CHAPTER VI.
NAPLES—THE KING AND QUEEN—NISMES—VIENNE—THE EMBASSY PROM TIPPOO SAHIB—GENOA—ROME—THE REVOLUTION AND THE PAPACY—ARRIVAL OF THE FRENCH TROOPS.
We left Rome on the 2nd of May, 1785, and reached Naples in the afternoon of the 5th. The dress of the common people was very slight, though very often exceedingly picturesque. The women wore their hair in the style of antique statues, and none of them had any stays. Ladies even of the highest rank went about with only a ribbon tied round their head, and seemed by no means scrupulous as to etiquette. Many of them kept running footmen, but these were very dirty. A black petticoat and a mantle that covered the whole figure were generally worn by all women, except those of the lowest orders.
A few days after our arrival we witnessed the funeral of an infant. The corpse was dressed in red and silver, and laid upon an immense and magnificent bier borne by eight young men, in fancy costumes, with plumes of feathers on their heads to represent angels, but much more resembling stage figurants. Two persons walked in front, carrying gold vases filled with flowers. The priests were in their usual place, and last of all came the coffin, decorated with yellow and silver. Refreshments were handed round at the house, and sugar-plums thrown out of the window into the street, as it is considered a matter for rejoicing that the child should have died before it could have committed sin.
We were presented to the queen by the Duchess d’Andria. Her Majesty stood beside a great table in a large room, and with only two candles lighted. She asked us two or three common-place questions, and then made us a civil curtsey, whereupon we took our leave. Her Majesty was not at all well dressed, nor was she at all graceful. She is said to have a fine hand and arm, which she leaned upon the table. She spoke to us in French. Many other ladies were presented at the same time, the duchess calling their names in order from a list she held in her hand.
The queen used to be subject to fits of devotion, at which times she stuck short prayers and pious ejaculations inside of her stays, and occasionally swallowed them. The king used to pass our house on his way to the lake where he caught the gulls that he sold to the fish-dealers. He weighed the birds with his own hands, and was very careful to be paid in good money.
We remained at Naples till the latter part of May, 1786, when we proceeded to Marseilles in a small sailing vessel. On our arrival at that port the custom-house officers came on board, and were very troublesome, though we had nothing contrary to their laws. It was impossible, indeed, not to remark a change in the manners of the French since we last resided in that country. The revolutionary spirit had made great progress during the few years that had elapsed, though it had not yet reached its acme. Injurious reflections were just beginning to be cast upon Marie Antoinette, and all sorts of reports were being spread abroad of a character to bring the “haute société” into discredit.
After staying a few days at Marseilles we went for a week to Avignon, and thence to Nismes, where we remained for nearly a year. The larger portion of the inhabitants were Calvinists, but the bishop was kind and liberal to all who stood in need of his assistance, and never omitted to send invitations to the higher order of Protestant gentlemen. Individuals, however, of the two persuasions were not equally tolerant. If a Catholic were invited to dine with a Protestant on Friday or Saturday, he was certain not to find anything he could eat; and if a Protestant happened to dine with a Catholic on a fast day, there was never anything but fish and vegetables. Nevertheless, the society of Nismes was very agreeable, and there were good families residing in the neighbourhood who were very sociable.
In the following spring we removed to Vienne, with which we were so well pleased that we resided there until the beginning of May, 1789.[[48]] An embassy from Tippoo Sahib passed through Vienne in July, 1788, on its way from Marseilles to Paris. The ambassadors consisted of a warrior dressed in white, said to be the king’s son-in-law, with his two sons who were learning French, and of a man of letters and a man of law. They travelled only from eleven to four, fearing the cold of the morning and evening. The whole town turned out to see them. The warrior laughed much on seeing abbés and ladies standing together, and said that the latter took a great liberty in touching persons who were sacred. He was also much grieved for the women who were not married, and thought they were not fairly treated.
From Vienne we descended the Rhône to Avignon, and thence proceeded by way of Aix to Toulon. The country was filled with soldiers, and the townspeople were breaking out into riots by reason of the heavy taxes and the high price of bread. We were detained at Toulon several days waiting for a French felucca from Antibes, as there was a nest of Barbary corsairs among the Iles d’Hyères which rendered Italian vessels unsafe. As it was, we crept along the coast, and landed at Nice, Frejus, and Savona,[[49]] being greatly delayed by contrary winds. However, on the eighteenth day after our departure from Toulon, we reached Genoa in safety. Society was then on a very magnificent footing in that aristocratic republic. Both men and women of the higher classes were familiar with both French and Italian, though they generally used the Genoese dialect. Many of them were also well acquainted with English, and, as in other parts of Italy, most of the men were good classical scholars. They were not, perhaps, so fond of music and painting as in the south, and yet the noble pictures in their churches and palaces bore evidence to the taste of the nation for the latter art.
All the nobility dressed in black, the men invariably, and the ladies when at the Doge’s palace and the large parties called the “Quarante.” It was considered their court dress, and was rarely worn for mourning. Indeed, it was the custom for the nobles to mention in their wills that they desired no mourning should be worn for them. The assemblies derived their name of “quarante” from their having been originally given by forty of the principal families in succession. There were not nearly so many families of distinction when we were at Genoa, but these parties were nevertheless very splendid, the houses being brilliantly illuminated within and without, and sumptuously adorned with choice tapestry and costly furniture. The nobility seldom gave grand dinners, but when they did it was in the very best style. They were for the most part engaged in commerce, and very keen in business matters.
I remember that after one of their great dinners a servant, who was carrying coffee round, let the tray fall, and broke a very valuable service of china. The master of the house took no further notice of the accident than to tell the man to bring some more coffee. One of the guests, who came from another part of Italy, remarked how patiently he bore this loss, although he had been so angry only the day before because his people were burning two small candles, instead of one, in the office. The host smiled, and said: “O! questa è altra cosa: qui si spende, là si guadagna.”[[50]]
It was a rare circumstance for Genoese noblemen to enter a foreign service, nor was the military profession generally held in high regard. One evening I was sitting by a lady at one of the parties of the “quarante,” when a young officer came up and spoke to my companion. After conversing a little while he moved away again, when she whispered to, me: “Though he is in uniform, I can assure you that he is a gentleman.” Very few of the Genoese noblemen cared to enter the army, but many Corsican noblemen still remained in the service, though that island no longer belonged to the Republic. The generalissimo, or rather the secretary-at-war, was a senator, and wore the black “toga” of his order. I saw him once review the troops in that dress, with a very fine lace braid. He sat in an arm-chair at a table, with pens, ink, and paper before him—his secretaries standing by the side of the table—while the soldiers were performing their military evolutions.
With respect to the naval service, however, it was very different—the frigates and galleys being commanded by young men of the highest families. For the same reason that the Genoese nobles would not serve in the army, they refused to be sent as ministers to foreign courts—ambassadors they had none. Every noble was “a sovereign,” and as such could not be a servant, even of the government, so simple citizens, or gentlemen from provincial towns, were employed as envoys of the republic.
There was one inconvenience, of a singular kind, which we never quite got over. The money of many different countries was current in Genoa, but changed in value every week. This at first puzzled us not a little, but a gentleman of our acquaintance afterwards used to call upon us every Saturday at noon, and tell us the rates of exchange for the following week. Still it was a matter of some trouble in paying a bill to calculate the different values of Austrian, Papal, Piedmontese, Tuscan, and French coins, all of which were mixed together in the money we received from our banker. The coin of the Republic was rare, and much sought after.[[51]]
We liked Genoa much, but were compelled to leave it when the intrigues of the revolutionary government of France rendered this city an undesirable residence for English families. On our way to Rome we stayed a few days at Parma, the sovereign of which was greatly beloved by his subjects, for, it was said, he had never refused a petition, and never imposed a new tax. There was no appearance of poverty in his states, and I never saw a more happy people. How he and his country were treated by the French republicans is matter of history. Both Parma and Piacenza were free cities.
A few years after this visit I became acquainted with a regular canon of the great church of Piacenza, and who, according to custom, had his own confessional box. One day, after the French occupation of the country, he entered the church, with the intention of taking his own seat, but was surprised at not finding the confessional in its proper place. After looking about for it in all directions, he found it in a gallery lying on its side, and on the top of it the dead body of a French soldier, which three surgeons, or surgeon’s mates, of that army were busily skinning. Horrified at the sight, he asked the meaning of this ghastly proceeding, and was told that some scientific men had discovered that the human skin made excellent leather. It had, therefore, been ordered that all dead bodies should be skinned, for the purpose of providing boots and shoes for the soldiers.
From the Duchy of Parma we proceeded to Bologna, and thence to Florence, which we greatly admired. The Tuscans, of all classes, appeared to me to be a very polished people, as if still retaining traces of their early civilisation. The peasants were far superior in every respect to those of other countries, and fewer crimes were at that time committed in Tuscany than in any other part of Europe.
On the 30th of April, 1791, we once more found ourselves in Rome.
The two French princesses, Madame Adelaide and Madame Victoire, aunts of Louis XVI., were lodged at Cardinal de Bernis’. The cardinal having declined to take the oath of allegiance to the republic, was no longer ambassador; but he still kept up his Friday evenings’ conversazioni, at which the princesses appeared, and were very courteous and affable. Madame Adelaide still retained traces of that beauty which had distinguished her in her youth, and there was great vivacity in her manner, and in the expression of her countenance. Madame Victoire had also an agreeable face, much good sense, and great sweetness of temper. Their dress, and that of their suite, were old-fashioned, but unostentatious. The jewels they brought with them had been sold, one by one, to afford assistance to the poor émigrés who applied to the princesses in their distress. They were highly respected by the Romans; not only by the higher orders, but by the common people, who had a horror of the French revolution, and no great partiality for that nation in general.
It was in January, 1793,[[52]] that the revolutionary propagandism first came into actual collision with the Pope’s government. A Frenchman named Basville, who had been secretary to Lafayette in America, had been sent from Paris to induce Pius VI. to acknowledge the republic, and permit the republican arms and three-coloured cockades to be publicly displayed in Rome. The Pope, however, resolutely refused to recognise any government in France but that of the king.
The students at the French Academy, who were nearly all democratical, then took down the statue of Louis XIV., the founder of that institution, and gave a banquet in honour of the occasion. Every one present wore a red cap on his head, or had a small one suspended from a ribbon round his neck.
On the 12th of January, Major Flotte arrived from Naples, and went straight to the Cardinal Secretary-of-State, whom he informed that his orders were to give the Pope only twenty-four hours to decide whether he would, or would not, recognise the republic; and that if his Holiness did not, within that space of time, allow the republican insignia to be put up, it would be considered as equivalent to a declaration of war. The Pope desired the Cardinal Secretary-of-State to intimate to M. Flotte that his resolution was already taken, and that if the republican insignia were placed up anywhere in public, he would not be answerable for the insults his countrymen might receive from the Roman people. On being told this, M. Flotte replied in a loud voice, that if any insults were offered, five hundred thousand Frenchmen would come to avenge them, and would leave not a single stone upon another.
In the afternoon of the following day a great crowd assembled in the Corso near the Academy of France, and after it was dark set fire to it. For some hours they promenaded the streets, shouting “Viva il Papa!” “Viva la Santa Chiesa!” We opened our windows to look at the people as they walked past in a very orderly manner. They looked up, and in a cheerful tone desired us to cry “Viva il Papa!”[[53]] which we did very willingly, and added “Viva mille anni!” for which they applauded us. One of them, however, a well-dressed young man, said, with an air of drollery, “But will you cry ‘Viva la Santa Chiesa?’” “Vivan tutte le Chiese!” cried I; to which he replied, “Brava! bravissima!”
Early in the afternoon of the 14th, Basville and Flotte drove out of the French Academy with republican cockades in their hats, and in those of the coachman and footman. Basville’s little boy was in the carriage with them, and kept waving out of the window a three-coloured flag, while they shouted to the people, “Romani, viva la libertà!” “Giù la cocarda!” was the only reply they received. But as they would neither take the cockades out of their own hats, nor allow the coachman to remove his, the crowd became furious, and ordered the driver to turn the horses’ heads homewards.
A pistol being fired from the carriage, whether by Flotte or Basville was never known, the people threw a volley of stones at them, and pursued them to the house where Basville was staying. The latter received a mortal wound, after having slightly wounded some of the populace. Flotte jumped out of a window when the mob rushed into the house, and took refuge with an old Roman marchioness. The furniture was broken into fragments and flung into the streets, but nothing whatever was stolen. Basville’s wife and child fell upon their knees and begged for their lives, upon which the people turned away in disgust, and indignantly asked, “If they thought they were going to hurt women and children?” Flotte and Madame Basville were afterwards sent off by night to Naples, the Pope giving each of them forty-five crowns to pay their travelling expenses.
In the course of the next few days it was estimated that nearly three thousand Frenchmen fled from Rome, some in carriages, others on horseback, and others, again, on foot. Basville died of the injuries he had received, and among his papers was found an unfinished treatise in his handwriting, the object of which was to prove that the monarchical form of government was the only one suited to the French nation.
For several days after this disturbance the people used to stop all carriages in the streets, and make their inmates cry “Viva il Papa!” Among others, they stopped that of Prince Augustus,[[54]] but some dragoons rode up, and told them it was a son of the King of England. The prince, however, said that he would very willingly cry “Viva il Papa!” to which they responded with “Viva il Rè d’Inghilterra!” A few houses were attacked, and some windows broken, but order was soon restored, beyond an attempt to attack the Ghetto, the Jews’ quarter, which was prevented by the soldiers, assisted by several noblemen of influence. The mob went first to St. Peter’s, and asked for the Pope’s benediction, before proceeding to vent their fury upon the Jews; and this gave time for the adoption of measures of repression.
It is not my intention, however, to write a history of the political events which occurred during our residence at Rome. We remained there unmolested until the occupation of that city by the French troops under General Berthier in February, 1798, when with some difficulty we effected our escape to Naples.