"'Ooh!' cried the Englishman, delighted with the advice, 'by all means a deaf one. Here is a piaster for you for having thought of it.' The lazzarone ran to the guard-house, and soon returned with an old soldier who was as deaf as a post.

"They began the usual round of the curiosities, during which the Englishman continued calling King Ferdinand any thing but a gentleman, of all which the invalid heard nothing, and the lazzarone took no notice. They visited the Via dei Sepolchri, the houses of Diomedes and Cicero. At last they came to Sallust's house, in one of the rooms of which was a fresco that hit the Englishman's fancy exceedingly. He immediately sat down, took a pencil and a blank book from his pocket, and began copying it. He had scarcely made a stroke, however, when the soldier and the lazzarone approached him. The former was going to speak, but the latter took the words out of his mouth.

"'Eccellenza,' said he, 'it is forbidden to copy the fresco.'

"'Oh!' said the Englishman, 'I must make this copy. I will pay for it.'

"'It is not allowed, even if you pay.'

"'But I will pay ten times its value if necessary; I must copy it, it is so funny.'

"'If you do, the invalid will put you in the guard-room.'

"'Pshaw! An Englishman has a right to draw any thing he likes.' And he went on with his sketch. The invalid approached him with an inexorable countenance.

"'Pardon me, Eccellenza,' said the lazzarone; 'but would you like to copy not only this fresco, but as many more as you please?'

"'Certainly I should, and I will too.'

"'Then, let me give you a word of advice. Take a blind invalid.'

"'Ooh!' cried the Englishman, still more enchanted with this second hint than with the first. 'By all means, a blind invalid. Here are two piasters for the idea.'

"They left Sallust's house, the deaf man was paid and discharged, and the lazzarone went to the guard-room, and brought back an invalid who was stone-blind and led by a black poodle.

"The Englishman wished to return immediately to continue his drawing, but the lazzarone persuaded him to delay it, in order to avoid exciting suspicion. They continued their rambles, therefore, guided by the invalid, or rather by his dog, who displayed a knowledge of Pompeii that might have qualified him to become a member of the antiquarian society. After visiting the blacksmith's shop, Fortunata's house, and the public oven, they returned to the abode of Sallust, where the Englishman finished his sketch, while the lazzarone chatted with the blind man, and kept him amused. Continuing their lounge, he made a number of other drawings, and in a couple of hours his book was half full.

"At last they arrived at a place where men were digging. There had been discovered a number of small busts and statues, bronzes, and curiosities of all kinds, which, as soon as they were dug up, were carried into a neighbouring house, and had his attention speedily attracted by a little statue of a satyr about six inches high. 'Oh!' cried he, 'I shall buy this figure.'

"'The king of Naples does not wish to sell it,' replied the lazzarone.

"'I will give its weight in sovereigns—double its weight even.'

"'I tell you it is not to be sold,' persisted the lazzarone; 'but,' added he, changing his tone, 'I have already given your excellence two pieces of advice which you liked, I will now give you a third: Do not buy the statue—steal it.'

"'Oh—oh! that will be very original, and we have a blind invalid too. Capital!'

"'Yes, but the invalid has a dog, who has two good eyes and sixteen good teeth, and who will fly at you if you so much as touch any thing with your little finger.'

"'I'll buy the dog, and hang him.'

"'Do better still; take a lame invalid. Then, as you have seen nearly every thing here, put the figure in your pocket and run away. He may call out as much as he likes, he will not be able to run after you.'

"'Ooh!' cried the Englishman, in convulsions of delight, 'here are three piasters for you. Fetch me a lame invalid.'

"And in order not to excite the suspicions of the blind man and his dog, he left the house, and pretended to be examining a fountain made of shell-work, while the lazzarone went for a third guide. In a quarter of an hour he returned, accompanied by an invalid with two wooden legs. They gave the blind man three carlini, two for him and one for his dog, and sent him away.

"The theatre and the temple of Isis were all that now remained to be seen. After visiting them, the Englishman, in the most careless tone he could assume, said he should like to return to the house in which were deposited the produce of the researches then making. The invalid, without the slightest suspicion, conducted them thither, and they entered the apartment in which the curiosities were arranged on shelves nailed against the wall.

"While the Englishman lounged about, pretending to be examining every thing with the greatest interest, the lazzarone busied himself in fastening a stout string across the doorway, at the height of a couple of feet from the ground. When he had done this, he made a sign to the Englishman, who seized the little statue that he coveted from under the very nose of the astounded invalid, put it into his pocket, and, jumping over the string, ran off as hard as he could, accompanied by the lazzarone. Darting through the Stabian gate, they found themselves on the Salerno road—an empty hackney-coach was passing, the Englishman jumped in, and had soon rejoined his carriage, which was waiting for him in Via dei Sepolchri. Two hours after he had left Pompeii he was at Torre del Greco, and in another hour at Naples.

"As to the invalid, he at first tried to step over the cord fastened across the door, but the height at which the lazzarone had fixed it was too great for wooden legs to accomplish. He then endeavoured to untie it, but with no better success; for the lazzarone had fastened it in a knot compared to which the one of Gordian celebrity would have appeared a mere slip-knot. Finally, the old soldier, who had perhaps read of Alexander the Great, determined to cut what he could not untie, and accordingly drew his sword. But the sword in its best days had never had much edge, and now it had none at all; so that the Englishman was halfway to Naples whilst the invalid was still sawing away at his cord.

"The same evening the Englishman left Naples on board a steamboat, and the lazzarone was lost in the crowd of his comrades; the six plasters he had got from his employer enabling him to live in what a lazzarone considers luxury for nearly as many months.

"The Englishman had been twelve hours at Naples, and had done the three things that are most expressly forbidden to be done there. He had abused the king, copied frescoes, and stolen a statue, and all owing, not to his money, but to the ingenuity of a lazzarone."

The lazzarone is a godsend for M. Dumas, an admirable peg upon which to hang his quaint conceit and sly satire; and he is accordingly frequently introduced in the course of the three volumes. We must make room for one more extract, in which he figures in conjunction with his friend the sbirro or gendarme, who before being invested with a uniform, and armed with carbine, pistols, and sabre, has frequently been a lazzarone himself, and usually preserves the instincts and tastes of his former station. The result of this is a coalition between the lazzarone and the sbirro—law-breaker and law-preserver uniting in a systematic attack upon the pockets of the public.

"I was one day passing down the Toledo, when I saw a sbirro arrested. Like La Fontaine's huntsman, he had been insatiable, and his greediness brought its own punishment. This is what had happened.

"A sbirro had caught a lazzarone in the fact.

"'What did you steal from that gentleman in black, who just went by?' he demanded he.

"'Nothing, your excellency,' replied the lazzarone. A lazzarone always addresses a sbirro as eccellenza.

"'I saw your hand in his pocket.'

"'His pocket was empty.'

"'What! Not a purse, a snuff-box, a handkerchief?'

"'Nothing, please your excellency. It was an author.'

"'Why do you go to those sort of people?'

"'I found out my mistake too late.'

"'Come along with me to the police-office.'

"'But, your excellency—since I have stolen nothing?'

"'Idiot, that's the very reason. If you had stolen something, we might have arranged matters.'

"'Only wait till next time. I shall not always be so unfortunate. I promise you the contents of the pocket of the next person who passes.'

"'Very good; but I will select the individual, or else you will be making a bad choice again.'

"'As your excellency pleases.'

"The sbirro folded his arms in a most dignified manner, and leaned his back against a post; the lazzarone stretched himself on the pavement at his feet. A priest came by, then a lawyer, then a poet; but the sbirro made no sign. At last there appeared a young officer, dressed in brilliant uniform, who passed gaily along, humming between his teeth a tune out of the last opera. The sbirro gave the signal. Up sprang the lazzarone and followed the officer. Both disappeared round a corner. Presently the lazzarone returned with his ransom in his hand.

"'What have you got there?' said the sbirro.

"'A handkerchief,' replied the other.

"'Is that all?'

"'That all! It is of the finest cambric.'

"'Had he only one?'¹¹

"'Only one in that pocket.'

"'And in the other?'

"'In the other he had a silk handkerchief.'

"'Why didn't you bring it?'

"'I keep that for myself, excellency. It is fair that we should divide the profits. One pocket for you, the other for me.'

"'I have a right to both, and I must have the silk handkerchief.'

"'But, your excelleilcy'–

"'I must have the silk handkerchief.'

"'It is an injustice.'

"'Ha! Do you dare speak ill of his majesty's sbirri? Come along to prison.'

"'You shall have the silk handkerchief, your excellency.'

"'How will you find the officer again?'

"'He is gone to pay a visit in the Strada de Foria. I will go and wait for him at the door.'

"The lazzarone walked away, turned the corner of the street, and established himself in the recess of a doorway. Presently the young officer came out of a house opposite, and before he had gone ten paces, put his hand in his pocket, and found he was minus a handkerchief.

"'Pardon me, excellency,' said the lazzarone, stepping up to him; 'you have lost something, I think?'

"'I have lost a cambric handkerchief.'

"'Your excellency has not lost it; it has been stolen from him.'

"'And who stole it?'

"'What will your excellency give me if I find him the thief?'

"'I will give you a piastre.'

"'I must have two.'

"'You shall. Hallo! What are you doing?'

"'I am stealing your silk handkerchief.'

"'In order to find my cambric one?'

"'Yes.'

"'And where will both of them be?'

"'In the same pocket. The person to whom I shall give this handkerchief is the same to whom I have already given the other. Follow me, and observe what I do.'

"The officer followed the lazzarone, who gave the handkerchief to the sbirro, and walked away. The latter had hardly put his prize in his pocket when the officer came up and seized him by the collar. The sbirro fell on his knees, but the officer was inexorable, and he was sent to prison. As the sbirro had himself been a lazzarone, he saw at once the trick that had been played him. He wanted to cheat his confederate, and his confederate had cheated him; but far from bearing him malice for having done so, the sbirro views the conduct of the lazzarone in the light of an exploit, and feels an additional respect for him in consequence. When he is released from prison, he will seek him out, and they will be hand and glove together. When that time comes, look to your pockets."

We are introduced to Ferdinand IV. of Naples, King Nasone, as the lazzaroni nicknamed him; also to Padre Rocco, a popular preacher, and the idol of the lower classes of Neapolitans; and to Cardinal Perelli, remarkable for his simplicity, which quality, as may be supposed, loses nothing in passing through the hands of his present biographer. With his usual skill, M. Dumas glides from a ticklish story of which the cardinal is the hero, (a story that he does not tell, for which forbearance we give him due credit, since he is evidently sorely tempted thereto,) to an account of the Vardarelli, a band of outlaws which for some time infested Calabria and the Capitanato.

"Gaetano Vardarelli was a native of Calabria, and one of the earliest members of the revolutionary society of the Carbonari. When Murat, after for some time favouring that society, began to persecute it, Vardarelli fled to Sicily, and took service under King Ferdinand. He was then twenty-six years of age, possessing the muscles and courage of a lion, the agility of a chamois, the eye of an eagle. Such a recruit was not to be despised, and he was made sergeant in the Sicilian guards. On Ferdinand's restoration in 1815, he followed him to Naples; but finding that he was not likely ever to rise above a very subordinate grade, he became disgusted with the service, deserted, and took refuge in the mountains of Calabria. There two of his brothers, and some thirty brigands and outlaws, assembled around him and elected him their chief, with right of life and death over them. He had been a slave in the town; he found himself a king in the mountains.

"Proceeding according to the old formula observed by banditti chiefs both in Calabria and in melodramas, Vardarelli proclaimed himself redresser general of wrongs and grievances, and acted up to his profession by robbing the rich and assisting the poor. The consequence was, that he soon became exceedingly dreaded by the former, and exceedingly popular among the latter class; and at last his exploits reached the ears of King Ferdinand himself, who was highly indignant at such goings on, and gave orders that the bandit should immediately be hung. But there are three things necessary to hang a man—a rope, a gallows, and the man himself. In this instance, the first two were easily found, but the third was unfortunately wanting. Gendarmes and soldiers were sent after Vardarelli, but the latter was too cunning for them all, and slipped through their fingers at every turn. His success in eluding pursuit increased his reputation, and recruits flocked to his standard. His band soon doubled its numbers, and its leader became a formidable and important person, which of course was an additional reason for the authorities to wish to capture him. A price was set on his head, large bodies of troops sent in search of him, but all in vain. One day the Prince of Leperano, Colonel Calcedonio, Major Delponte, with a dozen other officers, and a score of attendants, were hunting in a forest a few leagues from Bari, when the cry of 'Vardarelli!' was suddenly heard. The party took to flight with the utmost precipitation, and all escaped except Major Delponte, who was one of the bravest, but, at the same time, one of the poorest, officers of the whole army. When he was told that he must pay a thousand ducats for his ransom, he only laughed, and asked where he was to get such a sum. Vardarelli then threatened to shoot him if it was not forthcoming by a certain day. The major replied that it was losing time to wait; and that, if he had a piece of advice to give his captor, it was to shoot him at once. The bandit at first felt half inclined to do so; but he reflected that the less Delponte cared about his life, the more ought Ferdinand to value it. He was right in his calculation; for no sooner did the king learn that his brave major was in the hands of the banditti, than he ordered the ransom to be paid out of his privy purse, and the major recovered his freedom.

"But Ferdinand had sworn the extermination of the banditti with whom he was thus obliged to treat as from one potentate to another. A certain colonel, whose name I forget, and who had heard this vow, pledged himself, if a battalion were put under his command, to bring in Vardarelli, his two brothers, and the sixty men composing his troop, bound hand and foot, and to place them in the dungeons of the Vicaria. The offer was too good to be refused; the minister of war put five hundred men at the disposal of the colonel, who started with them at once in pursuit of the outlaw. The latter was soon informed by his spies of this fresh expedition, and he also made a vow, to the effect that he would cure his pursuer, once and for all, of any disposition to interfere with the Vardarelli.

"He began by leading the poor colonel such a dance over hill and dale, that the unfortunate officer and his men were worn out with fatigue; then, when he saw them in the state that he wished, he caused some false intelligence to be conveyed to them at two o'clock one morning. The colonel fell into the snare, and started immediately to surprise Vardarelli, whom he was assured was in a little village at the further extremity of a narrow pass, through which only four men could pass abreast. He made such haste that he marched four leagues in two hours, and at daybreak found himself at the entrance of the pass, which, however, seemed so peculiarly well adapted for an ambuscade, that he halted his battalion, and sent on twenty men to reconnoitre. In a quarter of an hour the twenty men returned. They had not met a single living thing. The colonel hesitated no longer, and entered the defile; but, on reaching a spot about halfway through it, where the road widened out into a sort of platform surrounded by high rocks and steep precipices, a shout was suddenly heard, proceeding apparently from the clouds, and the poor colonel looking up, saw the summits of the rocks covered with brigands, who levelled their rifles at him and his soldiers. Nevertheless, he began forming up his men as well as the nature of the ground would permit, when Vardarelli himself appeared upon a projecting crag. 'Down with your arms, or you are dead men!' he shouted in a voice of thunder. The bandits repeated his summons, and the echoes repeated their voices, so that the troops, who had not made the same vow as their colonel, and who thought themselves surrounded by greatly superior numbers, cried out for quarter, in spite of the entreaties and menaces of their unfortunate commander. Then Vardarelli, without leaving his position, ordered them to pile their arms, and march to two different places which he pointed out to them. They obeyed; and Vardarelli, leaving twenty of his men in their ambush, came down with the remainder, who immediately proceeded to render the Neapolitan muskets useless (for the moment at least) by the same process which Gulliver employed to extinguish the conflagration of the palace at Lilliput.

"The news of this affair put the king in very bad humour for the first twenty-four hours; after which time, however, the love of a joke overcoming his anger, he laughed heartily, and told the story to every one he saw; and as there are always lots of listeners when a king narrates, three years elapsed before the poor colonel ventured to show his face at Naples and encounter the ridicule of the court."

The general commanding in Calabria takes the matter rather more seriously, and vows the destruction of the banditti. By offers of large pay and privileges, they are induced to enter the Neapolitan service, and prove highly efficient as a troop of gendarmes. But the general cannot forget his old grudge against them; although, for lack of an opportunity, and on account of the desperate character of the men, he is obliged to defer his revenge for some time. At last he succeeds in having their leaders assassinated, and by pretending great indignation, and imprisoning the perpetrators of the deed, he lulls the suspicions of the remaining bandits, who elect new officers, and on an appointed day, proceed to the town of Foggia to have their election confirmed. Only eight of them, apprehensive of treachery, refuse to accompany their comrades. The remaining thirty-one, and a woman who would not leave her husband, obey the general's summons.

"It was a Sunday, the review had been publicly announced, and the square was thronged with spectators. The Vardarelli entered the town in perfect order, armed to the very teeth, but giving no sign of hostility or mistrust. On reaching the square, they raised their sabres, and with one voice exclaimed—'Viva il Re!' The general appeared on his balcony to acknowledge their salute. The aide-de-camp on duty came down to receive them, and after complimenting them on the beauty of their horses and good state of their arms, desired them to file past under the general's window, which they did with a precision worthy of regular troops. They then formed up again in the middle of the square, and dismounted.

"The aide-de-camp went into the house again with the list of the three new officers; the Vardarelli were standing by their horses, when suddenly there was a great confusion and movement in the crowd, which opened in various places, and down every street leading to the square, a column of Neapolitan troops was seen advancing. The Vardarelli were surrounded on all sides. Perceiving at once that they were betrayed, they sprang upon their horses and drew their sabres; but at the same moment the general took off his hat, which was the signal agreed upon; the command, 'Faccia in terra,' was heard, and the spectators, throwing themselves on their faces, the soldiers fired over them, and nine of the brigands fell to the ground, dead or mortally wounded. Those who were unhurt, seeing that they had no quarter to expect, dismounted, and forming a compact body, fought their way to an old castle in which they took refuge. Two only, trusting to the speed of their horses, charged the group of soldiers that appeared the least numerous, shot down two of them, and succeeded in breaking through the others and escaping. The woman owed her life to a similar piece of daring, effected, however, on another point of the enemy's line. She broke through, and galloped off, after having discharged both her pistols with fatal effect.

"The attention of all was now turned to the remaining twenty Vardarelli, who had taken refuge in the ruined castle. The soldiers advanced against them, encouraging one another, and expecting to encounter an obstinate resistance; but, to their surprise, they reached the gate of the castle without a shot being fired at them. The gate was soon beaten in, and the soldiers spread themselves through the halls and galleries of the old building. But all was silence and solitude; the bandits had disappeared.

"After an hour passed in rummaging every corner of the place, the assailants were going away in despair, convinced that their prey had escaped them; when a soldier, who was stooping down to look through the air-hole of a cellar, fell, shot through the body.

"The Vardarelli were discovered; but still it was no easy matter to get at them. Instead of losing men by a direct attack, the soldiers blocked up the air-hole with stones, set a guard over it, and then going round to the door of the cellar, which was barricadoed on the inner side, they heaped lighted fagots and combustibles against it, so that the staircase was soon one immense furnace. After a time the door gave way, and the fire poured like a torrent into the retreat of the unfortunate bandits. Still a profound silence reigned in the vault. Presently two carbine shots were fired; two brothers, determined not to fall alive into the hands of their enemies, had shot each other to death. A moment afterwards an explosion was heard; a bandit had thrown himself into the flames, and his cartridge box had blown up. At last the remainder of the unfortunate men being nearly suffocated, and seeing that escape was impossible, surrendered at discretion, were dragged through the air-hole, and immediately bound hand and foot, and conveyed to prison.

"As to the eight who had refused to come to Foggia, and the two who had escaped, they were hunted down like wild beasts, tracked from cavern to cavern, and from forest to forest. Some were shot, others betrayed by the peasantry, some gave themselves up, so that, before the year was out, all the Vardarelli were dead or prisoners. The woman who had displayed such masculine courage, was the only one who finally escaped. She was never heard of afterwards."

M. Dumas finds that the climate of Naples, delightful as it is, has nevertheless its little drawbacks and disadvantages. He returns one night from an excursion in the environs, and has scarcely got into bed, when he is almost blown out of it again by a tornado of tropical violence.

"At midnight, when we returned to Naples, the weather was perfect, the sky cloudless, the sea without a ripple. At three in the morning I was awakened by the windows of my room bursting open, their eighteen panes of glass falling upon the floor with a frightful clatter. I jumped out of bed, and felt that the house was shaking. I thought of Pliny the Elder, and having no desire for a similar fate, I hastily pulled on my clothes and hurried out into the corridor. My first impulse had apparently been that of all the inmates of the hotel, who were all standing, more or less dressed, at the doors of their apartments; amongst others, Jadin, who made his appearance with a phosphorus box in his hand, and his dog Milord at his heels. 'What a terrible draught in the house!' said he to me. This same draught, as he called it, had just carried off the roof of the Prince of San Feodoro's palace, including the garrets and several servants who were sleeping in them.

"My first thought had been of an eruption of Vesuvius, but there was no such luck for us; it was merely a hurricane. A hurricane at Naples, however, is rather different from the same thing in any other European country.

"Out of the seventy windows of the hotel, three only had escaped damage. The ceilings of seven or eight rooms were rent across. There was a crack extending from top to bottom of the house. Eight shutters had been carried away, and the servants were running down the street after them, just as one runs after one's hat on a windy day. The broken glass was swept away; as for sending for glaziers to mend the windows, it was out of the question. At Naples nobody thinks of disturbing himself at three in the morning. Besides, even had new panes been put in, they would soon have shared the fate of the old ones. We were obliged, therefore, to manage as well as we could with the shutters. I was tolerably lucky, for I had only lost one of mine. I went to bed again, and tried to sleep; but a storm of thunder and lightning soon rendered that impossible, and I took refuge on the ground-floor, where the wind had done less damage. Then began one of those storms of which we have no idea in the more northern parts of Europe. It was accompanied by a deluge such as I had never witnessed, except perhaps in Calabria. In an instant the Villa Reale appeared to be a part of the sea; the water came up to the windows of the ground-floor, and flooded the parlours. A minute afterwards, the servants came to tell M. Zill that his cellars were full, and his casks of wine floating about and staving one another. Presently we saw a jackass laden with vegetables come swimming down the street, carried along by the current. He was swept away into a large open drain, and disappeared. The peasant who owned him, and who had also been carried away, only saved himself from a like fate by clinging to a lamp-post. In one hour there fell more water than there falls in Paris during the two wettest months in the year.

"Two hours after the cessation of the rain, the water had disappeared, and I then perceived the use of this kind of deluge. The streets were clean; which they never are in Naples except after a flood of this sort."

One short anecdote, and we have done. After a long account of St Januarius, including the well-known miracle of the liquefaction of his blood, and some amusing illustrations of his immense popularity with the Neapolitans, M. Dumas, in two pithy lines, gives us the length, breadth, and thickness of a lazzarone's religion.

"I was one day in a church at Naples," he says, "and I heard a lazzarone praying aloud. He entreated God to intercede with St Januarius to make him win in the lottery."

On the whole, we think this one of the most amusing of M. Dumas's works, very light and sketchy, as is evident from our extracts; but at the same time giving a great deal of information concerning Naples, its environs, inhabitants, and customs, of much interest, and calculated to be highly useful to the traveller. It is also very free from a fault with which we taxed its author in a former paper, and we can scarcely call to mind a single line which it would be necessary to expunge, in order to render it fit reading for the most fastidious. As far as we ourselves are concerned, we heartily wish M. Dumas would travel over all the kingdoms of the earth, and write a book about each of them; and if he is as good company in a post-chaise as his books are at the chimney-corner, there are few things we should like better than to accompany him on his pilgrimage.

11. At Naples, it is customary to carry two handkerchiefs, one of silk, and the other of cambric; the latter being used to wipe the forehead.

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Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine – Volume 55, No. 341, March, 1844

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