Diversions in Sicily Part 7

I asked several people what St. Luke had to do with Alexandria, and was always told that St. Mark's body was brought from there to Venice in 828, why then should not another of the Evangelists have been there also? Why not indeed? But this reply was as little satisfying as those with which pre-occupied age endeavours to silence inquisitive childhood, and produced much the same sort of result, spurring me on to further investigations.

A musician who desires to compose a tune that shall become popular must contrive something apparently original and yet not so original as to demand study; it must also contain echoes of other tunes previously popular, and yet they must be so indefinite that no one can tell for certain where they come from, which is what we mean when we say it is a wise tune that knows its own father. Similarly, the framers of the foregoing legend had to compose an entirely Christian story, as original as was compatible with the use of the forms of Christian legend, and yet they could not neglect all the pagan traditions with which their public had been impregnated for generations. In the first place the picture must come over the sea--everything that arrives in an island does so; one of the most effective of the common forms in legend is the arrival of a boat with a precious cargo from a distant land, often bringing corn to stay a famine, and every one is now familiar with the opening of Lohengrin. Tunis would not do for the point of departure, not only because it is where pagan Astarte came from when she arrived in Sicily, but also because it had been Moslem since the seventh century and could not have been accepted by the people as a Christian seaport. It is quite likely that the popularity of the St. Mark legend determined the selection of Alexandria, which had the advantage also of being on the coast of the same continent as Tunis. The storm, the vow and the oxen are as much common form in legend as the ship; and the next thing that strikes one is the curious similarity between the alternate domiciles of the Madonna on the mountain and at Custonaci, and the flittings of Venus Erycina to and fro between the mountain and Carthage. If we look upon the arrival of the picture at Custonaci as involving the transplanting of a piece of Africa into Sicily, much as an amba.s.sador's house is regarded as being part of his own country transplanted into a foreign land, we may then consider that the Madonna, to all intents and purposes, still travels between the Mountain and Africa, only she now has an easier journey and avoids actually dwelling among heretics. In this view the transporting of her picture backwards and forwards should be looked upon as the modern version of the feasts of Anagogia and Catagogia.

It is admitted that the picture has, more than once, been placed in the hands of skilful modern painters whose services have been called in merely to repair any damage it may have sustained in its journeyings--they have had nothing to do therefore with the miraculous preservation of the colouring. What these experts thought about the date of the original painting is known only to themselves. We need not suppose that they agreed--that would have been indeed a miracle and quite a fresh departure for a picture with a reputation earned in a different branch of thaumaturgy. It does not much matter, however, what they thought, for experts in matters of art are the victims of such cast-iron prejudices that if once they fancy they see the influence of Leonardo da Vinci in a picture and take it into their heads that it comes from Piedmont, it will be found the most difficult thing in the world to persuade them that it really was painted in Egypt more than 1000 years before Giotto.

We shall probably not be far wrong if we a.s.sume that something like the processions of the Personaggi, involving the display of the most beautiful men and women that could be found, took place on the mountain in heathen times as part of the cult of the G.o.ddess and that, as a compromise, they were not abolished but accommodated to Christian usages.

Giuseppe Pitre, in his _Feste Patronali in Sicilia_, gives an account of the procession on the mountain held in 1752. We are to suppose that the wickedness of the good people of Eryx had attained to such monstrous proportions that the whole universe, incited thereto by observing the anger of G.o.d against them, took up arms in the cause of justice. The Madonna di Custonaci, however, intervened and saved her chosen people.

It began with the Wrath of G.o.d, personified by a warrior armed with thunderbolts and lightning and setting forth to destroy the mountain.

Then came the Angry Heavens, the Benignant Moon, Mars and Mercury ready to avenge the outrages done to G.o.d; Jove grasping a thunderbolt and about to hurl it against the comune, Venus anxious to overthrow the city, and Saturn whetting his golden scythe. The Sun is obscured, the Four Winds blow terribly, the Four Elements a.s.sist in the work of desolation, the Four Seasons threaten misery and affliction. Mount Eryx being convinced by this display that it is in a great danger, the Genius of the city appears next, bearing in his hand a figure of the Madonna di Custonaci.

He calls to his a.s.sistance Divine Counsel, Devotion, Beneficence and Piety, and the procession closes with the Guardian Angel.

It must have been a magnificent spectacle. Many clouds have rested on Mount Eryx since 1752 and we do not now expose our bedrock of paganism quite so openly. This, indeed, but for the slight veneer of Christianity, might have pa.s.sed for a downright pagan procession.

In 1894, _L'Aurora Consurgens della Cantica_ was the subject. There were twelve figures showing the growth of idolatry and culminating with the Emperor Julius Caesar who, it will be remembered, accepted worship as a G.o.d; moreover, his death having occurred not half a century before the birth of Christ, he was naturally followed by the Aurora, symbolizing the Madonna di Custonaci, and the explanatory pamphlet contained a reference to the _Song of Solomon_ vi. 10: "Who is she that looketh forth as the morning, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners?" After the Aurora came the Rising Sun, Faith, Christian Civilization, Mount Eryx, Charity and Youth--meaning, probably, that Christianity will never grow old. In conclusion came a car with a copy of the sacred picture and a chorus of youths.

It would seem that the personages formerly appeared on foot, for the earliest record states that in 1750 they appeared for the first time on horseback. In 1897 the subject was _Jael_, and the cavalcade consisted of eight figures, of whom Deborah, seated in the shade of a palm tree surrounded with a chorus of damsels, Jael in the tent with Sisera nailed to the ground, and Triumph, appeared on cars, each of the others being on horseback and the horses being led by grooms suitably attired. A nocturnal procession, whether the figures go on foot, on horseback, or on cars, does not strike one as being a particularly favourable medium for the telling of a story. Nevertheless, by choosing a subject with which the people are more or less familiar, by emphasizing the climax and by providing an explanatory pamphlet for 2d., a more satisfactory result is produced than one would have supposed probable, as I realized when I saw the procession in August, 1901. The sacred picture had been on the mountain since 1893, an unusually long time, and was now to be taken back to the sanctuary at Custonaci, which, during its absence, had been beautified "in the Gothic style." The two events of the Procession and the Return synchronizing, there was a double festa, lasting four days on the mountain and four days more at Custonaci.

CHAPTER X--THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE

On the morning of Sunday, 25th August, 1901, every one on Monte San Giuliano was up early and at 7.30 a bra.s.s band began to perambulate the town to announce that the festa had begun. At 8.30 the band entered the Matrice, and before Ma.s.s the sacred picture was unveiled, the band saluting it with a burst of music. Much may be done in music by allusion and suggestion. The service concluded with an extremely graceful movement in six-eight time, that drove the Madonna out of the mind of at least one listener and subst.i.tuted a vision of laughing girls swaying lightly to the rhythm and singing of the dancing waves whose foam gave birth to Venus.

When the church emptied we got a better view of the picture. It is about 6 ft. high by 3 broad, painted in oils on wood prepared with gesso, and represents a smiling Madonna with the Child at her breast. She is seated on a throne in a landscape; two angels hold over her head a ma.s.sive golden crown; the Child is crowned also and in His hand are three ears of corn, to signify fruitfulness; He also holds the keys. The crowns are really only half-crowns, but they are gold or silver-gilt, and are fastened into the wood of the picture. All round the Madonna's nimbus is a raised band of gold set with twelve diamond stars, valued at 14,000 lire. A large diamond earring hangs in her right ear, the only one that is visible; three large diamond rings are on the fingers of her right hand and one on the finger of her left which supports the Child, and suspended all over her skirts is an immense quant.i.ty of jewellery. The frame is of wood entirely coated with silver, in the form of a Renaissance doorway with a fluted column on each side and a broken pediment over the top. It is almost concealed by the jewellery hung about it, earrings, chains, necklaces, rings, watches etc. These are offerings from the faithful, but what is shown is nothing like all.

There is a large chest containing much more and what has been given this year is exposed in a separate case. These valuables const.i.tute the Madonna's dowry and she carries it with her on her journeys; but some of the more important articles never leave the mountain; her diamond stars, for instance, are removed from the picture when it goes down, and their place is taken by less valuable stars of gold.

In the afternoon there were horse-races outside the Trapani gate on a fairly level piece of road, and a concert and illumination in the balio in the evening.

In the course of the day I bought a copy of the explanatory pamphlet.

Its t.i.tle was _L'Arca Noetica_. _Simbolo Mariano_. _Processione notturna figurativa_ (_I Personaggi_) _in omaggio alla Diva di Custonaci Celeste Patrone degli Erecini_. _Ultimo Lunedi d'Agosto_, 1901. It was to be a procession of cars, there were to be no figures on horseback.

Having introduced cars, as in _Jael_, to give special importance to the three points of the story, viz. the opening, the climax, and the conclusion (or, as the pamphlet expressed it, Causa, Consequenza e Termine), it was, no doubt, felt that more could be done with them than with single figures on horseback in presenting the somewhat intractable subject of _Noah's Ark and the Universal Deluge_.

The preparations had taken a month or six weeks. The course is for the arciprete of the Matrice, who is the head of the clergy of the district, to determine what the story shall be and how it is to be told. The designing of each personaggio, or of each group of personaggi, is then confided to one of the inhabitants, who, provided he bears in mind the general scheme, is free to follow his natural artistic instincts. The dresses are hired from Palermo, and an astonishing quant.i.ty of jewellery is lent by the families of the comune; in 1897 the personaggi carried 85 lbs. weight of it, and far more is always lent than can possibly be used.

It is all gold and precious stones, no silver is to be seen, and nothing is ever lost, stolen, or mislaid; even the thieves become honest on these occasions. It is sewn on to the dresses in various designs and makes them look very rich, so that what is hired from Palermo is only the costumes in the rough, so to speak.

In wandering about the town next day, I came upon four or five of the cars lurking in obscure churches where they had been prepared. It was not easy to make much of them; there were a few rocks, banks and clouds, also the waters of the deluge, all made of papier mache painted to appear real, and in among the rocks and banks were real plants, mostly the dwarf palm which grows plentifully on the mountain. There were wooden supports for the figures, to help them to stand in their places. Each car carried under it an apparatus to supply it with acetylene gas, used in 1901 for the first time.

All day long people kept on coming up the mountain and pouring into the town. Those who did not come on foot left their carts and horses outside, and they all swarmed up through the narrow, irregular, roughly paved streets from the Trapani gate to the balio, till by nightfall the Piazza was as crowded as Piccadilly on Mafeking night. Every one who has been present at an Italian festa knows what it is like--men shouting and elbowing their way through the people with flaming lamps fitted to their baskets, selling water and syrups, cakes and confectionery, melon seeds and peanuts--others going about with halfpenny b.u.t.tonholes of gelsomina, each neatly folded up in a vine-leaf to keep the scent in--three independent piano-organs and a bra.s.s band in the middle distance--an enthusiastic blind singer, a survival of Demodocus in the _Odyssey_, with a falsetto voice and no bridge to his nose keeping a group of listeners spellbound in the foreground with their favourite ballad, ill.u.s.trated by a large sheet of oil paintings in eight tableaux, about the man who murdered his wife and mother with one b.l.o.o.d.y knife--there it is lying on the supper-table--and was ultimately taken by the carabinieri and executed.

This blind singer with no bridge to his nose is a humorist; on one occasion when he was fibbing in a particularly flagrant manner, he enforced his remarks by calling upon heaven to strike him blind and smash his nose if he was not speaking the truth.

While you are thinking that the tumult must be at its height, peaceful nuns are creeping up the convent stair, silently, one by one, they reach the roof, every one can see them collecting together in the moonlight and taking hold of the dangling bell-ropes. All of a sudden you realize what a mistake you had been making about the tumult as the riotous bells fling their additional accompaniments out into the night, all over the town, over the whole comune, down to Trapani, to Cofano and out to the islands.

In the meantime those in charge of the cars had been giving their final directions and seeing that everything was in order, and the personaggi, who had been being dressed ever since early in the afternoon, were ready to receive visitors. About 10 p.m. each of them began to hold an At Home. They sat there silent and motionless in their houses among trays full of superfluous jewellery and surrounded by lighted candles, gazing imperturbably in front of them while people streamed through the room admiring them, fingering their dresses and jewels, and asking questions of their relations and friends. About 11.30 I was conducted along the illuminated streets through the crowd to a house where I stood on a balcony looking up a street down which the procession was to come.

We had to wait till long after midnight, but at last the moving lights began to shine on the high houses in the distance, the band was heard approaching, and at 1.45 the first car staggered into sight. It represented _The Sons of G.o.d and the Daughters of Men_; there were three of each, reclining in the front part of the car and offering flowers to one another, instigated so to do by the Monster of Iniquity, a loathsome dragon, who was insinuating himself among them from rocks behind, while the Angel of the Lord, a singularly beautiful child, stood on a high cloud in the background, in an att.i.tude of horror, about to take wing from such a world of wickedness. Cupid was there also, sitting at the feet of the daughters of men and taking aim generally.

The second car brought _Sin_, a bearded man in an imperial att.i.tude with a golden sceptre resting on his hip. He dominated a globe round which the old Serpent had coiled himself. He was dressed in dark-blue velvet, and wore a voluminous red cloak. On his breast was a bunch of grapes, made entirely of diamond rings; each grape was a separate ring isolated from the others and so sewn on that the hoop, being pa.s.sed through a hole in the material, was not visible, and only the rose of diamonds was displayed. There were fifty-five grapes, and they sparkled and glittered in the flickering lights as the car lurched down the street and pa.s.sed the balcony.

The third car represented _The Voice of G.o.d_, a beautiful figure of an Angel blowing a trumpet, and the words written on the cloud behind were "Delebo hominem." In the front of the car sat a youth and a girl holding hands to represent the wicked population destined to destruction.

Then _The Universal Deluge_ came pitching and tossing round the corner--rather an ambitious car. The foreground was occupied by the water, with the head of a drowning man throwing up his arms, and the indication of another entirely submerged. The waves were beating against a steep bank up which a tigress was climbing, carrying her cub in her mouth. On the top of the bank stood a lovely woman endeavouring to save her terrified child. She was the only living figure on the car, everything else, even the terrified child, being of papier mache.

_The Ark_ came on the fifth car and had no living figure at all, being merely Noah's Ark resting on Mount Ararat with a dove in front. This may sound rather uninteresting and as though designed to support home industries, but, to the initiated, it palpitated with significance, for it symbolized the Madonna herself, the only means of salvation from the waters of punishment; and as the Ark rested on Mount Ararat while the flood subsided, so does the Madonna di Custonaci rest upon Mount Eryx while the calamity is stayed.

No. 6 was _The Sacrifice_ and represented Noah, an imposing old man with long white hair and beard, standing at an altar where a real sheep lay dead under a net and his three sons were in front praying.

No. 7 was _The Rainbow_, another lovely girl as an angel standing between a bank of clouds and a rainbow. On the breast of this figure was worked in jewels Noah's dove with an olive-branch; this was particularly appropriate, as it happens also to be the badge of the town.

The procession was closed by a long car carrying first a band of musicians, then a chorus of youths attired as angels and crowned with roses, the whole backed by a sort of temple front framing a copy of the sacred picture. This car had to stand still from time to time while its occupants performed music composed specially for the occasion, and the continual stopping dictated the movements of the other cars and was signalled to them by bells, so that there might always be about the same s.p.a.ce between them.

The cars were drawn by men and the figures made no attempt to stand rigidly still--anything of the kind would have been out of the question, for they must have been on the move between five and six hours. The last car pa.s.sed my balcony at 3.30, an hour and three-quarters after the first had come into sight, and one could tell the next day that they had been through nearly the whole town, for hardly a street was safe to walk in--they were all so slippery with the wax that had dropped from the candles. The constant moving of their limbs by the figures, though they never lost the general idea of the att.i.tude, together with the tottering motion caused by the roughness of the paving, prevented any sense of the pose plastique or living picture.

Every one of the female figures, except _The Voice of G.o.d_, had her breast encrusted with jewels, usually in a floral design, and the borders of their dresses were heavy with jewellery; the male figures also wore as much as could be suitably sewn on their costumes.

Omitting consideration of the final car, which was there to close the procession and bring on the music and the Madonna, and also of the Ark, which could hardly have been otherwise, there were six cars, three carrying groups and three practically single figures, for the boy and girl at the feet of _The Voice of G.o.d_, though they were the children of Donna Anna, my landlady, were not really necessary. Of the groups, the one representing _The Sons of G.o.d and the Daughters of Men_ was certainly the finest. It told its story in the right way and was full of the right kind of imagination. _The Sacrifice_ was next best, and owed much to the extreme dignity of the princ.i.p.al figure. I should have liked _The Flood_ better if it had had more living figures and less papier mache, though I am not ashamed to admit that I have no idea how this could have been done. Shakespeare himself, who apologizes for trying to make a c.o.c.kpit hold the vasty fields of France, might have been excused for not attempting to decant The Universal Deluge into a receptacle scarcely bigger than a costermonger's barrow. Of the three remaining cars, _Sin_ was beyond comparison the finest both in conception and execution.

Perhaps he would have looked the part more obviously if he had had more of a once-aboard-the-lugger expression on his kind and gentle face; on the other hand, the designer of this car may have intended that Sin is most successful in seducing the righteous when he appears with nothing repulsive in his aspect. The other two were merely just what they should have been--ordinary business cars, so to speak. Had these three single figures appeared on horseback with grooms to lead them, as in former times, the procession would have gained in variety and the importance of the groups on the cars would have been emphasized.

But this is a small matter. The procession as it was, with its car after car jolting along under an August full moon, the sparkling of the jewels, the flashing of the torches, the blazing of the gas, the beauty of the figures and the immense mult.i.tude of reverent worshippers made up a scene never to be forgotten. The impressiveness was deepened by the knowledge that this Mountain, where Astarte, Aphrodite and Venus have all reigned in turn, is also a place where much that has helped to mould the poetry and history of the world has happened since the Sicans first girded it with its megalithic cincture. Added to this was the conviction that for many and many an age some such procession has been winding through these narrow, irregular streets, the form changing, but the intention remaining ever the same--Praise to the Giver of the Increase.

The programme for the next day contained nothing till 5 p.m., when there were more horse-races, then Vespers in the Matrice, brilliantly illuminated; after dusk fireworks outside the Trapani Gate, and at night a concert in the illuminated balio.

In the afternoon of Wednesday, the 28th, a procession of fifty-nine mules and horses pa.s.sed through the town. Each animal was accompanied by its owner, a peasant of the comune, and was loaded with bags of grain, an offering for the Madonna. This grain was to be sold and, in the mean time, was estimated to be worth 2500 lire. About 1500 lire was collected during the festa, partly at the church doors and partly in the value of unused wax candles, and the municipio gave 1000, so that altogether the receipts were about 5000 lire. Against this the expenses of the festa were expected to amount to about 4000 lire, and the balance will go towards the expenses of the next.

CHAPTER XI--THE RETURN

The procession of the grain closed the harvest home and in the evening of the same day began the proceedings relating to the Return of the Madonna to Custonaci. At 8 p.m. another procession started. First came the band to clear the way, then a man beating a drum; this is a feature of Sicilian processions and is said to date from the time when the Saracens had possession of the island; it continues as long as the procession lasts, which may be for hours, and produces an unexpected effect. There is so much else going on that after a time you forget to notice it. But you have not really got away from it; you are being unconsciously saturated, and after the festa is over you become aware that you are suffering from a surfeit of drum; the rhythm runs in your head and keeps you awake at night; when you go out of doors you expect to hear it in the distance; when you turn a corner you listen for it, and as it is not there you find yourself listening for it all the more anxiously. But this wears off after two or three days.

Behind the drum came peasants walking two and two, carrying candles and an occasional banner; then the Society of the Misericordia, wearing those mysterious dresses that cover them entirely from head to foot, with holes for the eyes; then priests and men with lamps, and, lastly, the sacred picture out of the Matrice, carried by men, the whole frame quivering with its fringes of jewellery. Every few yards the procession stopped, partly to rest the bearers and partly to give the crowd an opportunity of seeing the picture.

Every church that lay on the route was lighted up and not till long past midnight, when the picture had been taken into each one of them to pay a farewell visit, was it carried back to the Matrice.

On Thursday, 29th, the day appointed for transporting the picture back to Custonaci, there was early Ma.s.s in the Matrice, where there was not nearly room for all the people, and after Ma.s.s a short sermon. The preacher contrasted the sadness of the present occasion with the joy of that happy day in 1893 when the Madonna had come to dwell among them, bringing the rain with her. He told them of her love for her people, of all she had done for them, of all they owed her and of how deeply she entered into the life of each one of them. He reminded them that the first name they had been taught to lisp at their mother's knee was Maria; that she to whom they raised their prayers in time of tribulation was Maria; that the one they blessed for benefits received was always Maria.

And now her gracious presence was to depart from her beloved Mountain; the time had come to utter the last farewell. Here the preacher spoke a few words so touching in their eloquence that all the women and most of the men burst into tears and made no attempt to conceal their emotion.

It would not occur to an Englishman to weep because a picture is taken from one place to another. Not so long ago quite a number of pictures were taken and put away in the Tate Gallery, and yet London looked stolidly on and not a tear was shed. Had one been shed, it would have been laughed at; and had only one or two of the congregation in the Matrice been so powerfully affected, it might have pa.s.sed unnoticed, but the simultaneousness and spontaneity of their almost hysterical grief was very impressive, and no one could have had any idea of laughing who saw the weeping crowd that accompanied the Madonna out of the church while the band played a funeral march. She was carried on men's shoulders, her face constantly turned towards the town, through the Trapani gate and down the road to the little church of Santa Maria delle Grazie, while the drum went in front, filling the air with the mournfulness of its perpetual rhythm. As the picture pa.s.sed among the people one of the women cried out--

"See how pale the face of the Madonna has become; it is with sorrow to leave the Mountain."

Another lifted up her voice and prayed that it might not be long before a calamity befell the comune--as that it might not rain till December, for example--in order that she might soon return. The bearers stopped at the little church, where a large chest had been prepared in which she was to repose during the rest of the journey, and the people's grief culminated as the chest received her out of their sight.

In _The Marriage of Heaven and h.e.l.l_, Blake tells us that, when the Prophets Isaiah and Ezekiel dined with him, he asked, "Does a firm persuasion that a thing is so make it so?" and Isaiah replied, "All poets believe that it does, and in ages of imagination this firm persuasion removed mountains; but many are not capable of a firm persuasion of anything." Certainly most of the Ericini are capable of a firm persuasion of something and probably, if Blake could have visited them at a time when the Madonna was going away from the mountain or coming back to it, he would have agreed that the age of imagination still lingers in this cla.s.sic spot.

Those who did not accompany the picture beyond Santa Maria delle Grazie now proceeded to the balio, and the beating of the drum floated up continuously as the chest, followed by an immense crowd on foot, in carts, and on horseback, was carried down the zigzags and along the winding road to Custonaci. In many places booths had been erected, where wine and bread were given freely to all while the bearers rested. At other points were pulpits, and here they stopped to listen to a short sermon. A crowd had come out from Paparella to meet and join the throng, other crowds from Fico, Ragosia, Crocevia, Palazzolo and the other villages forming the comune, were waiting at various points along the road. From the balio the whole journey was visible, except when the windings of the road hid part of the crowd, and, with the help of gla.s.ses, the arrival at the sanctuary could be seen distinctly at about 5 p.m., nearly nine hours after the morning start. On ordinary occasions the journey takes about three hours. In the evening there were fireworks and illuminations at Custonaci and bonfires in many of the other villages.