Vagaries Part 8

The morning pa.s.ses in calm _dolce far niente_ as a preparation for the exertions of the day. Seldom has anything happened since they met here yesterday, seldom is there the slightest indication that the day which now begins will bring in its train any change in the imperturbable harmony of their _status quo_. An Arcadian peace reigns over their whole being, a contemplative calm is stamped upon their faces. And yet this peace hovers over a volcano, like the summer which brightens the slopes of Vesuvius away on the far horizon. Now and then the thunder growls from the depths of Timberio Pagano's broad breast when Hotel Quisisana's s.h.a.ggy black guardian goes too near him. Seated on each side of the _farmacia_ door the two doctors' four-footed a.s.sistants stick out their tongues at each other on the sly, and often enough do the dogs of Don Nicolino and Don Chichillo (the new barber) fall upon each other, so that tufts of hair fly around. Animosity, however, soon sinks down again, and, calm as the rippling waves against the old Emperor's bath palace below, the hours glide away in rhythmical monotony.

They watch the girls as they stride past with mighty _Tufa_-stones on their well-poised heads, like the Caryatides of the Erechtheum; they watch the Marina fishermen bringing up for sale in baskets the night's haul of golden _Triglie_ and great _Scurmi_, of bright-coloured mussels from some rocky reef, or perhaps a coral-spun old Roman amphora dragged up by the deep _Palamido_ nets from out of its thousand-years-old hiding-place at the bottom of the sea.

Sometimes the longing for activity awakes, and they slowly cross the Piazza to the corner of the Anacapri road to gaze dreamily upon the bustling life in front of the stables, where cavalcades of _forestieri_ are waiting impatiently whilst saddles are laid upon the donkeys'

bleeding backs, and rusty bits are stuffed into their sore mouths.

_Aaaaah! Aaaaah! Avanti!!_ Off, little donkeys, for Monte Solaro, one hour and a half's stiff climbing with the happy tourists! Yes, the road is beautiful, winding up along the side of the mountain, clad with myrtle and broom. The view widens more and more--_Aaaaaah! Aaaaaaaah!!_ one more climb, and the vineyards and olive woods lie deep under your feet, and over your head rise steep cliffs as wild in their mighty desolation as the Via Mala of the Alps; and Barbarossa's half-crumbling castle riveted fast upon the edge of the precipice. Beyond gleams the gulf girdled by the immortal beauty of the sh.o.r.e, and from Posilipo's pine-crowned cape, island after island floats away towards the blue distance of the Mediterranean--_wunderbar! kolossal!!_

Under the saddle it burns like fire, and the mouth is so sore with the incessant tugging at the heavy bridle; but courage, little donkey! up above upon the heights lives Padre Anselmo in his hermit chapel, and he has good wine for thirsty throats!

Other dogs who do not get so far as the donkey-stand lean thoughtfully against the parapet of the Piazza, where some lounging sailors look out over the gulf. The eyes wander far over the gleaming line of Naples, and the mighty silhouette of Vesuvius, or follow absently the direction of some outstretched hand pointing towards Capo Sorrento, whence can be seen the steamboat on its way to Capri. And here come the two blind old men, Fenocchio and Giovanni, groping their way across the Piazza to their usual corner at the edge of the path, where the hum of thousands of gay tourists has rustled by them, where they have sat for so many years with their old fisher-caps in outstretched hands, and their vacant eyes staring into their eternal night of gleaming sunshine: "_Date u soldo Eccellenza al povero cieco! La Madonna vi accompagna!_"

Up on the Piazza the dogs are beginning to awake, and in scattered groups they wander across to the parapet to stare at the steamboat which glides past in the blue water on its way to the Grotto. It is time to start down to the Marina to greet the arriving strangers. Quisisana's, Pagano's, and Hotel de France's dogs solemnly escort their respective porters to the arched entrance of the Piazza with its Bourbon coat-of-arms still enthroned above it. Small ready-saddled donkeys also clatter patiently down the old stairway to the Marina, and with loud cracks of the whip Felicello's coachmen rattle down the new carriage-road. From the Piazza above, they watch the steamer anchoring outside the harbour, and the small boats landing the pa.s.sengers. A faint interest lights up the pa.s.sive faces of the lookers-on when the first strangers reach the Piazza. But alas! always the same invariable types, always the same colossal matron on the same slender little donkey, always the same correct "misses" in Felicello's landau, always the same fiery-red noisy Germans, wrangling over prices with the girls who have dragged their boxes up the heights to the town. Seldom are there any dogs amongst the arrivals, seldom does any occasion whatever arise for interference in one way or another--pa.s.sivity, nothing but pa.s.sivity!

Now the hotel bells ring for luncheon, and they one and all wander home.

The processes of digestion are carried out, according to correct physiological laws undisturbed by any brain-work, and the afternoon is pa.s.sed in a siesta on some loggia, whilst the sun's rays slowly climb the Anacapri cliff, and long shadows begin to glide down Monte Solaro's slopes towards the town. The air is cool and refreshing, and they prepare to resume public business on the Piazza. The second event of the day is about to happen. The post arrives. Don Peppino (post-master) solemnly shuts his office-door, and the loiterers wait with interest whilst the post-bag is being opened inside. Always the same disappointment--no letters for them, all the letters and newspapers are for the strangers in the hotels! Sometimes they get hold of a _Corriere di Napoli_ or a _Pungolo_, and then they disappear into some corner by themselves to make people believe that they can read; but after they have devoured the whole newspaper they are none the wiser for it. So they become drowsy again and wander a few times round the Piazza, past Don Antonio's _osteria_ with the faded photographs and dried-up biscuits in the window, and a few unconscious philosophers meditating inside; past Il Salone, where the flies keep watch over Don Nicolino's dreams; past La Farmacia, where the morphia of idleness soothes Don Petruccio's ideas to rest; past the stables where the donkeys are pushed into their dark holes after the strangers have returned from their expedition. They look out over the gulf where Ischia blushes in fading sunlight, while dark-blue twilight falls around Vesuvius. The day's session draws to an end and the Piazza is becoming deserted. Up in the Campanile there suddenly breaks out a terrible row amongst the cogs and wheels, and at last the old machinery loses its temper altogether, and, getting hold of a rusty hammer, begins to beat with all its might on some unwilling bells: "_Ventiquattro ore_," yawns Don Nicolino, shutting up his Salone; "_Ventiquattro ore_," say the flies, and go to sleep amongst the brushes and combs; "_Ventiquattro ore_," say the dogs, and go home with the feeling of having performed their duty to gather strength for the next day's toils by twelve or fourteen hours' dreamless sleep.

Then the church bells ring out the Ave Maria, and the day sinks into the sea.

So pa.s.ses day after day, each like the other, as are the beads of the rosaries which glide between the fingers of the _Figlie di Maria_ inside the Church. Each morning collects the citizens for social duty on the Piazza--each evening the campanile exhorts them to go to rest.

Under the walls of the houses the shadows begin to grow smaller and smaller, and the paving-stones of the Piazza get hotter and hotter in the sun-bath. Uneasy dreams begin to disturb the peace of the siesta, and Capri is seized with an irresistible desire to scratch itself. Don Antonio spreads the awning before his wineshop, and the questions of the day are oftener and oftener dealt with under its protecting shade. They linger later on the Piazza in the warm evenings, and with nose in the air they sit for long hours on the parapet looking out over the gulf towards Vesuvius, whose mighty smoke-cloud slowly spreads over the mainland--the wind is south, all is as it should be! And, with apprehensive thoughts of fatigues to come, they troop home to their much-needed repose.

The Piazza is quite empty, now and then a short bark is heard from some wineshop, or a howling "_Potz Donner Wetter!_" from Hiddigeigei's beer-house, then everything is still, and only the old watchman in the Campanile counts over the hours of the night in a sonorous brazen voice to keep himself awake. Still for a while the white town gleams out amongst the cliffs, then it becomes quite dark and Capri's isle sinks into the gloom of night.

But lo! already climbs the moon over Sorrento's mountain, and the veil of twilight glides down Monte Solaro's heights, over shimmering olive woods, over orange and myrtle groves, and vanishes amid the waves of the gulf. Night dreams a beautiful dream, and mysteriously the siren's moonlit island rises out of the dark sea. A gentle south wind breathes over the water, murmurs amidst the half-slumbering waves, flies fragrantly over orange-trees in blossom, and playfully rocks the tender vine branches. Jubilant voices call out from the sea, louder and louder they sound in the stillness of the night, and the wanderer on Monte Solaro hears the rustling of wings in the moonlit s.p.a.ce above.

When Capri awakes the next morning, every one knows that the wild geese have pa.s.sed. Spring has come, and the shooting season has begun! From early morning the Piazza is full of dogs. The quiet of everyday life has departed, a certain energy animates their dull features, and the reflection of an idea lights up the contemplative gloom of their eyes.

In front of Maria Vacca's butcher-shop hangs a dead quail, and outside Don Antonio's _osteria_ stand guns in long rows, and upon the chairs lie great game-bags and powder-horns. Il Cacciatore has been in the wineshop since sunrise, in colossal shooting-boots with cartridge-belt round his waist. Woe to the quail which may now appear in Maria Vacca's shop! It vanishes at once into Il Cacciatore's game-bag. Inside the Munic.i.p.al Portico a younger generation listens to old Timberio Pagano's shooting stories of the days of his youth, when many thousand quails were caught in a day, and up on the Church steps the clericals think sadly of that period of vanished splendour when Capri had its own Bishop, whose maintenance was paid by the quail harvest--"_Vescovo delle quaglie_"[28]

as he was called in Rome. Excitement increases as the hours pa.s.s, and when at last the Campanile's bells announce that the first day's shooting is over, each one goes to his home to gather strength for the next day's exertions. Once again darkness falls upon the island, and Capri sleeps the sleep of the just.

On tired wings swarms of birds fly over the sea. Thousands have fallen on Africa's coasts, where they a.s.sembled for their long journey, thousands have sunk exhausted amidst the waves, thousands will die on the rocky island which glimmers from afar in the darkness. Sheltered by the last hour of gloom they approach the island and silently swoop down upon its steep coast, upon the heights by Villa di Tiberio, where the hermit watches behind his snares; amongst the cliffs of Mitromania and the Piccola Marina, where nets are spread to catch their wings; upon the headlands of Limbo and Punta di Carena, where the Capri dogs, stealthy as cats, sneak round after their prey. When day dawns over Monte Solaro, and its first rays stream even as they did two thousand years ago in sacred fire upon the old sun-G.o.d's crumbling altar in the grotto of Mitromania,[29] hundreds of birds, quails, wood-pigeons, larks, thrushes, flutter in the nets around, and hundreds of others bleed to death amongst the cliffs--but what cares the sun for that! What matters it to the sun that the darkness he disperses conceals a mult.i.tude of worn-out birds from rapacious eyes, that to-day death stalks from cliff to cliff along the track shown by his gleaming light:

"So che Natura e sorda, Che miserar non sa; Che non del Ben sollecita Fu, ma dell 'esser solo."[30]

Upon the heights of Monte Solaro sits Il Cacciatore, armed to the teeth, looking with the eye of a conqueror over the field of battle below. The day has been a hot one, Il Cacciatore has fired some hundred shots in different directions. At his feet lie his two dogs, mother and son, and behind him sits Spadaro with an extra gun in his hands and an enormous game-bag over his shoulder. Now and then mother and son give little yelps and wag their tails, following in their dreams an escaping bird, now and then Il Cacciatore's hand fumbles after his trusty gun to bring down an imaginary quail or pigeon, now and then Spadaro seems to stuff some new booty into his vast bag. Deeper and deeper grows the silence over Monte Solaro. Down at their feet the three rocks of Faraglione shine in purple and gold, and the glow of the sinking sun falls on the waves of the gulf. From the town of Capri hotel bells ring for dinner.

A fragrant hallucination of quail-pie tickles Il Cacciatore's nostrils, and from under his half-shut eyelids the whole gulf a.s.sumes a tantalising resemblance to a sea of pure _Capri rosso_--that purple hue which already old Homer likened to red wine--whilst Spadaro's more modest imagination hears the macaroni splutter and boil in the murmur of the waves against the cliff below, and sees the purple glow of the evening sun pour ma.s.ses of "pumaroli"[31] sauce over it.

Suddenly Il Cacciatore rubs his eyes and looks dreamily around, and Spadaro investigates with amazement the bag, where only a single little lark, which was on its way to give spring concerts in the north, sleeps his last sleep. _Hallo! Spadaro! Andiamonci!_[32] The dogs wake up by degrees, and the caravan starts slowly on its way towards Capri. Tired by the day's toil, at last they reach the Piazza and its friendly wineshop, where Il Cacciatore sits down to rest whilst Spadaro and the dogs carry home the lark in triumph.

So pa.s.s the weeks of the shooting season in continued exertions. Every morning before daybreak they start off to try and capture Spring in its flight, every evening they meet on the Piazza to rest, and often enough do we a.s.semble round our friend Il Cacciatore's table to partake of a magnificent quail-pie, such as only he can put before us.

But although the ranks are thinned, the March of The Ten Thousand still advances victoriously. Soon the larks sing over the frosty fields in the distant North, soon the swallows twitter under the eaves of the far-off little cottage, which has lain so long half-buried in snow, and the quails sound their monotonous note in the spring evenings.

The shooting season is over, and the Capri dogs sit blankly upon the Piazza, staring out over the gulf in the direction the bird flew when he escaped out of their hands. Higher and higher the sacred fire flames each morning upon the sun-G.o.d's altar down in Mitromania's grotto, brighter and brighter the Faraglioni rocks gleam each evening with purple and gold, with a still ruddier glow the wine-hue of the gulf fascinates Il Cacciatore's retina. Silently the liberal dogs ponder over the burning questions of the day, and, panting, the clericals listen from their sunny church steps to the prophecies of the fires of _Il purgatorio_, which the priests proclaim every Sunday inside the cool Church. Public life ceases by degrees, and it seems as if a reaction sets in after the excitement of the shooting season. The arrival of the steamer is certainly still watched from the Piazza, and with one eye open they look at the few strangers who wander up to the Piazza with outspread sketching-umbrellas and easel and colour-box on a boy's head.

True, they still a.s.semble in front of the closed door of the office to await the opening of the post-bag, but interest in political life has slackened, and their hope of letters has become a quiet resignation.

Inside the _Farmacia_ the drugs ferment in their pots, and in Don Nicolino's Salone living frescoes of flies adorn the walls. About the slopes of Monte Salaro the Scirocco hangs in heavy clouds, and an irresistible drowsiness settles down upon the Piazza. Capri enters into its summer torpor.

When it awakes the sun has subdued his fire, and the table stands ready spread for the lords of creation to seat themselves and feast, and for the dogs to gather up the fragments that remain. From the _pergola_ over their heads hang grapes in heavy cl.u.s.ters, and amidst the shade of the orange-groves peep out juicy figs and red-cheeked peaches. Then comes the Baccha.n.a.lia of the vintage, with song and jest and maiden's bright eyes looking out from under huge baskets of grapes, and naked feet freeing the slumbering b.u.t.terfly of wine from its crushed chrysalis.

Over the Piazza a cooling sea breeze blows now and again, and Capri takes a refreshing bath of heavy autumnal rain to wash away the heat and dust of summer. The dogs save themselves in time from the vivacity of the unknown element, but millions of obscure lives are drowned in the streams which force their way like a deluge over the b.l.o.o.d.y battle-field of summer, whilst others find their Ararat amongst the brushes in Don Nicolino's Salone.

The mist of unconsciousness is gradually lifted from the dogs' brains, and waking dreams about activity and strength stare out from their half-shut eyes. Don Nicolino smilingly dusts the halo of flies from his portrait, and, deep in thought, Don Petruccio composes a new elixir of life from summer's _mixtum compositum_. Fenocchio and Giovanni seat themselves again in their corner to wash a little copper out of the tourist stream, and with trembling legs the small donkeys once more unload numbers of _forestieri_ in the Piazza. From Vesuvius the smoke falls in long cloud-streamers over the gulf, and upon the wings of the Tramontana (the north wind), Summer flies home again after her wedding-trip to the North. In vain do the Capriotes spread their nets once more round the sh.o.r.es of the island; in vain do the dogs lie in wait amongst the rocks; in vain does Il Cacciatore sit in full armour on the heights of Monte Solaro and shoot off his cartridges after the fugitive--Summer pa.s.ses by.

With drooping tails the dogs sit huddled together upon the stones of their Piazza, thinking with sorrow of their departed summer idyll. From snow-covered Apennines, Winter comes sailing in his foam-hidden dragon-ship over the uneasy waters of the gulf. The storm thunders amidst the ruins of the old watch-tower, whose alarm-bell[33] has been silent for so long, and amongst the foaming breakers the mad Viking boards Capri's cliffs. Strong as a whirlwind he cuts in pieces the pergola garlands which were left hanging after Autumn's Baccha.n.a.lian feast, and, brutal as a savage, he tears asunder the leaf-woven chiton which clothed the Dryad of the grove.

But down in Mitromania's grotto the sacred fire flames as before upon the old Persian G.o.d's altar, and tenderly the G.o.d of Day spreads his shining shield over his beloved island and bids the barbarian from the North go to sea again. So he departs, the rough stranger, his errand unaccomplished, without having robbed a single rose from the maiden's sun-warmed cheek, without having stolen a single golden fruit from the everlasting green of the orange groves. And scarcely has he turned his back before tiny fearless violets peep carefully out from among the hillocks, and narcissus and rosemary clamber high up on the steep cliffs to see whither the harsh Northerner has gone, and soon a whole flock of flower children come and set themselves down to play at summer in the gra.s.s.

Upon the Piazza the dogs sit as before in sunny contemplation. The cycle of their life's emotions has been run through, and they begin to turn over anew the blank pages of their history, page after page in unvarying sequence. Day follows day and year follows year, and soon old age comes and scatters some white almond blossom upon their heads. The buoyant delights of the senses are benumbed, youth's far-flying thoughts have broken their wings against the four walls of the Piazza, and like tame ducks they go round and round their enclosed s.p.a.ce, from Don Antonio's wineshop to Felicello's donkey-stand, from Don Nicolino's Salone to Don Petruccio's Farmacia. Now and again the free cry of the pa.s.sing wild geese high above in s.p.a.ce reaches the Piazza, the early youthful courage wakes anew, and they sluggishly tramp along towards the Anacapri road as far as their heavy limbs can carry them. Now and again a faint echo from some world's revolution trembles on their tympanums through Don Peppino's post-office, and they look away in dreaming peace to the white town of Naples, the noise of whose human life is lost amidst the murmur of the waves, or away to the old revolutionist Vesuvius, whose threatening wrath will never reach their Eden.

So they sit on their Piazza, staring out upon the river of time as it flows past them. They still sit there staring for a few more years to come, then they move no more--they have become hypnotised. The struggle for existence has ceased, and imperceptibly they sink into Buddha's Nirvana, unconscious, painless, inebriate with the sun.

[Footnote 26: I write here as I talk here--not Italian but Capri dialect. The old Emperor, who lived on the island for eleven years, is never called Tiberio here, but "Timberio."]

[Footnote 27: Our friend old Mr. X----, for fifteen years the delight and ornament of the Piazza of Capri, always cheerful, always thirsty, a great destroyer of quails and wine-bottles, now at last gone to rest in the quiet little field outside the town of Capri, where the sombre green of some laurel and cypress-trees stands out between the waving branches of his favourite plant, the vine. Old Spadaro is still alive, and will tell you all about his lamented master.]

[Footnote 28: Quail bishop. Capri no longer owns a bishop, but the quail harvest still forms one--and perhaps the most important--item of the island's revenue.]

[Footnote 29: Few strangers visit the grotto of Mitromania, the name of which may be derived from _Magnum Mitrae Antrum_. It faces east, and the first rays of the sun light up its mysterious gloom. One knows from excavations made here that once upon a time the old, yet ever young, sun-G.o.d was worshipped in this cave.]

[Footnote 30: Leopardi.]

[Footnote 31: Pumaroli-pomidoro, _i.e._ tomato, the Southern Italian's favourite fruit, the most important ingredient in everything he eats, sweetening the monotony of his macaroni.]

[Footnote 32: "Let us be off."]

[Footnote 33: The alarm-bell used to be rung from the old tower to warn the sh.o.r.es of the gulf of the approach of pirates.]

ZOOLOGY

They say that love for mankind is the highest of all virtues. I admire this love for mankind, and I know well that it only belongs to n.o.ble minds. My soul is too small, my thought flies too near the earth ever to reach so far, and I am obliged to acknowledge that the longer I live the farther I depart from this high ideal. I should lie if I said that I love mankind.

But I love animals, oppressed, despised animals, and I do not care when people laugh at me because I say that I feel happier with them than with the majority of people I come across.

When one has spoken with a human being for half an hour, one has, as a rule, had quite enough, isn't it so? I, at least, then usually feel inclined to slip away, and I am always astonished that he with whom I have been speaking has not tried to escape long before. But I am never bored in the society of a friendly dog, even if I do not know him or he me. Often when I meet a dog walking along by himself, I stop and ask him where he is going and have a little chat with him; and even if no further conversation takes place, it does me good to look at him and try to enter into the thoughts which are working in his mind. Dogs have this immense advantage over man that they cannot dissimulate, and Talleyrand's paradox that speech has been given us in order to conceal our thoughts, cannot at all be applied to dogs.

I can sit half the day in a field watching the grazing cattle; and to observe the physiognomy of a little donkey is one of the keenest pleasures of a psychologist. But it is specially when donkeys are free that they are most interesting, a tied-up donkey is not nearly so communicative as when she is loose and at liberty, and that after all is not much to be wondered at.

At Ischia I lived for a long time almost exclusively with a donkey. It was Fate which brought us together. I lived in a little boat-house down at the Marina, and the donkey lived next door to me. I had quite lost my sleep up in the stifling rooms of the hotel, and had gladly accepted my friend Antonio's invitation to live down at the Marina in his cool boat-house, while he was out fishing in the bay of Gaeta. I fared exceedingly well in there amongst the pots and fishing-nets; and astride on the keel of an old upturned boat I wrote long love-letters to the sea. And when evening came and it began to grow dusk in the boat-house, I went to bed in my hammock, with a sail for a covering and the memory of a happy day for a pillow. I fell asleep with the waves and I woke with the day. Each morning came my neighbour, the old donkey, and stuck in her solemn head through the open door, looking steadfastly at me. I always wondered why she stood there so still and did nothing but stare at me, and I could not hit upon any other explanation than that she thought I was nice to look at. I lay there half awake looking at her--I thought that she too was nice to look at. She resembled an old family portrait as she stood there with her gray head framed by the doorway against the blue background of a summer's morning. Out there it grew lighter and lighter, and the clear surface of the sea began to glitter.

Then came a ray of sunlight dancing right into my eyes, and I sprang up and greeted the gulf. I had nothing whatever to do all day, but the poor donkey was supposed to be at work the whole forenoon up in Casamicciola.

There grew, however, such a sympathy between us that I found a subst.i.tute for her, and then we wandered carelessly about all day long, like true vagabonds wherever the road led us. Sometimes it was I who went first with the donkey trotting quietly at my heels, sometimes it was she who had got a fixed determination of her own, and then I naturally followed her. I studied the whole time with great attention the interesting personality I had so unexpectedly come across, and it was long since I had found myself in such congenial company. I might have much more to say about all this, but these psychological researches may prove far too serious a topic for many of my readers, and I therefore believe I had better stop here.

And the birds, who can ever tire of them? Hour after hour I can sit on a mossy stone and listen to what a dear little bird has to say--I, who can never keep my thoughts together when some one is talking to me. But have you noticed how sweet a little bird is to look at when he sings his song, and now and again bends his graceful head, as if to listen for some one to answer far away in the forest? In the late summer, when the bird-mother has to teach her children to talk--do not believe it is only a matter of instinct, even they have to take lessons in learning their singing language--have you watched these lessons when the mother from her swinging-chair lectures about something or other, and the summer-old little ones stammer after her with their clear child-voices?