Part 12 (2/2)
LAZARETTO, VILLA FRANCA.--There were but eight of the twenty or thirty travellers stopped at the bridge who thought it worth while to persevere. We are all here in this pest-house, and a motley mixture of nations it is. There are two young Sicilians returning from college to Messina; a Belgian lad of seventeen, just started on his travels; two aristocratic young Frenchmen, very elegant and very ignorant of the world, running down to Italy in their own carriage, to avoid the cholera; a middle-aged surgeon in the British navy, very cool and very gentlemanly; a vulgar Ma.r.s.eilles trader, and myself.
We were from seven in the morning till two, getting away from Antibes.
Our difficulties during the whole day are such a practical comparison of the freedom of European states and ours, that I may as well detail them.
First of all, our pa.s.sports were to be vised by the police. We were compelled to stand an hour with our hats off, in a close, dirty office, waiting our turn for this favor. The next thing was to get the permission of the prefect of the _marine_ to embark; and this occupied another hour. Thence we were taken to the health-office, where a _bill of health_ was made out for eight persons _going to a lazaretto_! The padrone's freight duties were then to be settled, and we went back and forth between the Sardinian consul and the French, disputing these for another hour or more. Our baggage was piled upon the _charrette_, at last, to be taken to the boat. The quay is outside the gate, and here are stationed the _douanes_, or custom-officers, who ordered our trunks to be taken from the cart, and searched them from top to bottom. After a half hour spent in repacking our effects in the open street, amid a crowd of idle spectators, we were suffered to proceed.
Almost all these various gentlemen expect a fee, and some demand a heavy one; and all this trouble and expense of time and money to make a voyage of _fifteen miles in a fis.h.i.+ng-boat_!
We hoisted the fisherman's latteen sail, and put out of the little harbor in very bad temper. The wind was fair, and we ran along the sh.o.r.e for a couple of hours, till we came to Nice, where we were to stop for permission to go to the lazaretto. We were hailed, off the mole, with a trumpet, and suffered to pa.s.s. Doubling a little point, half a mile farther on, we ran into the bay of Villa Franca, a handful of houses at the base of an amphitheatre of mountains. A little round tower stood in the centre of the harbor, built upon a rock, and connected with the town by a draw-bridge, and we were landed at a staircase outside, by which we mounted to show our papers to the health-officer. The interior was a little circular yard, separated from an office on the town side by an iron grating, and looking out on the sea by two embrasures for cannon. Two strips of water and the sky above was our whole prospect for the hour that we waited here. The cause of the delay was presently explained by clouds of smoke issuing from the interior. The tower filled, and a more nauseating odor I never inhaled. We were near suffocating with the intolerable smell, and the quant.i.ty of smoke deemed necessary to secure his majesty's officers against contagion.
A cautious-looking old gentleman, with gray hair, emerged at last from the smoke, with a long cane-pole in his hand, and, coughing at every syllable, requested us to insert our pa.s.sports in the split at the extremity, which he thrust through the gate. This being done, we asked him for bread. We had breakfasted at seven, and it was now sundown--near twelve hours fast. Several of my companions had been seasick with the swell of the Mediterranean, in coming from Antibes, and all were faint with hunger and exhaustion. For myself, the villainous smell of our purification had made me sick, and I had no appet.i.te; but the rest ate very voraciously of a loaf of coa.r.s.e bread, which was extended to us with a tongs and two pieces of paper.
After reading our pa.s.sports, the magistrate informed us that he had no orders to admit us to the lazaretto, and we must lie in our boat till he could send a messenger to Nice with our pa.s.sports and obtain permission. We opened upon him, however, with such a flood of remonstrance, and with such an emphasis from hunger and fatigue, that he consented to admit us temporarily on his own responsibility, and gave the boatmen orders to row back to a long, low stone building, which we had observed at the foot of a precipice at the entrance to the harbor.
He was there before us, and as we mounted the stone ladder he pointed through the bars of a large inner gate to a single chamber, separated from the rest of the building, and promising to send us something to eat in the course of the evening, left us to take possession. Our position was desolate enough. The building was new, and the plaster still soft and wet. There was not an article of furniture in the chamber, and but a single window; the floor was of brick, and the air as damp within as a cellar. The alternative was to remain out of doors, in the small yard, walled up thirty feet on three sides, and washed by the sea on the other; and here, on a long block of granite, the softest thing I could find, I determined to make an _al fresco_ night of it.
Bread, cheese, wine, and cold meat, seethed, Italian fas.h.i.+on, in nauseous oil, arrived about nine o'clock; and, by the light of a candle standing in a boot, we sat around on the brick floor, and supped very merrily. Hunger had brought even our two French exquisites to their fare, and they ate well. The navy surgeon had seen service, and had no qualms; the Sicilians were from a German university, and were not delicate; the Ma.r.s.eilles trader knew no better; and we should have been less contented with a better meal. It was superfluous to abuse it.
A steep precipice hangs immediately over the lazaretto, and the horn of the half moon was just dipping below it, as I stretched myself to sleep. With a folded coat under me, and a carpet-bag for a pillow, I soon fell asleep, and slept soundly till sunrise. My companions had chosen shelter, but all were happy to be early risers. We mounted our wall upon the sea, and promenaded till the sun was broadly up, and the breeze from the Mediterranean sharpened our appet.i.tes, and then finis.h.i.+ng the relics of our supper, we waited with what patience we might the appearance of our breakfast.
The magistrate arrived at twelve, yesterday, with a commissary from Villa Franca, who is to be our victualler during the quarantine. He has enlarged our limits, by a stone staircase and an immense chamber, on condition that we pay for an extra guard, in the shape of a Sardinian soldier, who is to sleep in our room, and eat at our table.
By the way, we _have_ a table, and four rough benches, and these, with three single mattresses, are all the furniture we can procure. We are compelled to sleep _across_ the latter of course, to give every one his share.
We have come down very contentedly to our situation, and I have been exceedingly amused at the facility with which eight such different tempers can amalgamate, upon compulsion. Our small quarters bring us in contact continually, and we harmonize like schoolboys. At this moment the Ma.r.s.eilles trader and the two Frenchmen are throwing stones at something that is floating out with the tide; the surgeon has dropped his Italian grammar to decide upon which is the best shot; the Belgian is fis.h.i.+ng off the wall, with a pin hook and a bit of cheese; and the two Sicilians are talking _lingua franca_, at the top of their voices, to Carolina, the guardian's daughter, who stands coquetting on the pier just outside the limits. I have got out my books and portfolio, and taken possession of the broad stair, depending on the courtesy of my companions to jump over me and my papers when they go up and down. I sit here most of the day laughing at the fun below, and writing or reading alternately. The climate is too delicious for discontent. Every breath is a pleasure. The hills of the amphitheatre opposite to us are covered with olive, lemon, and orange trees; and in the evening, from the time the land breeze commences to blow off sh.o.r.e until ten or eleven, the air is impregnated with the delicate perfume of the orange-blossom, than which nothing could be more grateful. Nice is called the hospital of Europe; and truly, under this divine sky, and with the inspiriting vitality and softness of the air, and all that nature can lavish of luxuriance and variety upon the hills, it is the place, if there is one in the world, where the drooping spirit of the invalid must revive and renew. At this moment the sun has crept from the peak of the highest mountain across the bay, and we shall scent presently the spicy wind from the sh.o.r.e. I close my book to go upon the wall, which I see the surgeon has mounted already with the same object, to catch the first breath that blows seaward.
It is Sunday, and an Italian summer morning. I do not think my eyes ever woke upon so lovely a day. The long, lazy swell comes in from the Mediterranean as smooth as gla.s.s; the sails of a beautiful yacht, belonging to an English n.o.bleman at Nice, and lying becalmed just now in the bay, are hanging motionless about the masts; the sky is without a speck, the air just seems to me to steep every nerve and fibre of the frame with repose and pleasure. Now and then in America I have felt a June morning that approached it, but never the degree, the fulness, the sunny softness of this exquisite clime. It tranquilizes the mind as well as the body. You cannot resist feeling contented and genial. We are all out of doors, and my companions have brought down their mattresses, and are lying along the shade of the east wall, talking quietly and pleasantly; the usual sounds of the workmen on the quays of the town are still, our harbor-guard lies asleep in his boat, the yellow flag of the lazaretto clings to the staff, everything about us breathes tranquillity. Prisoner as I am, I would not stir willingly to-day.
We have had two new arrivals this morning--a boat from Antibes, with a company of players bound for the theatre at Milan; and two French deserters from the regiment at Toulon, who escaped in a leaky boat, and have made this voyage along the coast to get into Italy. They knew nothing of the quarantine, and were very much surprised at their arrest. They will, probably, be delivered up to the French consul. The new comers are all put together in the large chamber next us, and we have been talking with them through the grate. His majesty of Sardinia is not spared in their voluble denunciations.
Our imprisonment is getting to be a little tedious. We lengthen our breakfasts and dinners, go to sleep early and get up late, but a lazaretto is a dull place after all. We have no books except dictionaries and grammars, and I am on my last sheet of paper. What I shall do, the two remaining days, I cannot divine. Our meals were amusing for a while. We have but three knives and four gla.s.ses; and the Belgian, having cut his plate in two on the first day, has eaten since from the wash-bowl. The salt is in a brown paper, the vinegar in a sh.e.l.l; and the meats, to be kept warm during their pa.s.sage by water, are brought in the black utensils in which they are cooked. Our tablecloth appeared to-day of all the colors of the rainbow. We sat down to breakfast with a general cry of horror. Still, with youth and good spirits, we manage to be more contented than one would expect; and our lively discussions of the spot on the quay where the table shall be laid, and the noise of our dinners _en plein air_, would convince the spectator that we were a very merry and sufficiently happy company.
I like my companions, on the whole, very much. The surgeon has been in Canada and the west of New York, and we have travelled the same routes, and made in several instances, the same acquaintances. He has been in almost every part of the world also, and his descriptions are very graphic and sensible. The Belgian talks of his new king Leopold, the Sicilians of the German universities; and when I have exhausted all they can tell me, I turn to our Parisians, whom I find I have met all last winter without noticing them, at the parties; and we discuss the belles, and the different members of the _beau monde_, with all the touching air and tone of exiles from paradise. In a case of desperate ennui, wearied with studying and talking, the sea wall is a delightful lounge, and the blue Mediterranean plays the witch to the indolent fancy, and beguiles it well. I have never seen such a beautiful sheet of water. The color is peculiarly rich and clear, like an intensely blue sky, heaving into waves. I do not find the often-repeated description of its loveliness exaggerated.
Our seven days expire to-morrow, and we are preparing to eat our last dinner in the lazaretto with great glee. A temporary table is already laid upon the quay, and two strips of board raised upon some ingenious contrivance, I can not well say what, and covered with all the private and public napkins that retained any portion of their maiden whiteness. Our knives are reduced to two, one having disappeared unaccountably; but the deficiency is partially remedied. The surgeon has ”whittled” a pine knot, which floated in upon the tide, into a distant imitation; and one of the company has produced a delicate dagger, that looks very like a keepsake from a lady; and, by the reluctant manner in which it was put to service, the profanation cost his sentiment an effort. Its white handle and silver sheath lie across a plate, abridged of its proportions by a very formidable segment.
There was no disguising the poverty of the brown paper that contained the salt. It was too necessary to be made an ”aside,” and lies plump in the middle of the table. I fear there has been more fun in the preparation than we shall feel in eating the dinner when it arrives.
The Belgian stands on the wall, watching all the boats from town; but they pa.s.s off down the harbor, one after another, and we are destined to keep our appet.i.tes to a late hour. Their detestable cookery needs the ”sauce of hunger.”
The Belgian's hat waves in the air, and the commissary's boat must be in sight. As we get off at six o'clock to-morrow morning, my portfolio shuts till I find another resting place, probably Genoa.
LETTER XXVI.
Sh.o.r.e OF THE MEDITERRANEAN--NICE--FUNERAL SERVICES OF MARIA THERESA, ARCHd.u.c.h.eSS OF AUSTRIA--PRINc.i.p.aLITY OF MONACO--ROAD TO GENOA--SARDINIA--PRISON OF THE POPE--HOUSE OF COLUMBUS--GENOA.
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