At Polveroso, we had a magnificent glimpse of a deep valley, in the middle of which lies Porta, the principal town of the little district of Ampugnani, embosomed in chestnuts, now dripping with the thunder-shower. Here stood formerly the ancient Accia, a bishopric, not a trace of which remains. Porta is an unusually handsome place, and many of its little houses resemble elegant villas. The small yellow church has a pretty façade, and a surprisingly graceful tower stands, in Tuscan fashion, as isolated campanile or belfry by its side. From the hill of San Pietro, you look down into the rows of houses, and the narrow streets that group themselves about the church, as into a trim little theatre. Porta is the birthplace of Sebastiani.
The mountains now become balder, and more severe in form, losing the chestnuts that previously adorned them. I found huge thistles growing by the roadside, large almost as trees, with magnificent, broad, finely-cut leaves, and hard woody stem. Marcantonio had sunk into complete silence. The Corsicans speak little, like the Spartans; my host of Oreto was dumb as Harpocrates. I had ridden with him a whole day through the mountains, and, from morning till evening had never been able to draw him into conversation. Only now and then he threw out some naïve question: "Have you cannons? Have you hells in your country? Do fruits grow with you? Are you wealthy?"
After Ave Maria, we at length reached the canton of Rostino or Morosaglia, the country of Paoli, the most illustrious of all the localities celebrated in Corsican history, and the central point of the old democratic Terra del Commune. We were still upon the Campagna, when Marcantonio took leave of me; he was going to pass the night in a house at some distance, and return home with the horses on the morrow. He gave me a brotherly kiss, and turned away grave and silent; and I, happy to find myself in this land of heroes and free men, wandered on alone towards the convent of Morosaglia. I have still an hour on the solitary plain, and, before entering Paoli's house, I shall continue the history of his people and himself at the point where I left off.
CHAPTER VIII.
PASQUALE PAOLI.
"Il cittadin non la città son io."—Alfieri's Timoleon.
After Pasquale Paoli and his brother Clemens, with their companions, had left Corsica, the French easily made themselves masters of the whole island. Only a few straggling guerilla bands protracted the struggle a while longer among the mountains. Among these, one noble patriot especially deserves the love and admiration of future times—the poor parish priest of Guagno—Domenico Leca, of the old family of Giampolo. He had sworn upon the Gospels to abide true to freedom, and to die sooner than give up the struggle. When the whole country had submitted, and the enemy summoned him to lay down his arms, he declared that he could not violate his oath. He dismissed those of his people that did not wish any longer to follow him, and threw himself, with a faithful few, into the hills. For months he continued the struggle, fighting, however, only when he was attacked, and tending wounded foes with Christian compassion when they fell into his hands. He inflicted injury on none except in honourable conflict. In vain the French called on him to come down, and live unmolested in his village. The priest of Guagno wandered among the mountains, for he was resolved to be free; and when all had forsaken him, the goat-herds gave him shelter and sustenance. But one day he was found dead in a cave, whence he had gone home to his Master, weary and careworn, and a free man. A relative of Paoli and friend of Alfieri—Giuseppe Ottaviano Savelli—has celebrated the memory of the priest of Guagno in a Latin poem, with the title of Vir Nemoris—The Man of the Forest.
Other Corsicans, too, who had gone into exile to Italy, landed here and there, and attempted, like their forefathers, Vincentello, Renuccio, Giampolo, and Sampiero, to free the island. None of these attempts met with any success. Many Corsicans were barbarously dragged off to prison—many sent to the galleys at Toulon, as if they had been helots who had revolted against their masters. Abattucci, who had been one of the last to lay down arms, falsely accused of high treason and convicted, was condemned in Bastia to branding and the galleys. When Abattucci was sitting upon the scaffold ready to endure the execution of the sentence, the executioner shrank from applying the red-hot iron. "Do your duty," cried a French judge; the man turned round to the latter, and stretched the iron towards him, as if about to brand the judge. Some time after, Abattucci was pardoned.
Meanwhile, Count Marbœuf had succeeded the Count de Vaux in the command of Corsica. His government was on the whole mild and beneficial; the ancient civic regulations of the Corsicans, and their statutes, remained in force; the Council of Twelve was restored, and the administration of justice rendered more efficient. Efforts were also made to animate agriculture, and the general industry of the now utterly impoverished country. Marbœuf died in Bastia in 1786, after governing Corsica for sixteen years.
When the French Revolution broke out, that mighty movement absorbed all private interests of the Corsicans, and these ardent lovers of liberty threw themselves with enthusiasm into the current of the new time. The Corsican deputy, Saliceti, proposed that the island should be incorporated with France, in order that it might share in her constitution. This took place, in terms of a decree of the Legislative Assembly, on the 30th of November 1789, and excited universal exultation throughout Corsica. Most singular and contradictory was the turn affairs had taken. The same France, that twenty years before had sent out her armies to annihilate the liberties and the constitution of Corsica, now raised that constitution upon her throne!