
smoke, snorting in a high-pressure way, and whistling as steam launches
are wont to do. The scene was appropriate to the conversation, for we
were among a forest of great junks—most quaint and picturesque they
looked—so old-fashioned they seemed, that Noah’s Ark, had it been
there, would have had a much more modern look about it. My friend, to
whom the launch belonged, and who is in the machinery line himself,
gave his opinion. He began by giving a significant movement of his head
in the direction of the uncouth-looking junks, and then pointing to his
own craft with its engine, said ‘he did not believe much in war, and
the missionaries were not of much account. This is the thing to do it,’
he added, pointing to the launch; ‘let us get at them with this sort of
article, and steam at sixty pounds on the square inch; that would soon
do it; that’s the thing to civilize them—sixty pounds on the square
inch.’”