All night long, hour after hour, we have had more and more alarming
news from Vesuvius, and a rain of cinders in the late night, has
increased the terror in everybody's mind and heart. The morning is
profoundly sad with its still dark sea, with all the streets so black,
with that strange sense of anxiety and surprise, among those we meet.
The duke of Aosta has set off for Boscotrecase, Cardinal Prisco has
gone also there, and later, the duchess of Aosta has followed. It looks
as though a whole crowd was starting out for that town. All carriages
seem to go in the same direction, towards the Circumvesuviana station.
The tramways are loaded! What are we doing here, why don't we start
like all the others? Let us go, and see these deserted, and destroyed
countries, let us go and see Boscotrecase threatened by the monstruous
lava ready to burn it up. Let us run to see Torre Annunziata threatened
by the same, let us go to hear the desperate weeping of women, the
screams of children, the moans of the old people. In the train, in the
train, for it is too slow going by carriage. Let us go like thousand of
people have gone, in the train, since we don't possess an automobile
which could help us to fly on the main roads, way up yonder, where
destruction takes place.
In the train, in the train! It is easier said, than done. An immense
crowd of people anxious to start, are seiging the station of the
Circumvesuviana, and the most extraordinary scenes naturally happen,
since, if this beautiful and fine railroad, girdling Vesuvius, carries
generally about a thousand persons a day, it cannot transport to-day
fifty thousand. And really it has already worked wonders, due of
course, to the energy, calm, and tact of Mr. E. Rocco, and director
Ingarami. It has worked wonders, doubling and multiplying its trains
from dawn to mid-night, each of them starting with their platforms
packed, with their cars jammed with people, standing the most impetuous
assaults at every small, intermediate station. For whole bands of
foreigners, are waiting in these small stations, and they rush in to
take whatever seat they may find. Here all species of Neapolitans are
coming, the best known as the least: groups, coteries, families,
parties of friends, who like an immense human legion intend to go
to Boscotrecase. And little by little, with the young foreign girls
attired in their short excursion dresses, their hats covered with large
white veils, with the elegant and loquacious Neapolitan ladies, with
the friends and acquaintances which one meets, with the continuous
screaming and yelling, now stronger, now softer, with the most
extraordinary buzz of conversation, the sense of fright and anguish
gradually dies away. The big cloud of ashes which wrapped us up in the
beginning of the trip, disappears after Bellavista, the sky is getting
clearer, and of a delicate azure colour. In the train people begin to
joke, and at S. Giorgio a Cremano, a whole company of young girls,
jesting and laughing, gets up in our train. And now this immense
torrent of humanity running towards Boscotrecase, looks almost like a
large pleasure excursion. One would think that merry and thoughtless
life had had the best of fright. And what fright! The main-road going
from Torre Annunziata to Boscotrecase, is getting dark, almost black
with carriages and automobiles. One of these is coming down from
Boscotrecase. There are friends in it, and the train having stopped,
we ask them what is the latest news. "The lava has stopped", they cry,
shaking their heads and shoulders as if disappointed. In the train
people are getting altogether merry.
A big crowd of people coming down, meets at Boscotrecase a still bigger
crowd going up, with a confusion of carriages, wagons, automobiles,
byciclets, all moving towards that fine country, so richly surrounded,
by farms, vines, gardens, and which seems still so calm under the
grasp of its terrible enemy. And the people coming down describe with
gesticulations, and impressive words, what they have seen not very far
off, and they look all excited as though they had witnessed a grand
and incomparable spectacle! The crowd moves on, then stands still for
some time, for there is no place for it, in the beautiful little town.
The peasants of Boscotrecase stand around the tourists, silent and
still. Nobody is crying, no sad faces are to be seen, no complaints are
to be heard, nobody asks or pretends to ask for anything. A liturgic
sound reaches our ears at a cross path off the road, and a general
silence is made in the thick crowd. A rough wooden cross appears, and
behind it, over the heads of the people, an ancient statue of S. Anne,
the protectress of Boscotrecase, the Madonna's mother. S. Anne, the
powerful old woman, as these southern people call her, is seen. This
statue must be very ancient. It has a thin face, crowned by locks of
white hair, the thoughtful face of an old woman bending down on the
fresh and young face of a little girl. The statue moving on, waves over
the crowd. It was taken out yesterday from the church of the Oratorio,
which is near B. quite close to the lava, and it has been left there,
on the very extreme spot where the lava was rapidly advancing, in the
direction of Boscotrecase. This morning, at ten o'clock, this first
lava has stopped ten meters from the statue of S. Anne, while the
other branch on the right, stopped half an hour later. Far away in the
country, five or six farm houses, abandoned two days before, have been
surrounded by it, fortunately they were empty, without even furniture
in them. But Boscotrecase is safe, and S. Anne carried in triumphal
procession, enters the town.
The women sing softly some religious verses while walking behind the
statue. There is a certain sadness in their voices. Many kneel down
and pray, men lift their hats. The old statue of the thoughtful woman,
looking calmly to her daughter, is above the crowd. Foreigners look
with interest, and the sceptic, and those who have no faith dare say
nothing, for really, the lava has stopped this morning, at a certain
distance from S. Anne, and if this fact is due to nature, these people
don't care, all they want to know is that they have been saved once
more, by the prayers of the Protectress.
Now, a priest speaks to the people, begging them to be calm and hope
in God's help. This priest is very fervent, he has been preaching and
speaking for two days, advising his people to be calm! This morning
he has spoken before the lava. The statue descends slowly towards its
church, having done its work of charity. Automobiles are rushing every
where, whips are cracking, torrents of people push on. Bosco is black,
the country is black all around, swarms of men and women rush down,
while others come up. We pass by a mound of earth accumulated there for
the purpose of deviating, if possible, the lava. Near this mound the
houses are empty, and the doors open. Perhaps this same night, their
owners, eluding the watch, will return to sleep in them. I have seen
some mattresses brought in these abandoned houses.
* * * * *
But while we climb up towards the lava, the mouth of Vesuvius above our
heads, roars and thunders. A great column of white, gray, and black
smoke stands erect on the cone, and notwithstanding the full day light,
we see through those dark and light clouds, long flames arising as
through a veil, and showers of sparkles fall in a mass of fire around
the mouth, towards our right. The mountain thunders, and breathes as a
colossus, it sparkles terribly, dashing stones of fire, masses of fire,
rocks of fire every where.
The merriness of the trip seems subdued, and the frivolous chattering
is hushed altogether. People going towards the lava walk in awe, and
silent wonder. Every path either steep or easy, is now getting black
with people.
But in the great silence of this crowd, in that immense silence, only
the roaring of the Vulcano tells the story of this great telluric
cataclism. Are we not feeling, perhaps, the earth trembling under our
steps? The mountain lightens in flames, getting redder and redder,
more brilliant and dazzling every moment. Here in this great valley,
once formed by another eruption, here were vines, and olives grew on
old lavas of remote times, here is the lava of yesterday. Amazing
spectacle! The gigantic black mass rises powerful and straight, quite
at a few steps from us, and it looks like a dark sea petrified in its
foaming waves, a stormy black sea, magically transformed in stone or
rocky substance, a hardened, dead sea. Ah! why isn't it dead? Fire and
flames are still living within, and now and then it blazes, burns out,
shows its incandescence. Under our feet the earth is warm, but a little
further it is burning.
On the right, the other branch of the lava, the one which has still an
imperceptible movement, shows a burning furnace under its black and
rough stratus, from which masses of fire detach themselves rolling
down at our feet, while all around it, large drops of fire fall on the
ground, and gradually melt away. Wonderful sight!
Little by little, the fascination of this tremendous thing, of this
black and stony sea which once was fire and lava, which is now rock,
but still is lava, still is fire inside, seems to fascinate all of us,
even the most timid. Women, old people, children draw imprudently
near, bend over, plunge theirs sticks, their umbrellas in the furnace,
with a daring and audacity nearing madness. And Vesuvius continues to
roar quite over us. Way up go the flames of the crater, while night
falls.
Before us the brown and monstruous mass of the two still lavas, rises
frightful and menacing. Terror seems now to take hold of peasants,
gentlemen, indigens, Neapolitans, foreigners. A hush of tragedy is over
that country of tragedy, with the hardly conjured danger of this night,
and the imminent danger of to-morrow.
April 8 1906.