CHAPTER III.
THEODORE VON NEUHOFF.
"Abenamar, Abenamar,
Moro de la Moreria,
El dia que tu naciste,
Grandes senales avia."—Moorish Romance.
It was at Aleria that, on the 12th of March 1736, Theodore von Neuhoff disembarked, who was the first of a succession of Corsican parvenus, who give a mediæval and romantic character to modern European history.
That morning in Aleria, I had a vision of that strange knight-adventurer, as I had seen him represented in a still unedited Genoese manuscript of the year 1739: "Accinelli, Historico-geographico-political Memorials of the Kingdom of Corsica." This MS. is in the possession of Mr. Santelli of Bastia, who willingly permitted me to examine it, but refused to let me copy some original letters, which, however, I procured elsewhere at a later period. The spirit in which the Genoese has written his history may be gathered from its motto, which describes the Corsicans thus: Generatio prava et exorbitans: Bestiae et universa pecora—a wicked and depraved generation—beasts and cattle all. The Genoese has stolen his motto from the Bible. In his MS. he has painted Theodore in water-colours after life, in Moorish dress, peruke, and small hat, heavy sabre and cane. He stands gravely on the sea, and out of it an island is seen to project.
The portrait of Theodore of Corsica may also be found exquisitely drawn in an old German book of the year 1736, which was published in Frankfort under the following title: "An Account of the Life and Deeds of Baron Theodore von Neuhoff, and of the Republic of Genoa so injured by him, edited by Giovanni di S. Fiorenzo."
The vignette gives a full-length portrait of Theodore in Spanish costume, with a very white beard. In the background may be seen an un walled town, probably Bastia, before which are represented in the most satisfactory style three men, one of whom hangs on a gallows, another is impaled, and a third is in the act of being quartered.
The appearance of Theodore in Corsica, and his romantic election to the sovereignty of the island, attracted the attention of all Europe at the time. This may be gathered from the German book which I have just referred to, and which made its appearance in the very year in which that singular event occurred, 1736. As this volume is the only German book which I have made use of in my Corsican studies, I shall transfer some of it to these pages.