Calatafimi is a town of 10,000 inhabitants about twenty miles inland from
Trapani. A slight eminence to the west of the town, 1115 feet above the
sea, crowned by the ruins of a castle of the Saracens (hence the name of
the place, Cal' at Eufimi), commands an extensive and beautiful view
which includes three monuments--first, the famous Greek temple of
Segesta; secondly, the theatre and the remains of the city above it;
thirdly, the obelisk commemorating Garibaldi's first victory over the
Neapolitans in May, 1860. These three monuments are considered to be the
chief attractions of Calatafimi; but one should not suppose that, after
one has seen its principal monuments, there is nothing more to be got out
of a Sicilian town. I had picnicked in the temple of Segesta, climbed up
through the site of the ancient city to the theatre and seen Garibaldi's
monument over and over again and in all kinds of weather, before I knew
anything of the processions which occur at Calatafimi early in May.
I was there one year when the annual festa was conducted with more than
the usual ceremony. I went to the Albergo Samuel Butler, named after the
author of _Erewhon_, who often stayed there when writing _The Authoress
of the Odyssey_, and was well known in the town. Owing to the death of
Don Paolo who, with his wife, Donna Maria, used to manage the hotel, it
is now (1908), I regret to say, closed, and the traveller must do the
best he can at one of the other inns. Butler's memory is, however, still
preserved in the name of one of the streets.
The day after my arrival was the great day of the festa, and opened with
rain. The people, who had come from all the country round, hung about
listlessly during the morning, hoping that the weather might clear up and
by noon the authorities decided that the ceremonies should proceed, so
that, as they all had to be crowded into the afternoon, the town for the
rest of the day was choked with processions.
There was first the Procession of the Maestranza, of unascertainable
antiquity. Those who took part in it came riding on horses and mules
covered with gaudy trappings and carrying something to indicate their
trades. The Oil-pressers, suitably dressed, carried a model of an
oil-press; the Millers carried a little mill; and these two companies
carried their money on trays. The Vetturini, who came next, carried
their money stuck into little wooden horses, like almonds in a hedgehog
pudding. The Tillers of the Ground carried a model of a plough. There
were men carrying long lighted candles with circular loaves of bread
threaded on them; others carried bags full of nuts and sugar-plums which
they continually scattered among the crowd and threw in at the open
windows.
There was the procession with the traditional Car of the Massari, made by
fixing a square wooden framework on a cart and covering the outside of it
with green leaves which were again nearly hidden by loaves in the shape
of rings about eight inches across. It looked like a square
Jack-in-the-Green on wheels and the men inside it, standing on chairs and
looking over the top of the framework, cut off the loaves and threw them
to the crowd. They hit me full on the chest with one and I clutched it
before it fell, to the great delight of some children who were standing
near and who said I must take it home and keep it and it would never go
bad, but would bring me good luck.
Then there was the Procession of the Holy Crucifix, the Padrone of
Calatafimi. For many years no one knew of its existence; it stood, like
the Discobolus in Butler's poem, _A Psalm of Montreal_, stowed away, in a
lumber room, turning its face to the wall, and when brought out was found
to be so black that it might have come from Egypt and so intensely
thaumaturgic that the church of Il Crocefisso had to be built to hold it.
That particular crucifix, however, like the letter of the Madonna at
Messina, no longer exists; it was burnt and the one in use is a copy,
made, one must suppose, from memory. They had the good sense, however,
to make it, if anything, blacker than the original, and happily it has
turned out to be at least equally thaumaturgic. One cannot see how black
it really is, for it is covered with silver, like the frame of the
picture of the Madonna di Custonaci, and festooned with votive offerings,
earrings, necklaces, watches and chains which glitter and glisten as the
procession passes along the streets.
Finally, rather late in the day, came the Procession of the Personaggi,
telling the story of _The Prodigal Son_. It consisted of twenty-nine
principal and many accessory figures, the more important ones carrying
scrolls stating who they were. The dresses were not equal to those one
expects to see at a leading London theatre, but the peasants of the
neighbourhood are unaccustomed to contemplate the triumphs of the modern
theatrical costumier. There may have been much else in the procession
that would have failed to win praise from a metropolitan crowd of
spectators, and such justice as was done to it by the author of the
little book, which was on sale for a few centesimi, might have struck an
exacting critic as being tempered with more mercy than it fairly
deserved. But the author was not thinking of the exacting critic, his
attitude of mind was rather that of Theseus when he determined that
_Pyramus and Thisbe_ should be performed--
For never anything can be amiss
When simpleness and duty tender it.
Moreover, the little book was not intended to be the exact description of
something the writer had seen; it was written to ensure that the people
should miss nothing they had come to see, and I believe I can best convey
an idea of what this procession appeared to them by translating from the
book. In the group No. 6--the Prodigal departing with his friends--the
figures were on horseback; but all the other personages went on foot,
following each other at distances of about ten yards, and walking slowly
through the middle of the streets between wondering rows of solemn and
delighted people.
THE PRODIGAL SON
PART I
_Introduction_
I. _Divine Mercy_.--A majestic matron robed as a sovereign, resplendent
with jewels and sheltering sinners under the voluminous folds of her
mantle.
2. _The Blind Design of the Prodigal_.--His departure from his father's
house. A resolute youth in the garb of nudity, with a bandage over his
eyes; his right hand is tied behind him and in his left is a bunch of
flowers; he turns and gives ear to the Evil Spirit.
3. _The Evil Spirit_.--Clothed in skins like a faun, he is lying in wait
for the preceding figure.
PART II
_The Story of the Prodigal_
4. _The Young Son_.--His sword by his side, with haughty mien he demands
his portion.
5. _The Father of the Prodigal_.--A grave personage, sad and tearful, in
the act of handing over his keys and caskets which are carried by a
servant.
6. _The Departure of the Prodigal_.--A gay young man mounted on a
courser and attended by friends also on horseback. One of his companions
carries a scroll: "Invenies multos, si res tibi floret, amicos;" another
carries another scroll: "Si fortuna perit, nullus amicus erit."
7. _The Prodigal far from Home_.--He flaunts his rich raiment and
carries a lute; one would say he is enjoying life.
8. _The Allegory of the False Friends_.--They have consumed his wealth
and now conspire to abandon him. A man of double aspect, with two faces,
carries swallows taking wing: "Ita falsi amici."
9. _The Prodigal reduced to poverty_--despised and spurned by his
friends. A youth in mean attire, compelled by hunger to beg, he shades
his eyes with his left hand and in his right carries a scroll: "Confusion
hath covered my face. To beg I am ashamed."
10. _The Citizen Patron_--to whom the unhappy youth offers his services.
An austere man, gazing on him with a harsh countenance, gives him a crust
of bread and a rod and sends him forth into the country to tend the
swine.
11. _The Son's Resolution_.--In tattered rags, unshod and leaning on a
stick, the wretch is saying, "I will arise and go to my father."
12. _The Father's Welcome_.--Descrying him from afar, he goes with open
arms to meet his boy, embraces him, folds him tenderly to his bosom and,
exulting with joy, exclaims, "My son was dead and is alive again--was
lost and is found." The son is saying, "Father, I have sinned."
13. _The Rejoicings at Home_.--A group of youths and maidens crowned
with flowers and playing upon instruments of music.
14. _A Servant_ presenting the prodigal with sumptuous apparel and a
golden ring.
15. _The Elder Son_.--He has returned from the country, angry and
resentful, and is astonished to see the prodigal.
16. _The Good Father_ goes to meet him and, calming his anger with soft
words, exhorts him to become reconciled to his brother. He blesses them
both and foretells peace, brotherly love and happiness.
PART III
_The Allegorical Sense of the Parable_
17. _The Wicked Man in Prosperity_ contented with his state and
persisting in evil, a fit subject for reproof. A voluptuary and a miser,
magnificently attired, is clasping to his heart a purse full of money and
a bunch of flowers and corn.
18. _The Divine Warning_.--A prophet who contemplates the preceding
figure threateningly while he records the fatal sentence: "Thou fool;
this night thy soul shall be required of thee."
19. _The Punishment of Tribulation_.--Divine Love that desireth not the
death of a sinner. A celestial winged messenger carrying a scourge:
"Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth."
20. _The Remorse of Conscience_.--The awakening of Repentance. A man in
sorrowful garments expressing the emotions of his heart, now weeping, now
confused, now raising his eyes to Heaven, now looking on the serpent that
gnaws his heart.
21. _The Contrite Sinner_ hearkening to the whisperings of grace. A
penitent, his heart pierced by an arrow, weeping and carrying a scourge:
"Against Thee only have I sinned and done this evil in Thy sight."
22. _A Holy Minister_ supplicating the Crucifix with these words: "A
broken and contrite heart, O God, shalt Thou not despise."
23. _Divine Grace_.--A beautiful girl in white with a transparent veil,
radiant and joyful, carries a branch of palm.
24. _Peace of Mind_.--The soul reconciled with Jesus Christ. Jesus of
Nazareth comforting the soul and opening His arms to receive her: "Come
my Beloved, my Bride."
25. _The Soul_.--A lovely maiden, modestly clad, with precious gems on
her bosom and a garland of white roses on her brow: "My Beloved is mine
and I am His."
26. _The Joy of the Angels_.--They appear as nymphs and sing a hymn of
glory to God and of welcome to the repentant sinner.
27. _The Holy Cross_, decorated with flowers and rays of glory, carried
on high by a seraph.
28. _The Holy Virgin with the Cross_.--It is partly wrapped in a
precious cloth and the Madonna, full of joy and lovingkindness, invites
the people to kiss the holes from which the nails have been drawn.
29. _Calatafimi_.--A handsome, smiling youth in Trojan attire devoutly
offering his heart to the crucified Saviour with these words: "Thy
blessing be upon us evermore."
* * * * *
A stranger had arrived at the albergo and Donna Maria did not know how to
manage unless he supped with me; I was delighted to make his acquaintance
and to have his company, especially as he turned out to be an ingenious
French gentleman with a passion for classification. He had come from
Palermo and spent the morning at the Temple of Segesta which had pleased
him very much and given him no difficulty. It was architecture--a branch
of painting. His plans were upset by the rain and, instead of returning
to Palermo, he had come on for the night to Calatafimi, where he arrived
in time for the procession of _The Prodigal Son_ which had interested him
very much but puzzled him dreadfully. He could not classify it.
"Why not procession--a branch of drama?" I inquired.
He said it was perhaps not so simple as I thought, and that he had been
trying unsuccessfully to work it in with his scheme. I begged him to
expound his scheme, which he was so ready to do that I suspected he had
intended me to ask this.
"There are," he said, "three simple creative arts. In the first, ideas
are expressed in words; this is literature. In the second, ideas are
expressed in the sounds of the scale; this is music. In the third, ideas
are expressed in rigid forms either round, as in sculpture, or flat, as
in painting. We may call this third art painting, that being its most
popular phase."
"I see your difficulty," said I. "If drama is not one of the arts, the
procession cannot be a branch of drama. But I think the drama is one of
the arts all the same."
"Please do not be in a hurry," said the French gentleman. "Any two of
these arts cover some ground in common where they can meet, unite and
give birth to another distinct art related to both as a child is related
to its parents, and inheriting qualities from both. It is to these happy
marriages that we owe drama--the offspring of literature and painting;
song--the offspring of literature and music; and dance--the offspring of
music and painting. This gives us altogether six creative arts.
"And now observe what follows. In the first place, these six arts exist
for the purpose of expressing ideas. In the next place, painting is
without movement, its descendants, drama and dance, inherit movement, the
one from literature, and the other from music. Again, inasmuch as a
painter must paint his own pictures, painting does not tolerate the
intervention of a third person to interpret between the creator and the
public. The painter is his own executive artist; when his creative work
is done, nothing more is wanted than a frame and a good light.
Literature permits such intervention, for a book can be read aloud.
Music and song demand performance, and will continue to do so until the
public can read musical notation, and probably afterwards, for even
Mozart said that it does make a difference when you hear the music
performed; while in the case of the drama and the dance the performers
are so much part of the material of the work of art that it can hardly be
said to exist without them. Is not this a striking way of pointing the
essential difference between the creative artist and the executive?"
"Very," I replied. "I am afraid, however, that you have not a high
opinion of the executive artist."
"I will confess that he sometimes reminds me of the proverb, 'God sends
the tune and the devil sends the singer.'"
I laughed and said, "We have not exactly that proverb in English, though
I have heard something like it. It can, however, only apply to the
performer at his worst, whereas you are inclined to look upon him, even
at his best, as nothing more than a picture frame."
"And a good light," he added. "Don't forget the good light. Frame or no
frame, a picture presented in a bad light or in the dark is no more than
a sonata performed badly or not at all."
"Well, let us leave the performer for the present and return to your
second trio of arts. Are you now going to combine them, as you did the
first, and raise a third family in which a place may be found for such
things as processions?"
"That," he replied, "may hardly be, for there is no couple of them that
has not a parent in common. But there is no reason why any two or more
of the six arts should not appear simultaneously, assisting one another
to express an idea. Thus an illustrated book is not drama--it is
literature assisted by painting. And so a symphony illustrating a poem
is not song--it is music assisted by literature, or vice versa, and is
sometimes called Programme Music. When we look at dissolving views
accompanied by a piano, we are not contemplating a dance--we are looking
at painting illustrated by music; and, if there is some one to explain
the views in words, literature is also present. When you come to think
of it, it is rare to find music and painting either alone or together
without literature. Except in the case of fugues or sonatas and
symphonies, which are headed 'Op. ---' so-and-so, or 'No. ---' whatever
it may be, music usually has a title. And except in the case of such
things as decorative arabesques and sometimes landscapes, painting
usually has a title. The opportunity of supplying a title is peculiarly
tempting to literature who produces so many of her effects by putting the
right word in the right place."
I said that this was all very interesting, but what had become of the
procession? He replied that he was giving me, as I had requested, a
preliminary exposition of his scheme.
"Comic opera," he continued, "is drama interrupted by song and dance.
Grand opera is the simultaneous presentation of most, perhaps all, of the
six arts. There is no reason in nature against any conceivable
combination; it is for the creative artist to direct and for the
performing artists to execute the combination so that it shall please and
convince the public. And now, _revenons a nos processions_, where can we
find a place for them?"
"Surely," said I, "some such combination will include them--unless they
have nothing to do with art."
"I have thought that perhaps they have nothing to do with art, for art
should not be tainted with utility; but religious pictures are tainted
with utility just as much. Besides, I do not like to confess myself
beaten."
It was plain the procession was not going to be allowed to escape. I
considered for a moment and said--
"I suppose we may not classify the procession as literature assisted by
dance, because literature ought to have words and dance ought to have
music."
"The words are not omitted," he replied; "they are in the little book.
Besides, we have the story in our minds as with programme music. The
omission of the music from the dance is more serious. It may be that we
shall have to call it a variety of drama, as you originally suggested."
"Oh, but that," I replied modestly, "was only thrown out before I had the
advantage of hearing your scheme of classification. May it not be
that--"
"I have it," he interrupted. "Of course, how stupid I have been! The
procession does not move."
"Does not move!" I echoed. "Why, it moved all through the town."
"Yes, I know; but things like that often happen in classification," he
replied calmly. "Properly considered, each figure and each group
illustrated a separate point in the story, and was rigid. They went past
us, of course; and if they had gone on cars it would have been less
puzzling; but these good people cannot afford cars and so the figures had
to walk. It would have done as well if the public had walked past the
figures, but that would have been difficult to manage. The only movement
in the procession was in the story which we held in our minds, and of
which we were reminded both by the title and by the little book which we
held in our hands. The procession must be classified as literature
illustrated by living statuary, or sculpture, which, of course, is a
branch of painting."
I regret that the French gentleman left Calatafimi so early next morning
that I had no opportunity of ascertaining whether he slept well after
determining that processions do not proceed.
PALERMO
CHAPTER XIV--SAMSON
The next time I was in Palermo, Turiddu, the conduttore, who used to take
me about the town, had returned after being for a year in Naples. He was
employed at another hotel, but that did not prevent his making an
appointment to take me to the marionettes. My experiences at Trapani had
removed all sense of danger, and I now felt as safe in the theatre as in
the streets of London. Statistics may or may not support the view, but I
am inclined to attribute the general impression that Sicily is more
dangerous than other countries, less to the frequency of crime there than
to the operatic manner in which it is committed. So that I no longer
wanted Turiddu to protect me. As the figures on the stage were to
interpret the drama to the public, so he was to interpret to me their
interpretation. The ingenious French gentleman at Calatafimi would,
perhaps, have classified him as an incarnation of the book of the words.
The theatre was already full when we arrived. We had had to buy another
straw hat on the way, to preserve our dignity and incognito; this had
delayed us, and the play had begun, but the audience politely made room
for us in the gallery at the side.
We were in a wood and there was a picturesque, half-naked, wild man on
the stage with loose, brown hair hanging down to his waist; he wore a
short, green skirt trimmed with silver braid, a wreath of pink and white
roses, yellow leather boots and gaiters; a mantle fell from his shoulders
to the ground and made a background of green to his figure. He was
actually, as I afterwards discovered, about thirty inches high and his
roses were as large as real roses, so that his wreath was enormous and
looked very well. Turiddu whispered to me that he was Samson, which made
me inquire whether they were going through the whole Bible this winter,
but he said this was an exceptional evening, after which they would
return to the usual story.
Samson had already killed the lion with a blow of his sinewy right arm;
its body lay in the middle of the stage, and the busy bees were at work
filling its carcase with honey. He observed them, commented upon their
industry, tasted the honey and composed his riddle.
The next scene was the hall of audience in the king's palace. Guards
came in and placed themselves at corners. They were followed by a
paladin in golden armour with short trousers of Scotch plaid made very
full, so that when he stood with his legs together he appeared to be
wearing a kilt. Turiddu and I both took him for a Scotchman and, as I
had seen Ottone and Astolfo d'Inghilterra in the teatrino at Trapani,
there seemed to be no reason why he should not be one. Highlanders, of
course, do not wear trousers, but we supposed that his Sicilian tailor
had had little experience in the cutting of kilts. Whatever he was, he
had an unusually animated appearance, for, by a simple mechanism, he
could open and shut his eyes. Then came a lady, and the knight kissed
her. She was followed by a king and his prime minister, neither of them
very splendid, their robes being apparently dressing-gowns, such as one
might pick up cheap at any second-hand clothes shop in the Essex Road,
Islington. As each of these personages entered, the courtiers, who were
not in view, shouted "Evviva." Last of all came Samson.
There was a dispute and it was to be submitted to the king, whom they
addressed as Pharaoh. I said to Turiddu--
"But Pharaoh was king of Egypt and all this happened in Palestine--if,
indeed, it happened anywhere."
"Pharaoh also governed Palestine," replied Turiddu.
The dispute arose out of the killing of the lion which had been about to
attack the lady, and Samson, having delivered her, was by every precedent
of romance bound to marry her and wished to do so. But she was already
engaged to the golden Scotchman, and that was why he had kissed her.
After much discussion it was agreed that if the paladin should guess the
riddle to be put forth by Samson he might marry the lady, otherwise
Samson should have her. All was done regularly and in the presence of
King Pharaoh.
Samson then propounded his riddle: "Out of the eater came forth meat, and
out of the strong came forth sweetness."
The golden Highlander winked his eyes, put his fist up to his forehead
and meditated anxiously for some time. Then he said--
"Sono confuso."
He wanted to give it up, but the lady would not allow this, and King
Pharaoh, taking in the situation, ruled that he must have time; so they
all went away except the knight and the lady. Then the poor paladin made
the best use of his time and gave his whole attention to the riddle;
sometimes he winked his eyes, and sometimes he put his fist up to his
head and meditated as hard as ever he could, turning first one way and
then the other. But nothing came of it; he only repeated--
"Sono confuso."
The lady continued her encouragement, saying that riddles were seldom
easy to guess, that he must not worry too much and the true answer would
come into his head, probably while he was thinking of something else; but
he only turned away and said again--
"Sono confuso."
The lady did not mind how stupid he was, for she was really in love with
him; but she began to perceive that, unless something were done, she
might have to marry a man who, though very strong and clever enough to
compose a riddle, was unable to wink his eyes, so she undertook to see
Samson alone and try to inveigle the answer out of him. The knight,
having had some experience of her powers of persuasion, was comforted,
discontinued his meditations, dropped his fist, said "Addio," embraced
her and left the stage.
Samson now came on and the first thing he did was to put his arm round
the lady's neck. She was quite ready for him and put her arm round his.
Thus they stood indulging in a little preliminary fondling till she asked
him point-blank to tell her "il mistero dell' oscuro problema." He
instantly removed his arm and stood off, exclaiming with great firmness--
"No, no, no, non posso!"
Thereupon she began to go away as though all was over between them. It
was a simple ruse, but it deceived the framer of the riddle; he drew her
towards him in repentance, put his arm round her neck again and whispered
into her ear. She took a moment to consider, and then laughed. It was
not the spontaneous laugh of a person overwhelmed by the irresistible
humour of a good joke, it could not well have been that, assuming that he
had told her the true answer; nor was it the perfunctory laugh of a
person pretending to be amused. It was a laugh of heartless mockery.
"Ha, ha, ha!" laughed the lady.
Samson smelt mischief and brought the curtain down with a fine speech,
threatening her with his wrath if she should betray him.
The next act passed in the same hall of audience; soldiers entered and
stood as guards, and then came Pharaoh. He was followed by two obviously
comic men, who might have been costermongers or knockabout brothers from
a music hall, and one comic woman. The men wore modern shirts and
trousers and long-tailed coats, or rather dressing-gowns, that had once
been as good as those worn by Pharaoh and his prime minister. Turiddu
told me they were Pasquino and Onofrio, and the woman, who seemed to be
just an ordinary woman out of the market with an apron, was Colombina.
But the people give Pasquino the pet name of Peppinino and call the woman
Rosina. These are the masks of Palermo, whose origin, like that of other
Italian masks, is of great antiquity. They grew up to supply a want just
as in our own day we have seen Ally Sloper growing up to supply a want of
the people of London.
There was a dispute as to which of the two men Rosina was to marry, and
the question had been referred to King Pharaoh who decided that it was a
case for trial by riddle, and, accordingly, Rosina propounded a riddle
which was in four questions; after each question Onofrio turned away his
head to meditate, while Rosina, unobserved, whispered the answer into the
ear of Pasquino who presently announced it in a loud voice and then
danced with Rosina in triumph.
The four questions and answers were--
Q. A man that was no man--A. An eunuch--
Q. Threw a stone that was no stone--A. A pumice-stone--
Q. At a bird that was no bird--A. A bat--
Q. Sitting on a tree that was no tree--A. An elder-tree.
This being a riddle and in dialect and, moreover, dialect spoken in the
presence of a king, certainly was, or rather was intended to be,
humorous. Nevertheless, King Pharaoh was as little amused as our own
Queen Victoria would have been if Ally Sloper and his companions had been
taken to Windsor to perform in cockney slang before her. Pharaoh had to
sit it out because he was there to see fair play, but he was so bored
that he failed to observe how shamelessly Rosina was cheating; so she won
her cause and danced off with Pasquino.
Turiddu explained to me that elder-trees are in the habit of drying up
and falling down dead, a thing not done by properly conducted trees. I
asked him what all this had to do with the play. He had just bought a
handful of melon seeds from a man who was pushing his way about among the
audience, and was munching them contentedly, not in the least put out by
the course the story had taken. He said we had been witnessing a comic
interlude intentionally introduced to amuse the boys by burlesquing the
situation in the principal story the extreme seriousness of which might
otherwise have depressed them unduly. I had read of such things being
done in mediaeval mystery plays, and here was an instance in my presence
and not as an imitation or resuscitation of a dead archaism but as a
vital growth.
The interlude being over, the original story was resumed. The paladin
and the lady entered, followed by Pharaoh and his prime minister, who had
gone off to make room for the final dance, and lastly, by Samson. The
golden paladin took the stage, winking excessively, and, in a triumphant,
overbearing manner, said--
"What is sweeter than honey? and what is stronger than a lion?"
Samson glared at the lady who ostentatiously shook her head.
"Ha, ha, ha!" jeered the paladin, and Samson covered his face for shame.
The lady continued to shake her head, but, like the lady in another play,
she did protest too much and Samson's suspicions were confirmed. He
exercised great self-control and appealed to Pharaoh, pointing out that
it was absurd to suppose his riddle could have been guessed by an
unassisted Scotchman, no matter how bright his armour, and concluded his
speech by openly accusing the lady of having betrayed him. This was too
much for the paladin; he drew his sword and approached Samson to pay him
out for his rudeness and for not admitting that he had been fairly
beaten. Before he could finish the speech that usually precedes a stage
duel, Samson, who was unarmed, knocked him down in self-defence with one
blow of his fist. He fell back upon Pharaoh who happened to be standing
behind him; Pharaoh fell back upon his prime minister who happened to be
standing behind him; the prime minister fell back upon the lady who
happened to be shaking her head in protest behind him, and all four came
to the ground together. Trumpets sounded, the piano struck up, the
operators stamped with their clogged feet, the audience applauded and
there were calls for "Sansone," but it was not a moment for responding to
calls. Soldiers came on one by one and Samson knocked them down; they
came two by two and he knocked them down; they came three by three and he
knocked them down. Between his feats of strength he frequently put his
long hair back with his hand, so that it should fall behind and not
hinder his movements or obstruct his sight. When he had done, the
curtain fell on about thirty soldiers, heaps upon heaps, writhing in
their death agonies.
The next act was in a wood and there was the Highland paladin who had not
been killed when Samson knocked him down; he had, however, been a good
deal hurt and was winking more than ever. There were also a few soldiers
who had either recovered or had not been knocked down in the previous
scene; in these cases, as with earthquakes, one has to wait to find out
who is killed and who survives. Turiddu said that Samson was being
arrested and presently some more soldiers entered with a prisoner, but it
was the wrong man; it was, in fact, Samson's father. He was led away in
chains. Then they brought on Samson with several yards of iron chain
coiled round and hanging down from his joined hands.
"Andiamo, andiamo," said the soldiers, but the jubilant paladin could not
resist the temptation to stop the soldiers and make a taunting speech
which amounted to--
"Here is the end of all your rage, O Sansone!"
Samson listened with great forbearance and, when it was his turn, replied
in a speech full of dignity, containing a great deal about gloria and
vendetta and the weight of his chains and il cuore di Sansone, and he
threatened them over and over again, and struggled and shook himself and
made great efforts to get free, so that the soldiers shrank back.
Suddenly he broke his chains, and the soldiers all ran away and Samson
after them, leaving the paladin alone. A soldier soon returned and
announced that Samson was committing deeds of violence behind. This
frightened the paladin; he winked nervously and hurried away,
exclaiming--
"Arrest him, arrest him; I'm off," amid the derisive laughter of the
audience.
Then Samson came on in his fury, armed with the jawbone of an ass;
Turiddu said it was of a horse, but I knew better, at least, I knew what
it ought to have been. The soldiers did their best, but he knocked them
all down again as before amid immense cheering.
The next scene was outside a castle in the country. Samson came on alone
with his jawbone, and stood silent, very terrible, and waiting for an
opportunity to break out.
The silence was prolonged. Nothing happened. It was a pause of
expectation.
Then we heard a voice, a solemn, cavernous voice with a vibrato like a
cinematograph, calling loud and slow--
"Sansone, Sansone, Sansone!"
"Whose voice is that?" exclaimed Samson, looking round and seeing no one.
The voice repeated its call two or three times and at last Samson
recognized it.
"E la voce del mio genitore."
"Sansone, Sansone, Sansone! In questa torre sono incarcerato."
Then Samson understood that Manoah had been arrested and imprisoned and
must be delivered. He approached the castle and knocked.
"Chi e?" said the porter.
"Son io, Sansone."
We heard a movement of consternation within the castle and then Samson
called out--
"Aprite."
There was more consternation and the voice of Pasquino or Onofrio was
heard speaking in dialect which made the audience laugh. The castle sent
a messenger who came on and asked what Samson wanted.
"Open the door and give me my father," said Samson with suppressed rage.
Throughout Samson behaved with extreme moderation. But the messenger,
instead of doing as he was told, approached Samson in a hostile manner.
Samson took him in his arms and, with his great strength, threw him up
and out of sight. We heard his body fall inside the castle walls.
"Aprite," said Samson.
Then several messengers came, sometimes singly, sometimes two together,
and once four soldiers came and said--
"Va via, Sansone," but they only got themselves into trouble, for he took
them all up and threw them back into the castle and we heard each of them
fall separately.
"Aprite," said Samson, "datemi il mio genitore."
Then there came a comic dwarf; Samson looked at him scornfully, and
saying--
"Cosa vuoi, Insetto?" took him up, twirled him round and round and threw
him away.
Then Pasquino and Onofrio came on; Samson, after doing them some damage,
but not so much as they deserved because they were favourites with the
audience, passed by them and disappeared in the direction of the castle
gate. We heard him knock and we heard the movement within, indicating
serious alarm, while the masks made comments in dialect. This was
repeated and repeated with a roaring crescendo until, with a crash, the
walls of the castle fell upon the stage--a bushel of stones--and Samson
entered carrying the castle gates under his left arm and his father on
his right, and the delighted audience applauded as the curtain fell.
After this we came away, which I have often regretted since, because
these marionettes were the best I had seen. They were worked by artists
who understood the handling of repose and the value of small things well
placed. Occasionally, it is true, the figures moved too much and were
unintentionally comic, but wonderful effects were produced by very slight
movements. When a puppet was delivering a tirade, the listener, standing
as motionless as one of the knights at Catania, would sometimes turn his
head almost imperceptibly, or shift his weight from one leg to the other,
or place his right hand on his hip with his arm a-kimbo. The action not
only expressed contempt, acquiescence, or boredom as the case required,
but vivified the whole scene, spreading over it like the ripples from a
pebble thrown into a pond.
If I had been as strong as Samson I would have stayed to the end, for I
knew he could not be wearing all that loose, brown hair merely to toss it
back when he was fighting. The Philistines would come later on and bribe
the lady to entice him and see wherein his great strength lay, and he
would be enticed and, forgetting how she had betrayed him over the
riddle, would tell her everything; for he had a guileless, generous
nature, and every time he was deceived thought it an exceptional case and
no rule for future conduct. And presently the lady would make him sleep
upon her knees and a young man would come with a pair of scissors and
crouch under her mantle and cut off his locks and drop them into a
shallow round box upon the floor, as in Carpaccio's picture in Milan, and
she would wake him up, exclaiming--
"The Philistines be upon thee, Samson," and he would rise powerless and
be taken and bound in fetters of brass.
Nevertheless, the marionettes, with all the romance of their story and
the unexpected way in which their movements stimulate the imagination,
would certainly fail without the wizardry of the voice of the speaker,
for the voice is the soul of the marionettes. And as the cobbler from
Mount Eryx found his opportunity in the Death of Bradamante at Trapani,
so the voice at Palermo would surely have done something with the
Blinding of Samson--something perhaps not unworthy of _Total Eclipse_.
It communicated to us the dignity and beauty of Samson's character; when
he was observing the industrious bees it was full of pity for the dead
lion, and we knew that the poor beast had had every chance of escape and
had only been killed after a delay that was longer than it was judicious.
And so we knew that he did not kill the soldiers till his great patience
had been exhausted and the voice was full of sorrow for their death.
Why should he be so constantly driven to use his strength? Why could he
never use it without harming some one? Why was he born into a world
where men played on his simplicity and women charmed him to destruction?
These were the riddles that confused Samson. It seemed to him that he
was no better than the Arabian giant who held the Princess of Bizerta in
thrall--that cruel bully who cared not how many he killed, nor who they
were, and believed every man to be as wicked as himself. Samson, each
time his patience was exhausted, hated himself for what he had to do, yet
no experience could shake his faith in that melancholy but attractive
swindle--the ultimate goodness of man. Both Samson and the giant were as
mistaken as they were powerful, but Samson, by virtue of his weakness,
was the stronger man, for, while the giant's brutality aroused our
hatred, Samson's nobility compelled our love.
CHAPTER XV--THE CONVERSION OF THE EMPEROR CONSTANTINE
Being alone one autumn evening in Palermo, about a year and a half after
I had seen Samson, I returned to the teatrino and found it open. On
asking the young man at the door whether the performance had begun and
whether there was room for me, he pulled aside the curtain at the
entrance and disclosed the stage full of fighting paladins and the
auditorium half empty. I paid three soldi and took a seat. After the
first act, I congratulated the young man at the door on the performance
and told him it was not the first time I had been to his theatre, and
that I was sorry to see it so empty.
"There is no one here," he agreed; "do you know why? It is because
to-night will die Guido Santo, a marionette very sympathetic to the
public, they cannot bear to see his end. But it is the last night and
to-morrow they will come because the story will begin all over again."
Feeling I could bear to witness the death of Guido Santo, I returned to
my seat. Before the curtain drew up on the last act there entered a page
who took his hat off with his right hand and stood politely bowing until
the audience should be ready to listen to what he had to say. He then
recited the programme for the next evening, telling us that all who came
would see the baptism of Costantino, Imperatore del Mondo. As soon as he
had gone, Pasquino and Onofrio came on and in dialect comically commented
upon the programme.
At the end of the entertainment, after Guido Santo was dead and the angel
had come down, taken his white soul out of his mouth and carried it up to
heaven, I resumed conversation with the young man at the door, and soon
perceived that he was a fine natural actor who will commit a crime if he
does not go on the stage as a buffo. He told me that the theatre is open
all the year round; they do not make much money in the summer because the
people prefer to be in the open air, but in the winter--! and his
gestures indicating how they sat shoulder to shoulder and craned their
necks to see over one another's heads and wiped the perspiration off
their foreheads and scattered it upon the floor, were rapid, precise and
eloquent. He remembered the performance of _Samson_ and the crowd and,
as soon as he saw I was interested, became like a puppy that has found
some one to play with. If I would come to-morrow he would show me all
the marionettes and tell me all the secrets of the business.
I went and was introduced to his brother, his three sisters and his
father who is the proprietor of the show. It was the father's voice that
I had heard in _Samson_, the buffo and his brother help in working the
marionettes and in cleaning and repairing them after the performance, the
sisters do the housekeeping, speak for the women and make the dresses.
They told me a great deal that I wanted to hear. For instance, they knew
all about Michele and the Princess of Bizerta and told me that she is the
sister of Agramante, King of Campinas and Emperor of Yundiay, and her
name is Fulorinda di Nerbof di Bizerta; the name of her wicked Arabian
giant is Alaballak Aizan. I had asked Pasquale in the teatrino at
Trapani about them, but he had never heard of them. These professional
marionettists at Palermo had a poor opinion of the teatrino at Trapani
and, from what I told them about it, said it could only be an amateur
affair. They were particularly contemptuous of the management for
allowing the words to be read out of a book. They ought to be
improvised. At Palermo the only play that is ever read is _Samson_,
which was written by a Sicilian, and even in that the comic episode of
the masks with the riddle of Rosina is a home-made, unwritten
interpolation.
Pharaoh has nothing to do with the Egyptian Pharaohs. Faraone is his
private name and he is the king of the Philistines. The name of the
paladin is Acabbo and he is a Philistine and not a Scotchman; but they
excused me for falling into the error, and showed me that many of the
knights wear stuff sufficiently like a Scotch plaid to deceive a mere
Englishman. Moreover, Scotch knights do come into the story; Carlo Magno
sends Rinaldo off to fetch recruits and he returns with an army of Scotch
paladins under Zerbino, the Prince of Scotland. Samson ranks with
Christians because he is on the right side in religion and that is why
his skirt was really a skirt. Acabbo ranks with Turks because he is on
the wrong side in religion and that is why he wears trousers. The lady
is Tanimatea, but Dalila is brought on afterwards and it is she who cuts
Samson's hair. The buffo nearly wept when I told him I had gone away
without seeing the operation. However, he explained how it was done: his
long brown hair is a wig and is pulled off when she uses the scissors.
They told me all about the story, or rather stories, of the paladins.
First there is an _Introduction_ beginning with the conversion of the
Emperor Constantine, and passing rapidly through his son Fiovo and his
descendants to Pipino King of France and father of Carlo Magno. It lasts
about a month and is followed by--
I. _The Story of the Paladins of France_ with Carlo Magno, Orlando,
Rinaldo, Gano di Magonza and many others. This lasts about six months
and ends with the defeat and death of Orlando and the paladins at
Roncisvalle. It is followed by--
II. _The Story of the Sons of the Paladins_ with Palmerino d'Oliva,
Tarquasso, Scolimmaro and the crusades. This lasts about three months
and is followed by--
III. _The Story of Balocco_ with the valiant Paladins Trufaldino, Nitto,
Vanni Caccas, Pietro Fazio, Mimico Alicata and the giant Surchianespole.
This lasts about six months, and is followed by--
IV. _The Story of Michele_, Emperor of Belgium, against the Saracens.
This lasts about three months and ends with the death of Guido Santo.
I had come on the last night and if I had come a few nights before, I
might have happened upon the Palermitan version of what I had seen at
Catania.
Among all this, which by itself would last over a year and a half, they
celebrate certain anniversaries by interpolating other plays, each of
which lasts one, two, or three days. Thus, at Christmas they do the
Nativity, at Easter the Passion, at Midsummer the story of S. Giovanni
Battista; on the 11th of May, the day Garibaldi landed at Marsala, they
do the Sicilian episodes from his life; on the anniversary of the day
that Musolino, the famous brigand, was arrested, they do his life and on
the proper day they commemorate the execution of Anna Bonanno, la
Velenatrice, detta la Vecchia dell' Aceto, who sold poisoned vinegar.
There is no regular day for _Samson_; they do it whenever they feel
inclined, that is whenever they want a few more soldi than usual, for
they look upon the paladins as the pane quotidiano and on the
interpolations, for which they charge extra, as feasts.
They also occasionally give a kind of music-hall entertainment and I was
so fortunate as to see one.
PICCOLA SERATA BALLABILE
1. Passo a due eseguito da due ballerini di rango Francese, viz.
Miss Ella e Monsieur Canguiu.
2. Dansa del Gran Turco, fumatore di pipa.
3. L'Ubbriaco. Scena buffa.
In private life, that is behind the scenes, the ballerini are called Miss
Helvet and Monsieur Mastropinnuzza. Miss Helvet first danced alone; she
had six strings and two wires, not rods, and was dressed like the
conventional ballet-girl with a red bodice and a diamond necklace, and
she wriggled her white muslin skirts and waved a broad green ribbon.
Monsieur Canguiu then danced alone; he was slightly less complicated, and
kissed his hand with great frequency. They wound up by dancing together.
They twinkled their toes and alighted on the tips of them like Adeline
Genee and, as their heels were cunningly jointed and balanced, they could
also walk like ordinary mortals, or at least as well as any marionette.
He assisted her to leap up and pose in an attitude while standing on his
knee, and they waltzed round one another and did all the things that one
has learnt to expect from opera dancers.
The name of the Gran Turco was Piriteddu cu Giummu. He was accompanied
by Pasquino and danced while Pasquino went and fetched him a lighted
candle. He lighted his pipe at the flame and puffed real smoke out of
his mouth. After which Pasquino blew out the candle and they danced
together.
The Ubbriaco, whose name was Funcia, asked Pasquino for wine, and drank
it out of the bottle with consequences that might have been anticipated,
but may not be described. When he had done drinking, he threw the bottle
away, dancing all the time. He took off his coat and threw it away, then
unbuttoned his trousers and took them off, threw them away and went on
dancing in his shirt.
"He is a very common man," said the buffo apologetically; "a fellow of no
education."
This constant introduction of Pasquino must not be taken as involving any
anachronism. Pasquino is like Love, he is not Time's fool. Never having
been born, he can never die, and never to die is to be immortal.
Accordingly, whenever a comic servant is wanted, whether as a messenger
from a castle which is being stormed by Samson, or to assist a Grand Turk
or a drunkard of no definite period, or to accompany a paladin on a
journey, be put into prison with him and help him to escape, or merely on
behalf of the proprietor of the show to invite the people to to-morrow's
performance, Pasquino is always there, with his dialect and his comic
relief, to undertake the job. He works harder than any other marionette
and consequently is always requiring renovation.
There is so much renovation going on among the puppets that the buffo
cannot tell exactly how many there are at any particular time. He says
their number is fluid, and supposes that it rises and falls round about
five hundred. They are very heavy, especially those in armour, and vary
in height from twenty-six to thirty inches, giants being thirty-four
inches. They must represent a large capital, for a well-made marionette
in full armour will cost as much as 150 francs (6 pounds), the elaborate
ones, with tricks, and the dancers probably more; ordinary Turks and
pages unarmed will cost less, say perhaps 50 francs (2 pounds) each.
Some of them have glass eyes which catch the light and brighten them up
wonderfully. Many have eyes that move like Acabbo. There are two
paladins who can be cut in half, one horizontally and other
perpendicularly.
There was nothing the buffo and his brother could not explain, and what
this implies a glance through the notes to the _Orlando Furioso_, which
is only a fragment of the complete story, will show. Orlando squints,
both his eyeballs are close to his nose. They told me that this is
because when his uncle, Carlo Magno, met him as a child, not knowing who
he was and taking a fancy to the boy, he told him to look at him, and
Orlando came close and looked at him so fixedly that his eyes never
returned to their normal position. He also has two little holes, one on
each side of the bridge of his nose. This is because at Roncisvalle he
called for help by winding his magic horn; Oliviero told him to blow
louder and he blew so forcibly that he broke a blood-vessel and the blood
poured out of the little holes so that he died. He could not die by
being mortally wounded in the usual way, because his flesh was made of
diamonds, which was a gift of God to help him to propagate the faith and
to conquer the heathen.
They showed me the three separate Christs which they use at Easter, the
first as he walks among the people, the second as he is on the cross and
the third as he rises from the tomb, and all, especially the last, were
beautiful and impressive figures.
They give two performances every day, from six to eight and from nine to
eleven, all the year round, Sundays and festas included, unless some
irremovable obstacle, such as an illness or a wedding in the family, or
the death of the king or an earthquake, necessitates the closing of the
theatre. Nearly all the rest of every day they are cleaning up and
preparing for the next performance.
On the evening when Constantine was converted to Christianity I went to
both performances, being behind the scenes for the first so as to see how
everything was done. Before we began, I was let into the secret of how
the emperor had his leprosy lightly stitched on him in such a way that
the thread could be drawn, and it would fall off at the right moment.
The first performance was to a certain extent a rehearsal for the second,
at least in the second there were modifications--always improvements.
The father stood on one side of the stage, working some of the
marionettes and speaking for them. He had a MS. book which contained
little more than a list of the characters and properties and a short
statement of what was to happen in each scene. He also directed his
younger son who stood at the other side of the stage, working other
figures and speaking for some of them, and, when there were many puppets
on at once, the buffo was sent for from the front door, where he was
keeping order. When there were women or angels or children to speak, one
or more of the girls came down a ladder through a trap-door from the
house above. To speak improvised words on a given subject, as the father
did, is called "recitare a soggetto." When the girls spoke, the father
prompted, if necessary, and this they call "recitare col suggeritore"--to
speak, with the assistance of a prompter, words that have been learnt.
For the second performance I was among the audience, and this is what I
saw. It may not be in every detail in complete accordance with the
received views of historians, but the marionettes take their history
wherever they find it. In this case they found it not in Gibbon but in a
favourite legend of the people, and, considering that they depend upon
the favour of the people, to take it from that source was a judicious
proceeding.
The curtain rose on a bedroom in the palace in Rome. Constantine,
Emperor of the World, was lying in just such a bed as Pasquino or Onofrio
might have, with pillows and sheets and a red flowered counterpane. He
was endeavouring to allay the irritation of his skin caused by the
painful malady from which he had been suffering for twelve years. A
sentinel stood at the foot of the bed.
Amid shouts of "Evviva Costantino," two Christians were brought on in
chains. They knelt to the emperor who offered to spare their lives if
they would become Saracens or Turks or pagans--that is, if they would
adopt his religion. Of course, they indignantly refused and were led off
to be burnt, leaving the emperor restlessly soliloquizing to the effect
that all Christians must be burnt and all doctors, too, if they could not
cure him.
This was the cue for the family doctor to enter with a specialist.
"Come sta vostra Maiesta stamattina?" inquired the family doctor, and the
patient declared himself no better--he was much the same.
I expected the doctor to feel his pulse and look at his tongue, but the
buffo told me that this is not done in leprosy and that it was wrong of
his brother at the afternoon performance to outrage realism by making one
of them lay his hand upon the emperor's fevered brow; his father had
reproved him for it and the action was not repeated in the evening. One
cannot be too careful in dealing with diseases of a contagious nature.
The doctors consulted, and with unexpected unanimity and rapidity
recommended the emperor to bathe in the blood of six children. He
agreed, and said to the sentinel--
"Let six children be arrested at once and brought to me."
The sentinel showed the doctors out and departed to execute the order,
returning with six children already half dead with fright. The emperor
addressed him--
"Children," he said, "for twelve years I have suffered from a painful and
irritating disease. My learned physicians advise me that a bath of your
blood will restore me to health. The remedy is so simple that I have
resolved to try it. Of course, the first step will be to put you all to
death. This I regret, but--"
Here he was interrupted by the sobs and cries of the children--
"We do not want to die, your Majesty!"
He assured them of his sympathy, but begged them not to stray from the
point, explaining that, as it was a question of saving the life of the
Emperor of the World, their personal wishes could not be consulted and
they had better prepare to have their blood shed at once. They trembled
violently and, choking with tears and anguish, knelt to him for mercy.
"Pieta, Maiesta, pieta!"
It was a view of the situation which had not occurred to him. The
children, being too young to understand the nature of his complaint,
rashly leapt on the bed and embraced him. The noble sufferer
reconsidered while the children continued to cry--
"Pieta, Maiesta, pieta!"
He was touched with compassion, he wavered, he could resist no longer.
"It is not just," he declared, "to kill all these children; if that is
the only remedy, I am content to die."
So he pardoned them and they danced away, joyfully shouting, "Evviva
Costantino!"
The doctors puzzled me. After languishing for twelve years, why should
the patient suddenly call in a specialist? I wondered whether perhaps he
disbelieved entirely in doctors, and had at last yielded to the
reiterated entreaties of his adorata mamma.
"Now do, my dear, be guided by those who must know better than yourself.
It is such a pity you will persist in going on like this. If only you
would try to realize how much it distresses me to witness your
sufferings! Why not take a second opinion? What I always say is: Make
proper inquiries, go to a good man, follow his treatment and you will
derive benefit."
Twelve years of this sort of thing would bring round the most obstinate
emperor. The buffo, however, assured me that nothing of the kind had
happened; no specialist had been called in, those two doctors had had
charge of the case from the beginning, the emperor was an orphan who had
never known a mother's loving care and I must have been drawing upon my
imagination or my personal reminiscences. Nevertheless, like a true
Sicilian, he congratulated me upon the modification and promised to speak
to his father about it with a view to introducing it next time the
doctors come to see the emperor--that is in about a year and a half.
And then, what became of the doctors? Were they also pardoned?--they
stood more in need of pardon than the poor children. Or were they burnt
for failing to cure the emperor?--which would not have been fair, seeing
that he would not give their proposal a trial. The buffo explained that
they knew this was to be their last chance, and that if they did not cure
him in two hours they were to be burnt with the Christians. They had
proposed their barbarous treatment not expecting it to have any
beneficial effect on his health but merely to gain time, and they had
escaped.
As soon as the children had danced away, the patient pulled up the
bed-clothes, which had become disarranged owing partly to his
restlessness and partly to the children's terror, and composed himself to
slumber. He slept, woke and told his dream. He slept again, woke and
told his dream. He slept again and this time we saw his dream. There
was a juggling with the lights and a red gauze was let down. Two
quivering clouds descended from heaven; St. Peter, with the keys at his
girdle, and St. Paul, with a sword, burst through. They made passes at
the sleeping emperor and spoke antiphonally, one being a tenor and the
other a bass. They announced that the Padre Eterno was pleased with him
for pardoning the six children, and that if he would send for Silvestro,
a hermit living on Monte Sirach (_i.e._ Soracte, near Rome, where there
is now a church dedicated to S. Silvestro), he would be told what to do.
The saints and the quivering clouds rose and disappeared. The emperor
woke for the third time, called Captain Mucioalbano, told him his dream
and sent him to fetch Silvestro. It was all carried out with extreme
reverence and the applause was enthusiastic.
The second act passed before the hermit's grotto on Monte Sirach. Enter
Captain Mucioalbano with two comic Saracen soldiers. They have searched
all the mountain and this is the only grotto they have found; they hope
it will prove to be the right one, for they are tired and hungry.
"Come out, come out, come out," exclaims Captain Mucioalbano.
"You are a pagan," says a voice within.
"Yes, I know," shouts the captain, "but never mind that. Come out, I
want to speak to you."
Enter, from the grotto, Silvestro who declares he will have no dealings
with Turks.
"That has nothing to do with it," says the captain. "I come from
Constantine, Emperor of the World,"--and he tells him about the twelve
years' illness, the constant irritation and the mysterious vision.
Silvestro bows his head, crosses himself, and says--
"I understand."
"Then do not keep his Majesty waiting," says the captain. "Come at once
and cure him."
Silvestro agrees to come, but not till he has celebrated Mass, at which
he invites them to be present. They laugh at the idea--Saracens at Mass,
indeed!--and when they see that he is serious they laugh more; it is, in
fact, such a good joke that in a spirit of What next? they accept his
invitation, intending to jeer. First, however, they want something to
eat. Silvestro has nothing for them; besides, one does not eat before
Mass.
"But we are hungry," they say. "You don't fast all the year; what do you
eat?"
Silvestro, like so many hermits, lives on roots, but he has not yet sown
the seed--he will sow it now. The soldiers object, they are not going to
wait four months for their dinner. Silvestro did not mean that they
should: the seed will grow during Mass and they shall eat the roots
afterwards. They are more amused than ever, but consent to wait.
Silvestro sows his seed in two places and they all go off to Mass.
An angel descends with ballet-girl feet, performs an elegant dance and
blesses the seed, which by a simple stage trick immediately grows up in
two flower-pots. The angel dances again and disappears.
Silvestro returns from Mass with the captain, who is deep in thought, and
the two soldiers, who show comic incredulity in every movement. The
captain tells Silvestro that during Mass he had a vision of the Passion.
Silvestro is not surprised.
"Ah!" he says musingly, "yes; that, I suppose, would be so."
The captain is so much impressed he is not at all sure he ought not to be
baptized. The soldiers, who are too hungry to pay any attention,
interrupt--
"What about that food?"
They had been standing with their backs to the full-blown turnips.
Silvestro turns them round and they are stupefied to see that the miracle
has been performed. They are all three converted and insist on being
baptized instantly. Silvestro performs the ceremony, somewhat
perfunctorily, and promises to cure the emperor. They shout, "Evviva
Silvestro!" and dance for joy as the curtain falls.
For the third act we returned to the palace in Rome. Costantino was
still in bed, his son Fiovo and his nephew Sanguineo were with him
attempting to comfort him; he was pointing out that it is little use
trying to comfort a man who is, and has been for twelve years, enduring
such extreme discomfort. They were interrupted by a messenger who
announced the return of the captain with Silvestro.
"Let them be brought in," said the emperor.
Accordingly they came, and the patient repeated to Silvestro all about
the twelve years' illness and the constant irritation. Silvestro
imitated the emperor's action to show he understood how unpleasant it
must be. The patient then recounted his vision and asked--
"Can you propose any remedy?"
"Become a Christian. The water of baptism will wash away your disease."
The emperor hesitated not a moment. Silvestro retired to have a cup
fixed into his right fist and filled with real water, while the sufferer
cleverly turned down the bedclothes and, with the assistance of Fiovo and
Sanguineo, got out of bed and stood upright, showing his body and arms
covered with the dreadful marks of the leprosy.
Silvestro returned and solemnly performed the sacrament of baptism,
pouring all the water over the kneeling emperor who shivered violently
with the cold, so violently that, while he rose, his leprosy fell from
him as it had been a garment and his flesh became as the flesh of
Samson--which in fact it was, for ordinary naked men are so seldom
required that by changing his head one marionette can double the parts.
Then Costantino danced for joy and embraced Silvestro, he embraced Fiovo,
embraced Sanguineo, embraced Captain Mucioalbano, embraced the comic
soldiers, embraced Silvestro again and made him bishop over all
bishops--that is Pope of Rome. They were all dancing and embracing one
another indiscriminately as the curtain fell.
CASTELLINARIA
CHAPTER XVI--A GREAT ACTOR
Last time I was at Castellinaria there came to the town for a week a
company of Sicilian actors. I was afraid the dialect would be beyond me,
but Peppino assured me that it would matter very little if it were,
because I should understand the gestures, and he promised to come with me
and give me any explanation I wanted. So we went to the theatre the
first evening. He was right about the gestures which were wonderfully
expressive and, as for the dialect, it may have been because he
interpreted the long speeches that I found the first two acts of _La
Morte Civile_ rather dull. He admitted that it was so, but things would
improve as soon as Giovanni appeared.
In the third act a haggard, hunted creature, in a peasant's dress which
he had borrowed or stolen, wandered in among the actors; Peppino
whispered that he had escaped from prison. I could not take my eyes off
him; every movement, every attitude, every gesture was full of beauty,
nobility and significance, and his voice was a halo of romance. I
thought no more about leaving the theatre. The part has been played by
many famous actors, but the long account of how and why he killed his man
can never have been more finely delivered. I saw him do the deed. I saw
him turn and gaze upon the body while he wiped the blood off the knife
and wrung it from his hands. He sat on a chair during the whole speech
and I was surprised into believing I understood every word, whereas I
understood none, for it was all in the dialect of Catania and Peppino,
who was as much carried away as I was, forgot to interpret. And when,
still sitting on his chair, he came to his escape from prison, he seemed
to lift the roof off the theatre and to fill the place with freedom and
fresh air.
Peppino, before his uncle died, thought of going on the stage and passed
a year with Giovanni and his company in Catania and on tour, he therefore
knew him quite well and at the end of the play took me round to his
dressing-room. It was Carlo Magno in his palace receiving a couple of
friendly sovereigns, though we were none of us dressed for our parts. I
told him that he was the greatest dramatic artist I had ever seen and
that he had given me a new standard whereby to judge of acting. I said
that when he first appeared I thought he really was an escaped convict
who had lost his way in the streets and come on the stage for shelter,
and that he was going to interrupt the play, as the theatre cat sometimes
does. Suddenly, in a flash, I saw what was before me in two senses at
once, and knew that it must be Giovanni acting, and the sorrow for the
poor hunted wretch was turned to joy at seeing a man do something
supremely well. He was as pleased as a boy with a new half-sovereign,
particularly when I compared him to the theatre cat, and said, with
charming simplicity--
"Thank you. Yes; that is because of the realism; that is my art."
Peppino and I sat up late that night talking about him. He was then
about thirty-five, with a large repertoire and a reputation extending
through Europe and America. When he was about fourteen his father, who
owned and worked the most famous marionette theatre in Catania, died
suddenly, leaving the family unprovided for. He took over the business
and kept his mother, his sister and his young brother. He spoke for the
men figures himself, and his sister for the women. He says that in this
way he learned his art, but other men have had similar training without
arriving at such mastery. He has a passion for doing things thoroughly,
and so thoroughly well did he manage his theatre that Catania was
delighted with him. Three or four years after his father's death, one of
the celebrated Italian actors came to the town and they gave him a
private performance of the _Cavalleria Rusticana_. The celebrated actor
advised him not to waste his time with marionettes, but to act himself.
The theatre was barely large enough, only six or seven paces across, but
it could be made to do, and he followed the advice, giving, at first, in
the Catanian dialect, plays of which nothing was written except, perhaps,
a sketch of the plot. Formerly, when reading was a rarer accomplishment
than it is now, it would have been of little use to write the words.
These plays are full of violence and vendetta, jealousy, murder and the
elementary passions. The audience are uneducated, simple people who look
for the same thing over and over again, as children love the same story
and resent any radical change. This makes it easier to carry one through
than it would be if subtleties or much novelty were to be attempted. I
had seen some of these plays in Catania, and it may make matters clearer
to give a short account of one; it was not until Peppino told me about
them that I understood that the words were improvised.
In the first act Pietro Longo discovers that his sister has been
betrayed, shoots her seducer and is taken by the police.
The second act passes in prison. Two convicts are talking and a third, a
stupid fellow, old, dirty, only half clothed, is sitting apart, stitching
together a few more rags. Singing is heard without. Every one in the
theatre who had passed under prison walls by night had heard such music
and had seen the singers crouching in the shadows; we all knew it was a
signal. The two convicts go to the window and reply. A stone is thrown
in, wrapped up in a letter, which tells them that Pietro Longo has killed
one of their gang and will be taken to their prison; it is for them to
avenge the murder. They confer and agree that the stupid fellow shall be
their instrument. They call him from his occupation and instruct him.
They tell him that a prisoner will be brought in, he is to ask his name,
if he replies "Pietro Longo," he is to stab him with the knife which they
give him. He is so stupid that they have to act it for him, and to make
him imitate them till they think he can be trusted. They hide. A
prisoner is brought in and talks to the stupid fellow. The stupid fellow
has been in prison for years and has talked to hundreds of prisoners. In
the course of conversation, without any particular intention, for he has
forgotten all about his lesson, he asks the prisoner his name.
"Pietro Longo."
The stupid fellow remembers that this is his cue for doing something, but
cannot remember what. His arm accidentally hits the knife which is stuck
in his belt; of course, this is the prisoner he is to kill; he takes out
his knife, opens it with his teeth and attacks Pietro who, though
unarmed, is able to defend himself. This puts the stupid fellow out, he
was told nothing about the prisoner defending himself. The two convicts,
who have been watching, get impatient, come from their hiding and
encourage him. This makes matters worse, he was told nothing about this
either. He is irritated, he grows wilder and, in a fury, suddenly turns
from Pietro and murders the two convicts instead.
The two acts were of about equal length; the first existed merely to
introduce the second, and the second merely to introduce the stupid
fellow whose part was nearly all gesture and, as I afterwards
ascertained, was taken by Giovanni's brother, Domenico. He may have
spoken twenty words, he was too stupid to speak more; the others spoke a
good deal, but, except that they had been told beforehand, as to each
act, about as much as the reader has been told about the second, all they
said was impromptu, so that each repetition, like a Japanese netsuke,
would be a unique work of art.
Remembering how continually Sicilians use gesture in ordinary life, it
will be understood that in such a play the actual words are of secondary
importance. Giovanni, in working the marionettes had become familiar
with all the types that in different grades of society reappear in all
plays--the good king, the proud tyrant, the traitor, the faithful friend,
the young lover, the noble mother and so on; and, as the words were
always improvised, except in such plays as _Cavalleria Rusticana_, which
are exceptional with the Sicilian marionettes, his memory had become
stored with conventional phrases suitable for all the usual stage
emergencies and always ready for impromptu delivery. His fellow-actors
were also familiar with them, having heard the phrases over and over
again, and seen the types with their appropriate gestures from their
early youth as members of the marionette audience.
It is claimed for this kind of impromptu acting that the actors are freer
than when speaking words they have learnt, and can therefore behave with
more naturalness. It is the difference between delivering an extempore
speech and reciting one that has been learnt--the difference between
"recitare a soggetto" and "recitare col suggeritore." So great is the
freedom that an actor may introduce anything appropriate that occurs to
him at the moment, and the others must be ready to fall in with it.
Peppino told me that one night in Catania, after the performance, he was
sitting in the cool with Giovanni's family on the pavement and in the
road, outside the theatre, when an old beggar stopped to beg. He had
come a long way, he knew no one in the town, he had nothing to eat,
nowhere to sleep, no money. The mother gave him a penny, Giovanni gave
him another, his brother, Domenico, another--every one gave something.
The beggar, seeing all that wealth lying in the hollow of his hand, and
knowing that he was now safe for a few days, burst into tears and turned
away speechless. At the sight of this, Domenico called to him, went
after him, met him, emptied his pockets, gave him all he had, took his
head in his hands, kissed him on both cheeks, dismissed him, returned to
his family and was received with an approval that was too deep for words.
Such an improvised incident, the sudden outcome of uncontrollable
emotion, may be seen any day in Sicily and might be introduced any
evening into one of these unwritten plays by any actor who should take it
into his head to do it. The audience, who would probably have seen the
play before, would recognize that here was an impromptu interpolation,
and would applaud the actor both for the idea and for the way it was
carried out.
Gradually Giovanni added written plays and a prompter, and was the first
to take on tour a company of actors performing in a Sicilian dialect. He
also included plays written in Italian. These written plays, though
constructed with more care, did not depart far from the style with which
he began. Giovanni still frequently returns from prison, but as he never
forfeits the sympathy of the audience, if he really committed the crime
it was in self-defence. Whatever the play may be, it always contains,
besides the inevitable scenes of violence, many other passages such as
hearing a letter read (he is then a simple fellow who cannot read),
collapsing in the presence of the Madonna (he is then deeply religious),
dancing at a festa (he is a perfect dancer), confiding, with his last
breath, the name of his murderer to his young brother who promises to
execute the vendetta. In these passages his humour, his delicacy, his
grace, his tenderness, his voice and, most wonderful of all, his
apparently intense belief in the reality of everything he says and does
make one forget how crude and transpontine the bare theme is.
On my saying I should like to see more of him, Peppino asked why I had
come away so soon. I had thought he must be tired and would want to be
alone and change his dress.
"Never is he alone," said Peppino. "Surely now shall he be suppering by
his friends."
We thought it too late to go and look for him then, so we determined to
ask ourselves to supper after the play the following evening.
CHAPTER XVII--SUPPER WITH THE PLAYERS
Next evening the play was _Feudalismo_. Giovanni does not return from
prison; he is a shepherd and is made to marry a girl without being told
of the relations that had subsisted between her and his lord. He and his
wife fall in love with one another, he discovers the deception, kills his
lord and carries his wife off on his shoulders to live happily with him
among his sheep in the mountains.
We went round to his dressing-room after the performance to congratulate
him; when he began to bring the interview to a close, saying that no
doubt it was now my bedtime, I interrupted--
"If you are going to supper presently, may I be allowed to accompany
you?"
He was delighted, patted me on the back and exclaimed, "Bravo, bravo!"
It took us some time to get away; most of the company came into his
dressing-room to say "Good-night" to him, men, women and children all
came; each of the children expected some little attention, and Giovanni
playing with a child is a beautiful sight. Then there were
congratulating friends clustering round him and managers and secretaries
waiting for instructions. At last, with only about fifteen others, we
proceeded, stopping on the way for a prickly drink to cool us after the
performance, and the barman was so overcome by the honour of serving
Giovanni that we had the greatest difficulty in forcing him to accept
payment. We arrived at a small piazza where five or six more of the
company were waiting for us at a restaurant.
Tables were set out under the stars and we sat down to supper which was
the same for all: stock fish (which they called pesce stocco and
sometimes stocca fiscia), bread and wine. Giovanni kissed the loaf
before cutting it, as he does on the stage.
After supper it was proposed that we should play at Tocco. I did not
thoroughly understand the game, but it was something of this kind: Wine
was sent for and we all threw out one or more fingers of one hand,
perhaps there might be seventy-two fingers; then we were counted,
beginning with the one who had proposed the game and going over us again
and again until seventy-two was reached with some one who thereupon
became padrone of the wine. He was entitled to drink it all, but every
Sicilian is a born gentleman, so he appointed one of the company
presidente and another sotto-presidente, poured out a little wine for
himself and handed the bottle to the presidente, who again might drink it
all if he liked. But the game was that he made a speech proposing
so-and-so as a suitable person to be invited to drink, and the
sotto-presidente made another speech giving his reasons for agreeing or
differing. Any one who considered himself aggrieved might plead for
himself, and there was some risk in giving the verdict against him
because sooner or later he was pretty certain to become presidente or
sotto-presidente and to take his revenge. This gave opportunities for
declamation and gesticulation and resulted in much merriment.
Some discussion presently arose as to how far Africa and America are the
same place: one of the actors, who had not forgotten his geography, said
it was well known that they are separate countries, being, in fact, two
of the quarters of the globe. Whereupon Peppino remembered how when he
was at school one of the boys, on being asked to name the quarters of the
globe, replied--
"The five quarters of the globe are four in number and they are the three
following, viz. Europe and Asia."
"Bravo, bravo!" shouted Giovanni, and repeated the sentence several times
in his deep, rich voice.
But however amusing this might be, it did not convince us all that the
two names might not apply to one place; so the geographical actor went
further and told us that Africa had been known since the earliest ages,
that it was not very far from Sicily and contained Tunis, a city which
the company had visited on one of their tours, whereas America was a long
way off, on the other side of the world, and had been discovered in
comparatively recent times, and, strange to say, by an Italian. Giovanni
at once showed great interest.
"Tell us about it," he said, leaning forward.
"His name was Cristoforo Colombo," said the actor. "He was poor and
confided his difficulty to a priest who happened to be the queen's
confessor and a kind-hearted man. This priest went to the queen and
said, 'May it please your Majesty, I have a friend, Cristoforo Colombo,
who wishes to discover America but he has no money to buy ships.' The
queen thought it would be a good thing that America should be discovered
and promised to give him as much money as he wanted for the purpose."
"Oh, bel!" exclaimed Giovanni. "Let us drink the health of the good
queen."
"She died some years ago," said the actor in a warning tone.
"Then," said Giovanni, bowing his head reverently and crossing himself,
"let us drink to the repose of her blessed soul."
We did so and had all about the voyage and the tunnies, the flight of the
birds, the alarm of the crew when the meteor appeared, their
disappointment when the fancied land vanished in the morning, their
wonder at the distant moving light, their impatience and their
turbulence. All this he did, still sitting on his seat and
gesticulating. When he came to the mutiny he rose. He was peculiarly
well able to tell us about the mutiny because, in addition to the usual
sources of information, he had recently taken part in a performance of
the story got up for a charity in Palermo and he had been the one chosen
by lot to kill Colombo. He conspired apart with imaginary sailors,
occasionally glancing and pointing furtively towards the other end of the
piazza. When the murder had been sufficiently agreed upon, he snatched a
knife off the supper-table and, hiding himself behind our chairs, crept
cautiously towards that part of the deck where Colombo stood busily
discovering America through a telescope, the invention of another Italian
named Galileo (who was born some seventy years later). He took the knife
from between his teeth where he had been carrying it, and was about to
commit the dastardly act when Colombo turned round, seized him by the
collar, flung him away and had him put into chains. He was brought up
again when land was in sight and told to look ahead.
"But what do I see?" said the sailor, shading his eyes. "What strange
vegetation is yonder and what unknown beasts? When I look upon these
potatoes, this tobacco for the nose, all these elephants and cucumbers
and trees full of monkeys, it appears to me that I am taking part in the
discovery of America. O noble captain! Pieta, pieta!"
With this he knelt at the feet of Colombo who pardoned him, and the
sailors embraced and wept for joy.
And all the time Giovanni sat gazing and listening with all his eyes, his
ears, his expressive hands and his eloquent back as though it was the
first he had ever heard of it, which can hardly have been the case. More
probably he was considering and criticizing the speaker's delivery and
mentally casting him for a part in a new play, for he lives in his art;
his meals, his sleep, his recreations are all arranged with a view to the
theatre whose only rival in his affections is his mother.
Then we went on with the game, if this did not form part of it, and I was
given some wine and invited to drink. It was an occasion not to be
passed over in silence, so, although I am not good at speech-making, I
rose with my glass in my right hand and, laying my left on Giovanni's
shoulder said--
"Quattro sono le cinque parti del mondo e sono le tre seguenti: Sicilia,
Inghilterra."
Giovanni led the applause with shouts of "Bravo, bravo!" but before I
could drink, my glory slipped off me, the stars went out and the world
came to an end. I had spilt my wine. He saw my distress and at once
took charge of the situation--
"Oh, che bel augurio!" he exclaimed.
I tried to apologize.
"No, no, it will bring us good fortune," and turning sorrow into joy
again, he dipped his finger in the spilt wine and anointed my forehead
and the back of my neck; I did the same to him; he took up the bottle,
flourished it in the air, sprinkling every one of us with wine, and then
flung it away empty over our heads, so that it crashed down on the
pavement and the pieces skated across the piazza, bang up against the
opposite house. Thus we baptized our friendship and in a fresh bottle
drank to its eternal continuance. He then became Carlo Magno again and
declared that I was padrone of the theatre, and that if I did not come
every night to see him act, and to supper afterwards, there would be an
eruption of Mount Etna and he would never speak to me again.
Presently a greasy, throaty voice began to infect the air with
reminiscences of _O Sole Mio_! Nearer and nearer it came until it
floated into the piazza and a drunken vagabond reeled past us and out of
sight. It was a disturbance and we rose to go. I paid sevenpence for my
supper, _i.e._ fourpence for the pesce stocco and bread, a penny for the
wine, a penny for my share of the tocco wine and a penny for the waiter.
Giovanni was pleased with me for giving the waiter a penny. He said I
had done quite right because the waiter (who had never seen me before)
was very fond of me. It was now half-past two and I supposed we might be
going to bed, but on the way we sat down outside a second caffe, had some
more tables out and ordered coffee. _O Sole Mio_! sailed towards us
again, followed by the drunken man. They wanted to send him away, but
Giovanni, watching him, said--
"Let him stay. Give me a cigarette, some one"--as usual he had smoked
all his own.
He handed the cigarette to the man who accepted it and stood
gesticulating, trying to light it and mumbling unsteadily till he veered
off and capsized in a heap, spluttering and muttering in the gutter.
I said, "You have been taking a lesson for your next drunken man."
"Of course I have," he replied.
It was past three by the time we left the second caffe, but we drifted
into a third and, after liqueur, really did at last set about going
seriously to bed; but what with seeing one another home, trying to find
the reason why _Feudalismo_ was a better play than _La Morte Civile_ (no
one had any doubt that it was, but the reason was involved in declamation
and gesticulation) and one thing and another, it was past four before we
separated. We were standing on the pavement outside the albergo, our
numbers reduced to ten or twelve; instead of saying "Good-night" to me in
the usual way, Giovanni put his hands on my shoulders and said--
"Enrico mio! Caro fratello! Io ti voglio bene assai, assai, assai!"
These were his words, but, without his voice, they can convey no idea of
the great burst of emotion with which he pronounced the "bene," or of the
sobbing diminuendo with which he repeated the "assai."
Next morning there was a rehearsal at noon and plenty of work to be got
through, because the tour was only beginning, and there were six new
plays added to the repertoire and fifteen new performers to the company,
which numbers in all forty-four persons.
Giovanni sat with the prompter at a table and the actors went through
various passages requiring consideration. He was too intent upon getting
things right to waste any time by losing his temper, nor did I ever see
any sign of irritation or hear him speak a hasty word. It is true he
kicked Pietro off the stage one day, but he did it with the volcanic
energy of Vanni kicking his wife out of the house at the end of the
second act of _La Zolfara_. And Pietro was not really touched, he had
acted in many unwritten dramas, understood in a moment, played up with
the correct stage exit and we all laughed at the impromptu burlesque--or
modificazione, as one of them called it.
If Giovanni was not satisfied, he got up and showed the actor how he
wanted the passage done. If Berto still failed to satisfy him, he was
immediately replaced by Ernesto, if Ernesto could not do it, there was
always Pietro who could do nearly anything. Berto was the only one of
the company who had any self-consciousness in his acting or, rather, in
his attempts at acting. Probably he will return to the drapery shop in
which he has hitherto been an assistant, after a pleasant wanderjahr with
the company. Ernesto has been some time on the stage and was formerly a
barber; he is, in fact, still a barber and shaves the company, thereby
adding to his salary, the greater part of which he sends every week to
his wife who is at home with his two children.
Sicilians do not like being separated from their families and, as
travelling expenses are paid, if the husband and wife are both employed
in the theatre, it costs no more to bring the children than to leave them
at home. The principal lady is the wife of one of the young actors and
they have brought the baby. The brother of this lady is chief stage
carpenter and property-man, and is married to another lady of the
company. One of the under-carpenters is stepson of the chief comic who
was formerly a fruit seller and is a little fellow of inexhaustible
drollery with a flavour of Dan Leno in his method.
I dined one day with the actor who does old priests, respectable
commissaries of police, chief peasants and anything of that kind, a man
of about forty who formerly kept a shop and sold grain. His wife, the
daughter of artists, is about the same age and does comic mothers, women
who know a thing or two and won't stand any nonsense, garrulous duennas
and so on. They had brought four of their children and occupied a fairly
large room with a kitchen, which they had taken for the week. The
children also act if required; one of them, Lola, a girl between five and
six, was on the stage all through the first act of one of the plays; she
had only a few words to speak, and all the rest of the time was moving
about; she tried the rocking-chair, she stood irresolute on the side of
one foot leaning against a table with a finger to her mouth, she found a
ball, tossed it up, missed it and ran after it, she climbed up to a
table, got a piece of bread and ate it. She had not been taught any of
this business. They had merely said to her, "Play about, Lola," and,
being the daughter of artists, she had played about with an unconscious
spontaneity that was startling. Had there been an irritable uncle on the
scene he must have exclaimed--
"For goodness' sake, do send that child to bed."
Lola was at home upon the stage and was acting accordingly, if it can
properly be called acting, at any rate she was playing. What was
Giovanni doing at supper? Is Giovanni only an actor when on the stage
and when everything he says and does has been thought out? Is he a great
actor by virtue of producing the illusion of being a Lola? And is Lola
not really an actress at all, because she has not prepared what she is
doing and is not even trying to produce any illusion? What is acting?
And what is realism? Here are more problems for discussion at supper
under the stars and on the way to bed at four o'clock in the
morning--problems not easily solved by a company of gesticulating
freebooters who are for ever making raids, first into stage-land, then
into real life, and lifting incidents across the border into that
buffer-state where they lead a joyous life between the two.
CHAPTER XVIII--A YOUNG CRITIC
One day after rehearsal I had an appointment with a young man whose
acquaintance I had made the previous evening behind the scenes. He was
sitting on a packing-case, exchanging compliments with the head fireman,
and inquired whether I was looking for anything; finding I wanted a seat
he took me under his protection, scoured the theatre for a chair, and put
it for me in a corner with a view of the stage. There was only room for
one chair, so he sat on my knee and put his arm round my neck to keep
himself in place. He was absorbed by the performance, but, while the
curtain was down, had leisure to tell me that his name was Domenico, that
he was nearly thirteen years old and brother to one of the ladies of the
company; he was at school in the town and his sister had got him a week's
holiday and taken him to stay with her.
"And so they call you Domenico," said I, just to keep things going.
"No," he replied, "they call me Micio."
"Why do they do that if your name is Domenico?"
"Because they are all very fond of me. Domenico is my name as I said,
but Micio is a caress."
"I see; then may I also call you Micio?"
"Of course you may, and I hope you will."
He was very fond of reading and wanted me to lend him a story-book, but
_Tristram Shandy_, which was the nearest approach to a story-book I had
with me, was in English, so that would not do. Then he began searching
my pockets for chocolate, but there, again, he was disappointed. It was
to give me an opportunity of remedying these deficiencies in my equipment
that we made our appointment, and he was to do the bargaining. During
rehearsal I consulted his sister, which I suppose would have been the
correct thing to do in England, but she only shook her finger at him, and
he only laughed and played at hiding his fresh brown face and his curly
black head in her white skirts; she might as well have shaken her finger
at the scirocco.
The child put his hand in mine and avoiding the glare of the big streets,
led me through narrow lanes to one of the gates of the town. There had
been a storm the previous night, so sudden that our supper had been
spoilt before we could get it under cover and we had to begin again
inside the restaurant. The clouds had all cleared away and the panorama,
as seen from the gate, was at its best with the sun beating down on the
slopes of the mountain-side and sprinkling sapphires all over the sea.
Micio, however, had not come to admire the view; he turned from it to the
books that were laid out on a shady ledge of the town-wall and began to
consider those with the illustrated covers. He wanted them all, not
simultaneously but one after the other. He paused before _Uno Strano
Delitto_ but, the crime being too strange to be comprehensible, we passed
on to _Guirlanda Sanguinosa_, a lady dressed in bridal attire but,
doubtless through exposure to the weather, the blood had faded off the
wreath of orange blossoms, so we took up another. _Il Bacio del
Cadavere_ was about a lady in evening dress who had got out of cab No.
3402 which was waiting for her in the moonlight while she conversed with
the porter at the gates of the cemetery; Micio's anxiety to ascertain
whether the interview was preliminary or subsequent to the corpse's kiss
was not acute enough to induce him to buy the book. There was another
about a kiss, _Bacio Infame_, on which a lady with a stiletto was
defending herself from a bad man. All these were enticing, but we hoped
to do better, and I began to blush for the somewhat thin plot of
_Tristram Shandy_ and to be thankful that my copy was not in Italian.
Finally he took _La Mano del Defunto_: at the back of a sepulchral
chamber in a violated coffin, from which the lid had been removed, lay
the body of a woman, shockingly disarranged, over the edge hung her right
arm, the hand had been cut off and was being carried away by a city gent
in tall hat, unbuttoned frock coat, jaunty tie, yellow boots and streaky
trousers; he had a dark lantern with the help of which he had committed
the sacrilege--very horrible which attracted Micio, and only twenty-five
centimes which attracted me. We might possibly have done better, but we
should have had to search a long time. So we bought it and thought we
might take something else as well. Now, it seemed to me, was the time
for _Carlo Magno and the Paladins_ or the _Life of Musolino_, or
_Robinson Crusoe_, or _Don Quixote_, or _The Three Musketeers_, but he
had read them all, years ago. _The Arabian Nights_ was new to him, but
it was marked ten francs. In voluble Sicilian he expressed my views by
telling the bookseller it was ridiculously too expensive and that he
could give no more than two francs fifty centimes--he never gave more for
a book. The man held out for five francs. The boy laughed at him. They
declaimed and gesticulated and swore at each other until, at last, Micio,
a baffled paladin, wiped his brow wearily as though there was no doing
anything with these people, and told me to take three francs out of my
purse and give them to the brigand, who politely wrapped up our purchases
and we strolled off.
"Now," said Micio as we approached the chocolate shop, "we did rather
well over the _Arabian Nights_--saved seven francs--do you think it would
be extravagant if we were to have an ice to restore us after our
struggles?"
Of course I agreed, though I had not myself done any struggling, and, as
we sat at our little table eating our ices, we talked about the theatre.
I said I had never seen such acting; leaving Giovanni out of
consideration, all the company knew how to produce the illusion of
reality even down to Lola. Micio had no opinion of Lola. She was not to
be considered seriously as an actress; she might become one some day, but
she was only a child. All the children of artists can do as well as she,
but no one can really act who has not suffered. He himself used to act
quite as well as Lola, but had not appeared on the stage for a long
while--not since he had been at school. He could do better now.
"When I see the others acting," he said, "I am not moved, it is like
reading an index. But when I see Giovanni, it is all different, it is
like reading a romance and it makes me cry."
He found fault with some of the plays for not being worthy of the actor.
Too many of them were little more than disconnected incidents, strung
together to provide opportunities for effects, but with no more plot than
the doings of the paladins in the marionette theatres. They were like
the Pietro Longo play, which I had told him about, and he said that, if
that was really all of it, it began with one story and ended with another
and cried aloud for a third act to hold it together.
"Pietro must escape from prison," said Micio; "he must return home and we
must know whether his sister died or went into a convent or married the
policeman."
"What is the stupid fellow to do?" I inquired, "the play was made for
him."
"He must escape too, Pietro will help him because they will become
friends; besides, any one can escape from a stage prison, especially if
the knives are not taken away from the convicts. And then he can do
whatever the author likes.
"But it is always so in life," he continued, with a sigh, "we must not be
discontented because the best we can get is not the best we can imagine.
I am still young, but not too young to have kn--- Let us not talk about
that. What did you think of the play last night?"
I replied that it was a fine play.
He agreed, saying it was "strepitosamente bello." It opened with a state
of things easily comprehensible and of great interest. There were no
tedious explanatory speeches, but plenty of action leading naturally to a
catastrophe which was at once seen to be inevitable, though no one could
have predicted precisely that. And the conclusion sent the audience away
feeling that something tremendous had happened, and that the state of
things existing at the beginning could never exist again.
"That is how a play should be," said Micio.
I took a leaf out of Giovanni's book and patted him on the back.
"Bravo, Micio, bravo! No one has yet said anything like that at supper.
This is the second time this morning that you have expressed my thoughts
for me. We must get your sister to let you sit up with us one of these
evenings. You would keep us straight."
"They know all about it," he replied, "especially Giovanni, he knows
everything. But they don't say it because they like to go on talking."
"There! now you have done it a third time. You appear to me to know all
about it too. How did you find it all out? They did not teach it you at
school, did they?"
"I do not remember that any one ever taught it me," he replied; "I seem
to have known it always. It cannot be otherwise. It is like eating
cheese with maccaroni."
"We seldom eat maccaroni in England," said I, in defence, "and when we do
we usually eat sugar with it; perhaps that is why we are so slow."
This was a mistake because I wanted him to talk more about the theatre,
and there is something quicksilverish in Micio's temperament; having got
on the maccaroni he did not care to return to art.
"What do you eat in England if you do not eat maccaroni? Do you eat
chocolate?"
Which reintroduced the original question, and when we had attended to
that, it was nearly four o'clock, his sister's dinner-hour and time for
him to go home.
In the natural order of things, Micio, being the son of artists, will
return to the stage. Should he fail as an adult actor, he will perhaps
travel in tiles or in ecclesiastical millinery, or he may get employment
on the railway, or as a clerk in the office of the cemetery. I should
like to know when the time comes, for I feel towards him somewhat as he
feels towards Pietro Longo. And there is a chance that he will tell me,
for we promised to exchange postcards, and before parting he gave me his
address--
(Indirizzo)
ALL' EGREGIO GIOVANOTTO MICIO BOCCADIFUOCO,
Casa Educativa Garibaldi,
Via Fata Morgana No. 92, Castellinaria.
Four o'clock was also Giovanni's dinner-hour, and this was the day he had
promised to dine with me. I was in some fear lest I might choose the
wrong restaurant or order something that would disagree with him; the
evening's entertainment, on which the whole town depended, was at stake.
But I need not have worried about it. Giovanni lives so entirely among
people who are devoted to him that he habitually takes the lead in
everything. Consequently he chose the restaurant, and its name was _Quo
Vadis_? He also brought a couple of friends, ordered the dinner and, as
a matter of course, took me for a drive afterwards to the lighthouse and
back.
As we drove through the town, he pointed out the municipio, the
post-office, the old Saracen palace, and the other objects of interest.
When we got into the country, it occurred to me that I might not again
have Giovanni all to myself, it was the first time we had been alone. If
I could now get him to talk about his art, he might tell me exactly how
deeply he feels the emotions which he expresses with so much conviction.
I considered how to begin. I had better ask him first which was his
favourite character. I turned to put the question. He had fallen
asleep, and gave me rather an anxious time, for he repeatedly seemed to
be on the point of rolling out of the carriage. It was a relief when, at
last, the clattering of the horse's hoofs on the paved streets woke him
up, and there was no longer any necessity to hold him in by the
coat-tail.
"There now," said Giovanni, as he helped me out, "we have had a
delightful drive. Is this your umbrella?" he added, handing it to me;
"if I had known you had brought that, I would have put it up to keep the
sun off you while you were asleep."
I had not expected this and looked into his eye for a twinkle, I saw
nothing but grave politeness and the kindest consideration for my
comfort. There are moments when one may regret not having been brought
up on impromptu plays; Pietro would have known at once what to do. I
could only ask, rather feebly--
"Have I been to sleep?"--a question to which, of course, he did not know
the answer; he was quite capable of inventing one, however, so I hastily
went on about the umbrella: "Thank you very much. I am afraid it would
have been of no use. I intended to take it to be mended. I had an
accident with it in the storm last night. Look," and I opened it.
"You will never get that mended. You must buy a new one. Why, it is
broken into as many pieces as the quarters of the globe. Ha, ha! The
two parts of Enrico's umbrella are three in number and they are the four
following, viz. the handle, the ribs, the silk, most of the stick
and--and--yes, and this little bit broken off from the end."
"Bravo, Giovanni, bravo!"
"You are coming to see me act this evening?"
"Of course I am."
"And to supper afterwards?"
"Certainly, if I may. I do not want to cause an eruption of Mount Etna,
and I do not want you to leave off speaking to me."
"Bravo, bravo!" And away he went, apologizing for leaving me by saying
he really must try to get a little sleep before nine o'clock or he would
be no good at the performance. And this time I fancied there was
something of a twinkle in his eye.
Four o'clock P.M. is not such a bad dinner-hour when one is going to bed
at four A.M. And four A.M. is not such a bad time for going to bed in
Sicily. At some seasons it is better for getting up and then one takes
one's siesta during the heat of the day. Either way some alteration of
one's usual habits is a good thing on a holiday, and any one in want of a
thorough change from the life of the ordinary Londoner might do
worse--or, as I should prefer to say, could hardly do better--than spend
a week with a Sicilian Dramatic Company.
CHAPTER XIX--BRANCACCIA
After the players were gone I resumed my normal habits. One morning, as
Peppino and I were returning to colazione he asked me whether I had seen
the procession down on the shore.
"Of course I saw it, but I did not know what it was all about."
"That," said he, "was the bishop; he go to bless the sea and pray God to
send the tunnies. Every spring shall be coming always the tunnies, but
if to don't bless the sea, then to be coming few tunnies; if to bless the
sea then to be coming plenty many tunnies."
"It was a beautiful procession," I said. "I knew it was the bishop; I
saw his mitre and the vestments and the gilded crosses and the smoke of
the incense in the sunlight. But do you think it is quite sportsmanlike
to pray that many tunnies may be killed?"
"Yes," said Peppino, "it is right to pray to win the battle, and we
battle the tunnies so we may pray."
"It is not quite the same thing," said I. "In battle the enemy has a
religion too and can pray against us: it may be fair if both pray
equally, especially if both have the same religion. But it is taking a
mean advantage of the poor tunnies to pray against them, for they have no
religion."
"Perhaps they have," said Peppino. "Perhaps they have Signor Vescovo
down in the sea and make a procession with tunny priests very well
dressed, and bells and banners and incense and singing, and to pray
against the death and the boiling in oil, and to escape to be eaten."
"I should like to see that procession," I said.
I knew that Peppino had sporting instincts to which I could appeal
because, a few days before, he had taken me into his room and shown me
the cups he had won. Some of them were English, for when in London he
was not occupied as a waiter without intermission; his recreation was to
retire from business occasionally for a few weeks, go into training and
appear as a champion bicyclist. So that, after my frugal chop and potato
in Holborn, I had been in the habit of giving twopence to an athlete
famous enough to have had his portrait in the illustrated papers--that
is, if his recollection of me in Holborn was not his invention; anyhow,
there were the cups.
It had come to pass by this time that Peppino and I took our meals
together and we were attended by the waiter, a native of Messina, named
Letterio. This name is given to many of the boys of Messina, and the
girls are called Letteria. It seems that when St. Paul was at Messina
the citizens gave him a congratulatory address for the Madonna; he took
it back with him and gave it to her in Jerusalem. She, in reply, sent
them a letter in Hebrew which they have now in the cathedral. At least
they have a translation of it. Or, to be exact, a translation of a
translation of it. The first translation was into Greek and the second
into Latin. This is the letter after which the children are baptized.
It is to be hoped they have another translation ready in Sicilian, or
perhaps in Tuscan, to take its place in case anything should happen to
it. Letterio could not tell me the contents of the letter, but he knew
it was in the Duomo and was his padrona, and was sure that, though only a
translation, the meaning of the original had been religiously preserved.
Peppino never spoke a word to Letterio; he talked to me and gesticulated.
When he held out one hand flat and patted it with the other, I did not
pay much attention to the gesture, assuming that he was merely
emphasizing what he was saying to me, and that Letterio brought cutlets
because it was time for them. When he tumbled his hands rapidly one over
the other and Letterio brought salad, I did not see that it was cause and
effect. But when he put his hand to his mouth as though drinking and
Letterio brought another bottle of wine, I saw that Peppino had not been
saying everything twice over to me, once with words and once with
gestures, as a Sicilian usually does, but that he had been carrying on
two independent conversations with two people simultaneously.
Talking about Letterio's name naturally led us to talk about baptisms,
and so we returned to the subject of marriage. Another friend of
Peppino's was to be married that evening--yes, poor man! The church was
to bless the union at four o'clock next morning, after which the happy
pair would drive down to the station in a cart, the side panels painted
with scenes from the story of Orlando out of the marionette theatre, and
the back panel with a ballet girl over the words "Viva la Divina
Provvidenza." Then they would take the train to Palermo for a honeymoon
of three days. The interval between the two ceremonies was to be spent
in dancing and, if I liked, Peppino would take me to see it.
So in the evening we went to a house at the other end of the town, "far
away--beyond the Cappucini," as Peppino said. We entered by a back door
which led directly into a small bedroom containing the music: one
clarionet, a quartet of Saxhorns, and one trombone. The room also
contained four babies in one bed, and two more on a mattress on the
floor, all peacefully sleeping. These were the babies that had succumbed
to the late hour, their mothers having brought them because they wanted
their suppers, and would presently want their breakfasts. We sat among
the band and the babies for some time to get accustomed to the noise, and
then passed into the room where the dancing was going on. All round sat
the friends and relations, some with babies, some without; and all the
ladies very serious, the bride in the middle chair of a row along one
wall was so desperately serious that she was quite forbidding.
As when the traveller asks the chambermaid if he can have his linen back
from the wash in time to catch an early train, and notices an expression
passing across her face as she replies, "Impossibilissimo!"--well knowing
that nothing is easier, only she wants an extra fifty centimes--even such
an expression did I see not passing across the face of the bride, but
frozen upon it as she sat with her back up against the wall frowning on
the company. Peppino said she was all right. Brides have to behave like
this; they consider it modest and maiden-like to appear to take no
interest or pleasure in their wedding ceremonies.
The bridegroom was a very different sort of person--gay, alert and all
the time dancing, talking, laughing and gesticulating with every one, as
though his good spirits and vitality were inexhaustible.
The guests on the chairs left space for only two couples at a time. At
the first opportunity Peppino began to dance, choosing for his partner a
young lady who was not merely the prettiest girl in the room, but the
most beautiful girl I have ever seen. She was also an exception to the
other ladies in that she looked happy, especially when dancing with
Peppino. She had a quantity of fine, black, curly hair, a dark
complexion and surprising eyes, like Love-in-a-mist when the morning sun
shines on it, full of laughter and good humour. Her eyelids, her nose
and chin, her full lips and the curves of her cheeks were modelled with
the delicate precision of a violin, and when she moved it was with that
wave-o'-the-sea motion which Florizel observed in Perdita's dancing. I
put her black hair and complexion down to some Arabian ancestor, and her
blue eyes to some Norman strain.
"Who is that wonderfully beautiful girl you have been dancing with,
Peppino?" said I.
He replied, with a rather bored air, that her name was Brancaccia, and
that she was the daughter of a distant cousin of his father who kept a
curiosity shop in the corso.
"How long has this been going on, Peppino? Why did you never mention
Brancaccia to me before?"
He replied in a tone, as though closing the discussion, that there had
never been any reason to mention her, that he had known her all her life,
and she was nothing to him.
I changed the subject and, saying it was a long time since I had been to
a ball, asked if there was anything I ought to do. He said that I was
expected to dance. Now my dancing days terminated many years ago when I
was told that my dancing was the very prose of motion, but I did not want
to say so, because I thought it just possible I might be allowed to dance
with Brancaccia if I played my cards judiciously; so I merely said
modestly I was afraid of knocking up against the other couple. Peppino
silenced this objection by promising to dance with me himself, and to see
that all went well. So I danced a waltz with Peppino. He, of course,
complimented me upon my proficiency, and told me I ought now to dance
with the bridegroom. So I danced another waltz with the bridegroom. He
then said it was expected that I should dance with the bride. This
naturally alarmed me, but I boldly asked her and she consented with a
stiff bow: we performed a polka together and I restored her to her seat,
feeling as though I had crossed from Siracusa to Valletta in a storm,
more frightened than hurt, it is true, but glad it was over, especially
as I now considered myself entitled to introduce the subject of dancing
with Brancaccia. Peppino received the proposition without enthusiasm,
saying she was her own mistress and I could do as I liked.
"But first," he said, "there shall be a contraddanza; did you know what
is contraddanza? All right, I shall tell you. A dancing man shall be
crying to the people to do and they shall do, but if to don't know,
better to don't dance or would come confusion; better to see and to
expect."
"All right, Peppino," I said. "I don't know enough about it; I will look
on and wait, and when it is over I shall ask Brancaccia to dance a waltz
with me."
Peppino paid no attention: he was off and busy superintending the
preparations for the contraddanza.
Eight couples stood in the middle of the room, space being made for them
by removing the chairs they left unoccupied, and by the remaining guests
packing themselves more closely into the corners. The dancers stood in a
circle, men and women alternately, and the circle sometimes became a
square, as in a quadrille, and sometimes two parallel rows, as in Sir
Roger de Coverley. One of the men dancers, shouting in dialect, gave
short staccato directions which the others carried out. This brightened
up the party, and some of the women began to look less gloomy, but a week
of contraddanze would not have brought the best of them up to the
standard of Brancaccia. I approached her and said--
"Signorina, will you do me the favour of dancing with me?"
Another man was about to make a similar request and the girl might have
been in a difficulty had not Peppino, who happened to be hovering near,
made a gesture and taken the other man away. She rose and we danced a
waltz. As we went round and round I saw Peppino talking with the other
man and watching us, and then it flashed into my head that he had planned
all this. He and Brancaccia were in love with one another, any one could
tell that, and he wanted me to meet her so that he could talk to me about
her afterwards. I said to Brancaccia--
"What is Peppino saying to the gentleman?"
She, looking up and smiling, in an amused and friendly way, said--
"Oh! Peppino is always talking to people."
"Some of them seem to enjoy his conversation."
"Do you mean the gentleman?" she said, looking away.
"No, I do not," I replied, and she blushed delightfully.
As I led her back to her seat, I said, "If Peppino asks me about my
partner, I shall tell him that I have just danced with the most beautiful
and charming young lady in the world, and that her future husband,
whoever he may be, will be an extremely fortunate man."
She replied, "Thank you very much, but I do not suppose Peppino will ask
you anything about me."
"I shall tell him what I think of you whether he asks me or not," said I,
bowing.
It was now nearly two o'clock and I got Peppino to take me away.
Remembering what Brancaccia had said, I began at once--
"What a wonderfully beautiful and charming girl Brancaccia is; she seems
to me to be the most desirable young lady I have ever met." There was a
pause, and I added, "You are a bachelor, Peppino, Brancaccia is unmarried
and she is quite different from all the other young ladies."
"That," he replied, "is what says my mother. But womans it is always
like that. First she will be mother, not satisfied; then she will be
grandmother, not satisfied."
"Of course, if you are too much occupied there is an end of the matter.
But, you know, you have as much time as any one else, twenty-four hours
in the day, and some of the others find that enough. Would not
Brancaccia be exactly the woman to help you to run the albergo and to
look after your parents in their old age?"
He admitted that she had the reputation of being an admirable housekeeper
and that he had never heard anything against her. So I went on and said
all I could think of in favour of matrimony, to which he listened without
attempting to interrupt. I finished by saying that if he did marry
Brancaccia and it turned out unsuccessful he was not to blame me. He
replied with great decision that I need not fear anything of the kind,
for he had made up his mind never to marry any one, and certainly not
Brancaccia.
* * * * *
Soon after the wedding festa I returned to London. Peppino and I
exchanged several postcards, but Brancaccia's name was never mentioned in
any of his. After a year I received a letter from him. {329}
"CASTELLINARIA.
"PREGIATISSIMO E INDIMENTICABILE SIGNORE!
"Sono gia piu di dodeci mesi che non ho il piacere di vedere la sua
grata persona sulla nostra spiaggia.
"Con vero piacere Le faccio sapere che mio caro padre gode buonissima
salute e che desidera grandemente di rivederla.
"Tre mesi fa il mio cuore e stato distrutto, causa la salita al cielo
della mia adorata mamma. Non posso trovare parole per esprimerle il
mio cordoglio. Sarebbe stato meglio che il buon Dio avesse preso
anche me, perche non prendero piu alcun piacere nella vita.
"Vi annuncio che Domenica prossima si celebrera il mio matrimonio.
"Non posso mai dimenticare la sua squisita cortesia ed il gentile
pensiero che nutre a mio riguardo. La prego credere che io sono ora,
e per tutta la mia vita saro, a Lei legato di affezione, divozione e
rispetto.
"PAMPALONE GIUSEPPE."
I replied in a letter of congratulation to the bride and bridegroom,
wishing them every happiness, sending them a wedding present and
promising to come and see them as soon as possible. In due course I
received a box of sugar-plums and a letter signed by Peppino and
Brancaccia asking me to be godfather to their first son when he should he
born--an honour which, of course, I accepted. I trust that at the
christening festa this book may not be thought unworthy to take the place
of the more conventional silver mug.
THE END
PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED,
LONDON AND BECCLES.
Footnotes.
{151} [Greek text] offerings made at departure, a feast of Aphrodite at
Eryx. [Greek text] the festival of the return opp. to [Greek
text].--Liddell and Scott's Lexicon.
{154} Taken partly from oral tradition and partly from _Le Glorie di
Maria SS. Immaculata_, _sotto il titolo di Custonaci_, by Maestro F.
Giuseppe Castronuovo, and _Feste Patronali in Sicilia_, by Giuseppe
Pitre. Torino Palermo Carlo Clausen, 1900.
{329} Translation:
CASTELLINARIA.
MOST PRECIOUS AND UNFORGETTABLE SIR!
It is now more than twelve months since I had the pleasure of seeing
your grateful person upon our shore.
I have real pleasure in telling you that my dear father is in the
enjoyment of good health and greatly desires to see you again.
Three months ago my heart was destroyed in consequence of the ascent
into heaven of my adored mamma. I cannot find words to express to
you my grief. It would have been better if the good God had taken me
as well, for I shall have no more pleasure in life.
I announce to you that on Sunday next my wedding will be celebrated.
I can never forget your exquisite courtesy and the kind thoughts you
nourish with regard to me. I beg you to believe that I am now, and
for all my life shall be, bound to you by affection, devotion and
respect.
PAMPALONE GIUSEPPE.