The first place at which I looked with special interest was Milito, the little village where Garibaldi ran his ship ashore, when he came to conquer Naples, and was pursued by Neapolitan men-of-war. The Captain that pointed the place out to us, told us that there were still some débris left of the vessel that brought the deliverer of Southern Italy to the shores of Calabria. Then came Reggio, the Neapolitan fortress which the brave Garibaldians took under the command of our friend Colonel Chiassi, and a little further on lay Aspramonte. What a story those three places tell! I looked with a feeling of deep sadness at the mountains over which the flying Garibaldians had carried their wounded General, and thought of Columbus brought back to Spain in chains, of poor John Huss burned at the stake, of Galileo languishing in the prisons of the Inquisition, and how the world has ever cried “crucify him” against its benefactors.
The coast of Calabria looked cheerful and well cultivated; the mountains have wild strange shapes, but at their feet are orange groves, and mulberry plantations, with here and there, growing in the midst of the bright green, the sombre foliage of the olive. I observed many new comfortable looking houses, with large windows and green shutters, which I hope speak of an improved state of the country, and which contrast favourably with the old dwellings of the Italian peasantry. The latter are generally very wretched looking places, with small dismal looking holes instead of windows.
We stayed a day at Messina, and profited by it to look at the town, the churches, etc. How everything is relative in this world. Had I gone to Messina after visiting Florence and Naples, instead of before, I should most likely have thought it a very insignificant looking place. But after Constantinople and Smyrna, it looked a town of palaces. The nice pavement, the fine large stone houses, with their balconies before every window, on which dark girls in gay Sunday dress stood among flowers. It looked quite grand, and very pleasant. The churches are rich in precious marbles and gildings, but built in a very degenerate style of architecture. The pictures with which they are decorated generally represent tortured saints, and are even less satisfactory than the buildings themselves. I wanted to see a little of the country, and we therefore took a drive. I saw however nothing of it, except a dusty road between high walls, which seemed to enclose orchards, for the branches of orange, fig, mulberry, and olive trees, were visible above the walls. I cannot tell whether all the roads around Messina are like this one, or if our coachman was to blame for his choice. We found it difficult to understand the Sicilian dialect, and almost required an interpreter to translate it into Italian.
We left Messina the following afternoon. The weather was still calm and beautiful; the sky cloudless, and the sea shining in the sunlight, as calm as a lake. A short time after we had left Messina, we passed Scylla and Charybdis, the first only discernible by a very slight movement in the water, the latter a rather prominent rock on the opposite coast. It must have been very different in the time of Homer, I should think, for even the boldest imagination could not see in the present Scylla and Charybdis, anything like what Homer describes it to have been. As for Schiller’s beautiful description of it, in his ballad “The Diver,” it is purely imaginative, for Schiller never visited Italy. The next day we passed Stromboli, an island formed by a large volcano rising out of the sea. The mountain, a grand and imposing cone, was in a somewhat active state, much more so than Etna. I was sorry we did not see it by night, for the thick column of smoke that rises out of it, then looks red and fiery. It was however out of sight long before evening, but there were other lights burning through the balmy night, and throwing rays of silver light across the placid waters, Hesperus and “Cynthia’s shining orb.” It was past midnight before we went down stairs, and we had slept but few hours, when the bustle and noise that always follow the arrival of the boat in port, awoke me. When I got on deck, the sun was rising over Naples. I saw the Bay, and Vesuvius and Capri. All these wonderful names were no longer empty sounds, but had become a reality, and I rejoiced in that thought.
I have not spoken of any of my travelling companions since I left Constantinople. The reason is, that they hardly deserved any special notice. They were such people as any one is likely to meet. Several English families, that had wintered abroad, and returned most of them with coughs and sore throats. Some of the girls were very pretty, perhaps all the more so because they looked so fragile, it seemed one cold East wind would blow the pretty blossoms away. Then there was a rich Jewess from Constantinople, with three daughters, who were all “musical young ladies.” They were going to some European watering-place, not for their health though, I should think, for they looked as strong and hearty as one could wish. The Messageries Impériales steamers are unfortunately provided with a piano, which I consider a most inconsiderate arrangement on the part of the Company; for I had to listen for several hours daily to the performances of these young ladies, playing either singly or in couples. The nuisance became almost intolerable, when they were joined at Messina by a musical young gentleman, an officer from Malta, who, between the fantasias and sonatas of the young ladies, treated us to a succession of quadrilles and polkas. It broke into and spoiled the calm enjoyment of one of the most beautiful moonlight-nights on the Mediterranean, when nature seemed so hushed and still, that I involuntarily spoke in whispers.
There were also two interesting honey-moon couples on board: one of them always sitting in out-of-the-way corners, so that perhaps I might have been altogether unaware of their presence, so little were they in any body’s way, had they not turned up regularly at meal times. The other couple never turned up at all, at least not the lady. She was very poorly, and in fair or foul weather always lying down in the Ladies’ Saloon; to the open door of which the devoted young husband came ever so many times a day, offering lemonade, coffee, and other refreshments to the sufferer, who however seemed unable to relish any thing.
And I must not forget Miss L—, because of the singular adventure that happened to her. She was of middle age and rather delicate constitution, had spent the winter with some friends at Malta, and was now on her way home. We had been neighbours at dinner, and exchanged a few words. Early in the evening, after we had left Messina, where she came on board, she came to me in great agitation, and asked my advice under what were certainly trying circumstances. The stewardess in showing her to her cabin, had said that there would be but one other occupant, viz. a “jeune demoiselle.” How surprised and horrified therefore was the poor lady when, wishing to retire early, she had gone into her cabin, and saw standing before the other berth a pair of man’s boots, and a man lying dressed on it, who had his face covered with a silk handkerchief. She rushed back and told the stewardess that there was a man in her cabin. The stewardess however replied good humouredly, and with a smiling face: “Non, Madame, ce n’est pas un homme, mais une jeune demoiselle noire qui s’habille comme çà.” She told her at the same time that she was sorry there was no empty berth in any other cabin, as she seemed to dislike sleeping with the “jeune demoiselle noire.” At this information, the slight knowledge of the French language which Miss L— possessed, seemed quite to forsake her, she found no words to reply, and came in despair to me, as the only person with whom she had exchanged a few words on board. “What am I to do?” so the poor thing concluded her story, “I cannot sleep in the Saloon because it is full of gentlemen, and to remain on deck would be sure to make me ill, as I am very susceptible to colds.” I took her to my husband, as the tribunal to which I appeal in difficult cases, and he at once reassured her by his promise that he would take care she should not sleep in the same room with the black person, who travelled under the name of a “jeune demoiselle.” He went straight to the Captain, and what the stewardess said she could not do, the Captain arranged. She slept comfortably in the same room with some other ladies, who neither wore male attire, nor “the shadowy livery of a warmer sun.”
Her gratitude to my husband was boundless, and she remained my constant companion till we reached Naples, where we landed, while she proceeded to Genoa and Marseilles. We saw the “jeune demoiselle,” as we called the black person, a good deal on deck and at meals. Miss L— always kept as far as possible away from her, and I did not wonder at it. In looking at the African I felt more than ever, that, although in theory the Americans may be to blame for their manifest dislike to the Negroes; in practice I should find it very difficult not to do as they do, and avoid any intercourse with them. And I admired more than ever the heavenly kindness of Mrs. Beecher Stowe’s little Eva, who broke her heart at the fate of this race. I forget at this moment, if, according to Mr. Darwin’s theory, we have a common origin with them, or are descended from them. In the latter case I hope nobody will ever ask me the question Farinato addresses to Dante in the Inferno: “Chi fur i maggior tuoi”—as I should be rather ashamed to mention these ancestors.
Goethe quotes Pliny’s description of Naples, and what Goethe did I surely may be allowed to do. Instead, therefore, of trying to describe Naples myself, I will translate what he has quoted: “So happy, lovely, blessed is that region, that one perceives Nature has rejoiced in her work there. Such vital air, such continued salutary clemency of the sky, such fruitful fields, such sunny hills, such innoxious woods, such shady groves, such useful forests, such airy mountains, such far-extending cornfields, such an abundance of vines and olive-trees, such fine wool of the sheep, such fat necks of the oxen, so many lakes, such an abundance of irrigating rivers and streams, so many seas, so many harbours! The earth opens her bosom everywhere to commerce, and, almost anxious to assist man, stretches her arms into the sea.” After reading such a description, the well-known “Vedi Napoli e poi mori,” does not seem very exaggerated; nor when Goethe writes of his father: “It is said that he who has seen a ghost can never more be joyful, so on the contrary one might have said of him (his father) that he could never become quite unhappy, because he thought himself always back again at Naples.” That the days I spent there brought me enjoyment and delight, every one will easily suppose. People always call Paris a “gay” place, and such no doubt it is, still thousands and thousands lead a dreary and dismal life there, which seems hardly possible in Naples. Nature supplies all the necessaries of life in such abundance that even poverty ceases to cause real suffering. The climate is so mild that the want of what we should call indispensable clothing brings no discomfort; while a plate of macaroni, a dried fish, or a slice of melon seems to be all the food they require. They are exceedingly fond of music and dancing, and the Neapolitan airs are lively and pretty, and pleased me more than any I have heard in Italy. The performers who sing before the hotel, the caffés and restaurants, and accompany their songs with the guitar and the liveliest expression and gesticulations, look delightfully merry and cunning. Many of them improvise in a ready, pretty manner. Who can be sad and morose in a place like this, where everybody looks smiling, good-natured and contented? To be merry, joyful and happy lies in the air there, and is contagious like an epidemic. And I do not think the expression of good-nature and contentment one sees in almost every face, belies their feelings. The Neapolitans appeared to be very kind-hearted, and to delight in giving pleasure. We received, during our short stay at Naples, several marks of good will from them, of which I remember one especially with pleasure. We had stopped, on our way back from a short excursion to Posilipo, at a pretty restaurant, where we took some refreshments on an open platform overlooking the sea. While sitting there, and looking at the Bay and all the beauty surrounding it, a boat passed with a merry party in it, four of whom were amateur musicians. They played on two guitars, a flute, and a trombone. As soon as they saw us they stopped the boat right under our platform and played a pretty Neapolitan air, with the simple intention of giving us pleasure. When they had finished they greeted us and left. We returned the kind salute, and listened to their “renewed strain” till it became indistinct, and the accompanying sounds of the trombone only reached us.
After the great variety of Eastern costume the dress of the Neapolitans looked rather tame. The dress of the women is neat and clean, their full black hair is well plaited and shines like satin; but they wear nothing that can be called a costume, and I found even crinoline introduced to a great extent. If it were not for the dress of the different orders of monks and nuns, of boatmen and fishermen, and here and there a contadina in her pretty dress, the crowd would be not much more picturesque than an English one, from which however it would be easily distinguished by the darker complexion of the people, the animated features, and the lively gesticulations with which they accompany all they say.