its gray castle, perched high on the cliff that rises sheer from the
shore, was spared. Scylla, the ancient village at the foot of the purple
Calabrian mountains, was not forgotten, nor Reggio, nor the white
fishing hamlets that line the tawny shores of Sicily and Calabria on
either side of the restless straits. The people of the coast were
soonest reached and soonest helped by the sailors of the passing ships,
for the navies of the world flew on the wings of love and pity to succor
the stricken ports. Never were ships watched for with such eagerness,
never were sailors greeted with such passionate rapture since Theseus
sailed back from Crete to Athens with his precious freight of Athenian
youths and maidens, saved from the dreadful Minotaur. The people who
lived in the hills and valleys of the interior suffered longest, were
last relieved; but even to them help came, for the sailors were faithful
and carried the world’s bounty to the desolate inland towns of Sicily
and Calabria. The story of their labor of love would fill an
encyclopedia. This is the story of the American relief ship “Bayern,”
that brought comfort and hope to the forlorn survivors of the great
earthquake; to tell the story clearly, we must go back to Rome where the
cruise was planned.
Saturday afternoon, January second, the Via Quattro Fontane, in the
neighborhood of the American Embassy, was crowded with carriages, cabs
and automobiles. The tall handsome porter of the Palazzo del Drago was
on duty in full dress; he wore a long broadcloth overcoat that came down
to his feet, a black cocked hat with a cockade of red, white and blue.
His mighty staff of office, a certain grand air he has, make him a
formidable personage to those who have no real business at the palace.
Once you are known to this Cerberus, he has no terrors for you; he is
gentle by nature as such big men so often are.
“Can I see the Ambassador?” I asked the porter.
“That I cannot promise, lady. He has just returned from the Quirinal;
there are many persons waiting to see him, but--” he raised his
shoulders with the Latin gesture that expresses doubt--“who knows? The
Signora can but try.” He stood back, made me a splendid bow with as fine
a flourish of his tricorne as if I had been a princess, and the way was
free. I entered the handsome _portone_, walked through the long marble
gallery, past the courtyard where the noise of the fountain sounds like
the trampling of impatient steeds, past the twin lions of giallo antico
that guard the entrance, and up the magnificent stairway leading to the
_piano nobile_, the home of the American Ambassador. At the door of the
apartment I was met by another of those prodigious serving men--the
giants of the American Embassy were the talk of Rome that winter--they
were recruited from the ex-cuirassiers of the King’s own body guard, the
glorious hundred, the shortest of whom is six feet tall.
“Her Excellency would receive me; as to his Excellency, it was just
possible. The ladies were in the dancing hall.” He waved me towards the
mirrored gallery. I paused a moment to stare about the great anticamera,
big enough to hold an ordinary embassy. At one end there is a wide
fireplace, over which, instead of armorial bearings, our Eagle spreads
its mighty sheltering wings. This splendid anticamera was in strange
confusion, crowded with packing cases, piled half-way to the ceiling
with bales of goods, boxes of clothing, boots, food, medicines, relief
supplies of all kinds. Every able-bodied American in Rome was working
_pro Sicilia e Calabria_, and the Ambassador’s home was not only the
nerve-center of the relief work but a warehouse, a base of supplies.
From the ballroom came the sound of women’s voices, the snip-snip of
shears, the click of sewing machines. Here was another transformation;
the sumptuous ballroom with the smooth polished floor had become a busy
workroom. Under the gilt chandelier stood a long table, heaped with
bales of flannel and cloth, over which leaned four or five ladies,
scissors in hand, cutting out skirts, blouses and jackets. On the
satin-covered benches sat a bevy of young women and girls, basting,
sewing, planning, and chatting as they worked.
“I have nothing left but red flannel,” said the chief cutter-out, “what
shall I do with it?”
“Petticoats and under jackets,” said the Doctor’s wife. “We must put all
the colored goods into under-clothing. The poor things beg so for black
dresses. You wouldn’t want to wear red or blue if you had lost
twenty-five members of your family, as my _profughi_ have.”
“Still we must use what material we have. Let us keep the black for our
_profughi_ here in Rome and send the colored things down there where the
need is greater and they cannot be so particular.”
The scene was typical of Rome, of Italy, of the civilized world at that
time. In every home, rich or poor, in every country, women of all
classes were sewing for those naked wretches who had escaped from the
great earthquake with nothing but their lives. In the Palace of the
Quirinal the little princesses, Jolanda and Mafalda, sat up in their
high chairs, stitching busily for the children of the stricken South.
The fury of benevolence that had driven men and women all over the world
into some action, some sacrifice, for their suffering brothers, was
being organized, had become the great driving force that should compel
some sort of order out of chaos unparalleled. When it grew too dark to
see in the ballroom the friendly giant lighted the chandelier and the
candles in the gilt sconces. As he passed me he murmured:
“If the Signora can wait till the other ladies have gone her
Excellency--“
“Of course I can wait.” I settled down to overcast the seams of a black
woolen frock.
“Do you know where one can buy handkerchiefs?” asked the chief
cutter-out. “Every shop I tried today was sold out. All Sicilians use
handkerchiefs, even the poorest; it’s one of their good points. I was at
the station this morning helping the English Committee--they meet every
train from Naples that brings ‘survivors,’ and fit out the poor things
with shoes and clothes. Some of them were half naked; one pretty girl--a
perfect Hebe--was dressed in an officer’s uniform. The poor souls cry so
one _has_ to give them one’s own handkerchief; I have hardly one left!”
“Ask the Ambassadress; she knows more about what’s left in Rome than
anybody,” said the Doctor’s wife. Then in an undertone to me: “It’s
wonderful how she takes the lead and the rest of us all fall in line;
she makes us lose sight of the woman in the Ambassadress; she’s taken
command of the scattered forces of the colony like a generalissimo;
she’s proclaimed an armistice to internecine strife. Look at those two
women, the lamb and the wolf cutting out together; it took the
earthquake and Mrs. Griscom to bring that about!”
“Time to go home,” said the chief cutter-out, as the cracked bells of
San Bernardo’s rang six. “My hands ache with the weight of these shears;
this is the best day’s work we have done.”
One by one, the ladies, colonials and transients, fashionable and
unfashionable, took their leave. When all had gone, the giant ushered me
into the yellow drawing-room, where I found her Excellency seated in a
low chair before the fire making tea. She greeted me with her flashing
smile and bade me welcome.
I asked for news of those who had gone down to the city of the dreadful
night; we had heard nothing of Major Landis, Mr. Cutting, Mr. Chanler
and the others who had gone to Messina the Thursday before.
“No news--but from home, oh, so much! It is as we all knew it would be;
we shall do our share.”
Rumor already had it that great sums of money had been cabled from
America, both to the Ambassador and to the Italian Red Cross. If that
money was to be well spent, the Ambassador’s work was cut out for him,
as hard work as even he could covet.
A few moments later Mr. Griscom came in and asked his wife for a cup of
tea. His Excellency’s dark inscrutable face showed fatigue; the veiled
fire of the eyes was nearer the surface than usual, the clear-cut lips
were compressed. As the Doctor’s wife said, it was fortunate for us that
we had these strong young people to take the lead in the American relief
work. From the first they bore the brunt gallantly; work as hard as
their helpers might, they out-stripped all others, gave with a lavish
hand, power, sympathy, wit, energy, health; in a word they gave
themselves. We turned to them as to our natural leaders in all large
and even in small questions. It had seemed to me the most natural thing
in the world that, having given away all our available cash and all the
clothes we could spare, I should go to the Embassy to beg for my
_profughi_, the family of Francesco Calabresi, the plumber from Messina.
“You have received large sums of money from home,” I said to Mr.
Griscom.
“Yes,” he looked at me steadily, ready to guard the treasure from the
most desperate assault. He listened patiently to my story of the
Calabresi family, to my plea for money to buy clothes and a cradle for
the imminent baby, and plumber’s tools to set Francesco up in business
before he should become demoralized by the dreadful Roman system of
paying so much _per capita_ every day to each family of _profughi_,
without demanding any work in return for the money. First to lose
everything they owned, then to be robbed of their habit of
self-dependence was the cruel fate of too many.
“We must help these poor people to help themselves,” said the
Ambassador, sounding the key-note of the American relief work from first
to last. Then very kindly he pointed out to me that my interest in an
individual case made me lose sight of the fact that he must deal with
the situation as a whole. The American funds must be distributed with
method and exactness; the generous help our country was sending must be
well spent; his work was to lay out the general scheme, the detail was
for others; he had appointed an American Relief Committee; they had held
their first meeting that morning.
I saw it all then in a flash, got a sense of some great plan maturing,
and took my leave, mortified enough that I should have troubled the
god-in-the-machine with a mere detail.
The next day, Sunday, was like a poem bound in blue and gold. I went up
on the terrace to gather the last chrysanthemums that had escaped the
frost, and to loosen the soil about the first hyacinth, whose
close-furled pointed leaves pricked through the brown mould. Below the
Tiber rolled, a tawny flood, under the arches of the Ponte Margherita.
Across the river the angel of the Castel Sant’ Angelo lifted his bronze
sword over the tomb of Hadrian, the dome of St. Peter’s showed like a
pale blue bubble against the deeper blue of the sky; the bells of Rome
rocked and pealed in their towers, calling the people to mass. From the
barracks in the Prati di Castello the bugles sounded, and a regiment
swung down the white road by the Tiber, past the statue of Ciceruácchio,
and over the bridge to the gay music of the royal march. I was leaning
over the parapet to watch the soldiers out of sight, when Agnese called
me downstairs.
“A messenger from the Embassy, Signora, with a bundle so large we had to
open both sides of the _portone_ to let it pass!”
I hurried down in time to thank the good-natured giant for the gigantic
parcel he had brought. Agnese cut the strings and handed me a card with
a line in pencil signed Elizabeth Griscom.
“Signora, it is a cradle but of an unimaginable fineness! Observe the
pillow case, it is of linen. This is a blanket for a queen’s son; and
these garments, truly they are fit for a queen’s children, no less! They
doubtless belonged to that small angel with the eyes of his beautiful
mother, whom I saw when I took a letter to the Ambassadress? Consider,
Signora, are these magnificences fitting for the infant of a plumber?
_Madonna mia!_ It is turning to their account this business of the
earthquake! This dress, it is quite new; you yourself could wear it--the
color would suit you, or we could have it dyed a dark purple.”
What the Ambassador could not do, the Ambassadress had done. Besides the
dainty cradle, the blankets, jackets and other baby luxuries such as
neither Lucia nor Agnese had ever dreamed of, there was a little knitted
shawl for poor old Rosina, and good warm dresses for the plumber’s wife
and mother. Agnese was right; the pretty baby finery belonged to the
little son born to the Ambassador during his first months of office in
Rome. There is a story that the King, on being told that Mrs. Griscom
could not be present at some official reception on account of her baby,
exclaimed in astonishment:
“I never before have heard of an Ambassadress with a baby!”
The time had come when the King, the colony, all concerned were thankful
that the American Ambassador and Ambassadress were young people, with
strong young nerves and generous young hearts.
“Send for Napoleone,” I cried to Agnese. Napoleone the cabman can only
be reached through the connivance of a clerk of Fasani, the grocer in
the Piazza de Spagna. Napoleone is very “black” and has the superior
manners of the “clericals.”
By the time I had my bonnet on, Agnese announced to me that Napoleone
was at the door. When we appeared on the sidewalk he was deep in the
Popolo Romano, the Vatican organ which he reads so faithfully that J.
says he often loses a fare from being too much engrossed in his
newspaper.
“To the house in the Via Lamarmora where you took me the other day to
visit those unfortunate _profughi_,” I said.
“It appears to me, Signora, that they have become very fortunate
people,” said Napoleone, making room for the cradle beside him. He
whipped up his strawberry roan, a horse with an action like a crab’s, as
unique a figure in our Rome as his driver. Napoleone’s eyes were very
kind when he helped me out with the cradle and the big bundle of
clothes.
“I will wait for you, Signora, at my own cost, one understands.
_Diamini!_ we must all do something for these unfortunate _profughi_.”
Napoleone smoothed out the Popolo Romano, put a nosebag of fodder over
the roan’s head and prepared to wait for me, at his own expense!
When the porter’s wife looked out from her little den and saw the big
bundle, she put down the dish of _carciofi_ she was preparing for her
husband’s dinner and came to the rescue.
“_Per carità_, Signora, allow me to carry up that great big bundle; ask
the _padrona_ to leave the door open till I come.”
The _padrona di casa_ was smartly dressed and freshly powdered. She wore
huge pearl and diamond peasant earrings, and her wonderful hair with its
thick regular waves shone like the plumage of the black swan in the
Villa Borghese. She recognized me with a smile. “Ah, the American lady!
What a pleasure to see her again!” She motioned me to the room where the
theatrical costumes had been packed closely together to give more space.
The light from a big window struck across the gaunt barn of a place and
fell on a group in the center that Andrea del Sarto would have painted
as a “Visitation.”
Rosina, the wrinkled old woman, looked a perfect Elizabeth as she stood
there, holding her daughter-in-law by the hand: Lucia would have made a
lovely Mary. The young woman saw me first. She came towards me slowly,
heavily, took my hand in hers and with a strange solemnity kissed me on
the mouth; Francesco, her husband (the plumber), followed her example.
Caterina, sitting up in the big white bed, smiled at me with a radiant
inner lighting of the face, like a young martyr. Rosina mumbled my hand
with her withered lips and wiped her eyes upon a black-bordered
handkerchief I had given her; all this was before they caught a glimpse
of the porter’s wife, toiling upstairs with the gigantic bundle.
I was the first stranger who had come into the new life that was opening
before them, after they had passed through that hell of suffering at
Messina. The shackles of convention had dropped from them in that
elemental experience, that fearful convulsion when the very earth had
stoned them. They met me as equals on the ground of our common humanity;
they embraced me because I had brought them help from America, the land
of hope. When we grow old, I heard a poet say, we count the treasure of
unforgotten kisses as a miser counts his gold; In the coming years those
kisses, given for my country’s sake, will shine bright in my
imperishable hoard.
The next day, Monday morning, January 4th, as we were having early
coffee, Agnese brought in a note.
“Anything interesting?” I asked, as J. folded the small sheet of lilac
paper and put it back in the envelope. “It looks like an invitation.”
“It is,” said J., “one I shall accept.”
I must have looked incredulous, for he handed me the note. It was from
one of the ladies of the Embassy, who wrote to say that volunteers were
wanted for a relief ship the American Committee was fitting out. This
was the first we either of us heard of the expedition of the “Bayern,”
that a few days later thrilled all Italy and America. Ten minutes later
we were in Napoleone’s cab, rattling through the Piazza San Bernardo. As
we passed the Hotel Europa our friend, Mr. Samuel Parrish, came out of
the door. Mr. Parrish, a distinguished New York lawyer, had come to Rome
to pass a quiet winter, to improve his knowledge of the language and to
study Italian “primitives.” It seemed rather early for him to be about,
though I found a possible explanation for this as we passed the
flower-stand of the Piazza Mignianelli, brave with deep purple violets
and pale winter roses. The early birds get the best of everything; the
sunny salon at the Europa, where our friend proposed spending the easy
restful days of his “season off,” was always filled with lovely
flowers--yes, that was it, Mr. Parrish had come out at this unearthly
hour to buy his flowers.
In the Piazza Barberini, where a brisk wind blew the spray of the
fountain of the Triton half across the square, we passed Mr. William
Hooper of Boston, hurrying along; Mr. Hooper had arrived in Rome a few
weeks before with his wife and was established for the winter in the
Hotel Regina.
At the office of the American Embassy we were received by the smiling
usher, who showed us into the waiting room, threw a lump of soft coal on
the fire, and smiled himself out. Shortly after one of the habitues of
the Embassy, a Roman American, came in and told us a meeting of the
American Relief Committee was going on at the Palazzo del Drago; if we
could wait, they were all sure to come round to the office when it was
over.
“They have two or three meetings a day,” the Roman American said; “they
were up half last night. What with sending and receiving cables from
America, holding consultations with the King, Giolitti (the Prime
Minister) and Nathan the Sindaco, those men don’t have time to eat or to
sleep.”
At last Mr. Griscom came in, passing directly to his private office; a
little later Mr. Parrish and Mr. Hooper followed him. Through the open
door I caught a glimpse of the Ambassador at his desk, talking with Mr.
Nelson Gay and Mr. George Page, both American residents of Rome. These
five gentlemen were the Relief Committee, there was only one stranger to
us in the group; the naval attaché of the Embassy, Lieutenant-Commander
Reginald Rowan Belknap. As we waited in the reception room, most of the
American men in Rome passed through; first one, then another of the
committee or of the secretaries came in to speak to some visitor. We
could not but hear scraps of their conversation as they passed to and
fro.
“Griscom couldn’t have chosen his committee better: Parrish and Hooper
to help him raise the money in America; Page and Gay to help him spend
it; and Belknap--one sees with half an eye he’s a man for an emergency,”
said a visitor.
“Of course we shall get the money; I am ready to guarantee it!”
exclaimed the treasurer of the committee.
“Parrish is head of the Southampton Red Cross. He has cabled the
President,” murmured another.
“The steamer will start from Genoa. Smith, our Consul, is buying up the
town to fit her out,” said a young secretary.
“The Ambassadress has collected half a shipload of supplies!”
“All the sterilized milk you can lay your hands on--” This to one who
offered contributions.
“Put my money in tobacco; those poor devils need a smoke if ever man
did,” said the Roman American.
Waiting in that office was like watching the movement of a vast engine,
feeling the throbbing of our country’s mighty heart--our pulses leapt to
keep time with it.
“Weston Flint is just the man for you. He is a graduate of our school
and speaks Italian well,” said Mr. Carter, director of the American
Classical School.
“If you can get Giordano of the Tribuna, he’s your man. He speaks
English as well as I do,” said a journalist.
“I know three trained nurses who are ready to go if they’re wanted.”
At last our turn came; Captain Belknap found time to speak to J. The
intense concentrated force that we had felt in the atmosphere of that
room seemed personified in the naval attaché. To be in his company was
like touching an electric battery. Only a few words were exchanged; the
upshot of it all was that J. offered his services and was accepted. He
said he was ready to go in any capacity, and was then and there
appointed interpreter and general handy-andy-man to the expedition. My
services were refused; no women except professional trained nurses were
wanted.
“Do you know a man with some knowledge of accounts you could get to go
with us? He must speak Italian.” Captain Belknap said it lightly enough,
as if he were merely dropping a hint. What was it that made that hint
more imperative than a command?
“I will try to find one,” said J. As we walked out of the Embassy he
exclaimed, “Thompson is our man! This is a sort of press-gang business;
we had better drop down on him at once.”
We hurried to the studio in the Via Degli Artisti, where we found
Wilfred Thompson at work on his decoration for the English church. After
the tense atmosphere of the embassy the studio seemed strangely
peaceful. On the easel was a picture, still wet, of the pine trees in
the Villa Borghese, with the red sunset light striking between their
smooth stems. A little cat rubbed its arched back against my dress
purring her friendly song of welcome, “three thrums, three thrums.” We
felt like conspirators come to break up our friend’s quiet life. He
listened gravely to the proposition that he should volunteer for the
relief ship, and took time to consider it. In one sense it was not
difficult for him to go, he said; he only had to find a home for the
kitten, and, as a lesser consideration, to make a will. The words struck
chill; there was danger then! In the end Thompson decided to go; he
spoke without enthusiasm; it was evident that having been called upon
he felt it his duty to go. His mood was in strong contrast to the
enthusiasm of those men at the Embassy; they were on the circuit of the
Great Dynamo, they throbbed with the thrill of it, glowed with the
Niagara-like power of it. Tuesday morning Thompson offered his services
to Captain Belknap. When we met him that afternoon, we knew that he too
had come within the magnetic circle, had felt the thrill of the Great
Dynamo, for from that time on he toiled like the others with heart and
soul, with nerves and body doing double, triple work.
“Thompson’s got the pace,” said J., “a jolly good one too.”