The _Lazaroni_ who has his child run over by the coach of a man of
quality, has a regular claim upon him for no less than twelve _carlines_
(about five shillings English); if it is his wife that meets with
the accident, he gets two _ducats_, live or die; and for the master
of the family (house he has none) three is the regular compensation;
and no words pass here about _trifles_. Truth is, human life is lower
rated in all parts of Italy than with us; they think nothing of an
individual, but see him perish (excepting by the hand of justice) as a
cat or dog. A young man fell from our carriage at Milan one evening;
he was not a servant of ours, but a friend which, after we were gone
home, the coachman had picked up to go with him to the fireworks which
were exhibited that night near the _Corso_: there was a crowd and an
_embarras_, and the fellow tumbled off and died upon the spot, and nobody
even spoke, or I believe _thought_ about the matter, except one woman,
who supposed that he had neglected to cross himself when he got up behind.
The works of art here at Naples are neither very numerous nor very
excellent: I have seen the vaunted present of porcelain intended for
the king of England, in return for some cannon presented by him to this
court; and think it more entertaining in its design than admirable as a
manufacture. Every dish and plate, however, being the portrait as one may
say of some famous Etruscan vase, or other antique, dug out of the ruins
of these newly-discovered cities, with an account of its supposed story
engraved neatly round the figure, makes it interesting and elegant, and
worthy enough of one prince to accept, and another to bestow.
There is a work of art, however, peculiar to this city, and attempted
in no other; on which surprising sums of money are lavished by many of
the inhabitants, who connect or associate to this amusement ideas of
piety and devotion: the thing when finished is called a _presepio_, and
is composed in honour of this sacred season, after which all is taken to
pieces, and arranged after a different manner next year. In many houses
a room, in some a whole suite of apartments, in others the terrace upon
the house-top, is dedicated to this very uncommon show; consisting of
a miniature representation in sycamore wood, properly coloured, of the
house at Bethlehem, with the blessed Virgin, St. Joseph, and our Saviour
in the manger, with attendant angels, &c. as in pictures of the nativity;
the figures are about six inches high, and dressed with the most exact
propriety. This however, though the principal thing intended to attract
spectators’ notice, is kept back, so that sometimes I scarcely saw it
at all; while a general and excellent landscape, with figures of men at
work, women dressing dinner, a long road in real gravel, with rocks,
hills, rivers, cattle, camels, every thing that can be imagined, fill
the other rooms, so happily disposed too for the most part, the light
introduced so artfully, the perspective kept so surprisingly!--one
wonders and cries out, it is certainly but a baby-house at best; yet
managed by people whose heads naturally turned towards architecture and
design, give them power thus to defy a traveller not to feel delighted
with the general effect; while if every single figure is not capitally
executed, and nicely expressed beside, the proprietor is truly miserable,
and will cut a new cow, or vary the horse’s attitude, against next
Christmas _coûte qui coûte_: and perhaps I should not have said so
much about the matter, if there had not been shewn me within this last
week, _presepios_ which have cost their possessors fifteen hundred or
two thousand English pounds; and, rather than relinquish or sell them,
many families have gone to ruin: I have wrote the sums down in letters,
not figures, for fear of the possibility of a mistake. One of these
playthings had the journey of the three kings represented in it, and the
presents were all of real gold and silver finely worked; nothing could be
better or more livelily finished.--“But, Sir,” said I, “why do you dress
up one of the Wise Men with a turban and _crescent_, six hundred years
before the birth of Mahomet, who first put that mark in the forehead of
his followers? The eastern Magi were not _Turks_; this is a breach of
_costume_.” My gentleman paused, and thanked me; said he would enquire if
there was nothing heretical in the objection; and if all was right, it
should be changed next year without fail.
A young lady here of English parents, just ten years old, asked me,
very pertinently, “Why this pretty sight was called a _Presepio_?” but
said she suddenly, answering herself, “I suppose it is because it is
_preceptive_:” such a mistake was more valuable than knowledge, and gave
me great esteem of her understanding; the little girl’s name was Zaffory.
The King’s _menagerie_ is neither rich in animals, nor particularly well
kept: I wonder a man of his character and disposition should not delight
in possessing a very fine one. The bears however were as tame as lapdogs;
there was a wolf too, larger than ever I saw a wolf, and an elephant that
played a hundred tricks at the command of his keeper, little less a
beast than he; but as Pope says, after Horace,
Let bear or elephant be e’er so white,
The people sure, the people are the sight.
Let us then tell about the two assemblies, _o sia conversazioni_, where
one goes in search of amusement as to the rooms of Bath or Tunbridge
exactly; only that one of these places is devoted to the _nobiltà_, the
other is called _de’ buoni amici_; and such is the state of subordination
in this country, that though the great people may come among the little
ones, and be sure of the grossest adulation, a merchant’s wife, shining
in diamonds, being obliged to stand up reverentially before the chair of
a countess, who does her the honour to speak to her; the poor _amici_ are
totally excluded from the subscription of the nobles, nor dare even to
return the salutation of a superior, should a good-natured person of that
rank be tempted, from frequently seeing them at the rooms, to give them a
kind nod in the street or elsewhere. All this seems comical enough to us,
and I had much ado to look grave, while a beautiful and well-educated
wife of a rich banker here, confessed herself not fit company for an
ignorant mean-looking woman of quality. But though such unintelligible
doctrines make one for a moment ashamed both of one’s sex and species,
that lady’s knowledge of various languages, her numerous accomplishments
in a thousand methods of passing time away with innocent elegance, and a
sort of studied address never observed in Italy before, gave me infinite
delight in her society, and daily increased my suspicion that she was a
foreigner, till nearer intimacy discovered her a German Lutheran, with
a singular head of thick blonde hair, so unlike those I see around me.
We grew daily better acquainted, and she shewed me--but not indignantly
at all--some ladies from the higher assembly sitting among _these_, very
low dressed indeed, a knotting-bag and counters in their lap, to shew
their contempt of the company; while such as spoke to them stood before
their seat, like children before a governess in England, as long as the
conversation lasted.
I inquired if the men confined their addresses wholly to their own rank?
She said, beauty often broke the barrier, and when a pretty woman of the
second rank got a _cavalier servente_ of the first, much happiness and
much distinction was the consequence: but alas! he will not even _try_ to
push her up among the people of fashion, and when he meets any is sure to
look ashamed of his mistress; so that her felicity can consist only in
triumphing over equals, for to rival a superior is here an impossibility.
Our Duke and Dutchess of Cumberland have made all Naples adore them
though, by going richly dressed, and behaving with infinite courtesy and
good-humour, at an assembly or ball given in the _lower rooms_, as the
English comically call them. A young Palermitan prince applauded them for
it exceedingly; so I took the liberty to express my wonder. “Oh,” replied
he, “we are not ignorant how much English manners differ from our own: I
have already, though but just eighteen years old, as sovereign of my own
state, under the King of both Sicilies, condemned a man to death _because
he was a rascal_, but the law and the people govern in England I know.”
My desire of hearing about Sicily, which we could not contrive to visit,
made me happy to cultivate Prince Ventimiglia’s acquaintance; he was
very studious, very learned of his age, and uncommonly clever: told me of
the antiquities his island had to boast, with great intelligence, and a
surprising knowledge of ancient history.
We wished to have made a party to go in the same company to Pæstum, but
my cowardice kept me at home, so bad was the account of the roads and
accommodation; though Abate Bianconi of Milan, for whom I have so much
esteem, bid me remember to look at the buildings there attentively;
adding, that they were better worth our observation than all the boasted
antiquities at Rome; “as they had seen (said he) the original foundation
of her empire, and outlived its decay: that they had seen her second
birth too, and power under some of her pontiffs over all Europe about six
or seven centuries ago; and that they would now probably remain till all
_that_ was likewise abolished, with only slight traces left behind to
shew that _fuimus_, &c.”
How mortifying it is to go home and never see this Pæstum! Prince
Ventimiglia went there with Mr. Cox; he professes his intention soon
to visit England, concerning the manners and customs of which he is
very inquisitive, and not ill-versed in the language; but books drop
oddly into people’s hands: This gentleman commended Ambrose Philips’s
Pastorals, and I remember the Florentines seemed strangely impressed
with the merit of the other Philips as a poet. Bonducci has translated
his Cyder, and calls him _emulous of Milton_, in good time! but it is
difficult to distinguish jest from earnest in a foreign language.
I will not, if I can help it, lose sight of our Sicilian however,
till I have made him tell me something about Dionysius’s Ear, about
the eruptions of Ætna, and the _Castagno a cento cavalli_, which, he
protests, is not magnified by Brydone.
It is wonderfully mortifying to think how little information after all
can be obtained of any thing new or any thing strange, though so far from
one’s own country. What I picked up most curious and diverting from our
conversation, was his expression of surprise, when at our house one day
he read a letter from his mother, telling him that such a lady, naming
her, remained still unmarried, and even unbetrothed, though now past
ten years old. “She will,” said I, “perhaps break through old customs,
and chuse for herself, as she is an orphan, and has no one whom she need
consult.”--“Impossible, Madam!” was the reply.--“But tell me, Prince,
for information’s sake, if such a lady, this girl for example, should
venture to assert the rights of humanity, and make a choice somewhat
unusual, _what would come of it?_”--“Why nothing in the world would come
of it,” answered he; “the lass would be immediately at liberty again, for
no man so circumstanced could be permitted to leave the country _alive_
you know, nor would her folly benefit his family at all, as her estate
would be immediately adjudged to the next heir. No person of inferior
rank in our country would therefore, unless absolutely mad, set his life
to hazard for the sake of a frolic, the event of which is so well known
beforehand;--less still, because, if _love_ be in the case, all _personal
attachment_ may be fully gratified, only let her but be once legally
married to a man every way her equal.” Could one help recollecting
Fielding’s song in the Virgin unmasked? who says,
For now I’ve found out that as Michaelmas day
Is still the forerunner of Lammas;
So wedding another is just the right way
To get at my dear Mr. Thomas.
I will mention another talk I had with a Sicilian lady. We met at the
house of the Swedish minister, Monsieur André, uncle to the lamented
officer who perished in our sovereign’s service in America; and while
the rest of the company were entertaining themselves with cards and
music, I began laughing in myself at hearing the gentleman and lady
who sat next _me_, called by others _Don Raphael_ and _Donna Camilla_,
because those two names bring Gil Blas into one’s head. Their agreeable
and interesting conversation however soon gave my mind a more serious
turn when discoursing on the liberal premiums now offered by the King of
Naples to those who are willing to rebuild and repeople Messina. Donna
Camilla politely introduced me to a very sick but pleasing-looking lady,
who she said was going to return thither: at which _she_, starting,
cried, “Oh God forbid, my dear friend!” in an accent that made me think
she had already suffered something from the concussions that overwhelmed
that city in the year 1783. Her inviting manner, her soft and interesting
eyes, whose languid glances seemed to shew beauty sunk in sorrow, and
spirit oppressed by calamity, engaged my utmost attention, while Don
Raphael pressed her to indulge the foreigner’s curiosity with some
particulars of the distresses she had shared. Her own feelings were all
she could relate she said--and those confusedly. “You see that girl
there,” pointing to a child about seven or eight years old, who stood
listening to the harpsichord: “she escaped! I cannot, for my soul, guess
how, for we were not together at the time.”--“Where were _you_, madam,
at the moment of the fatal accident?”--“Who? _me_?” and her eyes lighted
up with recollected terror: “I was in the nursery with my maid, employed
in taking stains out of some Brussels lace upon a brazier; two babies,
neither of them four years old, playing in the room. The eldest boy,
dear lad! had just left us, and was in his father’s country-house. The
day grew _so_ dark all on a sudden, and the brazier--Oh, Lord Jesus! I
felt the brazier slide from me, and saw it run down the long room on its
three legs. The maid screamed, and I shut my eyes and knelt at a chair.
We thought all over; but my husband came, and snatching me up, cried,
_run, run_.--I know not how nor where, but all amongst falling houses
it was, and people shrieked so, and there was _such_ a noise! My poor
son! he was fifteen years old; he tried to hold me fast in the crowd. I
remember kissing _him_: Dear lad, dear lad! I said. I could speak _just
then_: but the throng at the gate! Oh that gate! Thousands at once! ay,
thousands! thousands at once: and my poor old confessor too! I knew him:
I threw my arms about his aged neck. _Padre mio!_ said I--_Padre mio!_
Down he dropt, a great stone struck his shoulder; I saw it coming, and
my boy pulled me: he saved my life, dear, dear lad! But the crash of the
gate, the screams of the people, the heat--Oh such a heat! I felt no more
on’t though; I saw no more on’t; I waked in bed, this girl by me, and her
father giving me cordials. We were on shipboard, they told me, coming
to Naples to my brother’s house here; and do you think I’ll ever go
back _there_ again? No, no; that’s a curst place; I lost my son in it.
_Never, never_ will I see it more! All my friends try to persuade me, but
the sight of it would do my business. If my poor boy were alive indeed!
but _he!_ ah, poor dear lad! he loved his mother; he held _me_ fast--No,
no, I’ll never see that place again: God has cursed it _now_; I am sure
he has.”
A narrative so melancholy, so tender, and so true, could not fail of its
effect. I ran for refuge to the harpsichord, where a lady was singing
divinely. I could not listen though: _her_ grateful sweetness who told
the dismal story, followed me thither: she had seen my ill-suppressed
tears, and followed to embrace me. The tale she had told saddened my
heart, and the news we heard returning to the Crocelle did not contribute
to lighten its weight, while an amiable young Englishman, who had long
lain ill there, was now breathing his last, far from his friends, his
country, or their customs; all easily dispensed with, perhaps derided,
during the bustle of a journey, and in the madness of superfluous
health; but sure to be sighed after, when life’s last twilight shuts in
precipitately closer and closer round a man, and leaves him only the
nearer objects to repose and dwell on.
Such was Captain ----’s situation! he had none but a foreign servant
with him. We thought it might sooth him to hear “_Can I do any thing
for you, Sir?_” in an English voice: so I sent my maid: he had no
commands he said; he could not eat the jelly she had made him; he wished
some clergyman could be found that he might speak to: such a one was
vainly enquired for, till it was discovered that ill-health had driven
Mr. Mentze to Naples, who kindly administered the last consolation a
Christian can receive; and heard the next day, when confined himself to
bed, of his countryman’s being properly thrust by the banker into the
_Buco Protestante_; so they contemptuously call a dirty garden one drives
by in this town, where not less than a hundred people, small and great,
from our island, annually resort, leaving fifty or sixty thousand pounds
behind them at a moderate computation; though if their bodies are obliged
to take _perpetual_ apartments here, no better place has been hitherto
provided for them than this kitchen ground; on which grow cabbages,
cauliflowers, &c. sold to their country folks for double price I trow,
the remaining part of the season.
Well! well! if the Neapolitans do bury Christians like dogs, they make
some singular compensations we will confess, by nursing dogs like
Christians. A very veracious man informed me yester morning, that his
poor wife was half broken-hearted at hearing such a Countess’s dog
was run over; “for,” said he, “having suckled the pretty creature
herself, she loved it like one of her children.” I bid him repeat the
circumstance, that no mistake might be made: he did so; but seeing me
look shocked, or ashamed, or something he did not like,--“Why, madam,”
said the fellow, “it is a common thing enough for ordinary men’s wives to
suckle the lapdogs of ladies of quality:” adding, that they were paid for
their milk, and he saw no harm in gratifying one’s _superiors_. As I was
disposed to see nothing _but_ harm in disputing with such a competitor,
our conference finished soon; but the fact is certain.
Indeed few things can be foolisher than to debate the propriety of
customs one is not bound to observe or comply with. If you dislike them,
the remedy is easy; turn yours and your horses heads the other way.
20th January 1786.
Here are the most excellent, the most incomparable fish I ever eat; red
mullets, large as our maycril, and of singularly high flavour; besides
the calamaro, or ink-fish, a dainty worthy of imperial luxury; almond and
even apple trees in blossom, to delight those who can be paid for coarse
manners and confined notions by the beauties of a brilliant climate. Here
are all the hedges in blow as you drive towards Pozzuoli, and a snow of
white May-flowers clustering round Virgil’s tomb. So strong was the sun’s
heat this morning, even before eleven o’clock, that I carried an umbrella
to defend me from his rays, as we sauntered about the walks, which are
spacious and elegant, laid out much in the style of St. James’s Park, but
with the sea on one side of you, the broad street, called Chiaja, on the
other. What trees are planted there however, either do not grow up so as
to afford shade, or else they cut them, and trim them about to make them
in pretty shapes forsooth, as we did in England half a century ago.
Be this as it will, the vaunted view from the castle of St. Elmo, though
much more deeply _interesting_, is in consequence of this defect less
_naturally_ pleasing than the prospect from Lomellino’s villa near Genoa,
or Lord Clifford’s park, called King’s Weston, in Somersetshire; those
two places being, in point of mere situation, possessed of beauties
hitherto unrivalled by any thing I have seen. Nor does the steady
regularity of this Mediterranean sea make me inclined to prefer it to
our more capricious or rather active channel. Sea views have at best too
little variety, and when the flux and reflux of the tide are taken away
from one, there remains only rough and smooth: whereas the hope which its
ebb and flow keep constantly renovating, serves to animate, and a little
change the course of one’s ideas, just as its swelling and sinking is of
use, to purify in some degree, and keep the whole from stagnation.
I made inquiry after the old story of Nicola Pesce, told by Kircher,
and sweetly brought back to all our memories by Goldsmith, who, as Dr.
Johnson said of him, touched nothing that he did not likewise adorn; but
I could gain no addition to what we have already heard. That there was
such a man is certain, who, though become nearly amphibious by living
constantly in the water, only coming sometimes on shore for sleep and
refreshment, suffered avarice to be his ruin, leaping voluntarily into
the Gulph of Charybdis to fetch out a gold cup thrown in thither to
tempt him--what could a gold cup have done one would wonder for Nicola
Pesce?--yet knowing the dangers of the place, he braved them all it
seems for this bright reward; and was supposed to be devoured by one of
the polypus fish, who, sticking close to the rocks, extend their arms
for prey. When I expressed my indignation that he should so perish;
“He forgot perhaps,” said one present, “to recommend himself to Santo
Gennaro.”
The castle on this hill, called the Castel St. Elmo, would be much my
comfort did I fix at Naples; for here are eight thousand soldiers
constantly kept, to secure the city from sudden insurrection; his majesty
most wisely trusting their command only to Spanish or German officers, or
some few gentlemen from the northern states of Italy, that no personal
tenderness for any in the town below may intervene, if occasion for
sudden severity should arise. We went to-day and saw their garrison,
comfortably and even elegantly kept; and I was wicked enough to rejoice
that the soldiers were never, but with the very utmost difficulty,
permitted to go among the towns-men for a moment.
To-morrow we mount the Volcano, whose present peaceful disposition has
tempted us to inspect it more nearly. Though it appears little less
than presumption thus to profane with eyes of examination the favourite
alembic of nature, while the great work of projection is carrying on;
guarded as all its secret caverns are too with every contradiction; snow
and flame! solid bodies heated into liquefaction, and rolling gently
down one of its sides; while fluids congeal and harden into ice on the
other; nothing can exceed the curiosity of its appearance, now the lava
is less rapid, and stiffens as it flows; stiffens too in ridges very
surprisingly, and gains an odd aspect, not unlike the pasteboard waves
representing sea at a theatre, but black, because this year’s eruption
has been mingled with coal. The connoisseurs here know the different
degrees, dates, and shades of lava to a perfection that amazes one;
and Sir William Hamilton’s courage, learning, and perfect skill in
these matters, is more people’s theme here than the Volcano itself.
Bartolomeo, the Cyclop of Vesuvius as he is called, studies its effects
and operations too with much attention and philosophical exactness,
relating the adventures he has had with our minister on the mountain to
every Englishman that goes up, with great success. The way one climbs is
by tying a broad sash with long ends round this Bartolomeo, letting him
walk before one, and holding it fast. As far as the Hermitage there is
no great difficulty, and to that place some chuse to ride an ass, but I
thought walking safer; and there you are sure of welcome and refreshment
from the poor good old man, who sets up a little cross wherever the fire
has stopt near his cell; shews you the place with a sort of polite
solemnity that impresses, spreads his scanty provisions before you
kindly, and tells the past and present state of the eruption accurately,
inviting you to partake of
His rushy couch, his frugal fare,
His blessing and repose.