The Naples Riviera Part 5

We bask lazily in the afternoon sunshine, to the soft, rather soporific cooing of some caged doves, that live in the back-ground out of sight behind a screen of lemon trees in huge red jars, such as Morgiana must have been familiar with. Beyond the terrace wall we note the carefully tended vines, precious plants, for their grapes produce the delicate _Episcopio_ wine, perhaps the choicest vintage to be obtained around Naples, and boasting a flavour and bouquet that are rarely to be encountered except in the products of the most celebrated vineyards of France or Germany.

"O quam placens in colore, O quam fragrans in odore, O quam sapidum in ore, Dolce linguae vinculum.

"Felix venter quem intrabis, Felix guttur quod rigabis, Felix os quod tu lavabis; Et beata l.a.b.i.a!"

Below the vinery we catch glimpses of the dancing waters of the Bay and of the little towns of Minori and Majori, seen through a screen of olive and almond trees that are gently swayed by the south wind. Opposite to us towers the huge form of the mountain of the Avvocata, upon whose slopes centuries ago the Madonna herself appeared in a flood of glory to an ignorant but pious shepherd lad, promising the startled youth to become his mediator, the _avvocata_ of his simple prayers. The story must be true, say the peasants, for there on the hillside can still be seen the ruins of the shrine that the wondering and grateful villagers raised upon the very site of the apparition in honour of their celestial visitor. But the whole country-side teems with interesting and often beautiful legends and traditions, handed down by generations of the simple hardy folk who toil for their daily bread amidst the vineyards and olive groves that clothe the sun-baked slopes descending to the sh.o.r.e.

The intervening distance is not great between Ravello and La Scala, which surmounts the opposite ridge of the valley of the Dragone, whence good walkers can easily descend by the ancient mule track that leads down direct to Amalfi by way of Scaletta. Like its neighbour and historic rival across the valley, the annals and fortunes of Scala are closely interwoven with those of Amalfi; and it was during the palmy days of the Republic that this daughter-town reached its height of prosperity. Although the tradition that once Scala possessed a hundred towers upon its walls and a hundred and thirty churches is obviously exaggerated, yet it must have been a place of importance even as early as 987, when Pope John XVI raised it to the rank of a bishopric, an honour which did not fall to Ravello until many years later. Early in the twelfth century Scala was pillaged by the Pisans, but some years afterwards, when the mother city tamely submitted to the demands of these Tuscan invaders without the smallest effort at self-defence, the higher-spirited mountaineers of La Scala manned their walls with skill and vigour, though without avail. The hill-set city was ultimately carried by storm, and so thoroughly did the enraged Pisans wreak their vengeance upon the place that Scala never again rose to fame or eminence, but henceforward dwindled in wealth and size until it finally sank to the condition of a large village, whilst Clement VIII offered an additional indignity to the city in its dotage by depriving it of episcopal rank. But though the citizens of modern Scala no longer possess a bishop in their midst, they are still the proud possessors and jealous guardians of the magnificent mitre presented by Charles of Anjou, who was greatly pleased by the men and money that this ancient town sent to aid his brother, St Louis of France, in his Crusade.

Some sculptured tombs, one of them a monument in honour of Marinella Rufolo of Ravello, who was married to a Coppola of Scala, remain in the churches to interest the curious traveller, but most visitors will find the princ.i.p.al charm of this dilapidated little city in its lofty striking situation beneath the frowning ma.s.s of Monte Cerrato.

But the sunset has come and gone, and the last tints of its rose-pink glow are rapidly disappearing from the serrated line of mountain tops against their background of daffodil sky. Stars are beginning to peep in the firmament, and yellow lights, the stars of earth, are springing up fast in the town below, and even appearing at rare intervals of s.p.a.ce amongst the cottages of the woody hillside, or upon the fishing boats that lie on the bosom of the Bay, now turning to a deep purple under the advancing shadows of night. A cheerful concert of unseen insects greets our ears as we descend rapidly towards Atrani, whilst the goatbells amid the distant pastures tinkle pleasantly from time to time. We soon exchange the dewy freshness of evening in the country for the heavy air, thick with dust, that hangs over the coast road, and in a few moments more find ourselves at the foot of the rock-cut staircase that leads to our convent inn.

But our days upon the beautiful Costiera d'Amalfi are at an end, and the moment has at last come for us to bid farewell to these enchanted scenes and to the ancient city slumbering peacefully in its rocky valley by the sh.o.r.e. Our rows upon the gla.s.sy waters of the Bay, our scrambles up the wild scrub-covered hillsides above the town, our evening walks along the broad high-road to catch the fleeting glories of the sun-set,-all are ended; the day, the hour of departure has actually arrived.

Casting a longing look behind we quit Amalfi in the cool of the evening, in order to cover the eight intervening miles of coast road that lie between us and Salerno. We pa.s.s Atrani, with its tall parti-coloured tower, and proceed towards our destination with the smooth plain of waters below us and the fertile slopes above our heads, and thus we quickly gain Minori, another of the busy little settlements that once helped to make up the collected might of the old Republic. We meet with bare-footed sun-embrowned peasants, in their suits of blue linen and broad shady straw hats; lean sinewy figures, returning from a long day's work in the fragrant orange groves by which the town is surrounded. We meet also, alas! with the usual crowd of beggars, the halt, the maimed, and the pseudo-blind, who are quickly left behind; nevertheless the naughty picturesque half-naked children, loudly screaming for _soldi_, caper in the dust alongside our carriage, until these little pests are out-stripped, but only to give way to other imps, equally naughty and unclothed, from Majori. Majori, nestling by the seash.o.r.e amidst the enfolding mountains, appears to us a second Amalfi, with its crowded beach and brightly coloured boats, with its paper and maccaroni mills, huddled into the narrow ravine of the Senna, which cuts the town in half ere it empties itself into the Bay. Overhead the huge ruined castle of San Niccol looms distinct against the rose-flushed evening sky, crouching like some decrepit old giant above the little city which he so oppressed in the bad old days when Sanseverini and Colonna carried on a perpetual selfish strife that allowed their humble neighbours no repose. Beautiful as is Majori, it is no lovelier than many another spot upon this exquisite coast; it is but as one pearl in a well-matched necklace, for the country that lies between Amalfi and Salerno is fully as rich in historical interest and natural charm as is the western portion that we have just traversed. Behind Majori we behold Monte Falerio, with its rocky summit tipped with the glow of evening and its base in purple shadow, descending abruptly into the darkening waters of the Bay. Slanting down to the surf-fringed beach, the great mountain seem to bar our further progress, but with a guttural imprecation and a loud cracking of the whip, our coachman deftly guides his half-starved but cunning little horses round the sharp corner of the mountain spur known as the Capo del' Orso, and in a trice Amalfi, whither we have been straining our eyes, is s.n.a.t.c.hed from our vision; a few minutes later, and we have rounded the Capo del Tumulo, with its memories of the great Genoese admiral, Filippino Doria, who in the treacherous currents that circle round this Cape, destroyed the Spanish fleet of the Emperor Charles V. Already the sun has dipped below the horizon, and the calm expanse of the Tyrrhene has lost the last reflected ray; forward our driver urges his horses in the fast-fading light. The Angelus rings out from half a score of belfries beside the seash.o.r.e and on the hillside, breaking the stillness of the gloaming with musical reverberations. Sunset and evening star, twilight and evening bell; how exquisite is the fall of night upon the sh.o.r.es of the Bay of Salerno! We pa.s.s the fishing village of Cetara, and in so doing we pa.s.s by the willing strength of imagination out of the dominion of the ancient Republic of Amalfi into the Princ.i.p.ality of Salerno. Onward we press, and it is not long before a shrill familiar sound bursts upon our ears, a sound that quickly tears the gossamer threads of a fancy revelling in the thoughts of long-extinct princ.i.p.alities and powers. It is the whistle of a railway-engine descending the slope from Vietri above us down to Salerno; it is the neighing of the iron horse that has not yet pranced along the unconquered Costiera d'Amalfi, nor befouled its crystal-clear air with his smoky breath. For at Vietri we re-enter the every-day world, and leave behind us the sea-girt fairy-land; Vietri, not Cetara, is the true frontier town to-day. But the lights of Salerno are drawing nearer and nearer, and in a few moments of time we are tearing along the broad lamp-lit Marina of the town, in the middle of which our driver pulls up suddenly at the entrance of that old-fashioned comfortable inn, the Albergo d'Inghilterra:

"Another day has told its feverish story, Another night has brought its promised rest."

[Ill.u.s.tration: MINORI AT SUNSET]

CHAPTER VIII

SALERNO AND THE HOUSE OF HAUTEVILLE

Backed by gentle slopes well wooded and well tilled, and screened from the northern blasts by its guarding amphitheatre of grey crags, Salerno occupies a delightful position upon the Bay to which it gives its own name. The long stretch of its Marina, tolerably clean to the eye if not at all points agreeable to the nostrils, follows the broad curve of the strand, and an idle hour or so may pleasantly be whiled away in watching the fishing craft moored beside the mole and the attendant sailors. At the northern end of this promenade, in what const.i.tutes the most fashionable quarter of the place, is a tiny garden with palms and daturas, whilst hard by stands a large theatre, evidences of the gentility of modern Salerno.

But the whole town appears sleepy and dead-alive to a stranger, though at the sunset hour a band occasionally plays in this open s.p.a.ce, the music attracting hither a crowd composed of all the divers elements of society in the quiet old city. Yet though not possessing any great attractions for a sojourn in itself, Salerno makes an excellent centre whence to explore the neighbourhood, for it lies within easy reach of the great Benedictine Abbey of Santa Trinita; of beautiful La Cava, "that Alpine valley under an Italian sky"; of Nocera, with its ancient cathedral that was once a pagan temple; and last, but very far from least, of that glorious group of temples at Paestum. It has tolerable hotels, and if only their _padroni_ could be brought to realise that a flavouring of rosemary and garlic in every dish is not appreciated by the palates of the _forestieri_, the fare provided would be excellent. As in all Italian cities, northern or southern, however, the nocturnal noise is prodigious. Shouting and shrieking, quarrelling and yelling rend the air at all hours, whilst the practice of serenading, more agreeable in romantic poetry than in everyday life, is here carried to excess, and the tw.a.n.ging of the mandoline and the throaty voices of ardent lovers are rarely silent o' nights in the dark narrow streets of Salerno.

"A lu scur' vagi cercann'

La bella mia addo e?

Mo m'annascunn' po' fann' dispera', I mor', I mor' pe' te, Ripos' cchiu ne ho!"

("In favouring dusk I wandering go, My fair, where shall I find her?

Now she attracts, now drives me wild; I die, I die for her; Repose no more have I.")

Behind the long line of lofty well-built houses facing the Bay, the streets are gloomy, narrow and crooked, a labyrinth of dark mysterious lanes that contain no palaces or churches of note, and but few artistic "bits" to catch the eye and delight the soul of a painter. As in the case of Amalfi, the Cathedral of San Matteo at Salerno is almost the sole monument left standing of a past that is peculiarly rich in historical a.s.sociations. Ever since the accession of the Angevin kings Salerno has remained a quiet provincial town, neither rich nor poor, but stagnant and without commerce. Into its harbour, which Norman and Suabian princes attempted to improve, the sand has long since silted, and Naples for many centuries past has been able to regard with serene contempt the city that it was once intended to make her commercial rival:

"Se Salerno avesse un porto, Napoli sarebbe morto."

Well, Naples owns an excellent harbour, and has in consequence grown into one of the largest sea-ports on the sh.o.r.es of the Mediterranean, whilst little Salerno can only afford anchorage for fishing boats.

The chief interest of the place centres in its close connection with the great Norman house of Hauteville, and especially with Robert Guiscard, Duke of Apulia and Calabria, who after a fierce struggle managed to capture this city from the Lombard princes. Sprung from a hardy race of _valva.s.sors_ or _bannerets_ in Normandy, Duke Robert was one of the twelve sons of Tancred of Hauteville in the bishopric of Coutances. Joining his elder half-brother William Bras-de-Fer in Italy, Robert at once began to make a remarkable display of soldierly and statesman-like qualities. An adventurer pure and simple in an alien land, this sharp-witted Norman in course of time obtained the nick-name of Guiscard, or the Wiseacre, and on the death of his elder brother he was nominated Count of Apulia by acclamation of the Norman followers, to the exclusion of his helpless young nephews. Robert Guiscard's appearance and character have been sketched for us with loving care by one of the most famous of the world's historians, who was fully able to appreciate the mingled force and cunning, the _suaviter in modo_ and the _fort.i.ter in re_, of this leader of a handful of Normans in a hostile and distant country. Let Gibbon's stately prose therefore present to us a word-painting of the Great Adventurer himself:-

"His lofty stature surpa.s.sed the tallest of his army; his limbs were cast in the true proportion of strength and gracefulness; and to the decline of life he maintained the patent vigour of health and the commanding dignity of his form. His complexion was ruddy, his shoulders were broad, his hair and beard were long and of a flaxen colour, his eyes sparkled with fire, and his voice, like that of Achilles, could impress obedience and terror amidst the tumult of battle. In the ruder ages of chivalry, such qualifications are not below the notice of the poet or historian; they may observe that Robert at once and with equal dexterity could wield in the right hand his sword, his lance in the left; that in the battle of Civitella he was thrice unhorsed, and that on the close of that memorable day he was adjudged to have borne away the prize of valour from the warriors of the two armies. His boundless ambition was founded on the consciousness of superior worth: in the pursuit of greatness he was never arrested by the scruples of justice, and seldom moved by the feelings of humanity: though not insensible of fame, the choice of open or clandestine means was determined only by his present advantage. The surname of _Guiscard_ was applied to this master of political wisdom, which is too often confounded with the practice of dissimulation and deceit; and Robert is praised by the Apulian poet for excelling the cunning of Ulysses and the eloquence of Cicero. Yet these arts were disguised by an appearance of military frankness: in his highest fortune he was accessible and courteous to his fellow soldiers, and while he indulged the prejudices of his new subjects, he affected in his dress and manners to maintain the ancient fashion of his country. He grasped with a rapacious, that he might distribute with a liberal hand; his primitive indigence had taught the habits of frugality; the gain of a merchant was not below his attention; and his prisoners were tortured with slow and unfeeling cruelty to force a discovery of their secret treasure. According to the Greeks, he departed from Normandy with only five followers on horse-back, and thirty on foot; yet even this allowance appears too bountiful;-the sixth son of Tancred of Hauteville pa.s.sed the Alps as a pilgrim, and his first military band was levied among the adventurers of Italy."

Gaining over the Pope Nicholas II. to his interests, the new Count was able to exact an oath of fealty in 1060 from the Italian barons, hitherto his equals, to recognise him as "Duke of Apulia, Calabria, and here-after of Sicily, by the grace of G.o.d and of St Peter," although it took many years of hard fighting before these lands, thus proudly claimed, could be subdued. Beginning with the conquest of the Duchy of Benevento, Guiscard at once laid siege to Salerno, taking it after an obstinate resistance lasting over eight months, during which he was himself severely wounded by a splinter from one of his own engines of war. The city captured with such difficulty now became the victor's favourite residence and the recipient of his bounty and enlightened rule, so that Salerno quickly rose to the rank of one of the most ill.u.s.trious towns in Europe, supplanting even its magnificent neighbour Amalfi in popular esteem.

"Urbs Latii non est hac delitiosior urbe, Frugibus arboribus vino redundat; et unde Non tibi poma nuces, non pulchra palatia desunt, Non species muliebris abest probitasque virorum."

("All Latium shows no more delightful place, Whose sunny slopes the vine and almond grace; 'Midst fruitful groves her palaces uprear, Her men are virtuous, and her women fair.")

It was under the Guiscard's auspices that the famous school of Medicine that had long been seated at Salerno rose to its highest point of excellence. "Paris for learning, Bologna for law, Orleans for poetry, and Salerno for Medicine";-such was the verdict of the age. With the somewhat grudging consent of the clergy, the hygienic skill of the dreaded Arabs was in this city permitted to temper the cra.s.s ignorance of medieval Italy, and at Salerno alone were the works of the infidel Avicenna and of the pagans Galen and Hippocrates openly studied. The result was that the fame of the doctors of this _Fons Medicinae_ spread over all Western Europe, so that distinguished patients either came hither to be treated in person or else sent emissaries to explain their symptoms and to obtain advice. Nor were the professors of the healing art at Salerno tied down by a strict adherence to drugs and boluses, for they fully realised that the height of all human ambition, the _mens sana in corpore sano_, is in any case more easily to be obtained by self-control than by all the ingredients of the pharmacopoeia. They were warm believers apparently in the doctrine of moderation in all things, which after all is one of the most valuable prescriptions of modern hygiene:

"Curas tolle graves, irasci crede profanum, Parce mero, coenato parum, non sit tibi vanum, Surgere post epulas, somnum fuge meridianum."

("Throw off dull care; thine angry moods restrain; Eschew the wine-cup; lightly eat, nor vain Deem our advice to make Enough thy feast.

Take exercise, and shun the noon-day rest.")

Such was the oracular reply of the Salernitan sages to Robert, Duke of Normandy, and no one can dispute the sound common sense of the prescription given, nor doubt that it is applicable to half the patients who to-day throng the consulting rooms of fashionable London physicians.

But to return to Robert Guiscard, who shares the historical honours of the place, together with the great Pope Gregory VII., of whom we shall speak presently. After subduing the southern half of Italy and the island of Sicily, the great Duke next turned his victorious arms against the Eastern Empire, with the secret intention, it was suspected, of ascending the throne of Constantine. With the pseudo-Emperor Michael in his train, the Great Adventurer in 1081 a.s.sembled a vast army at Otranto, consisting of 30,000 Italian subjects and of 1300 Norman knights, with the object of crossing over to Epirus. Durazzo on the opposite Albanian coast, the Dyrrachium of the ancients, a city that was henceforth destined to be closely a.s.sociated with succeeding dynasties of South Italy, was the objective of this gigantic expedition, for it was commonly reported to be the key of the Eastern Empire. Thither the flotilla set sail, but before reaching the Greek sh.o.r.e, an unexpected and unseasonable tempest scattered Guiscard's argosy, destroying many of the ships and drowning many crews.

Nevertheless, the undaunted spirit and endless resources of the Norman Duke rose superior to all misfortunes. Landing with the remnant of his army he at once laid siege to Durazzo, despite the fact that the Emperor Alexius was marching to its relief, and that the Venetian fleet was already anch.o.r.ed in its harbour. In spite of overwhelming odds, Guiscard utterly routed the Byzantine army. With his heir Bohemond and his wife Sigilgaita beside him, the Duke watched the progress of the battle, and at its most critical juncture, at a moment when it appeared inevitable that the hard-pressed Italian army must yield to the sheer numbers of the foe, the deep voice of the leader could be heard booming like a deep-toned bell over the battlefield, as he addressed his wavering troops. "Whither do ye fly? Your enemy is implacable, and death is less grievous than slavery!"

Joined with the hoa.r.s.e voice of Guiscard, the Norman warriors could distinguish the exhortations of the Amazon-like Sigilgaita, "a second Pallas, less skilful in arts, but no less terrible in arms than the Athenian G.o.ddess." Rallying at the words of their master and shamed by the martial ardour of the d.u.c.h.ess, the invading troops made one last desperate effort, whereby the Imperial army was driven back and scattered, so that Alexius barely escaped with his life. Having routed the Emperor in fair fight, Guiscard now made use of his unparalleled cunning by bribing the treacherous Venetians, who eventually a.s.sisted the Italian forces to enter the city gates, and thus Durazzo was gained at the point of the sword after one of the fiercest sieges known to history. Scarcely had the beleaguered town been reduced, than the indomitable Guiscard found himself compelled to return to Italy, where the Emperor of the West, the unhappy Henry IV., vainly endeavouring to wipe out the humiliation of Canossa, had seized Rome and was actually besieging the great Hildebrand in the Castle of Sant' Angelo. Leaving his son Bohemond in command of the army in Macedonia, Robert recrossed the sea, and hastened with a handful of men towards Rome. But so intense a fear did the victor of Durazzo inspire, that the terrified Emperor without waiting to give combat fled headlong together with his anti-pope from the Holy City, where Guiscard was received with acclamation. "Thus, in less than three years," remarks Gibbon, "the son of Tancred of Hauteville enjoyed the glory of delivering the Pope, and of compelling the two Emperors of the East and West to fly before his victorious arms." Guiscard's triumphal entry into Rome was however marred by scenes of violence and scandal, due to the conduct of the Saracen troops which his brother, the great Count Roger of Sicily, had brought to a.s.sist the enterprise. So infuriated were the Romans by the behaviour of the infidels, that the prudent Gregory deemed it wiser to return to Salerno together with his deliverer, and it was in Guiscard's palace that the famous "Caesar of spiritual conquest" expired three years later. As to the Great Adventurer himself, he died in the island of Cephalonia in the very year of the Pope's death at Salerno (1085) and was buried beside his first wife, the gentle Alberada, at Venosa in Apulia, though the city which he had always loved and favoured would seem to have offered a more appropriate spot for his interment.

But although the mortal remains of the Great Adventurer do not rest within the precincts of his beloved city, an undying monument of his glorious but turbulent reign is to be found in the Cathedral, which despite the neglect and alterations of eight centuries may still be ranked as one of the most interesting buildings in Southern Italy. Standing in a secluded part of the town, this magnificent church gains nothing from its position, for it can only be reached by means of tortuous dingy lanes, and even on a near approach the effect produced on the visitor is not impressive. "The Cathedral-church of San Matteo," says the Scotch traveller, Joseph Forsyth, in quaint pedantic language, "is a pile so antique and so modern, so repaired and rhapsodic, that it exhibits patches of every style, and is of no style itself." But is not this quality, we ask, exactly what a great historic building, such as Guiscard's church, truly demands? Ought not it to bear the impress of the various ages it has survived, and of the many famous persons who have contributed to its embellishment? From Duke Robert's day to the present time, the Cathedral is an epitome of the history of Salerno, a sermon in stones concerning the great past and the inglorious present of the city.

In the year preceding his own death and that of the great Pontiff, who was tarrying at Salerno as his not over-willing guest, Duke Robert erected this Cathedral, obtaining the chief ornaments for his new structure and also its most important relic, the supposed body of the Apostle St Matthew, from the lately deserted city of Paestum across the bay. The church is approached by means of a quadrangular fore-court, a cloister supported on antique columns, such as can still be observed in a few of the old Roman churches, so that we venture to think that this idea at Salerno was suggested by the great Pope himself. A number of sculptured sarcophagi, which, like the pillars, were the spoils of Paestum, are ranged alongside the entrance walls; and once upon a time there stood in the centre of the courtyard the huge granite basin that all visitors to Naples will recall as set in the middle of the Villa Reale, where it performs the humble office of decorating a miniature pond, wherein lily-white ducks quack and gobble at the bread crumbs thrown to them by children and their nurses. Fancy the irate disgust of Duke Robert at waking to learn that the antique fountain for his new Cathedral, brought with such care and toil from distant Poseidonia, should have been transported to the rival city and turned to such base uses! Above the splendid bronze doors, the gift of Landolfo Butomilea and his wife shortly after Guiscard's death, we perceive the dedication of the church to the Apostle Matthew by the proud conqueror of the Two Sicilies and the protector of Hildebrand.

"A Duce Roberto donaris Apostole templo: Pro meritis regno donetur ipse superno."

The donor, we note, is confident that the Apostle, in return for so glorious a fabric, will undertake to obtain the Kingdom of Heaven for this generous client upon earth.

The interior, which is sadly marred by white-wash and gaudy decoration, is a perfect treasure-house of works of art-antique, medieval, Renaissance-of which the guide-book will give a detailed list. Succeeding generations have put to strange uses some of the fine marble reliefs that Guiscard transported hither from Paestum, and we note that one archbishop has gone so far as to filch a sarcophagus carved with a Baccha.n.a.l procession to serve for his own tomb. We might perhaps infer that the deceased prelate was addicted to the wine-flask, and to have been a firm believer in and follower of one of the rules of the medical school of his own diocese:

"Si nocturna tibi noceat potatio vini, Hoc ter mane libas iterum, et fuerit medicina."

("If a carouse at night do make thee ill, For morning medicine drink of wine thy fill")

Let us hope that this extraordinary receipt for "hot coppers" was intended satirically, or else given seriously as the only advice that a confirmed toper was likely to follow in any case. But the use of cla.s.sical adjuncts to adorn Christian tombs, which to-day appears so incongruous to us, was popular enough at the time of the Renaissance, and readers of Robert Browning's poetry will call to mind the story of the dying Bishop's injunction to his heirs concerning his tomb in St Praxed's church at Rome:

"The bas-relief in bronze ye promised me, Those Pans and Nymphs ye wot of, and perchance Some tripod thyrsus with a vase or so, The Saviour at His sermon on the mount, Saint Praxed in a glory, and one Pan Ready to twitch the Nymph's last garment off, And Moses with the tables...."

But it is necessary to shake off the spirit of Renaissance dilettantism before we venture to approach the chapel of John of Procida to the right of the high altar, where stands the stern figure of the greatest of the medieval Pontiffs. Above the marble statue of the Caesar of the Papacy, that was tardily erected to his memory by the unfortunate Pio Nono, appear the glittering mosaics of the apse of the chapel, from which look down the figures of John of Procida and of King Manfred, the last sovereign prince of the hated Suabian line that Gregory twice anathematized. Beneath the cold forbidding eye of the last of the Hohenstaufen and his friend and avenger here rest, strangely enough, the ashes of that "great and inflexible a.s.serter of the supremacy of the sacerdotal order: the monk Hildebrand, afterwards Pope Gregory the Seventh." Born the son of a poor carpenter in the Tuscan village of Soana, this extraordinary man rose to eminence as a monk of Cluny, where he became famous for his extreme asceticism of life in an age of undisguised clerical corruption and luxury, when simony, lay invest.i.ture and priestly marriages were the rule rather than the exception on all sides, so that but few Churchmen were able to rise above their surrounding temptations. Such few as could resist the world, the flesh and the devil were accounted, and not unfrequently were in reality, ignorant crazy fanatics, half-pitied and half-despised.

Between these two extremes of worldly indulgence and of unreasoning severity of life, Hildebrand ever pursued a middle course, for whilst on the one hand he eschewed the vanities of life around him, on the other he never sank into the self-effacement of a hermit. His acknowledged purity and zeal soon won for him from the laity a respect mingled with awe, whilst his natural talents, his indomitable will, and his genuine piety in course of time brought all Churchmen who had any regard for their holy office to fix their hopes upon this Clugniac monk, now a Cardinal. For some years before his actual election to the Papal throne in 1079, Hildebrand had begun to exercise an immense control over the councils of the Church, and he was personally responsible for the epoch-making resolution under Nicholas II., which declared that the choice of a new Pontiff was vested in the College of Cardinals alone. His own election, under the terms of this new and drastic arrangement, became the signal for the fierce struggles, equally of the battlefield and the council-chamber, that were destined to distract Italy for generations to come. For, as might have been expected, the Emperor Henry IV., King of the Romans, was not long in protesting against so decided an infringement of his secular claims. From the synods of Worms and Piacenza came the Imperial decree of deposition against Gregory, which was addressed by "Henry, not by usurpation but by G.o.d's holy ordination, King, to Hildebrand, no longer Pope, but false monk." Gregory, strong alike in virtue and in resolve, and aided by the might of the Countess Matilda of Tuscany and of Robert Guiscard, answered by p.r.o.nouncing a solemn anathema upon his secular adversary. In awe-struck silence the Council of the Lateran listened to the Pope's final excommunication of the King, and of all those who dared to a.s.sociate themselves with him. "I absolve," said Gregory, "all Christians from the oaths which they have taken or may take to him; and I decree that no one shall obey him as king; for it is fitting that he, who has endeavoured to diminish the honour of the Church, should himself lose that honour which he seems to have." We all know the final act of that terrible unequal struggle, the duel of brute force against spiritual terrors in a rude age of violence and superst.i.tion, which took place in the courtyard of the Castle of Canossa, the Countess Matilda's fortress in the Apennines.

"On a dreary winter morning, with the ground deep in snow, the King, the heir of a long line of Emperors, was permitted to enter within the two outer of the three walls which girded the Castle of Canossa. He had laid aside every mark of royalty or of distinguished station; he was clad only in the thin white linen dress of the penitent, and there, fasting, he awaited in humble patience the pleasure of the Pope. But the gates did not unclose. A second day he stood, cold, hungry and mocked by vain hopes. And yet a third day dragged on from morning till evening over the unsheltered head of the discrowned King. Every heart was moved save that of the representative of Jesus Christ."

[Ill.u.s.tration: ON THE ROAD TO RAVELLO]