Part 7 (1/2)
I asked several people what St. Luke had to do with Alexandria, and was always told that St. Mark's body was brought from there to Venice in 828, why then should not another of the Evangelists have been there also? Why not indeed? But this reply was as little satisfying as those with which pre-occupied age endeavours to silence inquisitive childhood, and produced much the same sort of result, spurring me on to further investigations.
A musician who desires to compose a tune that shall become popular must contrive something apparently original and yet not so original as to demand study; it must also contain echoes of other tunes previously popular, and yet they must be so indefinite that no one can tell for certain where they come from, which is what we mean when we say it is a wise tune that knows its own father. Similarly, the framers of the foregoing legend had to compose an entirely Christian story, as original as was compatible with the use of the forms of Christian legend, and yet they could not neglect all the pagan traditions with which their public had been impregnated for generations. In the first place the picture must come over the sea--everything that arrives in an island does so; one of the most effective of the common forms in legend is the arrival of a boat with a precious cargo from a distant land, often bringing corn to stay a famine, and every one is now familiar with the opening of Lohengrin. Tunis would not do for the point of departure, not only because it is where pagan Astarte came from when she arrived in Sicily, but also because it had been Moslem since the seventh century and could not have been accepted by the people as a Christian seaport. It is quite likely that the popularity of the St. Mark legend determined the selection of Alexandria, which had the advantage also of being on the coast of the same continent as Tunis. The storm, the vow and the oxen are as much common form in legend as the s.h.i.+p; and the next thing that strikes one is the curious similarity between the alternate domiciles of the Madonna on the mountain and at Custonaci, and the flittings of Venus Erycina to and fro between the mountain and Carthage. If we look upon the arrival of the picture at Custonaci as involving the transplanting of a piece of Africa into Sicily, much as an amba.s.sador's house is regarded as being part of his own country transplanted into a foreign land, we may then consider that the Madonna, to all intents and purposes, still travels between the Mountain and Africa, only she now has an easier journey and avoids actually dwelling among heretics. In this view the transporting of her picture backwards and forwards should be looked upon as the modern version of the feasts of Anagogia and Catagogia.
It is admitted that the picture has, more than once, been placed in the hands of skilful modern painters whose services have been called in merely to repair any damage it may have sustained in its journeyings--they have had nothing to do therefore with the miraculous preservation of the colouring. What these experts thought about the date of the original painting is known only to themselves. We need not suppose that they agreed--that would have been indeed a miracle and quite a fresh departure for a picture with a reputation earned in a different branch of thaumaturgy. It does not much matter, however, what they thought, for experts in matters of art are the victims of such cast-iron prejudices that if once they fancy they see the influence of Leonardo da Vinci in a picture and take it into their heads that it comes from Piedmont, it will be found the most difficult thing in the world to persuade them that it really was painted in Egypt more than 1000 years before Giotto.
We shall probably not be far wrong if we a.s.sume that something like the processions of the Personaggi, involving the display of the most beautiful men and women that could be found, took place on the mountain in heathen times as part of the cult of the G.o.ddess and that, as a compromise, they were not abolished but accommodated to Christian usages.
Giuseppe Pitre, in his _Feste Patronali in Sicilia_, gives an account of the procession on the mountain held in 1752. We are to suppose that the wickedness of the good people of Eryx had attained to such monstrous proportions that the whole universe, incited thereto by observing the anger of G.o.d against them, took up arms in the cause of justice. The Madonna di Custonaci, however, intervened and saved her chosen people.
It began with the Wrath of G.o.d, personified by a warrior armed with thunderbolts and lightning and setting forth to destroy the mountain.
Then came the Angry Heavens, the Benignant Moon, Mars and Mercury ready to avenge the outrages done to G.o.d; Jove grasping a thunderbolt and about to hurl it against the comune, Venus anxious to overthrow the city, and Saturn whetting his golden scythe. The Sun is obscured, the Four Winds blow terribly, the Four Elements a.s.sist in the work of desolation, the Four Seasons threaten misery and affliction. Mount Eryx being convinced by this display that it is in a great danger, the Genius of the city appears next, bearing in his hand a figure of the Madonna di Custonaci.
He calls to his a.s.sistance Divine Counsel, Devotion, Beneficence and Piety, and the procession closes with the Guardian Angel.
It must have been a magnificent spectacle. Many clouds have rested on Mount Eryx since 1752 and we do not now expose our bedrock of paganism quite so openly. This, indeed, but for the slight veneer of Christianity, might have pa.s.sed for a downright pagan procession.
In 1894, _L'Aurora Consurgens della Cantica_ was the subject. There were twelve figures showing the growth of idolatry and culminating with the Emperor Julius Caesar who, it will be remembered, accepted wors.h.i.+p as a G.o.d; moreover, his death having occurred not half a century before the birth of Christ, he was naturally followed by the Aurora, symbolizing the Madonna di Custonaci, and the explanatory pamphlet contained a reference to the _Song of Solomon_ vi. 10: ”Who is she that looketh forth as the morning, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners?” After the Aurora came the Rising Sun, Faith, Christian Civilization, Mount Eryx, Charity and Youth--meaning, probably, that Christianity will never grow old. In conclusion came a car with a copy of the sacred picture and a chorus of youths.
It would seem that the personages formerly appeared on foot, for the earliest record states that in 1750 they appeared for the first time on horseback. In 1897 the subject was _Jael_, and the cavalcade consisted of eight figures, of whom Deborah, seated in the shade of a palm tree surrounded with a chorus of damsels, Jael in the tent with Sisera nailed to the ground, and Triumph, appeared on cars, each of the others being on horseback and the horses being led by grooms suitably attired. A nocturnal procession, whether the figures go on foot, on horseback, or on cars, does not strike one as being a particularly favourable medium for the telling of a story. Nevertheless, by choosing a subject with which the people are more or less familiar, by emphasizing the climax and by providing an explanatory pamphlet for 2d., a more satisfactory result is produced than one would have supposed probable, as I realized when I saw the procession in August, 1901. The sacred picture had been on the mountain since 1893, an unusually long time, and was now to be taken back to the sanctuary at Custonaci, which, during its absence, had been beautified ”in the Gothic style.” The two events of the Procession and the Return synchronizing, there was a double festa, lasting four days on the mountain and four days more at Custonaci.
CHAPTER X--THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE
On the morning of Sunday, 25th August, 1901, every one on Monte San Giuliano was up early and at 7.30 a bra.s.s band began to perambulate the town to announce that the festa had begun. At 8.30 the band entered the Matrice, and before Ma.s.s the sacred picture was unveiled, the band saluting it with a burst of music. Much may be done in music by allusion and suggestion. The service concluded with an extremely graceful movement in six-eight time, that drove the Madonna out of the mind of at least one listener and subst.i.tuted a vision of laughing girls swaying lightly to the rhythm and singing of the dancing waves whose foam gave birth to Venus.
When the church emptied we got a better view of the picture. It is about 6 ft. high by 3 broad, painted in oils on wood prepared with gesso, and represents a smiling Madonna with the Child at her breast. She is seated on a throne in a landscape; two angels hold over her head a ma.s.sive golden crown; the Child is crowned also and in His hand are three ears of corn, to signify fruitfulness; He also holds the keys. The crowns are really only half-crowns, but they are gold or silver-gilt, and are fastened into the wood of the picture. All round the Madonna's nimbus is a raised band of gold set with twelve diamond stars, valued at 14,000 lire. A large diamond earring hangs in her right ear, the only one that is visible; three large diamond rings are on the fingers of her right hand and one on the finger of her left which supports the Child, and suspended all over her skirts is an immense quant.i.ty of jewellery. The frame is of wood entirely coated with silver, in the form of a Renaissance doorway with a fluted column on each side and a broken pediment over the top. It is almost concealed by the jewellery hung about it, earrings, chains, necklaces, rings, watches etc. These are offerings from the faithful, but what is shown is nothing like all.
There is a large chest containing much more and what has been given this year is exposed in a separate case. These valuables const.i.tute the Madonna's dowry and she carries it with her on her journeys; but some of the more important articles never leave the mountain; her diamond stars, for instance, are removed from the picture when it goes down, and their place is taken by less valuable stars of gold.
In the afternoon there were horse-races outside the Trapani gate on a fairly level piece of road, and a concert and illumination in the balio in the evening.
In the course of the day I bought a copy of the explanatory pamphlet.
Its t.i.tle was _L'Arca Noetica_. _Simbolo Mariano_. _Processione notturna figurativa_ (_I Personaggi_) _in omaggio alla Diva di Custonaci Celeste Patrone degli Erecini_. _Ultimo Lunedi d'Agosto_, 1901. It was to be a procession of cars, there were to be no figures on horseback.
Having introduced cars, as in _Jael_, to give special importance to the three points of the story, viz. the opening, the climax, and the conclusion (or, as the pamphlet expressed it, Causa, Consequenza e Termine), it was, no doubt, felt that more could be done with them than with single figures on horseback in presenting the somewhat intractable subject of _Noah's Ark and the Universal Deluge_.
The preparations had taken a month or six weeks. The course is for the arciprete of the Matrice, who is the head of the clergy of the district, to determine what the story shall be and how it is to be told. The designing of each personaggio, or of each group of personaggi, is then confided to one of the inhabitants, who, provided he bears in mind the general scheme, is free to follow his natural artistic instincts. The dresses are hired from Palermo, and an astonis.h.i.+ng quant.i.ty of jewellery is lent by the families of the comune; in 1897 the personaggi carried 85 lbs. weight of it, and far more is always lent than can possibly be used.
It is all gold and precious stones, no silver is to be seen, and nothing is ever lost, stolen, or mislaid; even the thieves become honest on these occasions. It is sewn on to the dresses in various designs and makes them look very rich, so that what is hired from Palermo is only the costumes in the rough, so to speak.
In wandering about the town next day, I came upon four or five of the cars lurking in obscure churches where they had been prepared. It was not easy to make much of them; there were a few rocks, banks and clouds, also the waters of the deluge, all made of papier mache painted to appear real, and in among the rocks and banks were real plants, mostly the dwarf palm which grows plentifully on the mountain. There were wooden supports for the figures, to help them to stand in their places. Each car carried under it an apparatus to supply it with acetylene gas, used in 1901 for the first time.
All day long people kept on coming up the mountain and pouring into the town. Those who did not come on foot left their carts and horses outside, and they all swarmed up through the narrow, irregular, roughly paved streets from the Trapani gate to the balio, till by nightfall the Piazza was as crowded as Piccadilly on Mafeking night. Every one who has been present at an Italian festa knows what it is like--men shouting and elbowing their way through the people with flaming lamps fitted to their baskets, selling water and syrups, cakes and confectionery, melon seeds and peanuts--others going about with halfpenny b.u.t.tonholes of gelsomina, each neatly folded up in a vine-leaf to keep the scent in--three independent piano-organs and a bra.s.s band in the middle distance--an enthusiastic blind singer, a survival of Demodocus in the _Odyssey_, with a falsetto voice and no bridge to his nose keeping a group of listeners spellbound in the foreground with their favourite ballad, ill.u.s.trated by a large sheet of oil paintings in eight tableaux, about the man who murdered his wife and mother with one b.l.o.o.d.y knife--there it is lying on the supper-table--and was ultimately taken by the carabinieri and executed.
This blind singer with no bridge to his nose is a humorist; on one occasion when he was fibbing in a particularly flagrant manner, he enforced his remarks by calling upon heaven to strike him blind and smash his nose if he was not speaking the truth.
While you are thinking that the tumult must be at its height, peaceful nuns are creeping up the convent stair, silently, one by one, they reach the roof, every one can see them collecting together in the moonlight and taking hold of the dangling bell-ropes. All of a sudden you realize what a mistake you had been making about the tumult as the riotous bells fling their additional accompaniments out into the night, all over the town, over the whole comune, down to Trapani, to Cofano and out to the islands.
In the meantime those in charge of the cars had been giving their final directions and seeing that everything was in order, and the personaggi, who had been being dressed ever since early in the afternoon, were ready to receive visitors. About 10 p.m. each of them began to hold an At Home. They sat there silent and motionless in their houses among trays full of superfluous jewellery and surrounded by lighted candles, gazing imperturbably in front of them while people streamed through the room admiring them, fingering their dresses and jewels, and asking questions of their relations and friends. About 11.30 I was conducted along the illuminated streets through the crowd to a house where I stood on a balcony looking up a street down which the procession was to come.
We had to wait till long after midnight, but at last the moving lights began to s.h.i.+ne on the high houses in the distance, the band was heard approaching, and at 1.45 the first car staggered into sight. It represented _The Sons of G.o.d and the Daughters of Men_; there were three of each, reclining in the front part of the car and offering flowers to one another, instigated so to do by the Monster of Iniquity, a loathsome dragon, who was insinuating himself among them from rocks behind, while the Angel of the Lord, a singularly beautiful child, stood on a high cloud in the background, in an att.i.tude of horror, about to take wing from such a world of wickedness. Cupid was there also, sitting at the feet of the daughters of men and taking aim generally.