It was in this lovely park that Goethe spent a great deal of time during a Sicilian sojourn in 1789, reading Homer and seeing the Villa’s beauties with so sympathetic an eye, he wrote of it that it looked like fairyland and transported him into ancient times. His Italienische Reise is particularly enthusiastic on Sicily, and he sums up the island’s importance with a glowing tribute: “Italy without Sicily leaves no image in the soul—Sicily is the key to all.”
In clear weather a large raised terrace at the southeast corner of the Villa affords a peep at distant Ætna’s hoary crown. But if the weather be too hazy to see the Titan, the nearer view compensates in great measure for the invisible volcano. To the southeast the “poor man’s promenade” stretches away in a misty vista toward Monte Zaffarano. The fishing boats tie up here, and the fishermen and their families make merry over their early suppers at open-air tables in the dusty, unpaved square that extends inland from the broad and level beach. In the other direction the broad Foro Italico or Marina, a handsome, tree-lined esplanade circumscribing the edge of the bay, with Monte Pellegrino rising massive and dominant at the other end of the town, miles away, affords a striking contrast. This is the “rich man’s promenade,” and here, in summer, Fashion makes its evening corso. Half Palermo sits in its iron-bottomed chairs sipping at the ices and cool drinks for which the cafés are noted, and smoking countless sigaretti, while the other half rolls lazily by in its carriages of state.
From the Villa Giulia a line of old palaces marks the landward side of the Marina all the way down to the foot of the Corso, at its other extremity. Many of them belong to nobles whose names are woven deep into some of Sicily’s most important history. Down near the Porta Felice—the Happy Gate—a little wooden pavilion juts boldly out into the sea, a combination library and tearoom, whose presiding genius is an English gentlewoman, charming of speech and manners. No pleasanter way of resting after a hard day’s work sightseeing can be found than to sit here over cups of steaming Ceylon, while the sea shimmers an iridescent opal, ruffled with streaky little ripples of protest for the approaching night. And afterward what more fitting than to reënter Eden by the Happy Gate—the Porta Felice—named as a memorial of the Lady Felice Orsini, wife of the Viceroy who built it. Happy Lady Felice, to have such a monument—and porta felice in truth, looking one way out over the sparkling sea and the other upon the city beautiful.
VII
AROUND THE ISLAND
FASCINATION and Palermo are synonymous; the subtle charm of the city works into one’s very blood. Day after day and week after week roll by, until with a start of surprise that is akin to consternation one realizes that unless he has a year to devote to the island he must seek fresh vistas soon or leave Sicily, having seen nothing but the capital. Regretting is as vain as it is foolish. The only thing to do is to go!
Until you do, you have no idea of what the tessere—those amazing little bargain books—do for the Sicilians. Not only do they bring foreigners with money to spend, but natives of every class and station, unable to travel at other seasons of the year, flock to the ticket window with the tessere in their hands; and many of them who ordinarily would travel third class make a festa of their trips by buying first-class accommodations with the aid of the rebate.
There is no Pullman system in Sicily. The first arrivals at the station take the best seats, and hold them against all comers. If you do not like cheap tobacco, and do like air, it is a good plan to reach the station early. All this we learned by experience; so we were ready to leave Palermo some time before the train was, and secured a little stateroom called a berlina, in the front of the car, whence an unobstructed view on both sides is to be had.
Scarcely is the capital left behind than it is completely forgotten in the astonishing floral display that flashes past—an unending motion-picture in vivid colors. For miles the track runs close beside the sea between deep floral hedges. Crimson geraniums from five to eight feet in height blazing with color, pink wild roses, sweet-scented white locust blossoms, spiky prickly pear, the yellow striped spears of the agave, and pink and lavender morning glories vining among and over them all give one the impression of being hurled through a giant hot-house. But here is no cultivation. Sicilian Nature, with prodigal lavishness, is alone responsible for the brilliant pageant. At the feet of the taller plants burgeon scarlet poppies, low, earth-nestling lavender cactus blossoms, and legions of dazzling buttercups. More poppies among the grass and grain contrast with whole acres of heavy-headed deep crimson clover, in which the hungry cattle wade to their knees.
On the landward side of the railroad undulate the hills in soft nuances of green, speckled and flecked with ever-changing light and shade. Farmhouses massively built of rough unshaped stone, because the stone is there and mortar is cheap and the labor costs nothing, stand at long intervals among the golden grain square and squat, each with a heavy Normanesque battlemented tower. The poorer houses barely show their roofs or towers above the dense groves of lemon or orange. Sometimes part of a white wall appears through the bushy tree foliage, which is varied by occasional wide stretches of vines on low, far-reaching trellises, over which stands a slim-bodied palm, an alert, lonely sentinel.
The sea shimmers like glass in the gay sunlight, and even from the rapidly moving train the bottom is visible, sometimes ten or fifteen feet below the surface. White stones and deep purple patches of weed lie like pearls and amethysts imbedded in the heart of the cool emerald. Tiny reefs, far from their islets, and big, jagged rocks show their teeth at the ragged coast line through fringes of snowy foam. Ever shifting car-window prospects float by on the wing, and before you can fairly appreciate one, you pass another.