EDWARD A. FREEMAN.

From Golden Hours.

SIX WEEKS IN SORRENTO AND ISCHIA

BEFORE THE EARTHQUAKE.

BY THE AUTHOR OF "MORAVIAN LIFE IN THE
BLACK FOREST," ETC.

English tongue, a distinction which com- | Vittor Emanuele are perhaps two of the monly makes it easy to see from which most beautiful promenades to be enjoyed side of ocean a man comes. But there is anywhere, and the sight and sounds all no real difference of language, not even around are charming and delightful in the any real difference of dialect; the speech extreme. Here are the Abruzzi Piffarari of either side is understood without an in their rough, sheepskin clothing, piping effort by the men of the other side, and and dancing beneath our windows. There the differences are largely of a kind in goes a vendor of iced water, with his which neither usage can be said to be in stone jar on one side, and his basket of itself better or worse than the other. tumblers, sugar, and lemon on the other. Such is the general result of what I have At a street corner is a smart sherbet-stall, to say about language and about some decorated with branches of fresh flowerpoints specially connected with language. ing broom; and beneath a quiet arcade In another article I hope to carry on the sit a row of letter-writers, inditing epistles same line of argument with regard to for their various clients. A country lass some other matters. looks coy and delighted as hers is read over to her. The writer has evidently put her words into a form that pleases her. Further on two lads lean on their elbows, with anxious faces; probably they are answering some advertisement, or There stands a poor woman chaffering for offering themselves for some situation. a piece of sweet curd laid out on a leaf; there are morsels small and large, and the largest suits her appetite but not her NAPLES, May 14th. We had a delight-purse. In one arm she holds a little, ful drive to Castellamare, and on to Naples by train. The driver who brought us from the station to the hotel kept continually signing to us to beware lest anything should be snatched from the carriage, and Mrs. M- bade me hide my watch and chain, Canon M- told me I might get my pocket picked at the first turning; and altogether I gained rather an alarming impression of Naples. But I think the driver was alarming us for his own purposes to get an extra douceur for his care, and Mr. and Mrs. M's experiences dated from twenty years ago, and now tout cela est changé. In these years the city has grown to almost four times its former size; the new streets are as handsome and as crowded as Cheapside, and a great deal more picturesque; the lazzaroni have disappeared, and the population is clothed instead of going naked, or nearly so. Sixteen million francs have been expended in cleansing and purifying the town, and a pleasant, fresh air circulates through its open squares and thoroughfares. The old vicos and vicoli running up from the main streets are picturesque beyond description, far more so than those in Rome, and sometimes they are almost to be compared to an Eastern bazaar. The churches are numerous and richly decorated.

The Theatre of San Carlo is the largest in Europe, with the exception of La Scala at Milan; the Chiaja and the fine Corso

swaddled baby upright, with its face outwards. When it cries she lays hold of it by its feet and gives it a shake down in its bag, whereat it cries more; but we suppose this is to give its toes more room to kick in. Little open carriages fly about everywhere, the horses guided by a bright bar of brass across the nose instead of by a bit, the harness studded all over with polished nails, and surmounted on the back by a brazen figure-head of some kind of sphinx, or a flying dragon, or a flag, etc.

Wagons move slowly in between, drawn not seldom by mixed teams of horse, ass, and ox; and here come a file of donkeys, staggering beneath the heavy burdens of vegetables, wood, or charcoal with which their painted panniers are laden. Morning and evening, flocks of goats come and go through the streets, prettily tinkling their bells as they do in Switzerland; and cows are led by, with their calves, to be milked at the house doors, if required. After dark chiffoniers may be seen with their lanterns, carried à terre, wandering hither and thither, like Diogenes in the marketplace looking for an honest man, searching for odds and ends worth picking up. (Query: Why should they be so much more picturesque than our rag and bone pickers?) In the midst of the chromaticscale cries of the various errant vendors of all sorts of wares is heard the horn of the tramway-driver, warning vehicles off

the rails, and this mélange of noises seems to continue the whole night through, till early dawn arrives with that strange, indescribable stillness which that hour brings with it all the world over.

A propos of looking for honest men, Diogenes would have had to look long amongst the Neapolitan coral and tortoiseshell sellers. There is a great trade here in these wares, and they are to be had at all prices from one franc to many hundreds, and two-thirds more than their value seems to be the rule to ask. In two instances we have got things at exactly one-half of what was first named, and then one felt that one had still been cheated!

The Chiaja is very prettily planted with exotic trees and shrubs of all kinds, palms, prickly pears, and pepper-trees amongst others. Vesuvius still sends up his column of smoke and steam, but does nothing more, although more seems to be very generally expected of him.

and the church had just been closed. We
got permission, however, to ascend to the
ramparts of the fortress of St. Elmo, from
which we had a magnificent panorama
over the bay to Capri and Ischia, Vesu-
vius, the little island of Procida, and
down upon the flat roofs and tall houses
of the town of Naples itself.
We re-
turned by a steep stairway, which led
from the hill summit to the fine Corso
Emanuele, winding above the bay, and
commanding beautiful views at every
turn.

On Monday we made a pilgrimage amongst the churches, and to St. Thomas Aquinas's cells and oratory. The monastery in which he was visited by many great princes and people of the land is now turned into public offices and lawcourts. We entered one of the latter where a trial was going on. The prisoner, a very young man, who looked like a student, stood high upon a sort of graduated marble platform, guarded by solThe night after our arrival we went to diers with drawn bayonets and blank San Carlo to hear the opera of "Robert swords. I enquired what was his crime, le Diable," which was most excellently and was told that he had assassinated given. The music was perfect, and the some one. I did not quite make out dress and scenery and getting up alto- whom, but I am afraid it was a fellowgether capital. We all enjoyed it greatly. student, in some after-dinner quarrel, so The ballet, however, would certainly never far as I could make out from what was have been allowed by the lord chamber- said. When the judge had summed up, lain; the dress of the dancers is neither decent nor graceful, and would be vastly improved by a foot and a half added to the length. The theatre is magnificent, and the arrangements for entrance and exit most comfortable. Of course, we have been to the Exhibition and to the Museum. The modern pictures in the farmer do not nearly come up to our own Royal Academy Exhibition; but the beaux-arts collections, both of paintings and of china, are rich in the extreme. The Museum is most interesting, especially for the Pompeiian remains: frescoes, mosaics, vases, lamps, and jewellery. One might spend days and weeks in studying them.

Sunday was a great fête, the festival of St. Januarius, the patron of the cathedral here. On this day and on one other in the year his blood, preserved in a small jar in the sacristy, becomes miraculously liquefied, and is in that state exhibited to the people. The churches were most of them much decorated with flowers and colored draperies, and the country people, in their picturesque dresses, flocked in to the services. In the afternoon we drove up to St. Martino. Five o'clock had struck as we reached the summit of the steep hill,

he was asked whether he had anything to say in his own defence, and after some nervous twitching of his jaws and gloved hands, he spoke with considerable fluency. When he came to a stop, the judge looked at him very severely, and in angry, indignant tones told him that “he had lied." We could not stop to see him removed; but I asked what his sentence was likely to be, and was told it would not be death. It seemed singular that the very first trial that we should happen upon in Italy should be for assassination. The judge spoke most severely of the crime, both in a moral and religious point of view. Very picturesque groups of peasants streamed up and down the stairs to the courts, and if we had had time, we should have liked to have looked into another of them. In the Church of St. Severo there is a curious and beautiful figure of the veiled Christ, recumbent, and carved in marble. As an old priest observed, it is a cosa rara. We made our way back to the Via Tribunale, one of the most charmingly picturesque streets I have ever seen, lined on either side with arcades of shops, containing all sorts of bright wares, fruits and vegetables of every description, church decorations,

carvers of images and vendors of fanciful | perate at last, and the courier assured Sweetmeats. Here was found a little car- them that in this way they disgusted riage with much brass studding over it, every one who came to the island, and and we were quickly speeding down the the cameriere reasoned with them, and Via Toledo towards home. We spent the we by turns laughed at and scolded them; afternoon amongst the coral-shops, much but all to no purpose. They came with amused with some of our own bargain- us to the hotel, and the last words we ings. One man pointed to Mrs. M- 's heard were "Remember Antonio!" medal with the pope's effigy upon it, and solemnly said, "in the name of the Santo Padre," he could not reduce his prices to ours; but he took two-thirds of what he asked. In another shop we offered exactly one-half, and said laughingly that it was all we had left in our purses. The people looked amused, and the woman cast quite an admiring gaze upon Mrs.

men, that they might get some good fish! May 18th.We spent nearly all yesterday at Lacco, going down in the morning, and again in the afternoon, to remain till ten o'clock to see the illuminations and fireworks. The latter, however, began only as we came away. The whole village and mountain-side was lighted up with lines of tiny oil lamps, sheltered ingeniously from the wind by white and colored paper shades. Festoons of these formed triumphal arches and arcades across the market-place, and over and around the church porch. A little rocky islet in the bay was encircled with light, and a number of little barks hovered about, some, of which were hung with colored lanterns. Each mountain peak showed a crown of light, as if it were studded with fireflies. The whole effect was very pretty and fairy-like.

tracts of sweet chestnuts and pine-trees, | weather to-day for the sake of the fisherovertopped here and there by a silvery limestone crag. The walls of the narrow vicos glow with ferns and mosses and wild flowers of every hue, and every house and hut is a picture in itself - flat roofs, walls of pink or ochre, arcades and loggias with trellised vines, little domed buildings here and there, giving the place a Moorish sort of aspect, increased by the dark complexions of many of the people. Some of the men, with their half-bare legs and brown skins, remind me of the fellahs in Egypt, and the girls coming from the wells with their earthen water jars poised upon their heads look Egyptian The head-dress of the women is very picturesque and becoming - a handkerchief of some bright color, orange, scarlet, green, or blue, folded cornerwise over the head, one end hanging down the back, the other two crossed behind, and brought up to be tied in a large bow at the top. Sometimes the point at the back is caught lightly up, and tucked in on one side, which is prettier still.

too.

We reached the village in the morning in time for the choral mass, given with a full orchestra. We were astonished at the good music and singing, and at the quiet, orderly, and devout congregation

The chief occupation of these islanders consists in vine-culture and fishing. - such a contrast to Sorrento. It conThe women employ their spare time insisted chiefly of women, and their bright spinning. The island is but five miles by head-dresses and petticoats made a brilthree in extent, but it contains a population of five-and-twenty thousand. All seem industrious, and the ground is well utilized. Little patches of Indian corn, bamboos, and vegetables are cultivated on spare plots between the vineyards. The vin ordinaire is a very pleasant, fullflavored, light wine, the color of golden sherry, which I very much prefer to the claret species one otherwise gets.

The hotels seem to provision themselves from Naples, and are very comfortable and well-ordered, the worst thing in them being the beds, and they are dreadful. On a groundwork of hard boards is laid a sacking, filled with the hard dry leaves of the Indian corn, and over that a wool mattress, as hard and unyielding as iron. We have had this laid below, and the other above, thinking that the softer of the two. But how I do long for a good spring-mattress! We hear that there is to be a grand fête to-morrow at Lacco, a fishing village, about a mile and a half from Casamicciola. It is in honor of Saint Restituta, the patron of fishermen, whether in general, or only of this island, I can't say, but I should imagine her to be a local saint. Mrs. Msays she never heard of her before. A woman told us quite earnestly this morning that Saint Restituta had brought some rough

liant mass of color almost indescribable. The harmony was wonderful, when one considered the individual mixtures. Here a girl with an orange skirt and a scarlet kerchief; there another with a plum-colored jacket, trimmed with pea-green braid and a green apron; a woman in a skyblue dress and a crimson and yellow headpiece, and so on. The men seemed all to have got new fezzes for the occasion, scarlet or brown, with a broad red border

some of them must have been nearly half a yard long.

The church itself was decorated in every part, the whole roof and walls, pulpit, and altar, as well as Saint Restituta's shrine, were covered — not an inch of the original whitewash to be seen anywhere. The artistic arrangement was perfect, and all the designs in good taste, although not to be called ecclesiastical; indeed, the whole looked more like a very prettily got up little theatre, or the boudoir of some grand ballroom. But the ingenuity with which the most simple materials had been turned to effective account was what most of all pleased us. The groundwork was white tissue paper, or coarse white muslin, and on this was disposed tinsel, red, blue, and yellow, intermingled with folds and draperies of colored muslin, chiefly orange and crimson. Even the

The great event of the evening was the procession of the saint, accompanied by clergy and choir-boys, and a great confraternity of the villagers dressed in white cassocks with sky-blue copes-all carrying lighted tapers. The boys were dressed in muslin and tinsel, like the church, and sang sweetly as they went,

rose in the centre of the ceiling was done their respective performances. Over in puffs and flutes of this. On one side charcoal embers women were busily fry. of the high altar stood Saint Restituta ing little fish or vegetables in batter; iced resplendent with jewels and ornaments, water was cried about, a glass for five branches of coral, chains and rings, be- centesimi, with a few drops of anisetto in neath a gorgeous canopy. To her all it to take off the chill. Stalls of gingereyes were turned; and when the first bread displayed wonderful devices, ingrand burst of music came with the com- cluding St. Peter's keys and flaming mencement of the Gloria in Excelsis, hearts. Under a tent coffee was to be some of the poor women just behind us had, and opposite to it a temporary winesobbed aloud, and we could hear them shop had been erected. Of course Pulcrying, "Oh! Restituta mia! Restituta cinello did not fail. He always secured mia! A wail which sounded to me as an audience, and this time the gallows if their hearts were saying, "You have appeared upon the scene, which perhaps not stood by me." Probably they were was omitted the other day out of respect mourning some husband or son lost at to the children. sea. Others prayed very hard and earnestly to her, as if hoping against hope for the return of one long unheard of, and then they would sit down with eyes red and heavy with weeping. A little browneyed lad of about six brought to the priest, just before the commencement of the afternoon vespers, a packet of long wax tapers, tied round with a crimson ribbon, to which a ring was attached. It was evidently a votive offering to the shrine of the saint from his mother. The priest hung the handsome ring upon a coral branch, and gave the little fellow the relic of the saint to kiss. It was a pretty sight, but a sad one, and I prayed in my heart that these people might be taught of the Holy Spirit no longer to offer their substance to idols, or to put their faith in the dead, but to place their trust in the living God, to ask the Saviour to give them that help and comfort which they look for in vain from their imaginary saint, Restituta. Some of the women seem to possess a large amount of jewellery, good, but of a very quaint description. Huge gold earrings, of Genoese work, in the form of ships or boats, hanging down quite to their shoulders, quantities of rings, perhaps brought by sailor relatives from distant lands, and heavy gold chains, which must have come down as heirlooms in their families, from time immemorial.

Jesu's heart all burning

With fervent love for thee.

Three tiny maidens followed dressed in white muslin, with wreaths on their heads, flowers in their hands, and chains and jewellery all over them. They held the streamers of a large banner, and were led by sailor brothers. There was almost a fight on the altar steps between the young men for the honor of carrying the saint. It was ended by the priest turning one young fellow out of the church. This was the only bit of bad behavior we wit nessed from beginning to end of the festival. All the people were most civil and pleasant towards us, giving up to us the best places, asking whether we pleased with the fête, and anxious that we should understand and appreciate it.

were:

The procession had a long round to make. The priest gave the benediction with the relic to all the houses in the vil lage and the scattered dwellings about it. It was nearly nine o'clock before it returned to the church, which was now Towards the end of the mass some of brilliantly lighted up with chandeliers and the men, carried away by the enthusiasm tapers, about as pretty a sight as anything of the moment, clapped the singers, and could be. The people crowded in for the called out "bravo." This demonstration final ceremony of the "benediction with was, however, quenched in a moment, and the blessed Sacrament." We only looked was not repeated. Outside the church, in at the door, and then turned to see the before and after the service, we found effect of the illuminated village and mounourselves in the midst of a curious mot-tain sides and peaks. It was a scene not ley scene. Jugglers, tumblers, actors, and orators stood up upon casks, beating drums and tambourines, and inviting the crowds to enter their booths and witness LIVING AGE. VOL. XL. 2060

easily to be forgotten. In the distance Vesuvius reared his two peaks, a column of white steam ascending from the one, the other half lost in haze. In the fore