Anapo.
On the next day, having taken in all manner of supplies to our
complete satisfaction, and there not being wind enough to take us out,
as was too obvious even for the Governor to protest, the Admiral
expressed his desire to see the remains of ancient Syracuse, more
particularly those parts connected with the siege, and the surrender
of the Athenians, which last shocked him very much. "To surrender," he
said, "is to lose all your men and none of the enemy's, to give him
much larger stores of arms and ammunition. To surrender is shameful;
to die fighting against insuperable odds is the finest kind of death.
If those Athenians had gone on fighting their way, though it might
have cost the Syracusans only one man for their two, or one man for
their three, depend upon it some of them would have got through to the
friendly city of Catania."[2]
[2] Catana was the ancient name.
In the morning the Governor had arranged that we were to visit the
river Anapo, the only place, it is said, where the papyrus used for
the books of antiquity continues to grow in a natural state, taking on
our way the few stones which mark the position near which the
Athenians met their last defeat.
We had to rise betimes to do this, but the Governor explained that at
Syracuse there was always what he called a little storm in the
afternoon. The Admiral replied that he did not imagine that any storm
which they could have in that bay would be like to frighten his
Majesty's sailors, but if it came he should be glad to oblige the
Governor by sailing out on it to get a day nearer to those rascally
French.
Quite early in the morning, before one breakfasts in England, we rowed
across the Great Port in the Admiral's barge to the low-lying mouth of
the river. The Admiral made me coxswain for the day, out of the
goodness of his heart, I know, that Will should have a companion. We
could not enter the river for a bar with only a few inches of water on
it; but we were met by a very comical sight, for no sooner had we
grounded a few feet off the land than a mounted orderly came on board.
He had on enormous top boots and spurs, and a kind of sabre a great
deal too large for him, and he was all belts, and had on his head the
most wonderful kind of ancient Roman helmet, with a huge brass
cockscomb and the most extravagant plumes of horsehair I have ever
seen, calling to mind the pictures of Sir William Johnson's Indian
braves during the late war in America. But for all this he was
mounted, not on his horse, which he might very well have ridden out to
us, but sitting a-straddle on the left shoulder of a tall fisherman,
who threw him aboard with so little ceremony that, if he had not been
caught by our men, he would surely have fallen over his sabre and
broken it.
He pointed out on the shore a number of lumbering coaches, the upper
parts of which were mostly all glass. Some of these, he told us, were
empty, and for us, because the part of the river below the ancient
bridge (which the chaplain said was built by the Athenians) had become
too choked even for the river boats, which were to meet us at that
point. It being summer, he assured us that the coaches would not
become quagmired in doing this journey, which was only so many
hundred yards. The Governor, it appeared, did not like salt water well
enough to adventure the row across the bay, but had driven round in
his coach. There were fishermen ready, he said in conclusion, to carry
the English officers ashore.
After asking the Admiral's leave, he then made signs, and one of the
inarticulate noises with which the Italians express much; and a number
of fishermen, pretty well naked except for their short shirts and
hanging red caps, rushed into the water to the side of the barge. But
our English seamen were too quick for them, and, leaping overboard,
carried the Admiral and the captains who were with him in true English
humper-back style, though Will obtained the Admiral's permission for
him and me to try this queer shoulder-riding, which is not to be
commended above once.
We noticed that the officer who had come out to the Admiral from the
Governor, remounted with trepidation. No sooner were we ashore than
the Governor, with his principal officers, stepping down from their
coaches, advanced to meet us with bows which took us some trouble to
return with sufficient stooping. We feared to heel over. They had a
party of ladies with them, as we could see, though we were not
presented to them until we reached the boats which were to take us up
the river.
Before we started, the Governor asked us if we would make a slight
detour now to see the Temple of Jupiter, which the Admiral had
mentioned as one of the spots he desired most to investigate. The
Admiral said that he was in the Governor's hands, and the coaches
therefore turned off along what they call a road in Sicily, but which
is no better than a ploughed field. Our officer with the plumes, who
seemed a good fellow, assured Will and myself, who were with him of
the party in the first coach, that this was a good country road, and
that we were fortunate in not having to bump over broken rock.
When we came up with the ladies, I must say we were most agreeably
astonished, for the boats, which had the same high noses as the
_barca_ in which Will and I had adventured the night before, only were
in every way lighter and longer, were spread with rich cloths, and had
fine silken canopies. The ladies, too, being no longer in their
ancestral state dresses, but in robes of thin silk, mostly the thin
white which the Italians know so well how to wear, were a most
beautiful sight, for they were all young, and might have been chosen
for their appearance.
Among the number was Donna Rusidda, and it was arranged, with evident
design, that Will should have a place by her.
Seldom have I seen so gracious a sight as that procession presented.
I took particular note of this when we reached the first bed of the
Egyptian papyrus, which grows somewhat after the manner of the
palmetto, with branching stems, tufted at the tops. But there is this
difference between it and the palmetto--that its leaves, instead of
being papery, are like horses' tails, made of the greenest grass, each
blade being as round as twine. They make a pleasant whispering noise,
if there is a wind ever so light, and they are five, ten, and fifteen
feet high. There is a bend in the river where the bed begins, so I
caught sight of the next _barca_ almost broadside, as she swung round;
and the effect was, I say, very beautiful, for their deck cloths and
their silk canopies were of the Governor's colours, crimson edged with
silver and very rich facings, and these contrasted with the green of
the papyrus on the banks, which almost arched over our heads, so
narrow was the waterway. And I am sure that, to those in the other
_barcas_, the contrast of the white dresses of the ladies and the
bright blue uniforms of His Majesty's officers, made a splendid
bouquet of colour.
The Admiral sat with the Governor on a kind of little dais raised on
the stern, the like of which the other boats had not. Mr. Comyn was no
longer with him for interpreting, since Thucydides tells us nothing
about _fêtes_ on the Anapo with court ladies. He was learned in the
classics, Mr. Comyn, and the Admiral was always much interested to
hear what the classics had to say about this or the other spot, famous
in Greek or Roman history, when we came to it. The Admiral and the
Governor were surrounded by the most beautiful of the ladies, Will
sitting close to the Admiral's right hand to interpret, as occasion
arose, and with Donna Rusidda on his right hand. She looked as
beautiful as an angel in her filmy white robes, which brought out the
marvellous clearness of her cheeks and the soulfulness of her eyes.
Moreover, leaning against the cushioned side of a boat is a test
whether a lady have grace or not, in which she came out uncommon well.
The Admiral was in high spirits, leaning out of the boat to try and
gather a papyrus stalk (it was from the stalk that the ancients got
their paper), and laughing like a boy when his arm, in its best State
uniform, was dragged under water. Presently he spied with that eye of
his, which took in every object of a view at a single glance, a fine
green and blue lizard sitting on a papyrus stalk outlined against the
sky. The chaplain, who was in the middle of the boat, would have it--I
know not if he was right--that this was the famous chameleon.
"Catch him, Trinder," said the Admiral, and I made up my mind to have
him if I had to tumble into the water for it (it was good weather for
dipping in); but the boatman, seeing what I was going to do, knocked
the stalk away with his oar, jabbering like a monkey, and my lizard
was gone. The Governor spoke to him sharply in Sicilian, and turning
to Will, made a long apology in Italian for him to translate to the
Admiral, which was to the effect that this lizard had the evil eye, or
something of the sort, and it was most unlucky to anger it. The
Admiral gave one of his hearty laughs, and the incident passed off;
but presently, as we were passing right through a thick tuft, Will
said to me, "There is another: you catch him. I'll stop the boatman."
The long _barca_ glided swishing under the overhanging papyrus to
where the great lizard lay shamming sleep against the stalk. The
boatman saw us looking, and raised his oar again. Quick as lightning,
Will caught it, and was ready to strike the man or seize him by the
throat as occasion was; but another person had seen it, and a stern
voice came from the dais--"Mr. Hardres!"
Will looked back, still holding the oar. The Admiral did not use this
name in ordinary.
"We don't want to carry any ill fortune with us while we are trying to
fight the French."
Will dropped the oar and saluted; and the Admiral, smiling again, said
we might not be able to get enough wind even to frighten the Governor,
with the chaplain's chameleon on board. But Donna Rusidda arched her
eyebrows and said to Will,--
"We of the Favara have lasted six centuries, and we have always defied
Fate."
To which Will replied, "Don Comyn there, our _padre_, as you would
call him, says he believes the Admiral is like the Roman Sylla--that
there is no name by which he would so gladly be called as Faustus, the
favourite of the Gods."
We were not over long in the river Anapo, I believe, because the
Governor would have us see the fountain of Cyané, from which the river
named after it, the Cyano, derives its clear, plentiful water. The
tributary was decidedly deeper than the river, and here and there the
overarching clumps--I might almost speak of them as an avenue, for
they sometimes met above our heads--broke off for a while, and the
banks would be bordered with sedges of the leaves of the yellow iris,
which blossoms here in great abundance in the spring. So Donna
Rusidda informed Will. We quite missed the rustle of the papyrus
against our canopy when we came to these open spots, though I daresay
the boatmen were glad enough, for they must have impeded the way of
the boat very much.
The fountain was no great distance up--perhaps a mile or so, and it
certainly was a natural curiosity. It was the shape of the bowl of an
egg-cup, and the Governor claimed that it was fifty feet deep; and I
dare swear it was over thirty, though one could see every pebble on
the bottom, and see great mullet, looking quite blue, at what they
considered a safe depth from the attentions of man. It was curious to
see these sea fish running up to half a dozen pounds' weight so far
from the sea, in water fresh from the fountain head, and icy cold. I
was rather thankful that Will had his Donna Rusidda beside him, for he
would have been itching to slip out of his clothes somehow, and dive
for the stones, which looked like turquoises, at the bottom of the
spring. The prospect of groping about with his eyes open under thirty
or forty feet of water, clearer than glass, would have been
irresistible.
As it was, he did nothing worse to shock the Governor than attempt to
drink some of the same water during the _al fresco_ banquet held,
while the _barcas_ were moored to the low papyrus bushes round the
fountain or, as I should call it, the spring, which was the only place
on the whole river where there was room for two or three boats
together.
Whether his Excellency considered all water unwholesome, or that Will's
rushing to drink it in place of wine was a reflection on his
hospitality, did not appear. I do not know when I have seen such a
scene, which in a different way reminded me of the pictures of a
certain Watteau captured by my Lord Eastry in one of his prizes, and
now hanging in Will's gallery; though I do not maintain that the
Governor's ladies, beautiful and appropriate as their light summer
robes were, approached the Watteau ladies in elegance of costume. But,
on the other hand, the prim fountain with Diana in the centre,
supported by two dolphins, with their lips curled and their tails
plaited, certainly did not come up to our clear pool, as deep as many a
house is high, carrying on its bosom three or four great _barcas_,
hanging with crimson and silver, and ringed all round by overhanging
palmetto-like clumps of the feathery papyrus of old Egypt. Nor, I
confess, do the men in Monsieur Watteau's pictures, who are generally
dancing, come up to men like Captain Troubridge and Captain Berry, in
the uniform of His Majesty's Navy. And every little detail, each
feather in the plumes of the papyrus, each jewel, every burnished nail
within reflecting distance of the water, was mirrored as clearly as the
bright blue uniforms and shining epaulettes of His Majesty's officers,
and the great masses of crimson in the boat-hangings. We had music,
too, from the Governor's--well, I call them lute-players--especially
brought over from Naples, wearing the old doublet and hose, crimson and
silver liveries of the Governor's family, which their forerunners had
worn when Tommaso de Vigilia painted them three centuries before in the
pictures hanging in the Governor's palace. I could believe that these
were the same liveries, for in Sicily servants' fête-liveries are not
made for them, but made for the household, and handed on from one
servant to another, as a saddle from horse to horse.
I don't know how long the banquet may have lasted, there was such
profusion of pastrycooks' viands and fruits and wines. The Governor
looked as if he expected Will to die when he took an empty goblet and,
dipping it into the clear water, drank it off two or three times
filled; though, as we had put into his port for the purpose of getting
water for our ships, it did not appear why we should consider it unfit
for drink. Had I been enjoying Will's place beside Donna Rusidda, and
able to converse with her elegantly, as he was, I think I should have
been content for our _barca_ to have swayed gently on the bubbling
waters of the spring--to give you some idea of the size of the spring
there were four of these _barcas_ floating on it at one time--for the
rest of that summer day. But I could see that Will was fidgeting to be
off, and presently he asked the Admiral if he and I might leap ashore
off the high beak of our _barca_, which was overhanging some part of
the bank. He made the excuse of some strange flower or the like. The
boatman, seeing our intent, uttered some swift warning in Sicilian,
which the Governor very politely translated to Will to tell the
Admiral; but Master Will only used general terms of its not being
safe, and the Admiral said, "My Lord, a jump like that would not
frighten my officers."
But, jumping together, we got more than we bargained for: we shot
through the bank like a couple of bullets. We were almost up to our
middles in thick black slime, of which you could not have dreamed the
possibility so near that transparent water. Luckily for us, or I
verily believe we might have been swallowed up, the good-natured
boatman had unshipped the oars and held them out to us, and we were
able to pull ourselves up on to the _barca_, where we sat on the end
to dry our blackened legs in the sun, and presently the _barcas_ swung
round and dropped down stream.
The sun was now so powerful that long before we were back at the mouth
of the river we were dry enough to have accepted the invitation of the
courteous Sicilians and gone back among them to sit without fear of
soiling them, more especially since we had removed our shoes and
stockings--there was much naked-foot work on board ship in those
days--but Will said that he could not sit beside ladies in such a
plight, and I had never any say but Will's say, though I did not know
what was in his mind.
The town of Syracuse looks as I could imagine the cities of the Bible
would have looked, when one sees it from the mouth of the Anapo at the
opposite side of the great port on a July noon. Not a film of smoke
rises from the low flat roofs of the mellow white-and-yellow houses,
which, in their turn, seem to be crouching down within the shadow of
the city walls. There is even a temple, for the cathedral is but the
Temple of Minerva, with the columns still protruding from the northern
face.
I should have said that only Will and I went to the mouth of the
river, walking from where the water became too shallow for the
_barcas_; the rest of the Admiral's party rumbled off in the coaches
to see the ruins of Epipolæ and Achradina, and the Greek castle of
Euryalus and the street of tombs, the theatre, amphitheatre, and much
more that I cannot remember of ancient Syracuse, though the Admiral
had had Mr. Comyn to tell the younger officers about them most
carefully. Will and I had been dismissed, as not being in fit
condition to ride in gilt coaches with crimson velvet hangings, and
had orders to have the barge at the landing-stairs under the Marina at
such a time. I know that I was glad to be excused from parading in
state round miles of old stones. The Admiral would not willingly miss
a stone that had any ancient history hanging about it; and with a
guide telling the story first in Sicilian, and the Governor, who was
slow at taking the drift, putting it into Italian for Mr. Comyn, and
Mr. Comyn, who was slow with his Italian, putting it into English for
the Admiral, and the Admiral, not being satisfied, putting his
questions and persisting with them till he understood his point, it
would be a long day. The roads, too, were such that the coaches went
slower than a walk. Will had more in his mind, but this I did not know
then.
You may be sure that the Admiral had not embarked on this inland
voyage of discovery before he had made certain that the wind would be
lacking to carry the fleet, which had now everything on board, out.
Seeing that the day was one of those days without enough air to blow a
candle out, he said to Will:
"I am afraid that we have offended his Chameleonship after all." And
somehow I believe that Will's translation of this to the Governor was
a very lame affair.