Isabel soon began to like Trieste; the place grew upon her, and later she always spoke of it as “my beloved Trieste.” She has left on record in her journal her early impressions:
“Trieste is a town of threes. It has three quarters: the oldest, Citta Vecchia, is filthy and antiquated in the extreme. It has three winds: the bora, the winter wind, cold, dry, highly electrical, very exciting, and so violent that sometimes the quays are roped, and some of the walls have iron rails let in, to prevent people being blown into the sea; the sirocco, the summer wind, straight from Africa, wet, warm, and debilitating; and the contraste, which means the two blowing at once and against each other, with all the disadvantages of both. It has three races: Italians, Austrians, and Slavs. They are all ready to cut each other’s throats, especially the Italians and the Austrians; and the result is that Trieste, wealthy though she is, wants all modern improvements, simply because the two rival parties act like the two bundles of hay in the fable, and between them the ass starves. North of Ponte Rosso is Germania, or the Austrian colony, composed of the authorities, the employés, and a few wealthy merchants, who have a crazy idea of Germanizing their little world, an impossible dream, for there are twelve thousand Italians in Trieste, who speak a sort of corrupted Venetian. One thousand of these are very rich, the others very poor. However, whether rich or poor, the Italianissimi hate their Austrian rulers like poison; and in this hatred they are joined by the mass of the wealthy Israelites, who divide the commerce with the Greeks. The wealthy Italianissimi subscribe handsomely to every Italian charity and movement, and periodically and anonymously memorialize the King of Italy. The poor take a delight in throwing large squibs, called by courtesy ‘torpedoes,’ amongst the unpatriotic petticoats who dare to throng the Austrian balls; for though Trieste is Austrian nominally, it is Italian at heart. The feud between the Italians and the Austrians goes to spoil society in Trieste; they will not intermingle. The Slavs also form a distinct party.
“I found these discordant elements a little difficult to harmonize at first. But Richard desired me to form a neutral house, as at Damascus, where politics and religion should never be mentioned, and where all might meet on a common ground. I did so, with the result that we had friends in all camps. There was an abundance of society of all kinds: Austrian, Italian, and what Ouida has called the haute Juiverie. We were in touch with them all, and they were all good-natured and amiable. Society in Trieste did not care whether you were rich or poor, whether you received or did not receive; it only asked you to be nice, and it opened its arms to you. I dare say my visiting list, private and consular, comprised three hundred families; but we had our own little clique intime, which was quite charming, and included some sixty or seventy persons.
“We women had what Richard used to call ‘hen parties’ (Kaffee gesellschaft), which is really five o’clock tea, where we would dance together, play, sing, recite, and have refreshments; but a man, except the master of the house, was never seen at these gatherings. En revanche, we had plenty of evening entertainments for both sexes.
“Some curious little local customs still lingered at Trieste. One of them was, when two friends or relations met in society, after embracing affectionately, they were wont to drop one another an elaborate curtsey. The visiting hours were from twelve till two, an impossible time; and men were expected to call in white cravats, kid gloves and evening dress. When I first came to Trieste, I was often invited en intime to afternoon tea, and was told to come ‘just as you are, my dear.’ I took the invitation literally of course; and when I arrived, I used to find the other ladies décolletées, and blazing with diamonds. I remember feeling very awkward at appearing in an ordinary costume, but my hostess said to me, ‘You know, my dear, we are so fond of our jewels; it gives us pleasure to dress even for one another; but do not do it if it bores you.’ However, later I always took care to do it, on the principle that when one is at Rome one should do as Rome does. Apart from these little social peculiarities Trieste was the most hospitable and open-hearted town, and people entertained there, if they entertained at all, on a lavish scale and right royally.
“The population of Trieste was very interesting, though a strange medley. To the east of the town the Wallachian cici, or charcoal-dealers, wore the dress of the old Danubian homes whence they came. Then there was the Friulano, with his velvet jacket and green corduroys (the most estimable race in Trieste). He was often a roaster of chestnuts at the corners of the street, and his wife was the best balie (wet nurse). She was often more bravely attired than her mistress. The Slav market-women were also very interesting. I loved to go down and talk with them in the market-place. They drove in from neighbouring villages with their produce for sale in a kind of drosky, the carretella as it was called, with its single pony harnessed to the near side of the pole. Some of the girls, especially those of Servola, were quite beautiful, with a Greek profile, and a general delicacy of form and colour which one would hardly expect to find amongst the peasantry. But their eyes were colourless; and their blonde hair was like tow—it lacked the golden ray. The dresses were picturesque: a white triangular head-kerchief, with embroidered ends hanging down the back; a bodice either of white flannel picked out with splashes of colour, or of a black glazed and plaited stuff; a skirt of lively hue, edged with a broad belt of even livelier green, blue, pink, or yellow; white stockings; and short, stout shoes. The ornaments on high days and holidays were gold necklaces and crosses, a profusion of rings and pendants. This of course was the contadina, or peasant girl. Opposed to her was the sartorella, or little tailoress, which may be said to be synonymous with the French grisette. I always called Trieste Il Paradiso delle Sartorelle, because the sartorella was a prominent figure in Trieste, and Fortune’s favourite. She was wont to fill the streets and promenades, especially on festa days, dressed à quatre épingles, powdered and rouged and coiffée as for a ball, and with or without a veil. She was often pretty, and generally had a good figure; but she did not always look ‘nice’; and her manners, to put it mildly, were very dégagées. There were four thousand of these girls in Trieste, and they filled the lower-class balls and theatres. There was a sartorella in every house, off and on. For example, a family in Trieste always had a dress to make or a petticoat, and the sartorella came for a florin a day and her food, and she worked for twelve hours, leaving off work at six, when she began her ‘evening out.’ I am fain to add the sartorella was often a sort of whited sepulchre. She was gorgeously clad without, but as a rule had not a rag, not even a chemise, underneath, unless she were ‘in luck.’ ‘In luck,’ I grieve to say, meant that every boy, youth, and man in Trieste, beginning at twelve and up to twenty-five and twenty-eight, had an affaire with a sartorella; and I may safely assert, without being malicious, that she was not wont to give her heart—if we may call it so—gratis. She was rather a nuisance in a house; though after I had been in Trieste a little while I discovered that she was an indispensable nuisance, because there was always some mending or sewing to be done. She generally turned the servants’ heads by telling them that she was going to be married to a real graf (count) as soon as he was independent of his parents—a sort of King Cophetua and the Beggar Maid over again, I suppose.
“Trieste was a beautiful place, especially the view round our bay. The hills were covered with woodland and verdure; the deep blue Adriatic was in the foreground, dotted with lateen sails; and the town filled the valley and straggled up the slopes. The sky was softly blue on a balmy day; the bees and birds, the hum of insects, the flowers and fresh air, and the pretty, animated peasants, combined to form a picture which made one feel glad to live.
TRIESTE