Chapter XVI: Messina (ave Atque Vale!) 466 (5)

One afternoon Archbishop Ireland and his train of attendant Abbesses came to see us. The Archbishop’s sister and several other Mothers Superior had come from America to visit Rome; they were a picturesque group. The Archbishop’s sister was a cheery delightful soul; another of the Mothers was so lovely J. wanted to paint her as Santa Theresa. We met them first at the studio of Carolus Duran (now Director of the French Academy) in the Villa Medici. The “_Chèr Maitre_” has brought several of his masterpieces from Paris to Rome, among others a study for a crucifixion, a really noble composition; America ought to have it. The Church is so rich in our country that she could well afford to give him a handsome order for it. The Abbesses in their long veils, taking tea with the great French painter, was one of those impressions of the contrasts of Roman life I shall not forget. They all came to our studio; among the treasured names in the list of autographs are those of Mother Celestine, Mother Seraphine, Mother Agnes Gonzaga.

“They remind me,” said Patsy, after the Archbishop and the ladies took their leave, “of Sir Joseph Porter, K. C. B., his sisters and his cousins and his aunts!”

Patsy was of the greatest use. He was at the studio almost as much as we ourselves. He devoted himself to the humbler guests if there happened to be some great personage to whom J. had to attend.

“It’s a good thing to have friends in every calling,” said Patsy; “you never know just when they may come in handy.” I had reproached him for neglecting lovely Donna Beatrice for old Checco, the proprietor of the Concordia restaurant.

“Checco has given me credit many a time when it would have gone hard with me to get a meal anywhere else!” he said.

On the eighth of February a note came from the Marchese Guiccioli, Queen Margherita’s gentleman-in-waiting. The superscription, Casa della Regina Madre, set the whole house in a flutter. Eugenio, the porter, himself brought the royal messenger up in the lift. Agnese, who took the letter from him, came hurrying to the terrace, where Ignazio and I were talking about the wall flowers.

“See to it,” I was saying, “that this thing does not happen again. You were paid a large price for these flowers, enormous sums were charged for _concime_ (fertilizer) and they have done badly. Last season they were poor spindly little things, while those that sprang by chance from a crevice in the wall by the water pipe were a glory. Expound to me the reason of this absurdity.”

“Signora, how can I explain the laws of God? It is according to their nature. Those wall flowers that come up by chance without care always seem the fairest, perhaps because they grow beyond our reach. Those you speak of so abusively smelt like honey; you yourself complained that they attracted not only the butterflies but the bees from the priest’s hive.”

“A messenger from the Palazzo Margherita brought this.” Agnese offered the letter on the best silver tray she so rarely is willing to use. It is not well, she argues, that the first-comer should know we have such a valuable thing in the house, and use it so commonly. It might be stolen or, almost as bad, reported so that the tax for _richezza mobile_ would be augmented.

“This letter is for the Signore,” I said.

“Without doubt--the Signora has reason--but being of so much importance she will open it?”

“Certainly not.” Agnese and Ignazio were burnt up with curiosity about the letter; they could hardly wait till J.’s return. Lorenzo, who had followed Agnese, is more canny though quite as curious.

“Imbeciles! don’t you know that to break the seal of a letter from the Casa Reale is an offense? I know perfectly well what it contains; as I see you are beside yourselves with curiosity, I will tell you that--you too shall know in good time!”

J. had gone for a walk along the Tiber to the Ponto Milvio; he returned sooner than I expected. Eugenio, panting with suspense, had pursued and brought him back. The letter brought the news that Queen Margherita would come to the studio the next afternoon. As we were already in apple-pie order, there was nothing for Lorenzo to do but put fresh laurel branches in the vases and add a little polish to the “Queen’s Chair.”

Punctually to the minute the royal carriage drew up at the door of the Studio Corrodi. The servants on the box were dressed in dark colors,--the splendid scarlet liveries, alas! are Queen Margherita’s no longer; they are only worn by the servants of the reigning Queen. J. received her Majesty at the carriage door and escorted her up the marble stair to the big new studio. What a contrast to the dear old studio with the ancient courtyard, the murmuring fountain hundreds of years old, the water-worn stones dark with ages, where the maiden-hair fern grows in great feathery tufts! It all came back to me with a sudden rush of memory, as I followed the Queen up the wide white marble stair. I saw the two long flights of hollowed travertina steps that led to the old studio, the uneven brick floor, the window that gave on the court, where the falcon and the white doves from the Vatican lived, the birds of whose wings J. made such endless studies for the Hours in his “Triumph of Time.” How many hours, months, years, had flown by since we three last met!

Queen Margherita walked across the polished floor with the light step of a girl, and quite naturally, without prompting, took her place in the “Queen’s Chair.” The social temperature rose--we felt as children for whom “the party has begun.” How does she do it? That’s her secret, she could not tell us if she would. She is one of those rare beings who bring their own sunshine with them, whose presence warms us to the heart’s core! We hold out our hands towards the kindly glow, as we stretch chilled fingers to a cheerful fire.

“It’s because she’s all there!” Patsy said afterwards, trying to explain what we had all felt. After one quick glance about the studio, the royal visitor fixed her eyes on the big canvas.

“This is your Diana of the Tides for the new museum at Washington?” she said to J. “A fine opportunity; I congratulate you. At what height will it be placed, at what distance will it be seen?”

Her questions about the Diana, and the building it was painted for, were direct and to the point. She showed the closely trained mind of a woman used to dealing with many kinds of affairs, of giving instant and undivided attention to the matter in hand. “She was all there,” as Patsy put it. There was a great lesson in the power of concentration she showed. She is a busy active woman; every hour, each quarter of an hour of every day has its appointed duty. We had a sense that she took them up one by one with the same whole-hearted earnestness that made every word she said worthy to be graven on our memories. After she had looked a long time at the Diana, she walked across the studio to the easel with the portrait of the old Chieftainess. J. told her something of her life and work, and referred to the story that appeared a few days before in the Tribuna. In a recent speech before the _Circolo Italiano_ of Boston, my mother had snapped out this witticism:

“The American Eagle came out of the egg of Columbus.”

The _mot_ so delighted the Italians that it was quoted by the Italian press all over the world.

“What a beautiful old age!” sighed the Queen Mother, as she looked at the portrait of the woman who has been called in Boston’s Little Italy, “_La Nonna degl’ Italiani_.”

“You have painted a portrait of old age as it ought to be,” Queen Margherita continued; with that smile of hers, a little graver than of old but with the same piercing sweetness.

“Remember that,” murmured Patsy. “She hits the nail on the head every time; that’s the reason she has done so much for her generation. Come to think of it, they are two of a kind; both have served greatly and been greatly rewarded!” He looked from the face of the portrait on the easel to the face of the royal lady who stood before it.

“Your portrait of _Il Povero Re_,” said the Queen Mother to J., “has changed color. I am troubled about it. I fear it may be because I always take it with me from Rome to Gressoni every year. I fear the jarring may have hurt it.”

It was arranged then and there that J. should call upon the Countess Villamarina, the Queen Mother’s companion, and see what was wrong with his portrait of King Umberto. We all went down to the carriage; the Queen Mother shook hands with us all graciously, and promised she would come again to the studio some day.

We watched the landau with the sober liveries drive away. Across the Tiber the regiment of Philippus was returning to the barracks, after rifle practice at the Tor di Quinto. The gay notes of the royal march sounded joyously; the proud horses of the royal landau arched their beautiful necks--it was as if they recognized the music and tried to keep step to it.

Three days later, on the twelfth of February, we were waked at half past seven in the morning, with the news that the King would be at the studio in an hour. He came in an automobile with two aides, an admiral and a general. They all wore uniform and looked very smart and well turned out. Agnese and I watched them from the terrace (the studio is opposite the palazzo where we live). I was not allowed to go to the studio; Athol and J. decided it would not be suitable, the visit being so early and of so informal a nature; I was, of course, dreadfully disappointed. Lorenzo was there to open the door; he apparently managed to leave it ajar, for he gave me an account of the visit.

“His Majesty speaks every language as if it were his own--they all do, it is a gift like another. It was most unfortunate for me, considering the Signore talks Italian, that they spoke in Ingerlish, which resembles--with respect, Signora--the chatter of monkeys. Something I understood, however, by observing their faces. His Majesty pointed to the horses; they interested him; has he not the finest horses in the world? Before his Majesty departed he inquired if he should write his name in the book. The Signore ran to turn over a virgin page; this his Majesty would not allow but wrote his name with all the others, just where it came naturally, when he could have had a whole page to himself. You can see for yourself what a fine big signature he has; he might well be proud of it, but he is not proud--_nostro re_! He handed the pen to the Signor Ammiraglio, saying--that I could understand for it was in Italian--‘See that you write your name better than I have written mine.’ On the table lay the photographs the Signore made at Messina; when his Majesty saw them he turned back. They studied all those terrible pictures of the ruins together, and they talked again in that language I do not understand.”

They stayed twenty-five minutes by the clock on the Castle Sant’ Angelo,--Agnese kept watch of the time; then they all came down to the street. The King shook hands with J., wrapped his long military cloak about him (the air was keen), and got into the motor. The porter and Lorenzo, standing very straight like soldiers on either side of the door, saluted. The porter’s wife, the little stepson and the new baby all leaned from the window over the door.

“Observe, observe, Signora mia, his Majesty smiles, he is pleased,” whispered Agnese, all in a flutter. “Ah, what a good kind heart!”

The motor flashed past the Palazzo Frankenstein, and Agnese and I came down “to hear all about it.” Coffee for all hands was demanded and furnished forthwith. In the kitchen Lorenzo, Eugenio and Agnese talked for an hour about the King’s visit. All I could get out of J. was the last precious sentence of the interview:

“When I thanked him for the honor of the visit, King Victor said, ‘Not at all, my mother told me to come.’ His English is beautiful, just like Queen Margaret’s.”

VI

AT PALAZZO MARGHERITA

“The Signorina with the bright eyes, who lives in the handsome _villino_,” Agnese began, “asks if the Signora can use her carriage today. That fat beast, her coachman, is very avaricious, he will expect a _mancia_ of three francs--still if we employ Napoleone, it will cost more--besides with a private carriage _se fa più figura_.”

“As to making a good appearance, that’s of no consequence; the Signorina’s carriage, however, has better springs than Napoleone’s, rubber tires as well. What didst thou say?”

“As the Signora was occupied I said yes, with _tante grazie_, and combined that the ‘milor’ should come at two o’clock. The afternoons are short; as the _mancia_ must be paid, it is better to have one’s money’s worth.” Agnese wears thirty-two flawless pearls in her mouth--as she said these things she showed them all to me with the guileless smile of an infant.

Could it be by chance that Vera’s carriage was offered for this particular day? Impossible! Besides, Agnese knows I never go out till four. I have to believe in miracles, such miraculous things happen. Can it be that Agnese works the oracle? _Basta!_ best not lift the veil from such comfortable mysteries. We were booked to call on the Marchesa Villamarina at half past two o’clock; we had spoken to no living soul of this, and here was a fat coachman, a fine coach and pair coming to take us in state to the palace of the Regina Madre. If our very walls have ears, if our correspondence is tampered with, the result is fortunate--let us accept the “milor” the gods send us!

We drove up sunny Via Veneto, through the Ludovisi quarter, past the smart hotels that have sprung up near the Palazzo Margherita--the Savoy, Regina, Palace, half a dozen more named out of compliment to the Queen Mother. If the sacrifice had to be made, the beautiful Villa Ludovisi cut up into house lots, transformed into the fashionable quarter of Rome, the great winter watering place, it’s a little comfort that the best site now serves for the site of Queen Margherita’s palace.

“Do you remember the violets that used to grow here?

“I can smell them now!”

“It’s hard to forgive that vandalism, even if building lots were necessary.”

Other things are necessary; the cool shade of ancient cedars, their resinous breath at hot noontide, the plashing of water in moss-grown fountains, the rustle of birds at nesting time, the carpet of anemones beneath immemorial trees, the laurel and asphodel that once grew here in the garden that was Sallust’s, that has been sacred ground to poet and artist from Horace’s time to Crawford’s.

Palazzo Margherita faces Via Veneto with its smug hotels; behind the palace lie a few roods of ground, a shrunken splendor, the last vestige of the noble Villa Ludovisi. Here are shadowy walks between gnarled ilex trees, and a few old statues, the last of a great company. A high wall shuts off the Queen’s garden from the Via Sallustiana, on the left; at the back on the Via Boncompagni, the wall is surmounted by a balustrade with antique amphorae etched with a fine network of black and yellow stains. Perhaps they once held the wine that served at Sallust’s banquets--it was of the best, Falernian perhaps.

“A pleasant drive to you!” Herr Schmidt, at the door of his hotel, bowed and smiled. A gong clanged behind him; a crowd of porters in green baize apron and pages in buttons rushed from within, as the big hotel omnibus, covered with travelers’ luggage, crowded with tourists, drew up at the entrance.

“Isn’t he a type with his automobile, his big wife wearing the old Orsini diamonds?” I murmured.

The Roman hotel-keeper today is a far more important personage than the poet and artist he has ousted from their garden of delight, the lovely Villa Ludovisi. If he were really a Roman, it wouldn’t matter so much; but nine times out of ten he is a German or a Swiss. Herr Schmidt is a very rich man and much considered, while Enrico, the painter, who used to spend long delicious days sketching in the Villa--Enrico, who loves and paints the Campagna Romana as it has never been painted before--Enrico’s coat is threadbare as Martial’s only toga.

“Are you asleep?”

“No, only dreaming.”

“Wake up, we’re there.”

We were expected; the sentries at the gate allowed the fat coachman to drive the “milor” into the courtyard.

“The last time we were here together was at a dinner of Mrs. Draper’s,” J. reminded me. When General Draper was American ambassador he lived here, as did his predecessor, Mr. Wayne MacVeagh; in those days it was called the Palazzo Piombino. After the death of King Umberto the palace became the Roman residence of the Queen Mother.

A picturesque person in plush breeches, wearing a silver chain of office, received and showed us up the grand staircase. No mean economy of space or height here, or in the long corridor with the marble doorways; our palace builders at home must study Roman interiors as well as Italian gardens.

“Don’t you remember the MacVeaghs’ ball and Queen Margherita walking through this corridor with the Ambassador?” J. asked.

“Of course; she wore a blue brocade dress and her incomparable pearls; it all comes back to me. King Umberto was in uniform; he carried a helmet with white plume under his arm. Mr. and Mrs. Charles Francis Adams were here. Do you remember the Austrian diplomat’s fascinating court dress? And that Russian military attaché in Cossack uniform with a black patch over one eye?”

“Yes, what a hero you thought him till I told you his poor eye had been knocked out by a careless woman’s umbrella.”

The Marchesa Villamarina received us in the room where Mrs. MacVeagh used to give tea. As we sat talking, we heard a merry little scream of dismay; the Marchesa, excusing herself, hurried to the next room. Then we heard a laugh like a silver chime.

“It’s her voice,” I whispered.

In a moment the Marchesa returned, smiling and merry.

Queen Margherita, her eyes bright with laughter, received us in her library. The Queen’s dress was like the plumage of a silver pheasant; dress is a fine art with her. You never know what she has on, but you always know it is the perfect thing for the hour. The library is an immense apartment, even for Rome, full of color and atmosphere. It suits her as the background in a Velasquez portrait suits the central figure. The highest point of light was a blaze of yellow azaleas on the mantel. There was no senseless bric-a-brac, but every article of furniture was a gem. One who reads the character of a person from the room he or she lives in, would guess that this was the home of a woman of taste and of action; it was comfortable rather than luxurious; there was nothing of the “dreadful too much.” On the walls hung a few pictures, among them J.’s Dante in Exile. On the writing table stood his portrait of King Umberto. J. saw in a moment what had happened to it. The portrait is a silver-point drawing. When these are first made their color is very like a pencil drawing; with time the silver becomes oxidized, and turns darker, the tone improving every year till it becomes a rich soft tarnished color. While J. was explaining this to Queen Margherita, the Marchesa told me what had been the matter.

“In writing her name upon the photograph her Majesty designed to give you, she had the misfortune to upset the ink.”

“She too? Is she so human?”

“It is because her Majesty is so human,” said the Marchesa, “that one has that adoration for her.”

* * * * *

“I’ve had a letter from Belknap,” said J. a few days after this, “asking me to go back to Messina with him.”

“You’re not going?” I cried.

“Of course he is,” said Vera. She was playing ball with Patsy on the terrace.

“I can’t bear it; besides you must finish your Pan.’

“Your father would have gone.”

There was nothing for me to say to that.

“Take me with you,” said Patsy.

“And me!” cried Vera, all on fire.

“I can’t _take_ you; but there’s nothing to prevent your all making a trip to Sicily. You have always wanted to--” he looked at me. “This is your chance, a little later though--it’s such a cold season.”

“How can he be so keen about getting back to that awful place?” I exclaimed.

“It’s because there is so much more work to do there than there ever was in the world before,” said Vera. “Every one who has been down feels the same way.”

“You have said it!” This from Patsy, the golden butterfly. “A man’s happiest when he’s working to the limit, when there’s not one minute of time left in the day to get a grouch on!”

“What have you to say about it?” said Vera, looking at J.

“I would rather have had this letter than a big commission; we may start any day. You will see the Q.’s? Bonanno is sure to ask news of them,” J. went on.

“Let’s go now,” said Vera. “The Q.’s are far the most interesting of your _profughi_.”

There was still time before sunset, so Vera and I, escorted by Patsy, started to walk to the Q.’s. We crossed the Tiber, pausing on the bridge to watch the soldiers, maneuvering the big awkward pontoons on the river above, the part that makes the curve of the S. It was a gorgeous afternoon; the air was golden, sparkling, full of life.

“‘How tenderly the haughty day fills his blue urn with fire!’”

Patsy quoted. “I bet that was written in Rome!”

On the Lungo Tevere a young officer passed, riding a spirited bay.

“Look out!” cried Patsy warningly. Vera, startled by the prancing horse, sprang aside; the officer saluted.

“It’s Philippus!” I cried, as the bay danced along sidewise like a skittish crab.

“Whoever he is, he ought to give that beast more work and less corn!” Patsy flicked the dust the bay had kicked up from his sleeve.

“No matter about the dust; he’s alive! We shall all be dust soon enough.”

Patsy left us at the gate.

Although there was a nip in the air, we found old Count Q. in the garden.

“Babbo sits out whenever he can,” said Rosalia, oldest of the Count’s seven remaining daughters. “Since the earthquake he knows no peace within.”

When I told them J. was going to Messina, the Count’s drawn face changed; he began to sob pitifully. Rosalia, a faded beauty with tragic eyes (she had lain beneath the ruins of their house at Messina for twenty-four hours), put a finger to her lips.

“Speak not of Sicily, I pray!” she whispered, “though in truth he thinks of nothing else. He dreams each night the house is falling.”

The Count is seventy years old, and paralyzed. His house was destroyed with his oldest son’s next door. For days he heard his son’s voice and his little grandchildren’s calling for help. They were buried so deep that when help came it was too late. One of the granddaughters was the girl of the emerald scarab ring Bonanno told us of.

“How goes on the sewing?” I asked Rosalia.

“Famously; a thousand thanks for the machine. All the cotton is made up. The parents now sleep between sheets; we others shall have that luxury soon.”

The Countess and her daughters had worked early and late, making bed linen and underclothes of the cotton cloth sent by our committee. I asked Rosalia if there was any message for Bonanno.

“Tell the Signor Avvocato that we are more fortunate than many--God has sent us friends,” she said. “Would the Signore have the infinite kindness to carry him a little notepaper, of the most miserable kind, a few envelopes? His last letter was written on a bit of paper torn from the wall. I am sure he has done everything--but if he would write to _mamina_ and set her mind at rest--tell her the graves are marked, that she will know in which each of them lies--Nonna, Maddelena, Nina?”

“All this shall be related to the _avvocato_ without fail. Courage, _remember_, look forward, not back!”

“_Altro!_ It is what I most desire.” Rosalia fought back the tears. We left her, smiling bravely, at her post beside the poor old paralyzed father.

“Did you ever see a handsomer family?” I asked Vera as we walked away. “Rosalia is still fine, the next four are pretty as pinks, the two youngest real beauties. Which is that at the window? I can’t tell them apart.”

“Not since they’ve begun to smile? That’s the youngest, Beatrice--watch for the dimple when she laughs.”

“Wherever did she get that smart toggery?”

“Some of you soft-hearted Americans! She was lovely in her big black hat, the latest fashion. Can any of them do anything to earn money?”

“They could not earn a _centesimo_ among them all. The Count owned a lot of valuable real estate in Messina; they lived on their rents. In the end something surely will be saved; you can’t wipe out real estate. Such pretty girls are sure to marry.”

“If you had only seen it all, you would understand--it’s chaos! It will take years, a generation perhaps, before things can be straightened out. Meanwhile ‘it is not always May.’”

“But Beatrice and the other little one--They are lovely!”

“Beauty is a poor _dote_--young kittens soon make old cats! No, _cara mia_, they have no chance. You Americans can’t understand: you are still primitive. The American carries off his wife as the Indian his squaw. You are at the natural selection stage.”

“Well, we have been--“

“The man assumes the responsibility of the woman’s support?”

“As a rule!”

“It’s bad form for a man to ask a dowry or allowance from the girl’s father?”

“The unpardonable sin.”

“I know; my brother married an American. Her father gave her an allowance, but when she died he never offered to pay her funeral expenses--his own child. We thought this unfeeling--dreadful! Americans tell me it probably never occurred to him.”

“We think it is far better for young people to make their own way,” I maintained.

“The parents who bring a child into the world,” Vera argued, “especially a female child, are responsible for her support. When she marries, they are bound to settle the largest sum upon her they can afford. They must make a sacrifice for their child.”

There is a sort of finality about a disaster like the Q.’s that we Americans can hardly conceive of; with us failure so often spells success. If a young man’s father is ruined, we say of him (we are beginning to say it of his sister)--“This gives him a chance to show the stuff he’s made of!”

After leaving Vera I went back to the terrace, to watch the sun set over Mons Vaticanus. Ignazio was there before me, grafting a new American Beauty rose on the stem of the big Banksia.

“You have three sisters, Ignazio,” I began. “You have told me your father is dead.”

“And in Paradise, I trust, this long time; I have not grudged masses for his soul.”

“A good son! How did he leave his money? Did your sisters have dowries?”

“He divided his money into two parts--my mother already being in glory. A little more than half he left to me, the only son. That was right, for so the greater part of the property remains in the _casa paterna_. The other half he divided between my three sisters. The oldest went into a convent; it was her wish, you understand. Her share was paid just as if she had married. The second espoused a _vignerolo_ and invested her money in a new vineyard; they have prospered. The little one, Teresina, would go to the convent, where was Maria, the oldest. But that one, she is intelligent, fine, very fine, sent Teresina a letter--God knows how she managed it--telling her on her life not to come to that convent. Soon Teresina found a husband, a baker; he has a good business. Teresina has given him plenty of mouths to feed, three boys and five girls. That is better than a convent. Yes, I believe in the good God, Signora; I am not a free mason, nor an anarchist, but I think a girl can serve Him as well in the world, and far more pleasantly, than in a convent.”

“You have a daughter?”

“With respect, I have four. No convent for them; it is worse than a prison! If my daughter went to a prison I might see her again; but to a convent, never--it is finished.”

“You will give your girls a good dowry.”

“I am a poor man, times are hard, that fellow Cesare, my assistant, is a thief--the Signora knows it--but something I shall do for them.”

Poor Rosalia, poor Beatrice! Who would “do” for them? As Vera said, the Q.’s were my most interesting _profughi_. That good Samaritan, Miss Jane Sedgwick, found them soon after they came to Rome. When she first saw them, they were living in one dreadful dark room; the whole family sat like statues of stone around that dismal hole; the old Count’s dreadful sobbing was the only sign of life they gave. A pitiful smile dawned on the mother’s face when Miss Sedgwick drew out a fifty-franc bill. Here was a visitor who did more than ask questions and write down answers, a committee that committed itself--recklessly perhaps, but effectively--that justified itself not by its statistics but by its work.

On the twentieth of February, J. departed with his chief, Captain Belknap, for Messina, and I was left to devote myself to my _profughi_. Before he started we went to take leave of Mr. and Mrs. Griscom; happily we found them at home.

“Don’t you need a suit of clothes?” her Excellency asked J. as she gave him a cup of tea.

“I need several; most of mine have been given away.” He glanced at me. “I must make out with what’s left though--I don’t look too shabby for Messina?”

“The idea! It’s only that--I have a tailor--he makes really very well--I thought you might order a suit--“

“Do, I beg!” interrupted the Ambassador. “That Sicilian tailor has made me six suits already--I can’t use any more--he makes too well--they’ll never wear out!”

“How is your plumber doing?” asked Mrs. Griscom.

“Not so well as your tailor. He can’t follow his trade in Rome; if I could only send him to America, where plumbing is a fine art and takes the place of bric-a-brac!”

“And the new baby?” How could she remember that Lucia Calabresi had a baby!

Though aching to go to Sicily, Patsy remained in Rome to help me with my _profughi_. I had some of my “cases” from Countess Pasolini, some from Miss Noble Jones (her brother, our old friend Wallace Jones, was once Consul at Messina), others I read of in the papers. Patsy was studying counterpoint with a professor of music, Dante with a professor of literature, Arabic with a professor of Oriental languages--all late of the University of Messina.

“The professors and schoolmasters are having the roughest time of all,” he declared. “The devil and the lawyers look after their own. The _avvocatos_ and the _medicos_ all over Italy have organized to help their fellows--but these poor teachers!” He had just ferreted out a new professor and family. “They receive one franc and a half a day from the general committee--that keeps the breath of life in ’em--but the father, the only one capable of earning a _soldo_, has to stand in line and wait for hours every day to draw the money. If you could have seen their room! I spent those two hundred francs on chairs, beds and blankets. ‘Who gives promptly, gives twice,’ Mr. Parrish says. Isn’t he a corker? Don’t let ’em get discouraged--that’s his argument; it’s the delay that breaks their hearts. Those who have the stuff left in them ought to be kept hard at work, nose to the grindstone.”

Mrs. Griscom’s Ladies’ Auxiliary was the best committee I ever served on because it had the least red tape. Like the old vigilantes of the West, it was created for an urgent need, lived a short life with the maximum of work, the minimum of talk. My colleagues, Mesdames Samuel Abbott, Winthrop Chanler, and Nelson Gay, worked each according to their lights, meeting with the Ambassadress from time to time to compare notes and vote supplies. The work was quietly done, with little fuss or feathers. Every _soldo_ was well spent, and passed direct from the treasury to the sufferer. Jane Sedgwick and Luella Serrao were my right and left hand (Luella is the widow of our dear Teodoro, for years the lawyer of the Embassy, always the friend of the Americans in Rome), Patsy was my flying Mercury, Elinor Diederich took the Q.’s and other _profughi_ under her wing.

Luella had a patriarchal family from Bagnara in her care, an old man and woman with a screed of children and grandchildren. She had been telling me about them one afternoon as we were walking together; just as we turned out of the Piazza Venezia, into the Via Nazionale, a clear voice hailed us:

“_Mia grande Signora!_” Luella, delicate as a windflower, paused. A great gaunt woman, wearing a black kerchief over her head and a quaint short skirt, stood before us. She touched her fingers to her lips; then with the graceful Oriental gesture stooped and touched the hem of the “grande Signora’s” garment, and passed on.

“That was Sora Clara from Bagnara,” Luella explained. “She was discharged from the hospital yesterday.”

We were now passing the fine old palace of the Preffetura. “How well I remember coming to see you there!” I said, looking at the stern façade, “when the Prefect had that stroke of apoplexy. It was said the nursing of his American daughter-in-law saved his life.”

“Strange you should speak of that!” said Luella. “Pietro Ceccatiello, the young clerk who helped me so much, has been in my mind all day. After we left the Preffetura, Pietro went to Messina and married. He had a good position as an _impiegato_. We have all been anxious about him since the earthquake. The other day my brother-in-law, walking through a hospital at Naples, heard some one call, ‘Signor Rudolfo!’ He went up to the bed the voice came from, but the patient was so bandaged he did not recognize him. ‘Don’t you know me?’ the man cried. ‘I am Ceccatiello.’ ‘We feared thou wast killed,’ said Rudolfo, and put out his hand to take Pietro’s. The poor fellow held up two maimed swathed stumps. Then he told his story: after the earthquake Pietro found that he, his wife, and child, though little hurt, were buried, _sotto le macerie_, three metres deep. They could not make themselves heard; they could find nothing to dig with. With his two naked hands Pietro dug his way out of that living tomb, saved his wife and child. His fingers were literally worn away. The hands had to be amputated at the wrist, with one foot that had been crushed.”

We sent Pietro three hundred francs of American money. The messenger who took it to him warned us not to give money again to those in hospitals, but to wait rather till they were discharged.

“The miserable one in the next bed to Pietro, who was quite as badly hurt, wept because I had no money for him--_invidia_ (envy)!”

I told Vera and Patsy Pietro’s story that evening. Vera’s jewelled hands flashed as she hid her face in them.

“I can’t bear it!” she cried, as if she felt the loss of Pietro’s hands in hers. “What was that you said to Rosalia--‘look forward, not back’? Remember the English verse Athol taught us.”

“The inner side of every cloud
Is always bright and shining,
And so I turn my clouds about
And always wear them inside out,
To show their silver lining!”

“Right!” cried Patsy, “look for the silver lining. If every cloud had one, it’s this that darkens Italy!”

Let us turn the cloud about, dwell no more on Italy’s anguish unparalleled, but on the silver lining, the love and help her sisters lavished upon her. If we dwell most upon our country’s share, it is because we know more of it--not to set it above the others.

The minutes of the meeting of the Ladies’ Auxiliary (I was the Secretary), held January 9th, contain this entry:

“Mr. Parrish gave an account of an interview with Signor Nathan, the Syndic of Rome, who expressed the opinion that if the American Committee had a considerable sum of money at its disposal, it could best be invested in buying lumber and building houses in the devastated districts.”

That was the seed,--a good seed that bore fruit. By far the most important work done by America for the earthquake sufferers was the building of these houses in the devastated districts. In this enterprise our Ambassador proved worthy of his high office, of the great trust imposed upon him; from the moment the plan was decided upon, he devoted every ounce of energy to furthering it both at home and abroad. The details of his work do not properly belong to those outside the magic circle of diplomacy; his was a labor of Hercules--only the old Greek hero had seven labors, and the young American, seventy and seven. He was fortunate in having Captain Belknap to carry out the practical part of the work.

It was to help Belknap that J. left his studio, the terrace where the tromboni were blowing their golden trumpets, and the bees from the priest’s hive hummed in and out the wall flowers. Patsy and I stayed in Rome, worked for our _profughi_, played with our flowers. The Andalusian carnations, sent from Spain by our friend Don Jaime, were an intense interest. It seemed at first they would die; with the first touch of the March sun, they took heart of grace and decided that life was worth while, even for an Andalusian transplanted to Rome.

Ignazio’s bills had been growing heavier and heavier every month; he had not grafted the promised number of _innesti_ on the roses; there were other small grievances. In a moment of exasperation I resolved to put an end to these things. I surprised him early one morning as he was changing the earth of the big azalea; he was on his knees, patting the rich brown loam about the roots.

“Ignazio,” I began firmly, “the time has come when we must part.”

He shook the earth from his slim fingers, sprang to his feet, agile as a faun, and fixed me with his clear hazel eyes.

“_E vero?_ This is a fount of sorrow to me! Where might your Excellency be going?”

“It is not I who am going.”

“_Si capisce!_ The Signora will soon join the Signore? Let her be at ease; everything will go on as if she were at home. Behold the primole the Signora has asked for these many years! They are not a garden flower, therefore it was extraordinarily difficult to obtain these wild things. With infinite labor I got them from the _guardiano_ of the Villa Caprarola, where they cover the hills like a weed.”

This was my last attempt to part with Ignazio; whatever else is fleeting, he is permanent. To cover my defeat, I changed the subject and asked him what he knew of the Sicilians.

“I am from upper Italy, a Sienese; I have naught to do with those of the south; I do not say there are not brave people among them but they have too hot blood. They all go armed too, even the women; I have proof of it--” he glanced half consciously at a scar on his wrist; when he spoke again an odd note of resentment had crept into his voice, a shadow into eyes clear as a forest brook. “We who have nothing but our two arms--or at best a little _gingillo_ of a knife, so long, what can we do against them? Nothing! It is best to keep away from them, to have nothing to do with them--enough, I have said it!”

VII

BUILDING THE NEW MESSINA

“_Un soldo! Eh! Signore, un soldo!_” The brown boy, naked as the day he was born, threw up his right arm with that graceful gesture of asking that makes it hard to deny the Neapolitan beggar anything.

“Give me the valise, Signore; there is no danger of its getting wet,” said Antonio, the boatman, an old friend; J. knew him by his gold earrings and the red scar on his cheek.

“_Un soldo!_” the boy implored. J. tossed a coin into the water; the boy dived for the money, caught it before it was ten feet below the surface, and came up snorting like a young grampus, the _soldo_ in his cheek, his arm raised in that irresistible gesture.

“_Basta!_” cried Antonio, bending to his oars. There is war to the knife between him and the diver, a share of whose profits he demands. “To the American war-ship, Signore? Off to Messina again? I would not go in your place!”

The boat shot out from the Immacolatella and past the small steamer bound for Ischia, while J. counted his packages. They were pursued by a boatload of musicians, singing “Santa Lucia.” From the shore came a whiff of fried fish, just enough to whet the appetite.

“The ‘Celtic’ is close in shore, I believe,” said J., “I suppose I must give you a franc.”

“Four miles at least, Signore.” Antonio paused in his rowing; “To another it would be five francs, but we are old acquaintances, let us say three.”

In six minutes they were alongside the “Celtic,” anchored less than half a mile away. It was already seven o’clock when J. came on board. He was received by his chief, Captain Belknap, then turned over to the care of the ship’s doctor and made welcome by the officers at dinner in the ward-room. Later he was introduced to Captain Huse, in command of the “Celtic,” then took a few turns up and down the deck, just to make sure that Vesuvius was in his old place across the bay, that the sleeping Queen Capri still slept on the face of the waters; by four bells he was ready to sleep. The doctor showed him where he was to bunk. There were already four of them in the “sick bay,” up among the Jackies; not that any of them were ill, but because it was the only corner on the ship where there was a place to stow them. Belknap had written Captain Huse that he and his man were quite prepared to rough it and, if need be, could sleep between decks. The “Celtic” is a U. S. supply ship carrying about one hundred and forty men, and bow and stern guns; her officers’ quarters are small, but somehow Captain Huse made Belknap’s party very comfortable. J.’s bunk was in the sick bay, along with Lieutenant Allen Buchanan, Ensigns Wilcox and Spofford and Dr. Martin Donelson, all of our navy. The rest of the party (thirty-four petty officers and enlisted men from the U. S. S. “Scorpion”) were stowed in different parts of the ship; the chart-house was assigned to Belknap.

They all slept well. The next morning, as there was only space for one to dress at a time, J., the last comer, lay in his berth waiting his turn. He heard a familiar voice outside, and caught a glimpse of Hugh, the Yeoman, squatting on the slippery iron deck, talking with a machinist come on board that morning to join the Messina party.

“We was to Suez on the ‘Culgoa’ long about the end of December,” Hugh was saying, “when we got a message from Roosevelt to get up steam and push through to Messina, and give them all the food and clothing we could spare. We had a thousand loaves ready when we sailed into that Lord-forsaken place! We let it down to ’em in nets. We been hanging around these parts ever since.”

The machinist asked a question. The Yeoman’s answer was energetic:

“Sure! Didn’t you know? Roosevelt is sending out wood to build three thousand houses for these Eyetalians, and we’re the Johnnies that’s going to build ’em. Did you ever hear the likes o’ that? Ain’t he a wonder!”

Later in the morning J. went on shore with the doctor, in search of sheets and towels. He was much chagrined that he had not brought his own, and I that I had not sent them--we shall know better next time. They left Naples that afternoon, and early the next morning (the 22nd of February) the “Celtic,” her white sides shining, her rigging gay with bunting in honor of Washington’s birthday, sailed through the Straits and into the harbor of Messina. As they approached the Faro, the officers gathered on the poop deck. Belknap’s keen eyes, sailor’s eyes that see so much more than others, scrutinized the water-front.

“Things are waking up!” he said. “There’s a schooner taking on a cargo of lemons! That tramp steamer is discharging lumber.”

Half a dozen ships lay in the old harbor of Zancle, unloading all manner of building materials. Yes, trade had come back to the indispensable city, as it always has done after every earthquake since the one that frightened Ulysses and the Greeks of his time; the ancients made stories and myths about that earthquake that still delight us. Ulysses landed in Sicily, you remember, with twelve of his men and entered the cave of Polyphemus, a terrible one-eyed giant who tended his giant sheep on the slopes of Mt. Etna, the burning mountain that stood over the workshop of Vulcan; you can see the smoke, sometimes the fire of the smithy, coming out of the hole at the top of the mountain to this day. The giant killed and ate six of the adventurers; he would have killed them all but for the crafty Ulysses, who made the Cyclops drunk and while he slept put out his single eye with a red-hot pole. Then Ulysses and his six remaining companions concealed themselves under the bellies of the giant sheep; and so, when Polyphemus let out his flock to graze, they escaped. (I myself have seen this adventure pictured in an ancient sculpture at Palermo.) When the Cyclops found his prisoners were gone, he roared with anger and pursued them, hurling great rocks after them; but being blind his aim was not good, and three of the boulders fell into the sea, where you can find them today by Aci Castello. One has a round hole like an eye, through which the sunlight shines as it once did through the single eye of the Cyclops. All this means that some Greek sailors “in the dim red dawn of man” really were caught in an earthquake and were so greatly frightened that their descendants not only made myths and legends about it, but remembered it.

Centuries after, when Theocles, the Greek merchant, drew up his little fleet of vessels on the

long sandy point that runs out into the sea below Taormina, and founded Naxos, the first Greek settlement in Sicily, they still talked about the troubles of Ulysses. The real danger of the island, these early adventurers said, was not the Sicans--they were a quiet agricultural people, no match for the clever Greeks--but Polyphemus, the Laestrygones, and Hephaestus. They were right; Sicily’s real danger now as then is the terrible volcanic force, to account for whose havoc the ancients created those dear giants and monsters, the Cyclops, the Titans, and a hundred others.

In the lovely crescent-shaped harbor that once was called Zancle (sickle), then Messana, now Messina, two large deserted fruit steamers lay swinging idly at their moorings. When there was so much for ships to do, it was strange to see these splendid freighters idle.

“To whom do they belong?” J. asked. Alfredo Brofferio, Tenente di Vascello, an Italian navy officer, detailed to help Belknap in his work, answered:

“To three little children. Formerly they were owned by a great firm. The partners were all killed; of their families only these infants survive. The ships may lie there till they rot--who knows if they will ever get up steam again?”

The “Celtic’s” great anchor splashed in the water, her cables sang as they slipped through the hawse-holes.

“Do you see that house?” Brofferio pointed to a mass of ruins on the Marina. “I lived there with my Signora and our children for two years. On the 22nd of December, six days before the earthquake, I was ordered away to sea. My wife decided to remain in Messina. ‘We are so comfortable here,’ she said, ‘the climate suits the children.’ So it was agreed. The night before I was to leave, there was a slight earthquake shock, but a mere nothing; we had often felt worse. I thought nothing of it. Women, however, feel things that we cannot--my wife said to me: ‘This is a warning; tomorrow morning the children and I will depart with thee for Naples,’ her very words. A sailor’s wife makes long journeys at short notice; we all left together. If she had not been so wise--“ Brofferio’s steady blue eyes grew troubled, “you see? Not one who lived in that house is alive today!”

“The Flying Dutchman sailed away, oh yes, oh!
He tried to enter Table Bay a hundred years ago!”

The song of the sailor at the masthead broke the long silence that fell on the group.

“Today is a _festa_ in your country.” Brofferio shook himself and pointed to the “Celtic’s” three flags and extra bunting; “a saint’s day?”

“Why, yes!” said J.; “you may call it so. Three years ago today I went down to the North End (Boston’s Little Italy) in search of Parmesan cheese; an Italian grocer at the corner of North and Cross Streets sells the real kind in solid nubbles, hard as a brickbat, not that paltry grated stuff in bottles. As I passed the Catholic church, I saw a poor Italian woman trying to get in. She knocked, pounded, even kicked the church door; but nobody paid any attention. Then she took off her _fazoletto_--from her dress she was Abbruzese--spread it on the church steps, knelt, folded her hands, and began to pray:

“‘_O Santo Washingtone mio, non hanno aperto la chiesa_’ (O my Saint Washington, they have not opened the church!), her prayer began. You see she added Saint Washington, the patron of her new country, to her Calendar of Saints; she had come to say a prayer, perhaps light a candle to him, but the church, open on all other saints’ days, was inexplicably closed on this!”

A boatload of Italian naval officers and port officials now came on board to offer the usual courtesies; Brofferio explained to them the reason for the “Celtic’s” three flags and extra bunting; soon after this all the Italian navy ships in the harbor hoisted their masthead flags.

“You see?” said J., “they too are celebrating the _festa_ of Santo Washingtone!”

“And the weather?” Brofferio asked an Italian officer, “always the same?”

“You may say so! Per Bacco, this is the fifty-sixth day since the disaster; on forty-five of these blessed days it has rained as in the time of the deluge!”

“The Quartermaster reports a steamer standing in towards the harbor, flying the American flag and a white pennant with the words: ‘Headquarters of the U. S. Carpenters.’”

When he heard that, J. ran for his kodak, just in time to photograph the “Eva,” the first American lumber ship, as she dropped anchor close in shore.

“Gosh!” said Hugh, the Yeoman, scanning the “Eva’s” decks, “there are a couple of Boston cops aboard. Wonder who they’ve come for?” The American Carpenters’ uniform was very like the Boston policeman’s.