to street-begging, care for nothing but the table and the theatre; the king himself is the greatest gambler in the world, and derives his largest revenue from the lottery; while his subjects, of both sexes and all classes, live, move, and have their being in its hazards and its hopes. The most independent class of citizens are the lazzaroni. See that specimen yonder, with head, and neck, and bosom bare, toasting himself upon the glowing pavement. What cares he for yesterday, or what for to-morrow? His abandon is perfect. With a wit proverbial, a temper invariable, and a patience inexhaustible, he unites the art of an improvisitore, the tact of a diplomatist, and the grace of an Apollo. All this is indigenous with him: if he ever stoops to the drudgery of what Coleridge calls originating an idea,' it is in the way of pondering a lucky number for the lottery. 6 On The morning after our arrival a woman lay upon the naked stones, in front of the theatre of San Carlo, with four ragged little children around her, and she was weeping amain. I threw her a few carlini, and passed on. my return, an hour afterwards, she was sitting erect, and playing with the children; but as soon as she saw a forestiero approaching, she threw herself flat upon her face, and lifted up her voice and wept.' Subsequently I met with her often, and in various places; and she was generally lying upon the ground, and howling as loud as she could. Not understanding how she managed to maintain such constant intensity of grief, I one day asked our cicerone about it. He replied: 'Oh, that is her business; she weeps for her maccaroni; she will never cease weeping till the forestieri depart !' Without the regularity of what we call a market, certain districts here have a traffic peculiar to themselves. If you would see oranges, step down to the quay when the boats from Sorrento are unloading. If you like oysters, go along the street next the bay towards the Villa Reale. There is a place near the heart of the city where you may purchase almost anything that ever breathed the ocean brine. There you will see the delicate little sardine, fresh from its watery home; the skait and the sole, with eyes in the wrong place, and mouth all askew; beautiful creatures of all colours, pink and purple, green and yellow, blue and scarlet, all intermingled and changeable; great crawling masses of nondescript pulp-half-animal, half-vegetable-contracting and expanding like living jellies; huge eels-the real progeny of the sea-serpent-squirming and writhing in their tubs, in anticipation of the frying-pan; little transparent monstrosities, all head, and ninetieth cousins of the crab and the lobster, all claw. You will find any desirable number of glove-stores in the Strada Toledo, and the article in Naples is equal to any you get in Paris, and cheaper than in any other city in Europe. You should walk the whole length of this fine street, and you will be astonished at the amount of mercantile business in sundry departments. Of belle arti shops there is no lack in Naples. Who under the sun buys all these imitative wares, to say nothing of antiquesreal or supposed-lava ornaments from Vesuvius, and coral trinkets from the sea? In this rainbow-tinted climate, everybody is a painter, but every painter is not an artist, and most of the pictures are copies, and most of the copies are caricatures. But he who has seen only the Toledo, and the broad streets and beautiful open spaces along the margin of the bay, knows nothing yet of Naples. He must dive into the populous centre, and thread the narrow lanes and alleys, where two-thirds of its people dwell in their dark and filthy dens. I had wondered how it was possible that nearly five hundred thousand human souls embodied should live within an area only some two miles wide and five miles long, till one day I accidentally wandered into the locality now alluded to. It is impossible to describe the scene there beheld-streets without sidewalks, scarcely wide enough for a cart; buildings so lofty as entirely to shut out the sun, and almost the daylight; and these literally crammed, from cellar to garret, with a miscellaneous and miserable population. Thousands also seem to live altogether in the streets (if that is the appropriate name for such dismal ditches), and thousands in the open air carry on their various handicrafts. The cobbler, the tinker, the bootblack, the blacksmith, the carpenter, and even the public cook, pitch their industrial apparatus against the wall, reckless of hoof and wheel, and work away as if the city were their shop. In other localities frequented by such as read and shave, you will see bookstores and barber-shops apparently doing a brisk out-door business; and the mantua-maker and merchant-tailor arrange their respective assortments along the swarming avenues; and here are drygoods and groceries, hardware and cutlery, and all imaginable vendibles except cleanliness and virtue. Even water for drinking is publicly sold in the streets, carried about in earthen jars, and dispensed at the corners for a grano a glass. Half the people one meets with here are soldiers. You see a company or two march by your hotel every hour; and from sunrise to sunset, there is scarcely a moment when you may not hear the sound of trumpet and drum. The castles that guard the harbour command the city too; and their bastions are bristling with cannon, pointing down into the streets and squares; and armed sentinels are pacing the walls, and clustering at the corners, and crossing their bayonets at every portal. Sant' Elmo stands upon a conical hill, overlooking everything; and an enemy in possession of it, though an enemy would have something to do to get there, might demolish Naples in a few hours. The Ovo and the Nuovo could sweep the harbour, and make the bay in front of them a hot place for a hostile fleet. Every guard-house has its row of mounted guns; and the royal residence looks doubly formidable, with its dark array of iron muzzles. I never saw another city so earnestly watched over, and so evidently ready, at a moment's warning, for an outbreak of the people. All is quiet now, but there have been recent mutterings underground, and there is no telling how soon the smothered fires may burst forth. Where is Masaniello? CHAPTER XIII. NAPOLI LA BELLA. Environs--Villa Reale-Chiese de Partu-Poetry-A Picture-- Deep bosomed in the still and quiet bay, THE situation of Naples is one of unrivalled beauty. Whoever would look upon the grandest of terrestrial panoramas, should climb up to the citadel of Sant' Elmo, or ascend the lofty ridge of Posilipo. There he will see at his feet, lying in a semicircle along the margin of the most beautiful bay in the world, a city as fair as a pearly shell just cast up by the purple wave. To the east he will see Vesuvius, rising in imperial majesty from the level Campagna-nature's great altar, smoking with perpetual sacrifice. At its base are four populous towns, sitting as gaily upon the shore as if Herculaneum did not slumber in her lava tomb beneath, or the excavated palaces and temples of Pompeii continually rebuke their temerity. At its southern side flows the Sarno, through a valley brown with vineyards and bright with villages; while the Apennines in the background stretch away to the right and the left, 'all glowing of gold and amethyst.' Farther southward the Sorrentine Promontory runs far out into the sea, its dark side studded with five gemlike cities, and the threepointed Sant' Angelo shooting boldly up five thousand feet above the waters which lave its base. Still turning westward, the eye rests upon the broad expanse of azure, where the bay opens out into the Mediterranean; with Capri on the one hand, and Ischia on the other, lifting their rocky battlements three thousand feet towards the sky, like two great martello towers, reared by nature, on opposite sides of a channel fourteen miles in width, to guard the entrance to her loveliest domain. Naples is a city difficult to describe. The Italians call it bella, and certainly there is about it something of strange and wondrous fascination. The grounds of the Villa Reale are delightful, with open walks and umbrageous avenues, and the fresh breeze from the wave which breaks just below the terrace. In the main promenade you see the enormous granite bowl from Pestum, supported by modern lions. And here are busts and statues-saints and sages, poets and orators, heroes and emperors-for those who love to look at such things. But let us pass on to the Mergillina, where the tide of life ebbs away. Haste, or that pernicious musician will craze you with his bagpipe. I myself narrowly escaped with my hearing the other day, when one of them walked along by my side, blowing most dissonantly in my ear; and, on quickening my pace, he quickened his; and the more I cried Non c'e niente, the more lustily he blew. Those half-clad urchins, groping among the slippery rocks for crabs and sea-horses, seem brothers to the gulls that soar and swoop so familiarly about them. Every one of the little rascals can dive like a dolphin; and even now that roguish eye is watching to see if you will not cast a carlino into the thundering surf. The fishermen yonder are noble, stalwart fellows, the honest expression of whose swarthy countenances gives them an appearance of decided superiority to the mass of lower-class Neapolitans. Let us proceed. Here is a church, which, though a little one, is one of the most interesting in Naples. It was built by the poet Sannazarius, on the site of his favourite Villa Mergillina, which had previously been destroyed by the Prince of Orange, who commanded the garrison during the famous siege of Naples by the French. Its builder dedicated it to the Virgin, and called it De Partu, endowed it richly, and sung its charms in true Virgilian verse. The poem with which its name is chiefly associated is deemed one of the most beautiful that has appeared in the Latin language since the revival of letters. Thus it opens: |