XIV
FIUME AND VEGLIA
Fiume is one of the few towns along the coast in which the Italians are in the majority. It lies at the north-eastern end of the Bay of the Quarnero, and is the chief seaport of Hungary, to which it has belonged in the main since the beginning of the twelfth century; and permanently since 1870. Though it was a thriving town in the Middle Ages, and existed in Roman times, there is very little to be seen older than the period of the late Renaissance. It is a busy modern town, and for the archæologist is merely a convenient place of departure for other more interesting sites, though there is some picturesqueness of costume and situation about it; and the Englishman is pleased to see many ships with the national flag, and to know that one of the great industries of the place is the Whitehead torpedo factory. The Tarsia, as the Rjeka was called, gave the name of Tarsatica to the ancient Liburnian city. The Romans built a castle on the bank of the stream to rein in the ferocious Gepids. Round this castle the ancient Tarsatica grew up. The only Roman remains existing are: a triumphal arch said to have been erected in honour of the Emperor Claudius II., Gothicus (268-270), which resembles the Arco di Riccardo, Trieste, in its situation on the side of the hill in the old city, but is much less ornamented and more dilapidated; some remains of Roman construction in the Castle of the Frangipani; and at the top of the hill above the Porto di Martinschizza (called "Solin"), the remains of another Roman fortress, which protected the city to the east, commanding the ravine of La Draga, a mile and a half from Tarsatto. Tarsatica was destroyed in 799 by Charlemagne.
STALL ON THE WINE-QUAY, FIUME
The wine-quay, by the Porto Canale, Fiumara, is shaded pleasantly with trees, and always busy with its own particular trade, supplemented by stalls at which various goods are offered for sale. Close by is a street, which in the spring is bright with Judas-trees in flower. The ravine down which the stream flows has always been the boundary of the Croatian kingdom. On the further side is the ascent of 410 steps to the pilgrimage church of the Madonna del Tarsatto, on one of the spurs of the hills which surround the city; an ascent which devout pilgrims are said to have negotiated on their knees. A chronogram over the church door gives the date 1730, but it was founded in 1453 by one of the Frangipani counts on the site once occupied by the Nazareth House now at Loreto, the tradition being that this rested here for three years and seven months, from 1291 to 1294; and in a dark passage behind the high-altar a room is still shown said to be a part of it.
The church contains a picture of the Madonna and Child, ascribed as usual to S. Luke, of which a little copy hangs by the choir arch in the aisle; the two heads and hands are painted. The rest is covered with silver-gilt plates modelled in low relief to represent the drapery, nimbi, &c. Near the high-altar are frescoes with Latin inscriptions, of no great interest, also two great silver candlesticks and portions of Turkish harness, gifts of the Emperor Leopold I. The pillars are hung with the votive offerings of rescued mariners. The church has only one aisle, to the north. At the west end is an organ gallery on slight columns with fifteenth-century carving. The choir has a fine seventeenth-century wrought-iron grille with two amorini, a crown and heart, &c., interwoven with scrolls, gilded and painted. The beaten work is mixed with scrolls of flat thin material between strong uprights and cross pieces. At the height of the face of a kneeling figure is a row of small balusters. The upper portion is painted white.
In front of the church is an avenue of horse-chestnuts, and on a spur of hill to the left is the Castle of Tarsatto, once belonging to the Frangipani, now in the possession of Count Nugent, and completely restored. In the castle is a collection of statues from Minturnum, a gift of Ferdinand I. of Naples to Field-Marshal Nugent. From it a flight of steps conducts to a pleasant field-path which rounds the shoulder of the next hill and brings one back to the steps by which the church is reached. The view from the plateau is very extensive, the islands of Veglia and Cherso, in conjunction with the spurs of Monte Maggiore, seeming almost to enclose the sea, while to the south the Velebit range towers, generally cloud-capped.
The church of SS. Vito and Modesto was built in 1631 after the pattern of S. Maria della Salute. In the wall by the entrance is a cannon-ball, a memento of the English bombardment of 1813. On the quays there is to be seen much the same mixture of types and costumes as at Trieste. The country people wear a black loose coat with sleeves, over a kind of sweater which hangs below it; the trousers resemble broad breeches with a bit of loose stocking showing above the shoe. The rawhide shoes are of the same kind as those worn at Grado, at Monte S. Angelo across the water, and all over the country further south, pointed in shape and turned up at the toes, generally brown, with the upper part covered with lacing. On the men's heads are little caps, black, brown, or red.