Naples in 1888 ... With illustrations, etc

Front matter

VIEW OF NAPLES FROM THE VILLA LUI8A, POSILIPO. NAPLES IN 1888 BY EUSTACE NEVILLE ROLFE, AUTHOR OF' "POMPEII PAST AND PRESENT," " POMPEII POPULAR AND PRACTICAL, "HANDBOOK TO THE NAPLES MUSEUM," ETC. AND HOLCOMBE INGLEBY, AUTHOR OF " ECHOES FROM NAPLES," ETC. WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY H. J. I, LONDON: TRUBNER & CO., LUDGATE HILL. NAPLES : Libreria Hoepli— F. Furchheim. 1888. [All rights reserved.] 'Ba&mdgnt -pr-CM BALtANTYNE, HANSON AND CO. EDINBURGH AND LONDON ©cotcateo, BY SPECIAL PERMISSION, TO HER ROYAL AND IMPERIAL HIGHNESS, THE DUCHESS OF EDINBURGH. CONTENTS. CHAP. PAGE I. MODERN PARTHENOPE I II. THE STREETS l6 III. THE BAY 37 IV. SOME PHASES OF LIFE AND CHARACTER ... 56 V. UNDERGROUND NAPLES 84 VI. DREAD FASCINATION 106 VII. THE CLERGY 127 VIII. SECRET SOCIETIES 1 52 IX. GAMBLING 177 X. THE NEAPOLITAN DRAMA I98 XI.

DEATH AND BURIAL 2IQ. XII. INDUSTRIES LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. view OF NAPLES FROM THE VILLA LUISA, POSILIPO Frontispiece SANTA LUCIA Page 39 BOATS ENGAGED IN FISHING 44 MARE CHIARO 53 NEAPOLITAN CIMARUTA (full size) 117 SIRENA (half size) 123 SIREN MOUNTED ON TWO WINGED SEA-HORSES (half Size) . 1 25 CAVALLO MARINO (half size) . 126 NEAPOLITAN PLAYING CARDS 1 79 NEAPOLITAN FUNERAL 223 A STREET CORNER IN NAPLES NAPLES IN 1888.

Chapter I. Modern Parthenope

There are many finer towns in the world than Naples, but none that can boast so magnificent a situation. The rich blue of the Bay, the majestic form of Vesuvius, the promontory of Sorrento with its glittering towns and Monte St. Angelo towering above them, the grace ful outline of Capri, the picturesqueness and warmth of the old town itself, and an atmosphere which over comes distance and presents to us range upon range of hills and mountains — all these unite to give us a panorama, upon which the eye never wearies of gazing, and one which has no rival in the world. In striking contrast to the calm and dignified beauty of the situation is the history of the town and people. Strife and bloodshed, conquest and usurpation, have made the history of Naples one of the most unenviable that can be pictured.

From time immemorial down to quite recent years it has always been the sport and battle ground of jealous factions and contending dynasties. With its constantly varying history before us, it is A not surprising that Naples is less distinctively Italian than any other town in Italy, and it is certainly no easy matter to determine the component parts of its population. The Spanish occupation, which lasted for so long a period, furnished the large Spanish element as well as the brigandage, which, in living memory, was rampant upon the mountains of Sorrento and Amalfi. Feuds and jealousies between the various districts of Naples are probably also of Spanish origin, and can scarcely be said to have altogether died out ; for, strange as it may seem, it is undoubtedly true that Santa Lucia bears ill-will to the Chiaja, and that the district of San Ferdinando considers itself very superior to either of them.

Again, in the names of such streets as the Rua Catalana we find direct survival of the Spaniards, and the quarter known by the name of Miradois is merely a corruption ofthe Spanish Miratotos, a name given to the district because it commands a view over the whole city. Again, the expressions Don and Donna, where an Italian would say Signore and Signora, are universal at Naples, and clearly of Spanish origin, the christian name being always appended to them, as Don Antonio, Donna Carolina, and the like. Curious survivals of tbe French occupation at the beginning of this century are also traceable. Cooks at Naples are always called " Monsoo," a corruption of Monsieur, and milliners by a similar corruption from Madame are universally styled " Mararna." That a principal seaport on the high road to the East should have acquired a certain leaven of Arabian blood is only to be expected, for to Greek and Smyrniot, Arabian and Egyptian, Naples has been for ages a common rendezvous ; while the Maltese, those parasites of the Mediterranean seaports, have ever haunted the quays and the anchorage.

The traces of Eastern manners among the Neapolitans are abundant enough. They have hardly overcome the close seclusion of their women, who, except in the upper classes, are still kept, as it were, under lock and key, and are certainly not treated on a footing of equality with their husbands. This is the cause of so many mixed marriages proving unsatisfactory. The English wife does not at all intend to be made a drudge, and has spirit enough to resist any such treatment on the part of her Neapolitan husband. He, on his part, has learned from his childhood that a wife, who is a wife at all, expects an occasional dose of corporal punishment ; he knows that the women argue that a man who did not love them would not beat them, and that they look upon it and fall in with it as a part of the natural order of things.

So he takes the law into his own hands, and his hands are sometimes uncommonly heavy. We shall allude further on to the weird and monotonous Arab chant, which is clearly of Eastern origin ; and many of the expressions, and more especially the unparliamentary ones, savour strongly of the East. The Neapolitans are an extremely witty people, but their humour is perfectly unconscious and often resembles that of our Irish brethren. " Excuse my goats, signore," said a drover, whose flock had impeded our progress, " they are ill-bred and lack manners. I cannot teach them to be polite." One looks up, expecting to see a twinkle in the man's eye, but no ! the remark is made quite seriously. We were one day speaking to a girl about a friend of hers, whom we wished to engage as a servant. " I begged her to come to you," she said, " for I said to her, 'All the signore's servants are respectable, but in thy present place thou wilt inherit perdition.' " This was said without a smile.

In their expressions of politeness and hospitality Nea politans differ from other Italians ; and however insincere such expressions may be, they are pleasantly said and can not fail to produce an agreeable impression. Thus, when you enter their houses, they will entreat you to keep on your hat, and this is very embarrassing when you par ticularly wish to remove it. The idea is that you are showing unnecessary respect and ceremony to them by uncovering your head, and have they not assured you that their house is yours ? " Put on your hat, sir, I beg, you are in your own house." This custom must undoubtedly have come from the Eastern nations. Do you admire anything in the house ? It is at once pressed upon you as a gift. It is yours, indeed it is ; nothing could give the owner greater pleasure than to transfer the object from his possession to yours ; and he will press it upon you most warmly, although in fact he has not the smallest intention of parting company with it.

If you were to take him at his word, he would consider you extremely ill-bred, and invent an excuse to put you off till the following day, when he would deny you admission to his house and cut you in the street. Some years ago we were travelling in the provinces, and were warned not to take a certain road on account of the brigands. We decided, of course, to abandon our route ; at the same time we said jocularly to a casual acquaintance that, if we were captured, we should expect him to find the ransom. An Englishman would probably have told us that it was " not good enough ; " the Italian rejoined, " If they would be satisfied with my small patri mony, it is yours." These sayings are only customary politeness, but they are pleasant enough, and not embar rassing when once you understand them.

A story is told of the late king, that bluff old monarch, Victor Emmanuel, that he once entered a peasant's cot tage, and admired the children. " They are yours, signore," said the dark-eyed mother. His Majesty, who was un accustomed to Neapolitan manners, thought that his hostess was perpetrating a bad joke at his expense, and most unguardedly replied, that he had never visited the village before in his life. It is perhaps in consequence of this mixture of race, and certainly a consequence of oppressive government, that the Neapolitan is looked down upon not only by his brother Italian, but even by the dwellers in the insignificant islands which are situated near Naples. It has been stated that the knowledge of the Italian tongue was, if not forbidden, at any rate discounten anced by the old Court of Naples, and that the educa tion of women up to the time of the union of Italy was so far discouraged that there are in the present day women of position in Naples who can scarcely write a letter or read a book.

But, as we shall have a good deal to say about our friend, the Neapolitan, in the course of this volume, we will here turn to the town itself, premising only that we shall leave the reader to the tender mercies of the guide book for the principal objects set forth there, and confine ourselves for the most part to dealing with such matters as cannot readily be ascertained through the ordinary channels. There are many hundreds of streets in Naples, but the necessities of ordinary visitors, or even residents, do not take them into more than some half dozen ; and it is only the energetic explorer who cares to tread the inter minable labyrinth of her alleys, or to face the sights and endure the smells with which they abound. Much has been done in Naples by way of improve ment, but much also remains to be done.

Hitherto the wealthy quarters have been exclusively benefited ; for with the single exception ofthe Strada del Duomo, which was cut right through the slums of the city, Napoli nobile has alone received the attention of the municipal authorities. The reason of this is not far to seek. The wealthy can bring pressure to bear upon the Council, but the voice of the poor cannot make itself heard. The improvements carried out in the West End pay ; those in the East End are only carried out at a loss ; every one sees and notices the one ; nobody sees or concerns himself about the other. Of the wealthy quarters there is not much need to speak, for, much as Italy detests France, she honours her with that sincerest kind of flattery, imitation. The old palaces of Italy are the finest in the world ; the new ones are built on the Parisian model, and consist of huge houses of incomparable ugliness.

The apartments in them are composed of rooms, which, in regard to their size, corre spond to a human being much as a mousetrap does to that unlucky quadruped. The greatest discomfort of the greatest number seems to have been the aim and end of their architects ; and if a man who succeeds in what he attempts reaches our criterion of a successful man, these architects may, we presume, claim admission to the first ranks of that illustrious category. There are many reasons why the authorities should have shrunk so long from taking the sanitation of Naples seriously in baud. The difficulties are enormous, and the cost, as might be expected, corresponds to the obstacles to be overcome. We often hear the passing traveller, as he waves his magic wand in imagination over the town, solve problems with post-prandial suavity, which we know have engaged the serious attention of specialists for years, aud, at the end of it all, still remain unsolved.

It would appear the simplest thing in the world to widen a street ; and so it is — in imagination. To make a piazza seems to involve only the demolition of so many acres of foul rookeries ; to house the working-classes means only to build a few streets of model dwellings ; and, in fact, to carry out the late Mr. Depretis' famous dictum, "Bisogna sventrare Napoli" (Naples must be disembowelled), seems, to those who do not understand the matter, the question of an hour to plan, and a couple of years, at most, to accomplish. The main difficulty lies in the different levels upon which the town is built, and in the fact that to the eastward there is a large marshy plain upon which the foundations of heavy buildings cannot be securely laid with out enormous expense. Besides the ordinary difficulty of building on marshy ground, we have to remember the risk of earthquakes and the responsibility of putting up massive stone houses, with slight foundations, in a country so subject to these phenomena.

A further difficulty lies in the large number of valuable old palaces which stand in the centre of the ancient city. Now, these palaces are variously inhabited. In a few cases the old family, whose name they bear, lives in a part of them, and the remainder is inhabited by respectable tradesmen, who obtain an excellent apartment at a very moderate rent. The quarter, in fact, answers to the Bloomsbury of London. It has long ceased to be fashionable, for the aristocracy have gone westwards, and only their princely mansions remain. Again, there is a certain difficulty in letting these houses at an adequate rent, and they are expensive to keep up ; consequently, many of them have been sold to speculators, whose only object is to get as much rent out of the venture as they can. To effect this they divide up the palace into small tenements, let, room by room, to poor families.

These wretched people pay weekly in advance, and the palace brings in a fine revenue. When the valuation for expropriation comes, it is found that the tumble-down dirty old house has to be paid for at a higher rate than a better one with decent tenants ; and this makes it more difficult to drive a street where it is most wanted than to make one elsewhere. The best buildings must be spared on account of their importance ; the worst because of the enormous cost involved in their demolition. It is felt to be useless to attack the evil piecemeal ; it is felt to be impossible to remedy it by wholesale measures. 1 No one unacquainted with the mansions of old Naples can have any idea of their magnificence, huddled up as they are between tumble-down houses of wretched con struction, and facing what we should call " slums."

The Strada Maddaloni is lined on both sides with houses which no one could think of clearing away, though this street, once the Toledo of Naples, is barely wide enough for two carriages to pass and has no side-walks at all ! As an instance of the difficulties experienced, we may adduce the case of the fine thirteenth century palace in which the Filangieri collection is now exhibited. When the Slrada del Duomo was made, it was cut in a straight line from the port northwards, and was laid to avoid the Duomo on the east, and the splendid church of the Gerolomini on the west. The line unfortunately struck the palace we have named, and accordingly it was doomed to destruction. There was no help for it ; and the only thirteenth century palace in the city would have been made into a heap, and carted away for rubbish, but for the public spirit of the Prince Filangieri, who had it taken down and moved, stone by stone, to the other side of the new street.

He then filled it with mediæval specimens which he had collected, and made the whole of this great work a princely gift to his native city. All honour be to him ! but it is obvious that the will and the power are not always one to do such grand deeds as this ; and, in future, it is not likely that the municipality will find such a friend to come forward and help them in the time of their need. It is certain that, at whatever cost, pecuniary or æsthetic, straight and wide streets will be cut some day through tbe city from east to west ; but this cannot be done until some plan has been carried out for housing the population elsewhere. A hideous " brick-and-mortar wilderness " is being put up at the back of the castle of Sant Elmo, which will be connected with the town by a wire-rope railway ; and a workman's quarter is also being built down by the station.

These may relieve the monstrous overcrowding of the city to a limited extent, but they^are only remedial measures and are not exten sive enough to be completely satisfactory. With regard to the health of the city, it compares favourably with any city in Italy. Naples has had since 1884 the finest water supply in the world, and from the moment of its introduction her sanitary condition became transformed as if by magic. The "Acqua del Scrino " is drawn from an underground lake in the Apennines and brought into Naples by iron pipes. At no point in its course is this water above ground, and consequently its pollution is rendered im possible. Any one who has lived in Italy will appreciate the importance of this fact, and any one who has passed a summer in Naples can bear witness that the water is always icy cold in the hottest weather, and delivered con tinuously ; so that house cisterns, so fruitful of disease at home, are not necessary in Naples.

A scheme for arterial drainage has already been ap proved by the Government, by which the sewage will be taken to the open sea in the neighbourhood of Cumæ, about twelve miles from the town, instead of being dis charged into the bay as it now is. Any one, who will take the trouble, can criticise the scheme and learn for himself the difficulties to be contended with. Much has been done, as we have already said, for Napoli nobile. No city boasts a finer drive than the " Carracciolo," which runs along the sea-wall from the Castello dell' Ovo to Mergellina ; the Villa Nazionale is a splendid promenade ; the Via Tasso and the Posilipo road, the Corso Vittorio Emmanuele and the Vomero, afford charming drives, and disclose to view some of the finest scenery in Europe ; while the Strada di Eoria, the Via del Duomo and the Corso Garibaldi, are all new streets, well able to hold up their heads in competition with any ofthe streets of modern provincial towns.

Still, it must be admitted that the easiest part of the work has been done first, and that the great problems of this vast city remain unsolved. When these shall have been set at rest, Naples will be the finest, the most beautiful, and the most healthy city in the world. Till then we must take her as she is, and look to her picturesqueness and her unique character as some set off to her inconveniences and some mitigation of her backward condition in the polity of local government. The Villa Nazionale or Communale boasts a respectable antiquity, having originally been laid out along the beach of the Chiaja in 1692. A hundred years afterwards Ferdinand the First fenced it with iron railings, put sentries at the gates, called it the Villa Reale, and allowed only the upper classes to have access to it, excepting on the occasion of the festival of Piedigrotta in September, when it was open to the public indis criminately.

He removed the group of the Toro Farnese, which then stood in the centre, to the Museum for its better preservation, and substituted for it the massive porphyry basin, once the ornament of the temple of Neptune at Pæstum, and perhaps the finest specimen of its kind extant. A little later the temples to Virgil and Tasso were erected, the bust of Virgil being copied from that in the Capitoline Museum at Borne, a portrait of doubtful authenticity. Excellent copies of some of the most famous works of antiquity, such as the Apollo Bel vedere, the Faun of Praxiteles, and the Capture of Enropa, were added about this period ; and, in fact, any dilettante, who desires to acquaint himself in a casual way with some of the finest works of antique sculpture, cannot do better than wander for half an hour among the groves of the Villa Nazionale and identify the famous masterpieces he will there see around him.

Ever since 1860 the Villa has been thrown open to the public without any restriction ; it is beautifully laid out and kept in excellent order; but of the statuary put there since that date we will only say that it is of its own period. In the last few years the gardens have been much extended, and they are now, as ever, the most fashionable resort in the town. Science, too, has invaded the domain of pleasure ; for the finest Aquarium in Europe occupies an important place in the centre of the garden, and shelters the bandstand from the violence of the Scirocco wind. The scientific world is primarily indebted to the great German naturalist Professor Dohrn for this splendid Zoological Station, and, after him, to the German Government, who have supported him with a liberality worthy of all praise and imitation.

The Aquarium is in no sense a place of entertain ment, though the specimens in the tanks are so interesting and beautiful that no one should fail to pay it a visit. The variety of fish exhibited is very large and includes many rare species, comprising the electric fish, some very fine specimens of the octopus, lamprey, dogfish and sepia, while the tanks containing the zoophytes form a marine garden of splendid colouring and beautiful forms. But the Aquarium is a good deal more than a mere row of tanks, inhabited by marine fauna ; for its object is scientific, and its upper story is devoted to the pursuits of students from the chief universities of Europe. These learned bodies assist the Institution by paying an annual subsidy for the accom modation in the laboratory of the students they send to work there.

These gentlemen have the use of a large table with movable tanks for the specimens they are studying, and a running stream of sea water is always laid on, to keep the objects of their experiments comfort able and in good health. There is an excellent little library attached to the Station, and an annexe has just been built to provide more accommodation for the Pro fessors. Besides this, there is a laboratory where specimens are preserved in spirit for other Museums ; and by the ability of the chemist engaged to superintend this department, a plan has been discovered by which specimens may be preserved without losing their colour, a matter of very great importance to naturalists at a distance. As a zoological institution the Naples Station occupies the first rank. The spot upon which it stands was, in living memory, the sea-shore, but the construction of the noble Caracciolo embankment has reclaimed and rendered habitable what was once perhaps the foulest beach in Europe.

Dirty as it was, it was an historical spot, for it formed part of the " Plaga Olympica," upon which the celebrated festival of Jove was held in the classical times. It seems a far cry from " Plaga " to " Chiaja," but the changes in the word are the normal outcome of the transmutation of Latin into Neapolitan. Thus, the Latin " plangere " has become " chiagnere " in Neapolitan, having been subjected to precisely the same changes as " plaga " had to undergo before it became " chiaja." The name Chiaja is now given to the westernmost of the eleven districts into which the town is divided. Of these for our present purpose we may dismiss six, as they are all comparatively modern, and confine our attention to the five which form Naples proper and were included within the circuit of the mediæval fortifications.

Here we find the slums of the city ; here all that is left of her quaint picturesqueness ; here are her noble palaces, her finest churches, her historical monasteries. Hence come her crime and her terrible epidemics. Here dirt and misery lurk and fester in neglect and disorder. Here the problems of a great city may be studied in their most rudimentary stage. What an old world city it is, with its narrow tortuous streets winding in and out on the level parts and climb ing up the hills by steps and ramps in every direction ; the tottering houses scarcely prevented from falling in by arches spanning the streets right up to the topmost story, while the narrow strip of blue sky is chequered by the wash clothes, which hang across the street from window to window all the way up the lofty buildings !

Washing at home seems to be the order of the day, but who the wearers of the clean clothes may be must ever remain a mystery, for the general public seems utterly guileless of soap and has an inherent detestation of water.

Chapter II. The Streets

It is a well-known saying, and one that every visitor to Naples may verify for himself, that the Neapolitan lives in the street. If we wish therefore to study him as he is, we must follow him thither and make our reflections out of doors. And what a kaleidoscope of human life is a Neapo litan street; always thronged, always bustling, and yet always different ! Is it Christmas time ? we shall see the shops of meat and vegetables decked out in their gayest colours to tempt the thrifty housewife ; we shall see the turkeys in the balconies pecking away at the fragments of the family dinner, quite unconscious that they are to provide the main feature of that meal on the morrow ; we shall notice the stalls where crackers and other fireworks are sold to gratify the grown-up children of Naples ; for the police are only half-hearted in putting down the practice of street fireworks at Christmas ; and though notice is annually sent round, no one pays any heed to it ; for is not Naples the freest city in the world ?

Is it Eastertide ? — the pet lamb has taken the place of the turkey, and the children are leading him about the streets harnessed to tiny go-carts; he is one of the family till Saturday night, when the butchers walk round with their knives crying along the streets " Who wants his lamb killed ? " Pst ! Pssst ! comes from the top story, a wave of the hand, and the butcher has entered the door. In a few moments he comes down again, wiping his knife and pocketing his money; for the deed is done, and the children's playmate is sacrificed ! But stand back ! get into the doorway behind you, for the charcoal burners' cart is coming up the street drawn by its three struggling horses abreast ! They have come in from the country and can hardly keep their feet on the slippery pavement. They pull up in front of the doorway where we have taken refuge ; the driver has secured his clumsy brake outside the wheel to the tail of his cart.

We shall have a good chance of a look at the harness, with its old-world noseband inherited at least from the Romans, and probably much older. But see the pad of the centre horse, with its brass flags whizzing round like weather cocks, and its casinoof shining brass all bedecked with the Madonna and the Saints. They are to bear their share with the brass horn, the half-moon, and the bells, in protecting the horses, of which the driver takes so little care himself. But we hear the creaking of the brake ; yes, he is taking it off and is going to start again. Turn away, or you will be sickened by his disgusting cruelty. Poor brutes ! they are pulling all they know ; they are skating upon the greasy pavement ; it is fortunate you cannot understand the volley of foul blasphemy which issues from that grimy mouth, but the man's tone is sufficient to indicate the character of his language.

A start is made, refugees like ourselves emerge from shops and doorways, and the little street is full of sauntering pedestrians upon whom the incident has made no impression whatever! Where do all these people come from who swarm like ants on the squalid pavement and scarcely have the room, or the manners, to get out of our way as we go past them ? Where do they all live ? In answer to the first of these questions let us visit the Foundling Hospital, for a very large proportion of the population is connected directly or indirectly with this institution. This magnificent charity is largely endowed, but it is officially regulated by the municipality, who are responsible for its management. Its huge iron gates are open to-day, for it is the " Annunciation," and one of the few days when the public are allowed to enter.* As we approach the gates, we observe a small marble slab in the wall, with the words " Closed June 1875 " carved upon it.