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 space 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 shore. Our rows upon the glassy 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 pass 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 seashore 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 Niccolo 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 snatched 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 seashore 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 shores of the Bay of Salerno! We pass the fishing village of Cetara, and in so doing we pass by the willing strength of imagination out of the dominion of the ancient Republic of Amalfi into the Principality 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 principalities 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."





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 constitutes 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 space, 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 twanging 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 associations. 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 shores 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 valvassors 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 fortiter 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 surpassed 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 passed 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 God 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 illustrious 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 crass 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 assembled 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 associated 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 shore, 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 anchored 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 hoarse 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 goddess." Rallying at the words of their master and shamed by the martial ardour of the Duchess, 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 assisted 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 assist 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 Bacchanal 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 classical 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 asserter 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 investiture 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 God'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 pronouncing 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 associate 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 superstition, 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."



Can we wonder then that the phrase "to go to Canossa" (gehen nach Canossa) has become ingrafted on to the German language, or that so significant an expression was openly used by Prince Bismarck during the fierce religious struggles in the days of the "Kultur-kampf" between the newly-formed Empire and the direct successor of the spiritual Caesar who had thus humbled a former Emperor of Germany? It was in vain that Henry afterwards endeavoured, by making war upon his oppressor, to undo the evil effects of his public recantation at Canossa; the act of humiliation was too marked ever to be wiped out either by himself or by his descendants. For good or for bad, Gregory had succeeded in rendering the Papacy free from lay control; he had gained for ever for the Church one of her most cherished tenets, the absolute independence of the Pope's election by the College of Cardinals; and he had even partially reduced the Western Empire into a fief of the Church itself. The former of Gregory's great objects, the freedom of election, still remains intact after an interval of more than eight hundred years; the latter attempt, though long struggled for and apparently with success at times, has, we know, ultimately failed.

Having accomplished so much during his reign, it is strange to think that Gregory's last days should have been passed in a form of exile away from the Eternal City which he claimed as the metropolis of the Universal Church. There is pathos to be found in the Pope dying at Salerno, far removed from the scene of his ambition and success. With the bitter feeling that his name was execrated in Rome after Guiscard's sack, and that his host was bent upon obtaining the imperial title from his reluctant guest, Gregory's declining days were spent in melancholy reflections. To the last he spoke confidently of the righteousness of his cause, and whilst making his peace with all mankind in anticipation of his approaching end, he deliberately excepted from his own and God's mercy the names of his arch-enemy Henry and the anti-pope Guibert, together with all their followers. Thus the aged Pontiff languished to his end within the walls of the Castle of Salerno, encircled by flattering Churchmen who did their utmost to cheer their dying champion. "I have loved justice and hated iniquity, and therefore I die in exile," are the famous words recorded of Hildebrand in the face of the King of Terrors. "In exile thou canst not die!" eagerly responded an attendant priest. "Vicar of Christ and His Apostles, thou hast received the nations for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession."

Perhaps the expiring Pope was cheered by these words—who can tell? In any case they were prophetic, for the present world-wide character of the Roman Church, which embraces in its fold all nationalities and holds its members together all the globe over in one indissoluble bond of a spiritual empire, is largely due to the trials and exertions of one man: the monk Hildebrand, Pope Gregory the Seventh.

Here then he sleeps his last sleep, the friend of Matilda, the mortal foe of King Henry, the patron of William the Conqueror, the guest of Robert Guiscard:—what a galaxy of illustrious names shines upon that dim silent chapel in the Cathedral of Salerno! Here stands in unchanging benediction his gleaming marble effigy, calmly surveyed by King Manfred near at hand in imperial robes, the last prince of the hated and twice banned Suabian House, whose bones were destined to bleach in the sun and rattle in the wind by the bridge of Benevento under a Papal curse.

Before we quit the Cathedral in order to enjoy the evening sunshine, which is filling the interior with its roseate glow, let us return for one brief moment to the northern aisle, to glance at the grave of the Duchess who fought so boldly by her husband's side at Durazzo. It is easy to find, for her simple tomb stands not far from the beautiful and elaborate monument of Margaret of Durazzo (strange coincidence!) wife of King Charles of Naples, wherein the sculptor has portrayed angels drawing aside a curtain so as to display the sleeping form of the dead Queen within. Close to this monument of a not unusual Renaissance type, we discover the last resting place of Robert Guiscard's second wife, the Duchess Sigilgaita, their son Roger Bursa and their grandson William, in whom the direct line of the Great Adventurer became extinct. Many stories are told by the old chroniclers of this bold intrepid princess (not always to her credit)—daughter of the last Lombard prince Gisulf of Salerno and wife of her father's supplanter, whose humble Norman ancestry she affected to despise. But despite her reputation for cruelty and even for murder, Sigilgaita was a faithful wife and a brave woman, with a character not unlike that of our own Queen Margaret of Anjou; and it seems strange that so devoted and well mated a pair as herself and Robert Guiscard should be separated in death, he at Venosa and she in the cathedral of her husband's foundation.

Passing out of the silent church into the warm light of eventide, by steep alleys and by stony footpaths we gradually mount upwards towards the ruined castle that commands a lofty position with an all-embracing view of the bay and its encircling mountains. The crumbling fragment of the old palace of Salerno differs but little in appearance from any one of those innumerable dilapidated piles of the Middle Ages with which Southern Italy is so thickly studded, yet coming fresh from visiting Guiscard's cathedral and Hildebrand's last resting-place, we find it comparatively easy to conjure up some recollections of its past, so as to invest its crumbling red-hued walls with a spell of interest. These broken apertures were surely once the windows through which the dying Pope must have wearily glanced upon the sun-smitten waves and violet-shadowed hills that we behold to-day; here in this embrasure, long despoiled of its marble seat, must have brooded the fierce and unscrupulous Sigilgaita, thinking of how best to rid herself of her step-son Bohemond, in order that her own children might inherit their father's realms. The ghosts of princes and popes are around us, yet the only living inhabitant of the roofless castle is the ragged little goat-herd, whose unsavoury charges are cropping the short grass that covers the site of the banqueting hall, where Norman knights and Italian barons once caroused in the crusading days of long ago. We seat ourselves on the dry sward in a sun-warmed angle of the ruins, where an almond tree that has sprouted from the rubble sends down from time to time upon our heads a tiny shower of pale pink blossoms at the bidding of the soft evening breeze. At our feet are masses of the dark shiny leaves of the wild arum, and rank grass which is plentifully starred with tall-stemmed crimson-petalled daisies and the mauve wind-flowers that are drowsily closing their cups at the approach of night. The little goat-herd eyes us solemnly, but—strange and welcome to relate—shows no inclination to pester the signori. The soft murmuring of the distant sea, the subdued hum of the city far below us and the drowsy buzzing of the bees in the almond and ivy bloom close at hand combine to strengthen the golden chain of imagination. As we sit basking in the peaceful beauty of the scene around us and serenely conscious of its glorious past, one of our party suddenly remembers in a welcome flash of inspiration that this deserted courtyard has been made the scene of one of Boccaccio's most famous tales. It is a story that many writers of succeeding ages have endeavoured to imitate in prose or verse, but this fictitious love-tragedy between a princess and a page at Salerno has a simple charm and dignity in its original setting that only the master-hand of the Tuscan author could impart. The scene of the novel of Guiscard and Ghismonda is laid, as we have said, at this very spot, and as the hero, the heroine and the villain of the tale have Norman names, we may be allowed to conjecture that this graceful story, which Boccaccio puts into the mouth of the lady Fiammetta, was founded upon some actual but half-forgotten family scandal in the annals of the mighty but self-made House of Hauteville.

* * * * * *

Once upon a time there reigned in Salerno the Prince Tancred, who was a widower, and the father of an only daughter, Ghismonda, Duchess of Capua. The Duchess, who was considered one of the most beautiful, accomplished and virtuous princesses of her day, had been early married to the Duke of Capua, but on his death after a very few years of matrimony had been left a childless widow. Being still very young, the Princess Ghismonda was now taken back to his court by her father, who jealously guarded her and seemed unwilling for her to be remarried. Living in rooms that over-looked the courtyard of the palace, the Duchess, who found time hang on her hands somewhat heavily, used to spend hours daily in watching the lords and pages of her father's household passing and repassing the quadrangle below, and amongst the many well-favoured youths a certain page named Guiscard found most favour in her sight. Now Guiscard, who had thus all unwittingly attracted Ghismonda's attention and finally won her heart, was a young Norman of no great lineage and of small means, but being discreet, upright and sensible-minded, had obtained a high place in Prince Tancred's estimation. Skilfully questioning her maids of honour without exciting their suspicions, the Princess gained all she wished to know concerning Guiscard's position and attainments, and it was not long before she found means of conveying the secret of her affection to the youth, who in fact had already fallen head over ears in love with the beautiful Duchess who so often leaned from the casement above. She now sent him a letter hidden in a pair of bellows, wherein she explained to him the existence of a secret passage, long disused, that led from a hollow in the hillside below the castle walls up to her own apartment. Over-joyed at receiving this missive, the infatuated page took the first occasion, as we may well imagine, to make use of this friendly clue, and before many hours had passed after receiving the letter, the young man, flushed and triumphant, was standing in the chamber of his beloved mistress, who had meanwhile taken every necessary preparation for receiving her lover in secret. Many a time were the pair able to meet thus without awakening the least suspicion in the minds of Prince Tancred or of the maids of honour, and all would doubtless have gone well for an indefinite period of time, but for a most unforeseen accident. It appears that one morning the old Prince of Salerno, wishing to confer with his daughter on some matter of state, came to her private apartment, and on learning that she had gone out riding settled himself upon a couch that stood within a curtained alcove, and whilst waiting for her return fell sound asleep. After some hours of repose the prince was suddenly roused from his heavy slumber by the sound of two voices in the room, that of his daughter and of a strange man. Peeping stealthily through the folds of the draperies, he now beheld to his fury and amazement the Duchess alone with his page Guiscard. But the descendant of Robert the Wiseacre well knew how to temper vengeance with dissimulation. Dreading the scandal that would follow an open exposure, the Prince, in spite of his years and the stiffness of his joints, contrived to quit the chamber unperceived by means of a convenient window. That very night the unsuspecting Guiscard was seized by his sovereign's orders and thrust into a foul dungeon of the palace, whither Tancred himself descended to question his prisoner and to reprove him violently for his base ingratitude. But the unhappy page could only make repeated answer: "Sire, love hath greater powers than you or I!" On the following morning Tancred proceeded to visit the Duchess, still ignorant of her paramour's fate, and in a voice strangled with the conflicting emotions of paternal love and desired vengeance bitterly upbraided his erring child. "Daughter, I had such an opinion of your modesty and virtue, that I could never have believed, had I not seen it with mine own eyes, that you would have violated either, even so much as in thought. The recollection of this will make the pittance of life that is left very grievous to me. As you were determined to act in that manner, would to Heaven you had made choice of a person more suitable to your own quality; but this Guiscard is one of the meanest persons about my court. This gives me such concern, that I scarce know what to do. As for him, he was secured by my order last night, and his fate is determined. But with regard to yourself, I am influenced by two different motives: on one side, the tenderest regard that a father can have for a child; and on the other, the justest vengeance for the great folly you have committed. One pleads strongly in your behalf; and the other would excite me to do an act contrary to my nature. But before I come to a resolution, I would fain hear what you have to say for yourself."

Seeing clearly from her father's words that her secret had been discovered and that her lover was in prison, the intrepid Ghismonda, a true daughter of the high-spirited House of Hauteville, assuming a composure she was very far from feeling, made a dignified appeal on behalf of Guiscard and herself.

"Father, it is not my purpose either to deny or to entreat; for as the one can avail me nothing, so I intend the other shall be of little service. I will by no means bespeak your love and tenderness towards me; but shall first, by an open confession, endeavour to vindicate myself, and thus do what the greatness of my soul prompts me to. It is most true that I have loved, and do still love Guiscard; and whilst I live, which will not be long, shall continue to love him; and if such a thing as love be after death, I shall never cease to love him.... It appears from what you say, that you would have been less incensed if I had made choice of a nobleman, and you bitterly reproach me for having condescended to a man of low condition. In this you speak according to vulgar prejudice, and not according to truth; nor do you perceive that the fault you blame is not mine, but Fortune's, who often exalts the unworthy, and leaves the worthiest in low estate. But, not to dwell on such considerations, look a little into first principles, and you will see that we are all formed of the same material and by the same hand. The first difference amongst mankind, who are all born equal, was made by virtue; they who were virtuous were deemed noble, and the rest were all accounted otherwise. Though this law, therefore, may have been obscured by contrary custom, yet is it discarded neither by nature nor good manners. If you regard only the worth and virtue of your courtiers, and consider that of Guiscard, you will find him the only noble person, and these others a set of poltroons. With regard to his worth and valour, I appeal to yourself. Who ever commended man more for anything that was praise-worthy than you have commended him? And deservedly, in my judgment; but if I was deceived, it was by following your opinion. If you say, then, that I have had an affair with a person base and ignoble, I deny it; if with a poor one, it is to your shame to have let such merit go unrewarded. Now concerning your last doubt, namely how you are to deal with me: use your pleasure. If you are disposed to commit an act of cruelty, I shall say nothing to prevent such a resolution. But this I must apprise you of; that unless you do the same to me, which you either have done, or mean to do to Guiscard, mine own hands shall do it for you. If you mean to act with severity, cut us off both together, if it appear to you that we have deserved it."

The Duchess' able defence of her choice of Guiscard and her democratic views of society were hardly likely to influence the proud tyrant of Salerno, although his house was sprung from a plebeian stock of Normandy. Ignoring her plea and arguments, Tancred left his daughter alone with her grief, and proceeded to the cells below to give the order for Guiscard's immediate death by strangling. But Tancred's fury was by no means appeased by the page's death, for tearing the unhappy youth's heart from the warm and still quivering body, the brutal prince had the bleeding flesh placed in a golden covered cup, which he bade his chamberlain deliver to Ghismonda, with these cruel words: "Your father sends this present to comfort you with what was most dear to you; even as he was comforted by you in what was most dear to him." With a calm countenance and with a gracious word of thanks, the Princess accepted the gift, and on removing the cover and realising the contents of the cup, said with meaning to the bearer of this gruesome present: "My father has done very wisely; such a heart as this requires no worse a sepulchre than one of gold." Then after lamenting for a while over her lover's fate, Ghismonda filled the goblet with a draught of poison that she had already prepared in anticipation of her father's vengeance, and quaffed its contents. After this she lay down upon her bed, clasping the cup to her bosom, whereupon her maids, all ignorant of the cause of their mistress' conduct, ran terrified to call Prince Tancred, who arrived in time to witness his unhappy daughter's death agony. Now that it was too late, the Prince was stricken with remorse and began loudly to bewail the violence of his late anger. "Sire," said the dying Princess, "save those tears against worse fortune that may happen, for I want them not. Who but yourself would mourn for a thing of your own doing?" Then dropping her tone of irony, she made one last request of her weeping and repentant father, that her own and Guiscard's bodies might be honourably interred within the same tomb. Thus perished by her own hand the beautiful Princess Ghismonda of Salerno, Duchess of Capua, urged to the fell deed by a parent's inexorable cruelty. And it is some slight consolation to the sad ending of the story to learn that Tancred did at least carry out his daughter's dying entreaty, for the bodies of Ghismonda and Guiscard were duly laid in one grave amidst the pomp of religion and the cold comfort of a public mourning.(7)

* * * * * *

But the sun has long since sunk below the horizon, and the chill dews of night are falling round us. Hastily we leave the old palace of the princes of Salerno to the solitary occupation of the bats and owls, to seek warmth and cheerfulness in our inn upon the Marina.



CHAPTER IX

PAESTUM AND THE GLORY THAT WAS GREECE

In these days of easy travelling there lies a choice of two routes to Paestum and its temples: one by driving thither direct from La Cava or Salerno, in the mode of our forefathers; and the other by taking the train to the little junction of Battipaglia, and thence proceeding southward by the coast line to the station of Pesto itself, that stands almost within a stone's throw of the chief gate of Poseidonia. A third, and perhaps a preferable way, consists in using the railway beyond Battipaglia to Eboli, a town of no little interest in the upper valley of the Silarus, and thence driving along the base of the rocky hills that enclose the maritime plain and through the oak wood of Persano that was brigand-haunted within living memory. But though the scenery between Eboli and Paestum undoubtedly owns more charm and variety than the marshy flats can boast, yet the strange loneliness of the sea-girt level has a fascination of its own, which will appeal strongly to all lovers of pristine undisturbed nature. For the larger portion of these Lucanian plains still remains uncultivated, so that thickets of fragrant wild myrtle and lentisk, of coronella and of white-blossomed laurustinus, stud the landscape; whilst the open ground is thickly covered with masses of hardy but gay flowering weeds. The great star-thistles run to seed unchecked by the scythe, and the belled cerinthia and the glaucous-leaved tall yellow mulleins seem to thrive heartily on the barren soil. Boggy ground alternates with patches of dry stony earth, and in early summer every little pool of water affords sustenance to coarse-scented white water-lilies, and clumps of the yellow iris that are over-shadowed by masses of tall graceful reeds. These arundini, which are to be found near every water-course or pool throughout Italy, are characteristic of the country with their broad grey leaves, their heads of pink feathery bloom, and their mournful whispering answers to the question of every passing breeze; elegant in their growth, they are also beloved by the practical peasant who utilizes their long slender stems for a variety of purposes in his domestic economy. For the reeds, stripped of their foliage, support his tender young vines and make good frame-work whereon to train his peas and tomatoes; the longest canes of all, moreover, serve well as handles for the long feather brushes which are used so extensively in all Italian households. Other floral denizens of the plain are the great rank porri, or wild leeks, conspicuous with their bright green curling leaves issuing from globe-like roots above the ground, and of course, the asphodel, the plant of Death. For the asphodel is pre-eminently the flower of Southern Italy and of Sicily, since it presents a fit emblem of a departed grandeur that is still impressive in its decay. How beautiful to the eye appear the dark grey-green sword-like leaves from the centre of which up-shoots the tall branching stem with its clusters of delicate pink-striped blossoms, that show so lovely yet smell so vile! Apart from its fetid odour, the asphodel is a thing of intense beauty, so that a long line of these plants in full bloom, covering some ridge of orange-coloured tufa or the velvety-grey crest of some ancient wall, with their spikes of starry flowers standing out distinct like floral candelabra against the clear blue of a southern sky, makes an impression upon the beholder that will ever be gratefully remembered.

But flowers and shrubs are not the only occupants of the Poseidonian plain, for as we proceed on our way towards the Temples, we notice in the drier pastures large herds of the long-horned dove-coloured cattle of the country, whilst in marshy places our interest is aroused by the sight of great shaggy buffaloes of sinister mien. The buffalo has long been acclimatized in Italy, though its original home seems to have been the trackless marshes of the Tigris and Euphrates. The conquering Arabs first introduced these uncouth Eastern cattle into Sicily, whence they were imported into Italy by the Norman kings of Naples. In spite of its malevolent nature and the poor quality of its flesh and hide, the buffalo came to be extensively bred in the Pontine and Lucanian marshes, where the moisture of the soil and the unwholesome air always affected the native herds unfavourably. For hours together these fierce untameable beasts love to lie amidst the swampy reed-beds, wallowing up to their flanks in slimy malodorous mud and seemingly impervious to the ceaseless attacks of the local wasps and gad-flies, which try in vain to penetrate with their barbed stings the thick hairy covering of defence. Perchance between Battipaglia and Paestum we may encounter a herd of these shaggy beeves being driven by a peasant on horse-back, with his pungolo or small lance in hand: a human being that in his goat-skin breeches and with his luxuriant untrimmed locks, seems to our eyes only one degree less savage and unkempt than the fierce beasts he guides. As cultivation has made progress of recent years and the unhealthy marshes of the coast line are being gradually drained, the numbers of buffalo tend to decrease, whilst the native Italian oxen are being introduced once more into the newly reclaimed pastures. That former arch-enemy of the cattle in the days of Vergil seems to have disappeared: that "flying pest," the asilo of the Romans and the aestrum of the Greeks, which in antique times was wont to drive the grazing herds frantic with terror and pain, until the valley of the Tanager and the Alburnian woods re-echoed with the agonised lowing of the poor tortured creatures. And speaking of noxious insects, a general belief prevails in Italy that their bite—as well as that of snakes and scorpions—becomes more acute and dangerous when the sun enters into the sign of Lion, so that human beings, as well as defenceless cattle, must carefully avoid all chances of being bitten during the months of July and August.

Before our goal can be reached it is necessary for us to cross the broad willow-fringed stream of the Sele, the Silarus of antiquity, which according to the testimony of Silius Italicus once possessed the property of petrifying wood. In the distant days of the eighteenth century, the traveller to Paestum had to endure amidst other difficulties and dangers of the road the disagreeable business of being ferried across the Sele, which was then bridgeless. Owing to the malaria and the loneliness of the spot, the acting of ferryman over this river was not an agreeable post, and Count Stolberg, a German dilettante who has left some memories of his Italian wanderings, relates how a feeble dismal soured old man, a veritable Charon of the upper air, had great difficulty in conveying himself, his horse and his servant across the swollen stream. The old man's age and misery aroused the Count's compassion, so that he asked him why he continued thus to perform a task at once so arduous and so distasteful. "Sir," replied the boatman, "I would gladly be excused, but that my master compels me to undertake this work." "And who, pray, is this tyrant of a master of yours?" indignantly enquired the Count. "Sir, it is my Lord Poverty!" grimly answered the old ferryman, as he pocketed the Teuton's fee. Times have changed with regard to the necessity of a ferry over the Sele, but to judge from the appearance of the people and from the accounts in the journals, we much doubt if my Lord Poverty's sway has been much weakened in these parts.

At length we reach the tiny hamlet and station of Pesto, surrounded by its groves of mournful eucalyptus trees, and if we visit the station itself, we cannot help noticing the fine gauze net-work over every window and door, also the veiled faces and be-gloved hands of the station-master and his facchini. It is not difficult to gauge the reason of the eucalyptus trees at Pesto, an alien importation like the buffalo, for these native trees of Australia have been planted here with the avowed object of reducing the malaria, for which the place is only too renowned. Scientists have positively declared that the mosquitoes which rise in clouds from the poisonous swamps at sunset are directly responsible for this terrible form of ague, and a paternal Government has accordingly introduced gum-trees to improve the quality of the air, and has presented gloves, veils and fine lattice work to its servants in the hope of protecting them from the bites of these tiny pestilence-bearing insects. We do not wish to dispute the wisdom of modern bacteriologists, but somehow we have no great faith in this elaborate scheme for battling with Nature; and indeed not a few persons who have studied the matter declare that though the reeking marshes are certainly productive of malaria in themselves (so much so that it is dangerous to linger amidst the ruined temples of an evening), yet these spiteful little creatures are at least innocent of innoculating humanity with this particular disease. Moreover, a plausible idea that is now largely held insists that the recent spread of cultivation over the Lucanian Plain is itself largely responsible for the increase of malaria; it is the up-turning of the germ-impregnated earth that has lain fallow for centuries, say the supporters of this theory, which awakens and sets free the slumbering demon of fever in the soil, so that the speeding of the plough on the Neapolitan coast must inevitably mean also the spreading of this fell and mysterious sickness. Let us therefore give the devil his due: the mosquito is a hateful and persistent foe, and his sting is both painful and disfiguring, but do not let us accuse him of carrying malaria until the case can be better proved against him. But enough of fevers and doctors' saws! Let us turn our willing eyes towards the three great temples that confront us close at hand. Before however proceeding to inspect these great monuments of Grecian art and civilization, which rank amongst the most venerable as well as the most beautiful relics of antiquity, it is only meet that we should carry with us into their ruined halls a few grains of historical knowledge, whereby our sense of reality and our appreciation of their greatness and splendour may be increased.



Although we do not possess a definite history of Paestum, similar to that of Rome or of Athens, yet from the many allusions to be found scattered throughout the pages of classical historians, as well as from the various inscriptions and devices found upon ancient coins of this city, it is not a difficult task to piece together the main features of Poseidonian annals. From a very remote period of antiquity there was undoubtedly a settlement on or near the coast to the south of the river Silarus, whilst it is commonly held that this spot was called Peste—a name almost identical with the modern Italian appellation—many hundreds of years before the arrival of Doric settlers on the shores of the Tyrrhene Sea. Late in the seventh century before Christ, the Greek colony of Poseidonia, the city of the Sea God, was founded on or near the site of Italian Peste by certain Hellenic adventurers from Troezen, who were amongst the inhabitants of Sybaris, at that time one of the most flourishing of the famous cities of Magna Graecia: and this new colony of Troezenians henceforward was accounted one of the twenty-five subject-towns that recognised Sybaris for their metropolis, or mother and suzerain city. We have no details of its early history, but it is quite certain that under the protection of Sybaris the new city of Poseidonia rose by degrees to such wealth and importance that in course of time it gave its own name to the whole Bay of Salerno, which henceforth became known to the Greeks as the Poseidonian Gulf and later, to the Romans, as the Bay of Paestum. With the fall of the mother city, this flourishing colony was left alone to face the attacks of the Samnites, the native barbarians who peopled the dense forests and the barren mountains of Lucania; yet it somehow contrived to retain its independence until the close of the fourth century B.C., when the Samnite hordes, forcing the fortified line of the Silarus, made themselves masters of Poseidonia, and put an end, practically for ever, to its existence as a purely Hellenic city. From its Lucanian masters the captured town received the name of Paestum, and its inhabitants were at once deprived of their independence, were forbidden to carry arms, and were probably in many instances reduced to the level of serfs. A large number of Samnites also settled within the walls of the town, and compelled the former owners to surrender to them the larger and richer portion of the public and private lands upon the maritime plain. The use of the Hellenic language and public worship were however permitted, and, strange to relate, no interference was made with a solemn annual festival, which the depressed and enslaved population now inaugurated with the confessed object of remembering for ever their Greek origin and their former greatness. For once a year at a fixed date all Greeks were wont to gather together and to bewail in public, outside the great temple of Poseidon, their lost liberty and their vanished power. It is evident that the Lucanians did not fear the tears and lamentations of this unhappy subject state, for this custom continued to be observed throughout the whole period of Samnite oppression, and survived even till Roman times—perhaps to the very end of the city's existence,—although in the course of passing generations there could have been but few persons of pure Greek descent left in the place.

With the advent of Alexander of Epirus, who had been called into Italy by the Greeks of Tarentum in order to assist the sorely-pressed colonies of Magna Graecia, Epirot troops were landed at the mouth of the Silarus. Under the very walls of Paestum there now took place a stubborn fight wherein the army of the Samnites was completely routed, and its survivors driven in confusion from the coast into the wild woods and rocky valleys of the Lucanian hills. For a brief interval of years Poseidonia regained its lost liberty and its Hellenic name, but with the overthrow and death of Alexander of Epirus, the scattered hordes pressed down once more from their mountain fastnesses upon the rich plain, and the city was for the second time enslaved by the ruder conquering race. Forty years later, after the Pyrrhine war, all Lucania fell under the rising power of Rome, a change that was by no means unacceptable to the Greek cities, which were groaning under the rude tyranny of the Samnites. A Latin colony was now planted at Paestum, to form a convenient centre whence the neighbouring district could be kept in order and peaceably developed according to Roman ideas. These Roman colonists, although they did not restore the lands and buildings held by the expelled Samnites to their rightful owners, yet lived on terms of amity with the Greek population, with whom they must have freely intermarried. The original Hellenic inhabitants, relieved of the bonds of servitude, were now placed on an equal footing with the new colonists, partaking of political rights in the city thus freshly re-created under the supremacy of Rome, and soon they grew to imitate the speech and manners of their new masters, so that as an immediate result of the expulsion of the barbaric Samnites and the entry of the progressive Romans, Paestum began to recover a considerable portion of its ancient splendour.

During the course of the second Punic War the name of Paestum is not unfrequently mentioned in Roman annals, and owing its revived prosperity to its annexation by Rome, it is not surprising to find the existence of a strong feeling of gratitude amongst the inhabitants. At the date of fatal Cannae this faithful Greek city sent assurances of unswerving allegiance to the Senate, and also more substantial help in the form of all the golden vessels from its temples. It was Paestum also that early in the third century B.C. supplied part of the ill-fated fleet of Decius Quinctius, that was raised to run the blockade of Tarentum. But even the loss of its ships and men did not deter this loyal city from coming forward a second time with expressions of fealty and promise of further aid to the great suzerain city in this dark hour of its difficulties. From this point onward till the close of the Republic, History is almost silent with regard to Paestum; but its numerous coins go far to attest its continued welfare, for it now shared, together with Venusia, Brundusium and Vibo Valentia, a special right to strike money in its own name and with its own devices. Under the Empire, Paestum managed to uphold its size and importance, so that it became the capital of one of the eight Prefectures into which the district of Lucania had been divided. At this period, there can be no doubt, the surrounding plain was in the highest state of cultivation, whilst its prolific rose-gardens—biferi rosaria Paesti—have supplied the theme of every Roman poet from Vergil to Ausonius. Yet in spite of its apparent prosperity, the seeds of coming decline had already been sown. Strabo tells us that even in early Imperial days the city was obtaining an unenviable reputation for malaria: a circumstance that was due to the over-flowing of the unwholesome streamlet, the Salso, whose reeking and fever-bearing waters began to impregnate the earth. Engineering works on a large scale were planned to remedy this drawback, but these were never executed, and in consequence the unhealthiness of the place increased. With the decline of the Roman power the population and prosperity of Paestum likewise tended to lessen, so that its citizens were placed in a worse position than before with regard to the carrying out of this vast but necessary scheme of sanitation.

In a spot so accessible to external influence, it is easy to understand that Christianity early took root in Paestum, which in the fifth century of our own era had already become a bishopric. The story of the growth of the Faith in Lucania is closely connected with a legend that centres round a native of the place, a certain Gavinius, a general in the army of the Emperor Valentinian, who whilst serving in Britain against the Picts by some means succeeded in obtaining a valuable relic, supposed to be nothing less than the body of the Apostle Matthew, which he brought back with him to his native place. Early in the ninth century there appeared a fresh cause of alarm, more serious and far-reaching even than the dreaded malaria, for plundering Saracens, foes alike to the old Roman civilisation and to the new Christian creed, now began to harass the Tyrrhenian shores. Settling at Agropoli to the south of the Bay, these Oriental freebooters found little difficulty in effecting a landing on the Poseidonian beach, and in raiding the weakened and almost defenceless city. Able-bodied men and young maidens were forcibly carried off to the pirates' nest at Agropoli, or perhaps even to the distant coast of Barbary, to be sold into perpetual slavery. Alarmed beyond measure by this raid, the remaining inhabitants of the place, at the advice and under the guidance of their bishop, now decided—wisely, for they had to choose between immediate flight or gradual extermination by disease, slavery and the sword—to remove themselves to the barren mountains in their rear, once the haunts of the Samnites, and to build a new Paestum on a site at once more healthy and better protected by Nature against the raids of infidel corsairs. In a body therefore the remaining citizens amid deep wailing left for ever the ancient city with its glorious temples, and retired to a strong position to the east. The spot chosen for the new residence of these exiles lay close to the source that supplied with pure water their ancient aqueduct, known for this reason as Caputaqueum, now corrupted into Capaccio. A link with the old city, that lay deserted in the plain below, was still retained by the bishop of the newly founded town in the mountains, who continued to be known as Episcopus Paestanus. In the eleventh century Robert Guiscard systematically plundered the ruins of Paestum in order to erect or embellish the churches and palaces of Salerno and Amalfi. Every remaining piece of sculpture and of marble was removed, and it was only the vast size of the pillars of the three great temples, and the consequent difficulty attending their transport by boat across the bay or along the marshy ground of the coast line, that saved from destruction these magnificent relics of "the glory that was Greece." But even humble Capaccio did not afford a final resting-place to the harried Paestani, for in the year 1245 the great Emperor Frederick II., who had been defied by the feudal Counts of Capaccio, besieged and utterly destroyed this stronghold of the mountains that had been the child of Poseidonia of the sea-girt plains. Another and a yet loftier retreat had to be sought by the survivors of the Imperial vengeance, so that the ruined Capaccio the Old was abandoned for another settlement, which still exists as a miserable village amidst those barren hills that had ever looked down with jealous envy upon the proud city with its pillared temples. One curious circumstance with regard to Paestum must finally be mentioned, in that the existence of its ruins, the grandest and most ancient group of monuments on the mainland of Italy, remained unknown to the learned world until comparatively modern times. Only the local peasants and the inhabitants of the poverty-stricken towns in the Lucanian hills seem to have been aware of the presence of the gigantic temples standing in lonely majesty by the shore and as the superstitious nature of these ignorant people attributed these structures to the work of a magician—perhaps to the great wizard Vergil himself—they were shunned both by night and by day as the haunt of malignant spirits. Poor fisher-folk and buffalo-drivers, who had of necessity to pass near the ruined fanes, were wont to slink by in fear and trembling, and doubtless they brought back strange stories of its ghostly occupants with which they regaled their friends or families by the fire-side of a winter's evening. Yet it is most strange that during the period of the Renaissance, at a time when enthusiastic research was being made into the neglected antiquities of Italy, this unique group of Doric temples should have escaped notice. For neither Cyriaco of Ancona nor Leandro Alberti, who visited Lucania ostensibly for the sake of recording its classical remains, make mention of "the ruined majesty of Paestum," and it was reserved for a certain Count Gazola (whose name is certainly worthy of being recorded), an officer in the service of the Neapolitan King, to present to the notice of scholars and archaeologists towards the middle of the eighteenth century the first known description of what is perhaps Italy's chief existing treasure of antiquity. From Gazola's day onward the beauty and interest of Paestum have been appraised at their true worth, and numberless artists and writers of almost every nationality have sketched or described its marvellous temples.

With this brief introduction to the history of a city, whose chief building is still standing almost intact after a lapse of 2500 years, let us take a rapid survey of Poseidonia as it exists to-day. Its walls, of Greek construction but probably built or restored as late as the time of Alexander of Epirus, who gave the captured town a fleeting spell of liberty, form an irregular pentagon about three miles in circumference, whereon the remains of eight towers can be observed, whilst the four gates, placed at the four cardinal points of the compass, are clearly traceable. We enter this citta morta by the so-called Porta della Sirena, the eastern gate that faces the hostile Samnite Hills and (oh, the prosaic touch!) the modern railway-station. This gate remains in a tolerable state of preservation, and draws its name from the key-stone of its arch, which bears in low relief a much defaced design of a mermaid or siren, its counterpart on the inner keystone being a dolphin: two devices very appropriate to the entrance of a city dedicated to the Lord of Ocean. Passing the picturesque yellow-washed Villa Salati, with its high walls and iron-barred windows testifying only too plainly to the lawlessness that once reigned in this district, we find ourselves face to face with the great temple of Neptune or Poseidon, and its companion-fane, the so-called Basilica. The Temple of Neptune (for in this instance at least the popular appellation chances to be the correct one), in all probability co-eval with the first Greek foundation of the city, formed the central point of the life of Poseidonia during the 1400 years of its existence as a Hellenic, a Samnite, and finally a Roman city. In its simple grandeur and its perfect proportions this wonderful temple possesses only one rival outside Greece itself: the Temple of Concord at Girgenti, which the poet Goethe compared to a god, after designating the building before us as a giant. Superiority in grace is therefore a disputed point between the two great structures of Poseidonia and Agrigentum, yet in every other respect the temple of the Lucanian Plain surpasses its Sicilian rival.

To-day, after more than a score of centuries of exposure to the salt winds and to the burning sunshine of the south, the walls and pillars of these great buildings have been calcined to a glorious shade of tawny yellow, fit to delight the soul of every artist, whether he views their Titanic but graceful forms outlined against the deep blue of sky and sea on the western horizon, or against the equally lovely background of grey and violet mountains to the east. But it was not always thus. The porous local travertine that gave their building material to the Greeks of the sixth century before Christ was once carefully stuccoed, and, in the manner of Hellenic art, painted in the most brilliant hues of azure and vermilion, so that it becomes hard for us to realise the original effect of such gorgeous masses standing erect in a landscape that is itself fraught with glowing colour. But better to appreciate the magnificence before us, let us give a brief technical description of the greatest of the temples in the choice words of an eminent French antiquary.

"The largest and most elegant, and likewise the oldest of the Temples of Paestum, is that commonly known by the name of the Temple of Neptune. This building shares, together with the Temple of Theseus at Athens, the honour of being the best preserved monument of the Doric order in existence, and the impression of grandeur that it gives to the spectator rivals even the first sight of the Parthenon itself. In front of the building is a platform in the midst of which can be seen the hollow space that formerly held the altar of sacrifice, for according to the practice of the Greek religion, these rites of blood-shedding took place in the open air and outside the temple. With a length of 190 feet and a breadth of 84 feet, this building is hypoethral, which means that the cella, or sanctuary that held the statue of the deity, was constructed open to the sky. It is peripteral, and presents a row of six pillars fluted at base and top, with twelve on each side, making thirty-six in all. The cella itself in the interior is upheld by sixteen columns about six feet in diameter, which in their turn are surmounted by two rows of smaller pillars above that support the roof. With the exception of one side of the upper stage of the interior every column of the temple remains intact, as do likewise the entablature and pediments. Only the wall of the cella has been pulled down; doubtless to supply material for building."(8)

Having quoted Monsieur Lenormant's careful description of the chief pride of Poseidonia, we shall confine ourselves to as few remarks as possible concerning the two remaining temples. The Basilica, a misnomer of which the veriest amateur must at once perceive the absurdity, is inferior both in size and in beauty of proportion to its close neighbour of Neptune. Its chief peculiarity from an architectural point of view will be at once remarked, for it has its two facades composed of seven—an odd number—of columns, so that its interior easily divides itself into two narrow chambers of equal length, affording ample ground for the theory, now generally held, that this building was not a hall of Justice, or Basilica, but a temple intended expressly for the worship of dual divinities. Almost without a doubt it was erected—probably not long after the Temple of Poseidon—in honour of Demeter (Ceres) and of her only child Persephone (Proserpine), who was seized from her mother's care by the amorous god of the Infernal Regions, as she was plucking anemones in the verdant meadows of Enna. We all know "the old sweet mythos"; we all understand its hidden allegory with regard to the sowing, the up-springing and the garnering of the yellow corn, that spends half the year in the embraces of the earth, the palace of Pluto, and half the year on the broad loving bosom of Mother Demeter. Here then within these bare and ruined walls were mother and daughter worshipped by the people of Poseidonia, who reasonably considered that the two goddesses of the Earth should have their habitation as near as possible to the Sanctuary of the Sovereign of Ocean.

Much smaller than either of these immense temples is the third remaining Greek building of Paestum, which lies a good quarter of a mile to the north, not far from the Golden Gate, the Porta Aurea, that leads northward in the direction of Salerno. Like that of Neptune, this temple is hexastyle, with six columns on each of its facades and twelve on either flank, but as it is little more than half the size of its grander and older brethren, it is now frequently known as "Il Piccolo Tempio," although its former incorrect ascription to Ceres still clings to it in popular parlance. It is from this building, which stands on slightly rising ground, that the best impression of the whole city and of its wondrous setting between the savage Lucanian hills and the blue Mediterranean can be obtained.

"Between the mountains and the tideless sea Stretches a plain where silence reigns supreme; A land of asphodel and weeds that teem Where once a city's life ran joyfully. 'Vanity! Vanity! All Vanity!' Whisper the winds to Sele's murmuring stream; Whilst the vast temples preach th' eternal theme, How pass the glories and their memory. Think what these ruins saw! what songs and cries Once through these roofless colonnades did ring! What crowds here gathered, where the all-seeing skies For centuries have watched the daisies spring! Dead all within this crumbling circle lies: Dead as the roses Roman bards did sing."

Beautiful as Paestum presents itself in the bright noontide of a Spring day, beneath a cloudless sky and with the blue waters of the Mediterranean lapping the distant yellow sands, there appears something incongruous in the sharp contrast between this joyfulness of vigorous life and the solemn atmosphere of the deserted city. The noisy twittering of multitudes of ubiquitous sparrows, equally at home in Doric temples as amongst the sooty chimney stacks of London; the twinklings and rustlings of the lizards in the young leaves and grass; the polyglot babble of excursionists from Naples or La Cava that a warm day in Spring invariably attracts to Paestum:—these are not sounds that blend well with the solemn spirit of the place. We long to cross the intervening ages so as to throw ourselves, if only for one short hour, outside the cares and interests of to-day into the heart of that refined civilisation which is gone for ever;—with the cheerful sunlight around us, and with our fellow-mortals on pleasure bent close at hand, we find it difficult to forget the present. Would it be possible, we ask ourselves, to spend a nocturnal vigil within the hall of the great temple of the Sea God, so as to behold, like that undaunted traveller, Crawford Ramage, the shafts of crystalline moonlight shed through the aperture of the roof leap from pillar to pillar, making bars of brilliant light amidst the surrounding blackness! O to sit and meditate thus engrossed with the memory of the past, and with no other sounds around us than the sad cry of the aziola, the little downy owl that Shelley so loved! But the gaunt spectre of Fever ever haunts this spot, and after sunset his power is supreme; so that he would be a bold man indeed who in an age of luxury and selfish comfort would carry out an idea at once so romantic and so perilous.

We ourselves were especially fortunate on the occasion of our last visit to Poseidonia on a mild day in December, a month which on the Lucanian shore somewhat resembles a northern October. A soft luminous haze hung over the landscape and over the Bay of Salerno itself, rendering the classic mountains at once indistinct in outline and unnaturally lofty to the eye. More grandiose and mysterious than under the fierce light of a sunny noontide appeared that day the three giant pillared forms, as we entered the precincts of the ruined city by the Siren's Gate, and made our way through the thick herbage still pearled with dew, since there was neither sunshine nor sirocco to dry "the tears of mournful Eve" off the clumps of silver-glinted acanthus, or the tall grasses bending with the moisture. In the warm humid air we seated ourselves on the plinth of a column, and gazing around allowed the influence of this marvellous spot to sink deep into the soul. No tourists with unseemly or unnecessary chatter arrived that day to share our selfish delight or to break the all-pervading spell of solitude; all lay peaceful and deserted. All was silent too save for the low monotonous sobbing of the sea on the unseen beach near at hand, the historic beach on which at various times throughout the roll of past ages Doric colonists, Epirot warriors, Roman legionaries and fierce Mohammedan pirates had disembarked, all with the same object:—to seize the proud city that had now for the last thousand years lain uninhabited, save for the owls and the bats. It was too cloudy a day for sun-loving creatures such as lizards or serpents to emerge and rustle amongst the broken stones and leaves, over all of which during the silent hours of the past night Arachne had been employed in weaving her softest and whitest textures, that the windless morning had allowed to remain intact. The only sign of animate life was visible in a pair of lively gold-finches, which with merry notes were fluttering from thistle to thistle, picking the down from each ripened flower-head and prodigally scattering the seeds upon the weed-grown soil where once had bloomed the odorous Roses of Paestum that the poets loved.

Sitting thus amid the silence and solitude of a city half as old as Time itself, we were unexpectedly aroused by a gruff salutation proceeding from a little distance behind the temple. Turning quickly in the direction of the sound, we perceived the figure of a tall bearded man dressed in conical hat, with goat-skin trousers and cross-gartered legs, who but for the gun slung across his shoulders by a stout leathern strap might well have been mistaken for an apparition of the god Pan himself returned to earth. Vague recollections of the brigand Manzoni, the scourge of the neighbourhood and the murderer of more than one unhappy visitor to the ruins of Paestum in the good old vetturino days, flashed through our mind, as we surveyed the muscular frame and the fowling-piece of the strange being before us. It was with a sigh of relief that we noted upon the straight stretch of white road leading to the Little Temple in the distance the presence of two royal carabinieri majestically riding at a foot's pace, their tall forms enveloped in long black cloaks whose folds swept over their horses' tails. We felt reassured, and when for a second time the guttural voice addressed us in unintelligible patois, we perceived the innocent object of this mysterious visit. Searching in a capacious goat-skin bag, a species of Neapolitan sporran, this descendant of the Poseidonian Greeks produced and held up to our gaze three birds that he had shot in his morning's hunting. For the modest sum of three lire the game exchanged hands, and the sportsman departed, well satisfied with his luck. Next evening we feasted royally in our inn at Salerno upon a succulent woodcock fattened upon the berries of the wood of Persano, and upon a couple of snipe that had grown plump amongst the Neptunian marshes. Nor was this dainty addition to our supper that night altogether undeserved; for having decided in a momentary fit of enthusiasm to forego the usual basket of hotel food at the time of starting from Salerno, in order to follow the advice of old Evelyn "to diet with the natives," we had preferred to take our chance of midday refreshment at the solitary osteria within the ruined city wall. The good people of the inn did what they could to regale the two gran' signori Inglesi, whose unexpected presence had the effect of creating some stir within their humble walls. No little time was expended in bustling preparations, before a flask of red wine, some coarse bread, a dish of fried eggs and a plateful of cold sausage were placed before us upon the rough oak table, well scored with knife-cuts. Eggs, wine and bread are usually tolerable everywhere throughout Italy, no matter how mean the inn that provides them; but the Lucanian sausage, though interesting as a relic of classical times, is positive poison to the Anglo-Saxon digestion. For the Lucanian sausage of to-day is the Lucanica unchanged; the same tough, greasy, odoriferous compound, in fact, that Cicero describes as "an intestine, stuffed with minced pork, mixed with ground pepper, cummin, savory, rue, rock-parsley, berries of laurel, and suet." And we have only to add that mingling with the above-mentioned condiments there was an all-pervading flavour of wood-smoke, due to the sausage's place of storage, a hook within the kitchen chimney. But if the fare was rough, it was cheap and smacked of classical times, and our reception by the Paestani of to-day was most cordial.

We left Poseidonia late in the afternoon, casting back many regretful glances at the three giant sentinels of the plain, looming preternaturally large in the rapidly fading light of a starless evening. At that hour we felt we could understand and sympathise with the poor untutored peasant's fear and avoidance of these lonely ruins, for superstition is often as much the result of chance environment as of crass ignorance.



CHAPTER X

SORRENTO AND ITS POET

It has been said of more than one spot on this globe, that it was so beautiful in summer the marvel was to think any one could die there; and so wretched in winter, it was a miracle for its inhabitants to survive. Sorrento may be said to belong to this class of place, for the climate of its short winter is one of the most trying and inclement that can possibly be imagined, whilst during spring, summer and early autumn it well merits its local reputation as il piccolo paradiso of the Bay of Naples, and its air is considered by Neapolitans as the "balm in Gilead" for every evil to which human flesh is heir. The Lactarian Mountains protect the plain of Sorrento in summer from the scorching rays of the sun, and lay their beneficent shadow for several hours of the long hot summer's day over the many thousands who dwell on the fertile Piano di Sorrento at their base. But in winter these same hills intercept the blessed sunshine, which is what most travellers speed southwards to obtain, and leave the coast line from Castellamare to the Punta di Sorrento with its northern aspect wrapped in shade and moisture, whilst the remainder of the Bay is still basking in the genial warmth, so that anything more miserable than a mid-winter sojourn in Sorrento it would be impossible to conceive. There are of course calm warm days to be met with even in December and January, but these are occasional and by no means dependable blessings, and the visitor who persists in taking up his abode here at this season of the year must prepare himself to experience cold, damp, wind and rain, without any of the contrivances or comforts of a northern winter. "One swallow does not make a summer," and on the same principle a southern latitude and the presence of orange groves do not necessarily imply a salubrious climate; indeed, the sub-tropical surroundings seem to add an extra degree of chilliness to the place. To sit at Christmastide in a large lofty room before a meagre fire of sputtering smoky logs, with Vesuvius wrapped from crest to base in a white mantle of new fallen snow, and with an icy tramontana from the bleak Abruzzi howling round the house, bending the bay trees and penetrating into every corner of the chamber, is by no means the ideal picture of a winter in the Sunny South; yet this is only what the traveller must be prepared to face, and is very likely to obtain. Nor is the cold compensated for by any advantages in the neighbourhood itself, for there is but the high road from Castellamare which passes through the town and leads above the seashore to Massa Lubrense. It is all very well in its way, but in wet weather its surface is one sheet of slippery mud, and the streams pouring down the hillside make it chilly and damp for all who are not quick walkers. Besides this not very attractive and soon exploited walk, there are only the vicoletti, the narrow steep rocky paths running up hill, which make rough going and give little pleasure, for they are almost all bounded on either side by high stone walls that jealously exclude the view. So much for Sorrento in its winter dress. But when the spring comes, here truly is a transformation from cold and torpor! The soft warm air is redolent of the penetrating fragrance of orange blossom, of stocks, of jessamine, of wallflower, and of a hundred odorous plants and shrubs from each garden and grove behind the many obstructing walls. The balconies and gate-pillars are draped in scented masses of the beautiful wistaria, which in Italy produces its long pendant bunches of purple flowers before putting forth its bronze-coloured leaves. Cascades of white and yellow banksia roses fall over each confining barrier, or else their stems may be seen climbing like huge serpents up the trunks of pine and olive, to burst forth amidst the topmost boughs into floral rockets against the cloudless sky. The ravines with which the whole of the Piano di Sorrento is intersected are filled with a perfect jungle of fresh spring foliage, amidst whose varied tints of green appear here and there the bright red shoots of the pomegranate trees bursting into leaf. In the heavily perfumed air at dusk, or when the bright moonlight is flooding the whole scene and is turning the Bay into a mirror of molten silver, the song of the innumerable nightingales can be heard resounding from all sides; alas! too often sweet songs of sorrow for nests despoiled by the ruthless hands of young Sorrentine imps, as in the days of the Georgics.