SUMMER AT NAPLES
We made rather a sad entrance into our new abode, for we had not been
settled above two days when the portress appeared to me with a very
troubled face, and asked me to come and see her Giulia, who, she feared,
was dying. The poor woman was in dreadful grief, having lost another
daughter not many months before. I accompanied her to the sick room,
where I found a very pretty girl, by whose bedside I took my place. With
that trustfulness which is a leading characteristic in young Italians,
she took my hand, and addressed me as if I had been an old friend. I
tried to speak cheerfully to her, but there was something so spiritual
and far away in the look of her pleading eyes that it failed me to hold
out to her any hope of recovery.
She had only lately fallen ill, she told me, but knew that she was
dying, for her sister’s last words to her were “Tornero per te.”[33] She
scarcely knew at the time what was meant by these ominous words.
Footnote 33:
“I will return for thee.”
“But two nights ago, signorina,” she said, “I looked up and saw Anna by
my bedside; she had fulfilled her promise and came back for me.”
Poor Giulia! I only saw her once again, and that was on the morrow, when
she was carried past our windows on the way to the Campo Santo.
According to the custom of those days (I do not know if it still
continues), she lay with her face exposed on a bier of magnificent
crimson velvet, embroidered with gold, attended by a long procession of
priests and mourners for the dead. Her beautiful long hair crowned with
fresh roses, her gala dress thrown loosely over her, to be removed when
the funeral reached the cemetery, and the fair young creature to be
thrown headlong into one of those noisome holes which were opened daily
for the interment of the dead.
[Sidenote: RIDING PARTIES AT NIGHT]
With the exception of two attacks of illness which befell me and my
sister, and which were productive of a good result in the friendship we
formed with the chief physician of the place, our summer at Naples was
most enjoyable. As usual, we had our cavalcades, in which we were always
joined by the two Boddington sisters and a compatriot of ours, Hugh
Cholmondeley, afterwards Lord Delamere; so that with my two brothers, my
sister and myself we formed no insignificant troop of horses. But summer
was at its height, and our rides were nocturnal. The horses were ordered
at 10 P.M., and we rode till one and two in the morning, for, as I heard
a passer-by once say under my window:—
“A Napoli non e mai notte.”
How beautiful were those moonlight rides along the coast towards
Posillippo, with the Mediterranean glittering and sparkling, and
occasionally dotted by fishing-boats, with their flickering lights,
while Vesuvius at intervals threw up volleys of flame and columns of
smoke.
What a happy band we were!—alas! there are but two survivors! What
delightful excursions we had (the pleasure enhanced by the presence of
our respective parents) to Pompeii, to Sorrento and Amalfi and Paestum,
and what delicious evenings we spent in the little garden of Villa
Craven which overhung the sea! What a trip to the island of Ischia,
where the Boddingtons and I danced tarantellas on the terrace of the
pretty inn under the tuition of a dark-eyed young Ischiate. How
enchanting was the scenery of that sweet little island, the pleasure
only marred to our friends’ English maid by the fact that we had to
cross the sea to get there.
Harvey (for that was her name), the hysterical friend of Lucca days,
expostulated with her mistress on the inconvenience of coming in an open
boat—
“Lord and Lady Sydney, ma’m,” she said, “preferred coming by land, and
found it much more comfortable.”
Poor Harvey! she was one of those people who remain faithful to their
first idea. It was in vain her young ladies explained to her that it was
very difficult, they might say impossible, to reach an island by land!
Harvey maintained stoutly that Lord and Lady Sydney had achieved this
feat, for she had it from the best authority, that of the lady’s maid;
and in that belief Harvey went down to her grave.
Vesuvius vouchsafed three separate eruptions to us during our sojourn at
Naples, and we made a pilgrimage up the mountain while the fire-stones
were falling and the lava flowing in all directions, much to the
consternation and disgust of our guides.
[Sidenote: OUR DOCTOR RECITES DANTE]
But to return from Nature to human nature, and to speak first of our
beloved physician.
Michael Giardano was the son of an Italian by an English woman, and
combined in his own person the best characteristics of both nations. He
was eminently handsome, well skilled in his profession, a scholar, a
sportsman, and an artist. He nursed me and my sister, and our faithful
Henry, through bad attacks of fever, and as far as I was concerned,
assisted in my recovery by the opiates he administered in the form of
long recitals from favourite passages in Dante as he sat by my bedside.
Poetry is a medicine which I have always found efficacious in my own
case, either to a body or mind diseased, and I was reminded of my
Neapolitan friend not long ago, when another distinguished member of the
same profession, and another valued friend of my own, administered the
same remedy, only then the tonic was Goethe instead of Dante.
Giardano was a favourite with man, woman, child, and dog, for he set the
paw of our Scotch terrier when run over by the carriage. “Boch-Dhu” was
very much pleased with the care he bestowed on her, and, I grieve to
say, showed some dissimulation in order to attract his notice. Long
after she had become sound, the instant the door opened, and the Doctor
appeared, this deceitful individual would limp to the chair and, sitting
beside her medical attendant, offer him her paw!
Poor Michael Giardano! Many years afterwards I picked some violets from
his grave in the Protestant cemetery at Rome, where an elaborate tomb
had been erected to his memory by an English lady, who became his wife,
not long after we had bidden him adieu at Naples. There could be no
doubt of the admiration and affection in which she held this gifted man,
whose epitaph she wrote, detailing his many virtues and talents, while
the sculptured sides of the monument symbolised the many pursuits in
which he was proficient.
One evening, riding with my eldest brother, we resolved to go up to the
castle of Sant’ Elmo (then the Chelsea Hospital of Naples) in order to
view the sunset from the summit of the hill. When we arrived at the
gates of the fortress, we found that we were too late to be admitted,
but I looked so disappointed, and pleaded so piteously to be allowed to
pass, that a soldier who was standing by offered to go in and ask the
Commandant for his permission. The request was readily granted. We
dismounted from our horses, and made our way on to the terrace, where we
were welcomed by the good old general, who was enjoying his coffee, and
kindly asked us to join him. He was already long past middle age, with a
military bearing, for he had seen much good service, and with a kind,
genial manner, which warmed into enthusiasm when he found we spoke his
language with fluency. He did the honours of the place and of the pretty
garden which embellished the grim old castle, and the magnificent view
it commanded; for Naples lay beneath us, the blue Mediterranean dotted
with islands, the country towards Baiæ on one side, Pompeii on the
other, stretching out into the distance, the Villa Reale, enlivened by
numerous groups of gay pedestrians, and the fire and smoke of Vesuvius
in the back-ground.
[Sidenote: CASTLE OF SANT’ ELMO]
We lingered on the terrace a long time, until the moon rose over the
bay, and then, bidding our new friend good-night, gratefully accepted
his invitation to return there again, and, above all, to bring my sister
and my brother Charles, who were shortly expected from England, to enjoy
that beautiful prospect.
Dear old General Ruberti! May I be forgiven if I boast of so decided a
conquest. From that time till we left Naples, he would send me constant
presents of sweet nosegays, of delicious fruits, and of different kinds
of dried fish, and any other especial Neapolitan delicacy, the packets
usually tied up with coloured ribbons, and invariably accompanied by a
large square letter directed:
“_Aa sua eccellenza,
La nobil donzella,
Donna Marietta Boyle,
Palazzo Calabritti_,”
which bore very little resemblance to a _billet-doux_, either outside or
in. Yet the contents were usually of a tender and complimentary nature,
and surely never were love-letters more peculiar in their character.
They were written by proxy in the large, full round hand of a secretary,
very eloquent and very flowery, with a most affectionate yet respectful
heading and ending, while at the bottom of the paper, in a little
cramped and rather trembling hand, came the signature of my devoted
admirer,
“_Ruberti, Generale Commandante di Sant’ Elmo_.”
Natural as was the pride I felt in the conquest of so elevated an
adorer, it was nothing to the glory which awaited me. One evening I was
bidden with my mother and the whole of the family to dinner, and a most
excellent repast was served to us on the beautiful terrace, and when the
purple shades of night deepened in the sky, the grim old Castle of Sant’
Elmo burst forth into brilliant illuminations—and all this in honour of
Donna Marietta. I have never since gazed on a picture or drawing of
Naples the beautiful, crowned with the old castle, without remembering
that proud night in my life. Dear, noble old general!
When King Bomba issued his commands that the Commandante should fire
upon his countrymen from the heights above the town, the patriot
refused, and, in spite of his previous services and advanced age, was
cast into prison. A tribute is paid to this noble rebel in Ruffini’s
pathetic tale of “Dr Antonio.”
He outlived his captivity, and shortly before his death (which, I think,
took place at Turin) sent me a letter with a string of coral beads, to
entwine, as he expressed himself, in my golden hair, by that lover of
Italian freedom, the Countess Belgiojoto, a connection, by the way, of
our Poet-Laureate.[34]
Footnote 34:
Alfred Lord Tennyson.
[Sidenote: FEAST OF MADONNA DELL’ ARCO]
Naples, justly called the beautiful, appeared to us on another occasion
under what might well be termed a miraculous aspect. It was the feast of
the Madonna dell’ Arco, When the Neapolitans leave the city to purchase
in some neighbouring district rural utensils of husbandry, such as
rakes, pitchforks, baskets of various shapes, etc.,
they return at evening into the city with these implements crowned with
flowers and decked with coloured ribbons a species of triumphal
procession, which formed the subject many years ago for a charming
little picture by the Italian painter, “Urvins,” which decorates one of
the small rooms in Lord Lansdowne’s splendid collection at Bowood.
But let it not be supposed that the mirthful Neapolitans marched
stiffly, or walked sedately into the city at the close of the festival.
Oh, no! the whole procession danced into the town with all the varying
steps of the tarantella, the men wheeling and circling round the women,
and shaking and striking the tambourines above their heads; and on the
glorious afternoon in question, the Madonna was propitious, and across
the whole city was thrown a rainbow of immense magnitude and brilliant
colours, framing with its prismatic arch one of the most glorious
pictures that can be imagined, and promising to the happy citizens a
fertile and beautiful season.
The arrangement of the hours of the day at Naples during the summer was
a source of great amusement to us. The belfry of a neighbouring church
tolled the hours, but only as far as six, so that when, according to our
English reckoning, it was 7 P.M., the clock struck one, and the hour was
called twenty-four.
One more curious experience befell me at Naples—Naples the delight of
her citizens, as the old carbonari song says, which strangers are
enjoined to see before they die. I slept in a corner room opening into
those of my mother and my sister, the two doors being in an angle close
to each other, and, of course, always open during the summer months
(they were all passage rooms). I had not slept there very long, before I
came to the conclusion that my apartment was haunted. Every night there
passed through from one door to the other the figure of a woman, so
hastily, so softly, that I was only aware of the movement and the
scarcely perceptible flutter of a garment. At first I supposed it was my
sister, and called out, but received no answer. I said very little—I am
not sure, but I believe I kept silence altogether on the subject; the
servants would have been terrified, the rest of the family sceptical, so
I and my ghost kept our own counsel. I had not the slightest fear, or
feeling even bordering on excitement, but I was curious, and determined
to test myself whether the vision was a fancy of my own; so I used to
look up and think, “Now I shall see it,” but that did not succeed, and
afterwards when I was thinking of something else there she was, or
rather there she went, her movements being visible to me by the glimmer
of outside _cafés_, etc., which were never extinguished till dawn, and
my curtains were closed.
[Sidenote: THE PALAZZO CALABRITTI GHOST]
My visitor was very faithful, but was not regular in her hours. She
never made her presence known by any audible sound, unless the piercing
shriek that I heard one night, some hours after I had gone to bed, had
any connection with my ghostly friend. I was roused from my slumber by a
scream which appeared to me to come from our drawing-room, which was
three rooms off from mine. I dashed out of bed and found my sister, who
had sat up late, calmly writing letters to England, and she naturally
took me for a ghost, as I made my sudden appearance in my night attire.
I sometimes also heard my name called when no one was by, but that was
all I ever saw or knew of the ghost of the Palazzo Calabritti. Neither
could I in any way account for the apparition, unless the question could
be solved by our Neapolitan housemaid saying to me one day:
“Ah! a poor young lady from your country died in that bed, for the love
of the Prince of Capua.”
I think the poor girl must have had the most susceptible heart, for that
royal prince had little to recommend him, either in looks or in
character, although he shortly afterwards married an English wife. We
heard sad stories of him while we were at Naples, and how he persecuted
a beautiful young Englishwoman by his attentions, and in revenge for the
slight she put upon him, endeavoured to compromise her by causing his
empty carriage to stand almost every night at her door. In order to
defeat his wicked design, this fair creature would walk up and down the
pavement before her own house, sometimes for hours together, until
fatigue drove her in. Yet I must confess we were indebted to this
reprobate prince for a delightful sail to the island of Capri, he having
lent my sailor brother the small yacht in which he made frequent
cruises.
It was a glaring hot July day, and going below, to escape the heat of
the sun, I was most unpleasantly impressed by the gaudy colouring of the
cabin and its fittings. Why on earth, thought I, should a Neapolitan
prince sport the Royal Stuart tartan, which, however dear to loyal eyes,
looked tawdry and incongruous in such a position. It was some time
before I discovered the meaning of the sentiments or the allusions to
“Prince Charlie,” as the Prince of Capua bore that name.
Now while we are on the subject of the Bay of Naples, and the yacht is
in the harbour, I must mention that the skipper of Lord Anglesey’s
charming craft, the _Pearl_, was an Irishman, but of so refined and
educated a class that, avoiding all temptations to brogue, he invariably
called the crater of Mount Vesuvius “the creature.”
Bidding adieu to beautiful Naples, we embarked on a French steamer for
Leghorn, and had so fine a passage that we were able to sleep both
nights on deck, “under the roof of blue _Italian_ weather,” and make our
way to Pisa, _en route_ for Florence.
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