A FIRST GLIMPSE OF ITALY
My days in Monte Carlo after this were only four, exactly. In spite of
my solemn resolutions of the morning the spirit of this gem-like world
got into my bones by three o’clock; and at four, when we were having
tea at the Riviera Palace Hotel high above the Casino, I was satisfied
that I should like to stay here for months. Barfleur, as usual, was
full of plans for enjoyment; and he insisted that I had not half
exhausted the charms of the place. We should go to some old monastery
at Laghet where miracles of healing were performed, and to Cannes and
Beaulieu in order to see the social life there.
A part of one of these days we spent viewing a performance in Mentone.
Another day Barfleur and I went to Laghet and Nice, beginning with a
luncheon at the Riviera Palace and winding up at the Hôtel des Fleurs.
The last day we were in the Casino, gambling cheerfully for a little
while, and then on the terrace viewing the pigeon shooting, which
Barfleur persistently refused to contemplate. This (to me) brutal
sport was evidently fascinating to many, for the popping of guns was
constant. It is so curious how radically our views differ in this world
as to what constitutes evil and good. To Scorp this was a legitimate
sport. The birds were ultimately destined for pies anyhow; why not kill
them here in this manner? To me the crippling of the perfect winged
things was a crime. I would never be one to hold a gun in such a sport.
It was this last day in the Café de Paris that Barfleur and I
encountered Marcelle and Mme. Y., our companions of that first dinner
in Paris. Barfleur was leaving for London, Scorp was to stay on at
Monte Carlo, and for the first time I faced the prospect of traveling
alone. Acting on impulse I turned to Marcelle and said: “Come with me
as far as Ventimiglia,” never thinking for a moment that she would.
“_Oui_,” she replied, “_oui, oui_,” and seemed very cheerful over the
prospect.
Marcelle arrived some fifteen minutes before my train was due, but
she was not to speak to me until we were on the train. It took some
manœuvering to avoid the suspicions of Scorp.
Barfleur left for the north at four-thirty, assuring me that we would
meet in Paris in April and ride at Fontainebleau, and that we would
take a walking tour in England. After he was gone, Scorp and I walked
to and fro and then it was that Marcelle appeared. I had to smile as I
walked with Scorp, thinking how wrathful he would have been if he had
known that every so often we were passing Marcelle, who gazed demurely
the other way. The platforms, as usual, were alive with passengers
with huge piles of baggage. My train was a half hour late and it was
getting dark. Some other train which was not bound for Rome entered,
and Marcelle signaled to know whether she was to get into that. I shook
my head and hunted up the Cook’s tourist agent, always to be found on
these foreign platforms, and explained to him that he was to go to the
young lady in the blue suit and white walking-shoes and tell her that
the train was a half hour late and ask her if she cared to wait. With
quite an American _sang-froid_ he took in the situation at once, and
wanted to know how far she was going. I told him Ventimiglia and he
advised that she get off at Garaban in order to catch the first train
back. He departed, and presently returned, cutting me out from the
company of Sir Scorp by a very wise look of the eye, and informed me
that the lady would wait and would go. I promptly gave him a franc for
his trouble. My pocket was bulging with Italian silver lire and paper
five- and ten-lire pieces which I had secured the day before. Finally
my train rolled in and I took one last look at the sea in the fading
light and entered. Sir Scorp gave me parting instructions as to simple
restaurants that I would find at different places in Italy--not the
showy and expensive cafés, beloved of Barfleur. He wanted me to save
money on food and have my portrait painted by Mancini, which I could
have done, he assured me, with a letter from him. He looked wisely
around the platform to see that there was no suspicious lady anywhere
in the foreground and said he suspected one might be going with me.
“Oh, Scorp,” I said, “how could you? Besides, I am very poor now.”
“The ruling passion--strong in poverty,” he commented, and waved me a
farewell.
I walked forward through the train looking for my belongings and
encountered Marcelle. She was eager to explain by signs that the Cook’s
man had told her to get off at Garaban.
“_M’sieur Thomas Cook, il m’a dit--il faut que je descends à
Garaban--pas Ventimiglia--Garaban._” She understood well enough that if
she wanted to get back to Monte Carlo early in the evening she would
have to make this train, as the next was not before ten o’clock.
I led the way to a table in the dining-car still vacant, and we
talked as only people can talk who have no common language. By the
most astonishing efforts Marcelle made it known that she would not
stay at Monte Carlo very long now, and that if I wanted her to come
to Florence when I got there she would. Also she kept talking about
Fontainebleau and horseback riding in April. She imitated a smart rider
holding the reins with one hand and clucking to the horse with her
lips. She folded her hands expressively to show how heavenly it would
be. Then she put her right hand over her eyes and waved her left hand
to indicate that there were lovely vistas which we could contemplate.
Finally she extracted all her bills from the Hôtel de Paris--and they
were astonishing--to show me how expensive her life was at Monte Carlo;
but I refused to be impressed. It did not make the least difference,
however, in her attitude or her mood. She was just as cheerful as
ever, and repeated “Avril--Fontainebleau,” as the train stopped and
she stepped off. She reached up and gave me an affectionate farewell
kiss. The last I saw of her she was standing, her arms akimbo, her head
thrown smartly back, looking after the train.
* * * * *
It was due to a railroad wreck about twenty miles beyond Ventimiglia
that I owe my acquaintance with one of the most interesting men I have
met in years, a man who was very charming to me afterwards in Rome,
but before that I should like to relate how I first really entered
Italy. One afternoon, several days before, Barfleur and I paid a flying
visit to Ventimiglia, some twenty miles over the border, a hill city
and the agreed customs entry city between France and Italy. No train
leaving France in this region, so I learned, stopped before it reached
Ventimiglia, and none leaving Ventimiglia stopped before it entered
France, and once there customs inspectors seized upon one and examined
one’s baggage. If you have no baggage you are almost an object of
suspicion in Italy.
On the first visit we came to scale the walls of this old city which
was much like Eze and commanded the sea from a great eminence. But
after Eze it was not Ventimiglia that interested me so much as the fact
that Italy was so different from France. In landing at Fishguard I had
felt the astonishing difference between England and the United States.
In landing at Calais the atmosphere of England had fallen from me like
a cloak and France--its high color and enthusiasm--had succeeded to it.
Here this day, stepping off the train at Ventimiglia only a few miles
from Monte Carlo, I was once more astonished at the sharp change that
had come over the spirit of man. Here were Italians, not French, dark,
vivid, interesting little men who, it seemed to me, were so much more
inclined to strut and stare than the French that they appeared to be
vain. They were keen, temperamental, avid, like the French but strange
to say not so gay, so light-hearted, so devil-may-care.
Italy, it seemed to me at once, was much poorer than France and
Barfleur was very quick to point it out. “A different people,” he
commented, “not like the French, much darker and more mysterious. See
the cars--how poor they are. You will note that everywhere. And the
buildings, the trains--the rolling stock is not so good. Look at the
houses. The life here is more poverty-stricken. Italy is poor--very. I
like it and I don’t. Some things are splendid. My mother adores Rome. I
crave the French temperament. It is so much more light-hearted.” So he
rambled on.
It was all true--accurate and keenly observed. I could not feel that I
was anywhere save in a land that was seeking to rehabilitate itself but
that had a long way to go. The men--the officials and soldiery of whom
there were a legion clad in remarkable and even astonishing uniforms,
appealed to my eye, but the souls of them to begin with, did not take
my fancy. I felt them to be suspicious and greedy. Here for the first
time I saw the uniform of the Italian _bersaglieri_: smart-looking
in long capes, round hats of shiny leather with glossy green rooster
feathers, and carrying short swords.
This night as I crossed the border after leaving Garaban I thought
of all I had seen the day I came with Barfleur. When we reached
Ventimiglia it was pitch dark and being alone and speaking no Italian
whatsoever, I was confused by the thought of approaching difficulties.
Presently a customs inspector descended on me--a large, bearded
individual who by signs made me understand that I had to go to the
baggage car and open my trunk. I went. Torches supplied the only
light: I felt as though I were in a bandit’s cave. Yet I came through
well enough. Nothing contraband was found. I went back and sat down,
plunging into a Baedeker for Italian wisdom and wishing gloomily that I
had read more history than I had.
Somewhere beyond Ventimiglia the train came to a dead stop in the dark,
and the next morning we were still stalled in the same place. I had
risen early, under the impression that I was to get out quickly, but
was waved back by the porter who repeated over and over, “_Beaucoup de
retard!_” I understood that much but I did not understand what caused
it, or that I would not arrive in Pisa until two in the afternoon.
I went into the dining-car and there encountered one of the most
obstreperous English women that I have ever met. She was obviously of
the highly intellectual class, but so haughty in her manner and so
loud-spoken in her opinions that she was really offensive. She was
having her morning fruit and rolls and some chops and was explaining to
a lady, who was with her, much of the character of Italy as she knew
it. She was of the type that never accepts an opinion from any one,
but invariably gives her own or corrects any that may be volunteered.
At one time I think she must have been attractive, for she was
moderately tall and graceful, but her face had become waxy and sallow,
and a little thin--I will not say hard, although it was anything but
ingratiating. My one wish was that she would stop talking and leave
the dining-car, she talked so loud; but she stayed on until her friend
and her husband arrived. I took him to be her husband by the way she
contradicted him.
He was a very pleasing, intellectual person--the type of man, I
thought, who would complacently endure such a woman. He was certainly
not above the medium in height, quite well filled out, and decidedly
phlegmatic. I should have said from my first glance that he never took
any exercise of any kind; and his face had that interesting pallor
which comes from much brooding over the midnight oil. He had large,
soft, lustrous gray eyes and a mop of gray hair which hung low over
a very high white forehead. I must repeat here that I am the poorest
judge of people whom I am going to like of any human being. Now and
then I take to a person instantly, and my feeling endures for years. On
the other hand I have taken the most groundless oppositions based on
nothing at all to people of whom subsequently I have become very fond.
Perhaps my groundless opposition in this case was due to the fact that
the gentleman was plainly submissive and overborne by his loud-talking
wife. Anyhow I gave him a single glance and dismissed him from my
thoughts. I was far more interested in a stern, official-looking
Englishman with white hair who ordered his bottle of Perrier in a low,
rusty voice and cut his orange up into small bits with a knife.
Presently I heard a German explaining to his wife about a wreck
ahead. We were just starting now, perhaps twenty-five or thirty miles
from Ventimiglia, and were dashing in and out of rocky tunnels and
momentarily bursting into wonderful views of walled caves and sunlit
sweeps of sea. The hill-town, the striped basilica with its square,
many-arched campanile was coming into view. I was delighted to see
open plains bordered in the distance by snow-capped mountains, and
dotted sparsely with little huts of stone and brick--how old, Heaven
only knows. “Here once the Tuscan shepherds strayed.” As Barfleur
said, Italy was much poorer than France. The cars and stations seemed
shabbier, the dress of the inhabitants much poorer. I saw natives,
staring idly at the cars as we flashed past, or taking freight away
from the platforms in rude carts drawn by oxen. Many of the vehicles
appeared to be rattle-trap, dusty, unpainted; and some miles this
side of Genoa--our first stop--we ran into a region where it had been
snowing and the ground was covered with a wet slushy snowfall. After
Monte Carlo, with its lemon and orange trees and its lovely palms, this
was a sad comedown; and I could scarcely realize that we were not so
much as a hundred miles away and going southward toward Rome at that.
I often saw, however, distant hills crowned with a stronghold or a
campanile in high browns and yellows, which made up for the otherwise
poor foreground. Often we dashed through a cave, protected by high
surrounding walls of rock, where the palm came into view again and
where one could see how plainly these high walls of stone made for a
tropic atmosphere. I heard the loud-voiced English woman saying, “It is
such a delight to see the high colors again. England is so dreary. I
never feel it so much as when we come down through here.”
We were passing through a small Italian town, rich in whites, pinks,
browns and blues, a world of clothes-lines showing between rows of
buildings, and the crowds, pure Italian in type, plodding to and
fro along the streets. It was nice to see windows open here and the
sunshine pouring down and making dark shadows. I saw one Italian
woman, in a pink-dotted dress partly covered by a bright yellow apron,
looking out of a window; and then it was that I first got the tang of
Italy--the thing that I felt afterwards in Rome and Florence and Assisi
and Perugia--that wonderful love of color that is not rampant but just
deliciously selective, giving the eye something to feed on when it
least expects it. That is Italy!
When nearly all the diners had left the car the English lady left also
and her husband remained to smoke. He was not so very far removed from
me, but he came a little nearer, and said: “The Italians must have
their striped churches and their wash lines or they wouldn’t be happy.”
It was some time before he volunteered another suggestion, which was
that the Italians along this part of the coast had a poor region to
farm. I got up and left presently because I did not want to have
anything to do with his wife. I was afraid that I might have to talk to
her, which seemed to me a ghastly prospect.
I sat in my berth and read the history of art as it related to
Florence, Genoa, and Pisa, interrupting my paragraphs with glances at
every interesting scene. The value of the prospect changed first from
one side of the train to the other, and I went out into the corridor to
open a window and look out. We passed through a valley where it looked
as though grapes were flourishing splendidly, and my Englishman came
out and told me the name of the place, saying that it was good wine
that was made there. He was determined to talk to me whether I would
or no, and so I decided to make the best of it. It just occurred to
me that he might be the least bit lonely, and, seeing that I was very
curious about the country through which we were passing, that he might
know something about Italy. The moment it dawned upon me that he might
be helpful to me in this respect I began to ask him questions, and I
found his knowledge to be delightfully wide. He knew Italy thoroughly.
As we proceeded he described how the country was divided into virtually
three valleys, separated by two mountain ranges, and what the lines of
its early, almost prehistoric, development, had been. He knew where
it was that Shelley had come to spend his summers, and spots that had
been preferred by Browning and other famous Englishmen. He talked
of the cities that lie in a row down the center of Italy--Perugia,
Florence, Bologna, Modena, Piacenza and Milan--of the fact that
Italy had no educational system whatsoever and that the priests were
bitterly opposed to it. He was sorry that I was not going to stop at
Spezia, because at Spezia the climate was very mild and the gulf very
beautiful. He was delighted to think that I was going to stop at Pisa
and see the cathedral and the Baptistery. He commented on the charms
of Genoa--commercialized as it had been these later years--saying that
there was a very beautiful Campo Santo and that some of the palaces of
the quarreling Guelphs and Ghibellines still remaining were well worth
seeing. When we passed the quarries of Carrara he told me of their age
and of how endless the quantity of marble still was. He was going to
Rome with his wife and he wanted to know if I would not look him up,
giving me the name of a hotel where he lived by the season. I caught
a note of remarkable erudition; for we fell to discussing religion
and priestcraft and the significance of government generally, and he
astonished me by the breadth of his knowledge. We passed to the subject
of metaphysics from which all religions spring; and then I saw how
truly philosophic and esoteric he was. His mind knew no country, his
knowledge no school. He led off by easy stages into vague speculations
as to the transcendental character of race impulses; and I knew I had
chanced upon a profound scholar as well as a very genial person. I was
very sorry now that I had been so rude to him. By the time we reached
Pisa we were fast friends, and he told me that he had a distinguished
friend, now a resident of Assisi, and that he would give me a letter to
him which would bring me charming intellectual companionship for a day
or two. I promised to seek him out at his hotel; and as we passed the
Leaning Tower and the Baptistery, not so very distant from the railroad
track as we entered Pisa, he gave me his card. I recognized the name
as connected with some intellectual labors of a most distinguished
character and I said so. He accepted the recognition gracefully and
asked me to be sure and come. He would show me around Rome.
I gathered my bags and stepped out upon the platform at Pisa, eager to
see what I could in the few hours that I wished to remain.