THE GRAVE OF ALARIC
It would have been prudent to consult with my driver as to the inns of
Cosenza. But, with a pardonable desire not to seem helpless in his
hands, I had from the first directed him to the _Due Lionetti_, relying
upon my guide-book. Even at Cosenza there is progress, and guide-books
to little-known parts of Europe are easily allowed to fall out of date.
On my arrival----
But, first of all, the _dazio_. This time it was a serious business;
impossible to convince the rather surly officer that certain of the
contents of my portmanteau were not for sale. What in the world was I
doing with _tanti libri_? Of course I was a commercial traveller;
ridiculous to pretend anything else. After much strain of courtesy, I
clapped to my luggage, locked it up, and with a resolute face cried
"Avanti!" And there was an end of it. In this case, as so often, I have
no doubt that simple curiosity went for much in the man's pertinacious
questioning. Of course the whole _dazio_ business is ludicrous and
contemptible; I scarce know a baser spectacle than that of uniformed
officials groping in the poor little bundles of starved peasant women,
mauling a handful of onions, or prodding with long irons a cartload of
straw. Did any one ever compare the expenses with the results?
A glance shows the situation of Cosenza. The town is built on a steep
hillside, above the point where two rivers, flowing from the valleys on
either side, mingle their waters under one name, that of the Crati. We
drove over a bridge which spans the united current, and entered a
narrow street, climbing abruptly between houses so high and so close
together as to make a gloom amid sunshine. It was four o'clock; I felt
tired and half choked with dust; the thought of rest and a meal was
very pleasant. As I searched for the sign of my inn, we suddenly drew
up, midway in the dark street, before a darker portal, which seemed the
entrance to some dirty warehouse. The driver jumped down--"Ecco
l'albergo!"
I had seen a good many Italian hostelries, and nourished no
unreasonable expectations. The Lion at Paola would have seemed to any
untravelled Englishman a squalid and comfortless hole, incredible as a
place of public entertainment; the _Two Little Lions_ of Cosenza made a
decidedly worse impression. Over sloppy stones, in an atmosphere heavy
with indescribable stenches, I felt rather than saw my way to the foot
of a stone staircase; this I ascended, and on the floor above found a
dusky room, where tablecloths and an odour of frying oil afforded some
suggestion of refreshment. My arrival interested nobody; with a good
deal of trouble I persuaded an untidy fellow, who seemed to be a
waiter, to come down with me and secure my luggage. More trouble before
I could find a bedroom; hunting for keys, wandering up and down stone
stairs and along pitch-black corridors, sounds of voices in quarrel.
The room itself was utterly depressing--so bare, so grimy, so dark.
Quickly I examined the bed, and was rewarded. It is the good point of
Italian inns; be the house and the room howsoever sordid, the bed is
almost invariably clean and dry and comfortable.
I ate, not amiss; I drank copiously to the memory of Alaric, and felt
equal to any fortune. When night had fallen I walked a little about the
scarce-lighted streets and came to an open place, dark and solitary and
silent, where I could hear the voices of the two streams as they
mingled below the hill. Presently I passed an open office of some kind,
where a pleasant-looking man sat at a table writing; on an impulse I
entered, and made bold to ask whether Cosenza had no better inn than
the _Due Lionetti_. Great was this gentleman's courtesy; he laid down
his pen, as if for ever, and gave himself wholly to my concerns. His
discourse delighted me, so flowing were the phrases, so rounded the
periods. Yes, there were other inns; one at the top of the town--the
_Vetere_--in a very good position; and they doubtless excelled my own
in modern comfort. As a matter of fact, it might be avowed that the
_Lionetti_, from the point of view of the great centres of
civilization, left something to be desired--something to be desired;
but it was a good old inn, a reputable old inn, and probably on further
acquaintance----
Further acquaintance did not increase my respect for the _Lionetti_; it
would not be easy to describe those features in which, most notably, it
fell short of all that might be desired. But I proposed no long stay at
Cosenza, where malarial fever is endemic, and it did not seem worth
while to change my quarters. I slept very well.
I had come here to think about Alaric, and with my own eyes to behold
the place of his burial. Ever since the first boyish reading of Gibbon,
my imagination has loved to play upon that scene of Alaric's death.
Thinking to conquer Sicily, the Visigoth marched as far as to the
capital of the Bruttii, those mountain tribes which Rome herself never
really subdued; at Consentia he fell sick and died. How often had I
longed to see this river Busento, which the "labour of a captive
multitude" turned aside, that its flood might cover and conceal for all
time the tomb of the Conqueror! I saw it in the light of sunrise,
flowing amid low, brown, olive-planted hills; at this time of the year
it is a narrow, but rapid stream, running through a wide, waste bed of
yellow sand and stones. The Crati, which here has only just started
upon its long seaward way from some glen of Sila, presents much the
same appearance, the track which it has worn in flood being many times
as broad as the actual current. They flow, these historic waters, with
a pleasant sound, overborne at moments by the clapping noise of
Cosenza's washerwomen, who cleanse their linen by beating it, then
leave it to dry on the river-bed. Along the banks stood tall poplars,
each a spire of burnished gold, blazing against the dark olive foliage
on the slopes behind them; plane trees, also, very rich of colour, and
fig trees shedding their latest leaves. Now, tradition has it that
Alaric was buried close to the confluence of the Busento and the Crati.
If so, he lay in full view of the town. But the Goths are said to have
slain all their prisoners who took part in the work, to ensure secrecy.
Are we to suppose that Consentia was depopulated? On any other
supposition the story must be incorrect, and Alaric's tomb would have
to be sought at least half a mile away, where the Busento is hidden in
its deep valley.
Gibbon, by the way, calls it Busentinus; the true Latin was Buxentius.
To make sure of the present name, I questioned some half a dozen
peasants, who all named the river Basenzio or Basenz'; a countryman of
more intelligent appearance assured me that this was only a dialectical
form, the true one being Busento. At a bookseller's shop (Cosenza had
one, a very little one) I found the same opinion to prevail.
It is difficult to walk much in this climate; lassitude and feverish
symptoms follow on the slightest exertion; but--if one can disregard
the evil smells which everywhere catch one's breath--Cosenza has
wonders and delights which tempt to day-long rambling. To call the town
picturesque is to use an inadequate word; at every step, from the
opening of the main street at the hill-foot up to the stern mediaeval
castle crowning its height, one marvels and admires. So narrow are the
ways that a cart drives the pedestrian into shop or alley; two vehicles
(but perhaps the thing never happened) would with difficulty pass each
other. As in all towns of Southern Italy, the number of hair-dressers
is astonishing, and they hang out the barber's basin--the very basin
(of shining brass and with a semicircle cut out of the rim) which the
Knight of La Mancha took as substitute for his damaged helmet. Through
the gloom of high balconied houses, one climbs to a sunny piazza, where
there are several fine buildings; beyond it lies the public garden, a
lovely spot, set with alleys of acacia and groups of palm and
flower-beds and fountains; marble busts of Garibaldi, Mazzini, and
Cavour gleam among the trees. Here one looks down upon the yellow gorge
of the Crati, and sees it widen northward into a vast green plain, in
which the track of the river is soon lost. On the other side of the
Crati valley, in full view of this garden, begins the mountain region
of many-folded Sila--a noble sight at any time of the day, but most of
all when the mists of morning cling about its summits, or when the
sunset clothes its broad flanks with purple. Turn westward, and you
behold the long range which hides the Mediterranean so high and wild
from this distance, that I could scarce believe I had driven over it.
Sila--locally the Black Mountain, because dark with climbing
forests--held my gaze through a long afternoon. From the grassy
table-land of its heights, pasturage for numberless flocks and herds
when the long snows have melted, one might look over the shore of the
Ionian Sea where Greek craftsmen built ships of timber cut upon the
mountain's side. Not so long ago it was a haunt of brigands; now there
is no risk for the rare traveller who penetrates that wilderness; but
he must needs depend upon the hospitality of labourers and shepherds. I
dream of sunny glades, never touched, perhaps, by the foot of man since
the Greek herdsman wandered there with his sheep or goats. Somewhere on
Sila rises the Neaithos (now Neto) mentioned by Theocritus; one would
like to sit by its source in the woodland solitude, and let fancy have
her way.
In these garden walks I met a group of peasants, evidently strange to
Cosenza, and wondering at all they saw. The women wore a very striking
costume: a short petticoat of scarlet, much embroidered, and over it a
blue skirt, rolled up in front and gathered in a sort of knot behind
the waist; a bodice adorned with needlework and metal; elaborate
glistening head-gear, and bare feet. The town-folk have no peculiarity
of dress. I observed among them a grave, intelligent type of
countenance, handsome and full of character, which may be that of their
brave ancestors the Bruttii. With pleasure I saw that they behaved
gently to their beasts, the mules being very sleek and
contented-looking. There is much difference between these people and
the Neapolitans; they seem to have no liking for noise, talk with a
certain repose, and allow the stranger to go about among them
unmolested, unimportuned. Women above the poorest class are not seen in
the streets; there prevails an Oriental system of seclusion.
I was glad to come upon the pot market; in the south of Italy it is
always a beautiful and interesting sight. Pottery for commonest use
among Calabrian peasants has a grace of line, a charm of colour, far
beyond anything native to our most pretentious china-shops. Here still
lingers a trace of the old civilization. There must be a great good in
a people which has preserved this need of beauty through ages of
servitude and suffering. Compare such domestic utensils--these oil-jugs
and water-jars--with those in the house of an English labourer. Is it
really so certain that all virtues of race dwell with those who can
rest amid the ugly and know it not for ugliness?
The new age declares itself here and there at Cosenza. A squalid
railway station, a hideous railway bridge, have brought the town into
the European network; and the craze for building, which has disfigured
and half ruined Italy, shows itself in an immense new theatre--Teatro
Garibaldi--just being finished. The old one, which stands ruinous close
by, struck me as, if anything, too large for the town; possibly it had
been damaged by an earthquake, the commonest sort of disaster at
Cosenza. On the front of the new edifice I found two inscriptions, both
exulting over the fall of the papal power; one was interesting enough
to copy:--
"20 SEPT., 1870.
QUESTA DATA POLITICA
DICE FINITA LA TEOCRAZIA
NEGLI ORDINAMENTI CIVILI.
IL DI CHE LA DIRA FINITA
MORALMENTE
SARA LA DATA UMANA."
which signifies: "This political date marks the end of theocracy in
civil life. The day which ends its moral rule will begin the epoch of
humanity." A remarkable utterance anywhere; not least so within the
hearing of the stream which flows over the grave of Alaric.
One goes to bed early at Cosenza; the night air is dangerous,
and--Teatro Garibaldi still incomplete--darkness brings with it no sort
of pastime. I did manage to read a little in my miserable room by an
antique lamp, but the effort was dispiriting; better to lie in the dark
and think of Goth and Roman.
Do the rivers Busento and Crati still keep the secret of that "royal
sepulchre, adorned with the splendid spoils and trophies of Rome"? It
seems improbable that the grave was ever disturbed; to this day there
exists somewhere near Cosenza a treasure-house more alluring than any
pictured in Arabian tale. It is not easy to conjecture what "spoils and
trophies" the Goths buried with their king; if they sacrificed masses
of precious metal, then perchance there still lies in the river-bed
some portion of that golden statue of _Virtus_, which the Romans melted
down to eke out the ransom claimed by Alaric. The year 410 A.D. was no
unfitting moment to break into bullion the figure personifying Manly
Worth. "After that," says an old historian, "all bravery and honour
perished out of Rome."