Paoli said when dying:—“My nephews have little to expect from me; but I will bequeath to them, as a memorial and consolation, this Bible—saying, ‘I have never seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging their bread.’”
CHAP. XVIII.
Excursion to a Forest.—Borders of the Niolo.—Adventures.—Corsican Pines.—The Pinus Maritima and Pinus Luriccio.—Government Forests.
Our excursion to the forest came off on the day before we left Corte, under the auspices of our “man of the woods.” He procured us mules, and our hostess supplied a basket of provisions and wine; for it promised to be a hard day's work, carrying us far into the heart of the mountains.
Leaving Corte by the Corso, we soon turned up a valley to the left, winding among hills of no great elevation and cultivated to their summits. Not much farther than a mile from the town, we passed a lone house, the door of which was riddled with bullets. The brigands attacked it not long before. It was an affair, I believe, of summary justice for some trespass on property.
“No one was safe,” said our conductor, “two years ago, outside the town. If you had been in the island then, you would have seen half Corsica armed to the teeth.”—
“The disarming has been complete, for since our landing we have only once seen fire-arms except in the hands of the military. Then the banditti, of whom we have heard more than enough, no longer exist?”
“No; they have been shot down, brought to justice, or driven out of the island. Many of them escaped to Sardinia; if you go there, you will find things just in the same state they were here; perhaps worse, if our outlaws are roaming there. I will tell you, some time, the story of the last of the banditti. Not far from hence they fell in a desperate conflict with the gendarmes.”
The hollows between some of the hills among which we wound were embosomed in chestnut-trees, and the husks were beginning to burst and shed the nuts on the ground.