“Women? Women in the theater? Why, the theater is not good for them. I never bring my woman!”
Evidently a foreign woman was different, and none of the audience seemed to regard it as strange that one should be among them. As we came out into the fresh night air, Gualterio was apologetically solicitous, a little nervous as to the success of his experiment in bringing us to this particular theater. But our manifest satisfaction with our night of dissipation speedily reassured him, and all the way back to the hotel he sang canzone to his chunky little Arab out of pure joy and thankfulness.
IV
CATHEDRALS
IT has already been pointed out that the Easter season is an especially good time to be in Palermo. On Easter morning the great Court of the Lord before the Cathedral is a surprising picture. Upon the heavy stone balustrade enclosing it sixteen massive saints meditate benignly in the scented air. The great gray cement yard, flowers all colors of the rainbow, marble Santa Rosalia—patroness of Palermo—the huge church itself: all are bathed in the most brilliant sunshine imaginable. Words and pictures alike fail to give any adequate expression of it. The noise and unrest of the busy Corso are forgotten in this magic precinct; smiling, happy men, women and children stream through the yard, picturesque in their holiday attire; while from the windows drones the chant of the Mass, like the buzzing of a swarm of kindly bees hovering over the flowers. The white glare of the Egyptian desert is never more blinding than a Sicilian spring morning radiance.
Though the service calls, religion in Sicily takes small heed of the antics of foreigners, and if one chooses to stay outside in the courtyard and take photographs, it causes not the slightest comment. The main charm of the Cathedral lies in the curious blending of its different forms of architecture—Arabic, Norman, Gothic; which produces a dashing and almost whimsical effect in its fine arcades, its rich friezes and battlements, its interlacing arches, and its airy turrets outlined against the blue sky. Two graceful flying arches connect the Cathedral with the campanile or belfry which, as is often the case, is separated from the Cathedral proper—in this instance across the street. The vast structure as a whole is the very epitome of Sicily’s many sided culture and art during her high tide of glory, the Norman period. A witty Englishman has fitly remarked that the badly restored and whitewashed interior, however, is of the “railroad station type.”
In the south aisle chapels, though, are the excellent tombs of the kings, the grim and silent last homes of the marvelous Frederick, that “Wonder of the World,” of Henry VI, The Butcher, of Constance the Broken-Hearted, and of others. A great crimson porphyry sarcophagus holds the dust of King Roger, of whom it has been well said indeed that he was “one of the wisest, most renowned, most worthy, and most fortunate princes of his time” (Freeman). Kneeling Norman nobles carved in white marble upbear the simple, boxlike mass of porphyry upon their armored shoulders. What an expression of the homage of the people! The simple inscription, in Latin, reads:
IN QUIET AND PEACE, ROGER, STRENUOUS
DUKE AND OF SICILY FIRST KING,
IS DEAD IN PANORMOS, THE MONTH OF FEBRUARY
IN THE YEAR 1154.
So it would seem that we are not the first people to discover “the strenuous life!”
And King Roger’s life was certainly strenuous. But it was nothing at all compared to the career of his father, who landed stealthily in Sicily by night with a handful of trusty knights and men-at-arms, captured Messina before breakfast, and stormed on through the island, felling the Saracens like so many saplings. The Norman conquest was distinguished throughout by the most impossible feats of both personal valor and consideration; the island was ready for Roger to knit together and administer when he succeeded his father, and played the rôle of lawgiver and organizer to his fiery parent’s conquests. And young Roger rose even higher than his father. Where he had been Count, Roger made himself not only King of Sicily, but ruler of a considerable part of Southern Italy as well. What manner of man he was is shown by an ancient mosaic still on the wall of the church of the Martorana, a remarkable example in itself of Norman-Sicilian art. Notwithstanding the tremendous temporal power of the Popes in those days, this descendant of the vikings refused to be crowned by the papal legate, and the mosaic represents him placing the diadem upon his head with his own hands.