7. With the Thousand

29th March 1897

I don't know whether I could have recalled all those events, and especially what I felt, during my travels in Sicily between June 1860 and March 1861, had it not been for a bundle of dog-eared papers I found yesterday evening while rummaging through some old documents in the bottom of a bureau downstairs in the shop. There I had noted down what had happened, and I had probably written them as a rough draft of a more detailed report for my paymasters in Turin. The notes are incomplete, and I obviously recorded only what I thought was relevant, or wanted to seem relevant. What I might have left out I do not know.

***

By the 6th of June I am on board the Emma. Dumas welcomed me with much cordiality. He was wearing a pale brown lightweight coat and looked unmistakably like the half-caste he was—olive skin, protruding, fleshy, sensual lips and a head of frizzy hair like an African savage. Otherwise he had a lively, wry expression, a pleasant smile and the rotund figure of a bon vivant...I remembered one of the many stories about him: some impudent young Parisian had made a malicious reference in his presence to the latest theories suggesting a link between primitive man and lower species. Dumas replied: "Yes, sir, I do indeed come from the monkey. But you, sir, are returning to one!"

He introduced me to Captain Beaugrand, the second-in-command Brémond, the pilot Podimatas (a man as hirsute as a wild boar, his face so completely covered by hair and beard that he appeared to shave only the whites of his eyes) and, in particular, the cook Jean Boyer—Dumas seemed to regard the cook as the most important member of the crew. He traveled with a retinue, like some grand lord from the past.

As he showed me to my cabin, Podimatas told me Boyer's speciality was asperges en petits pois, a curious recipe, since peas were not among its ingredients.

We rounded the island of Caprera, where Garibaldi hides out when he's not fighting.

"You'll soon be meeting the general," said Dumas, and his face lit up with admiration at the mere mention of the man. "With his fair beard and blue eyes he seems like Jesus in Leonardo's Last Supper. His movements are full of elegance, his voice has an infinite gentleness. He seems an even-tempered man, but when the words 'Italy' and 'independence' are uttered you will see him stir like a volcano, with eruptions of fire and torrents of lava. He is never armed for combat; at the moment of action he draws the first saber he comes across, throwing aside the scabbard, and launches himself upon the enemy. He has only one weakness: he thinks he's a champion bowls player."

 

 

"You'll soon be meeting the general," said Dumas, and his face lit up with admiration at the mere mention of the man. "With his fair beard and blue eyes he seems like Jesus in Leonardo's Last Supper.

 

Shortly afterward there was great commotion aboard. The sailors were about to haul up a large turtle of the kind to be found south of Corsica. Dumas was delighted.

"There'll be work to do. First you have to turn it on its back. The turtle innocently stretches out its neck and you take advantage of its imprudence to cut off its head—thwack!—before hanging it by the tail to let it bleed for twelve hours. Then you turn it on its back again, insert a strong blade between the carapace and the breastplate, being very careful not to perforate the gallbladder, otherwise it becomes inedible. Remove the innards and retain only the liver—the transparent pulp inside serves no purpose, but there are two lobes that, because of their whiteness and their flavor, seem like two veal noisettes. Finally, remove the membranes, the neck and the flippers. Cut them into pieces the size of walnuts, leave them to soak, then add the pieces to a good broth, with pepper, cloves, carrot, thyme and a bay leaf, and cook together for three or four hours over low heat. In the meantime, prepare strips of chicken seasoned with parsley, chives and anchovy, cook them in boiling broth, then add them to the turtle soup, into which you've poured three or four glasses of dry Madeira. If you have no Madeira, you can use Marsala with a small glass of brandy or rum, though that would be second best, un pis-aller. We'll taste our soup tomorrow evening."

I felt a certain liking for a man who so enjoyed good food, despite his dubious breeding.

***

(13th June) The Emma arrived in Palermo the day before yesterday. With Redshirts everywhere, the city looks like a poppy field. But many of Garibaldi's volunteers are dressed and armed any old way, some with no more than a feather in their hat and wearing ordinary civilian dress. Red cloth is now hard to find, and a shirt of that color costs a fortune—perhaps it is more readily available to the many sons of local aristocrats, who didn't enlist with Garibaldi's men until after the first bloody battles, than to the volunteers who came here from Genoa. Bianco had given me enough money to survive in Sicily and, so as not to look like a dandy, I immediately found myself a well-worn uniform with a shirt that was beginning to turn pink after many washes, and some threadbare trousers; the shirt alone had cost me fifteen francs, and I could have bought four for the same price in Turin.

Here everything is expensive—an egg costs four soldi, a pound of bread six soldi, a pound of meat thirty. I don't know if it's because the island is poor and the occupiers are using up the few remaining resources, or if the people of Palermo have decided that the Garibaldini are manna from heaven and are fleecing them for all they can.

***

The meeting between the two great men at the Palazzo del Senato ("like the Hôtel de Ville in Paris in 1830!" cried Dumas ecstatically) was very theatrical. Of the two, I don't know who was more histrionic.

"My dear Dumas, how I've missed you!" the general shouted. When Dumas offered him his congratulations, Garibaldi replied, "Not me, not me, congratulate these men. They have been giants!" And then to his men: "Give Monsieur Dumas the finest apartment in the building, right now. Nothing is too good for a man who has brought me letters announcing the arrival of two and a half thousand men, ten thousand rifles and two steamships!"

 

I viewed the hero with the suspicion I had felt for all heroes since my father's death. Dumas had described him as an Apollo, but to me he seemed of modest stature, not fair but mousy, with short bandy legs and, judging from his gait, suffering from rheumatism. I saw him mount his horse with some difficulty, helped by two of his men.

Toward the end of the afternoon, a crowd had gathered below the royal palace shouting, "Long live Dumas, long live Italy!" The writer was clearly delighted, but I had the impression the whole thing had been staged by Garibaldi, who understood his friend's vanity and badly needed the promised rifles. I mingled with the crowd and found it hard to understand what they were saying in their incomprehensible dialect, like the language of Africans, but I did catch one brief exchange. Someone asked who this fellow Dumas was that they were cheering, and the other replied that he was a Circassian prince who was rolling in money and had come to place his wealth at Garibaldi's service.

Dumas introduced me to some of the general's men, and I was struck by the hawk-like gaze of Garibaldi's lieutenant, the terrible Nino Bixio, and felt so intimidated that I left. I needed to look for an inn where I could come and go without being seen.

The locals now think I am one of Garibaldi's men, while the expedition corps think I am a reporter.

***

I saw Nino Bixio again as he was passing through the city on horseback. He is said to be the real military leader behind the expedition. Garibaldi gets distracted, always thinking about tomorrow. He is fine during attacks, urging his men on, but Bixio looks after the here and now and keeps the troops in line. As he was passing, I heard one of Garibaldi's men say to his comrade: "Look at that gaze, flashing everywhere. His figure cuts like a saber. Bixio! Even his name sounds like a bolt of lightning."

It's obvious that Garibaldi and his lieutenants have hypnotized these volunteers. That's bad—leaders with too much charisma should be removed immediately, for the peace and security of the kingdom. My masters in Turin are right. This Garibaldi myth mustn't be allowed to spread north, otherwise all the king's subjects up there will be wearing red shirts and it'll become a republic.

***

(15th June) Difficult to talk to the local people. The only thing certain is that they're trying to exploit anyone who, according to them, looks Piedmontese, even though very few volunteers come from Piedmont. I've found a tavern where I can dine cheaply and try various dishes with unpronounceable names. I managed to choke on some bread rolls stuffed with spleen, but with a good local wine was able to get through two or three of them. Over dinner I befriended two volunteers, one called Abba, just over twenty years old, from Liguria, and the other Bandi, a journalist about my own age from Livorno. Their accounts enabled me to build up a picture of the arrival of Garibaldi's men, and their first battles.

"Ah, my dear Simonini," said Abba, "if you only knew. The landing at Marsala was a complete circus! There in front of us are the Bourbon ships, the Stromboli and the Capri. Our ship, the Lombardo, gets caught on a reef, and Nino Bixio says it's better they capture it with a hole in its belly than safe and sound, and indeed we ought to sink the Piemonte as well. 'Fine waste,' say I, but Bixio was right, we shouldn't give away two ships to the Bourbons. And anyway, that's what great leaders do—they burn their boats after landing so there's no retreat. The Piemonte starts the landing, and the Stromboli begins its cannonade but fires wide. The commander of an English ship in port goes aboard the Stromboli and tells the captain there are English subjects ashore and he'll hold him responsible for any international incident—the English, you know, have large financial interests in Marsala because of the wine. The Bourbon captain says he couldn't care less about international incidents and once again gives the order to fire, but the cannon shoot wide again. When the Bourbon ships finally manage to score a few hits, the only damage they cause is to chop a dog in half."

"So the English were helping you?"

"Let's just say they were quite happy to get in the way to embarrass the Bourbons."

"What contact does the general have with the English?"

Abba made a gesture to indicate that foot soldiers like him obey orders without asking too many questions. "But listen to this one. Arriving in the city, the general had given orders to take over the telegraph and cut the wires. They send a lieutenant with a few men, and the fellow in the telegraph office runs off when he sees them coming. The lieutenant goes into the office and finds a copy of the dispatch just sent to the military commander at Trapani: 'Two steamships flying a Piedmont flag have just arrived in port and are landing men.' At that very moment the reply arrives. One of the volunteers who had worked at the telegraph office in Genoa translates: 'How many men and why are they landing?' The officer gets him to transmit: 'Sorry, I've made a mistake, they're two merchant ships from Girgenti with a cargo of sulfur.' Answer from Trapani: 'You are an idiot.' The officer reads it, very pleased with himself, cuts the wires and leaves."

"Let's be honest," commented Bandi, "the landing wasn't a complete circus as Abba suggests. When we came alongside the Bourbon ships, the first grenades and gunfire finally got going. We were having fun, of course. In the midst of the explosions, a plump old friar, hat in hand, turned up to welcome us. Someone shouted, 'Come to make yourself a pain in the ass, Friar?' But Garibaldi raised his hand and said, 'Good Friar, what are you looking for? Can't you hear the bullets whistling?' And the friar answered, 'I'm not afraid of bullets. I'm a servant of poor Saint Francis and a son of Italy.' 'You're with the people, then?' asked the general. 'With the people, yes, with the people,' replied the friar. And that was when we realized that Marsala was ours. The general sent Crispi to the tax collector in the name of Vittorio Emanuele, king of Italy, to requisition all revenues. These were handed over to Acerbi, the quartermaster general, who issued a receipt. A Kingdom of Italy did not yet exist, but that receipt given by Crispi to the tax collector is the first document in which Vittorio Emanuele is described as king of Italy."

I took the opportunity to ask, "But isn't Nievo the quartermaster?"

"Nievo is Acerbi's deputy," explained Abba. "So young, and already a great writer. A true poet. His brilliance shines. He's always alone, gazing into the distance, as if trying to reach to the horizon. I understand that Garibaldi's about to appoint him colonel."

Bandi's praises went further: "At Calatafimi he was getting a little behind, distributing bread. Bozzetti called him into battle and he leapt into the fray, swooping down on the enemy like a great black bird, the wings of his cloak wide open, so a bullet immediately tore a hole through it."

This was quite enough for me to feel an antipathy toward this Nievo. He and I must have been about the same age and he already thought himself famous. The warrior poet. Of course your cloak will get shot through if you flap it open like that—a fine way of showing off a hole that could have been in your breast.

At that point Abba and Bandi described the battle of Calatafimi—a miraculous victory, a thousand volunteers on one side and twenty-five thousand well-armed Bourbons on the other.

"Garibaldi is leading us," said Abba, "on a bay gelding fit for a grand vizier, with a magnificent saddle and fretted stirrups, wearing a red shirt and Hungarian-style cap. At Salemi we're joined by local volunteers. They arrive from all directions, on horseback, on foot, an evil-looking mob, mountain folk armed to the teeth, with bandit faces and eyes like the barrels of pistols. But led by gentry, local landowners. Salemi is filthy, its streets like open sewers, but the monks had fine monasteries and we're billeted there. We get conflicting information about the enemy—four thousand, no, ten thousand, twenty thousand, with horses and cannon, north, no south, advancing, retreating...And all of a sudden the enemy appears. There'd be about five thousand men, but someone said, 'Nonsense, there's ten thousand of them.' Between us and them a barren plain. The Neapolitan riflemen make their way down from the hills. How calm, how confident—you can see they're well trained, not like our rabble. And their bugles, what a mournful sound! The first shots don't ring out until half past one in the afternoon. They're fired by the Neapolitan riflemen who have come down through the prickly pear cactuses. 'Don't reply, don't fire back!' our captains shout. But the rifle bullets whistle past us with such a din that we can hardly keep still. We hear a bang, then another, then the general's bugler sounds the call to arms and the charge. The bullets rain down like hailstones. On the hill there's a cloud of smoke from the cannon firing on us. We cross the plain and break through the enemy's front line. I turn back and see Garibaldi standing on the hill, his sword still sheathed over his right shoulder, advancing slowly and keeping an eye on the action. Bixio gallops to shelter him with his horse and shouts, 'What are you trying to do, General? You'll get killed.' And he answers, 'What better way to die than for my country?' And he continues on, heedless of the hail of bullets. I feared, in that instant, the general had decided it was impossible to win and was trying to get killed. But just then one of our cannon blasts out from the road. We seem to have the support of a thousand men. 'Onward, onward, onward!' All you can hear is the bugle, which has never stopped sounding the charge. With bayonets fixed we pass through the first, the second, the third line, up the hill. The Bourbon battalions retreat higher, regroup and seem to grow in strength. They still look invincible—they're up there on the summit and we're beneath the ridge, exhausted. There's a moment's rest, with them above and us flat on the ground. Gunfire here and there. The Bourbons start rolling boulders, throwing stones. Someone says the general's been hit. I see a fine-looking youth among the prickly pear cactuses, fatally injured, supported by two companions. He's pleading with his companions to take pity on the Neapolitans because they too are Italians. The whole slope is strewn with dead and wounded, but not a groan is to be heard. Now and then, from the summit, the Neapolitans cry, 'Long live the king!' Meanwhile, reinforcements arrive. Bandi, I remember that was when you appeared, covered in wounds, but worst of all with a bullet stuck in your left breast, and I thought you'd be dead in half an hour. And yet there you were on the final assault, ahead of everyone—what spirit you had!"

"Nonsense," said Bandi, "they were only scratches."

"And what about the Franciscans who were fighting with us? One friar, all filth and bones, was loading a blunderbuss with handfuls of shot and pebbles, then clambering up to within sight of the enemy and firing it. I saw one who'd been hit in the thigh pull the bullet out of his flesh and carry on firing."

Abba then began to describe the battle at Ponte dell'Ammiraglio: "By God, Simonini, a day out of Homer! Pure poetry. We are at the gates of Palermo and a troop of local insurgents come to help us. Someone—perhaps he's the first sentry we take by surprise—cries out 'Oh, God!,' staggers backward, takes three or four steps sideways like a drunkard and falls into a ditch beneath two poplar trees, near a dead Neapolitan rifleman. And I can still hear one of our Genoese comrades, just as lead shot was hailing down on us, shouting, 'Hell, which way?' And a bullet hits him in the forehead, splitting open his skull. At Ponte dell'Ammiraglio, along the road, over the arches, under the bridge and in the fields, they're massacred by bayonets. Near dawn we hold the bridge, but we're cut off by fierce gunfire from an infantry line behind a wall, and charged by cavalry from the left, but we drive them back into the fields. Once over the bridge, we regroup at the crossroads by Porta Termini, but we're bombarded by cannon from a ship in the port and are under fire from a barricade in front of us. We carry on regardless. A bell rings out the tocsin. We continue on through the narrow streets, and at a certain point—dear God, what a vision!—three ravishing young girls dressed in white, clinging to a railing with hands as white as lilies, are watching us in silence. They look like angels you see in church frescoes. 'Who are you?' they ask, and we tell them we're Italians and ask who they are, and they tell us they're nuns. 'Oh, poor young things,' we say—we wouldn't mind releasing them from that prison and offering them some sweet amusement—and they cry, 'Long live Saint Rosalia!' We reply, 'Long live Italy!' They also shout 'Long live Italy!' with gentle holy voices, and wish us victory. We fought for another five days in Palermo before the armistice...but with no young nuns to comfort us, just whores!"

 

How far can I rely on these two fanatics? They are young and this is their first experience of war. They had worshiped their general from the very start and in their own way are storytellers like Dumas, embellishing their recollections so that all their geese are swans. They certainly fought well during those skirmishes, but it sounds very strange that Garibaldi could wander around in the midst of the battle (and his enemies would have been able to see him clearly from far away) without ever being hit. Or was the enemy shooting wide on orders from higher up?

I had already begun to form these opinions based on various rumors I'd heard from my innkeeper—he must have traveled around other parts of the peninsula, and speaks a language that is almost comprehensible. And it was he who suggested I should have a chat with Don Fortunato Musumeci, a lawyer who apparently knows everything about everyone, and has shown his distrust of the new arrivals on several occasions.

I certainly couldn't approach him wearing my red shirt, and I thought about Father Bergamaschi's cassock, which I'd brought with me. A comb through my hair, a sufficiently unctuous tone, eyes lowered, and there I am slipping out of the inn, unrecognizable to everyone. It was, in fact, most unwise, as there was a rumor abroad that the Jesuits were to be expelled from the island. But all in all, it went well. And then again, as the victim of an imminent injustice, I could also inspire confidence among those opposing Garibaldi.

***

 

"At Ponte dell'Ammiraglio, along the road, over the arches, under the bridge and in the fields, they're massacred by bayonets."

 

I made contact with Don Fortunato by surprising him, one morning after Mass, as he was quietly sipping his coffee. The café was in the center of town, almost elegant, and Don Fortunato was relaxed, his face angled toward the sun, eyes closed, a few days' growth of beard, a black jacket and cravat even on those days of searing heat, and a barely lit cigar between his nicotine-stained fingers. I noticed they add lemon peel to the coffee down here—I hope they don't also put it into caffelatte.

Sitting at a nearby table, all I had to do was complain about the heat and our conversation had begun. I told him I'd been sent by the Roman Curia to find out what was going on in these parts, and this allowed Musumeci to speak freely.

"Most reverend Father, do you think that a thousand men, gathered together from all over the place, armed any old way, are able to land at Marsala without losing a single man? Why was it that the Bourbon navy—the finest fleet in Europe after the English—fired here and there without hitting a single person? And later at Calatafimi, how did the same band of a thousand bunglers—plus several hundred young scoundrels sent out there with a kick up their backsides by a few landowners who wanted to curry favor with the occupying forces—when put in front of one of the best-trained armies in the world (and I don't know whether you're aware of what a Bourbon military academy is like)...how did that thousand or so bunglers manage to drive back twenty-five thousand men, even if only a few thousand of them had actually been sent into battle and the others had been held back in their barracks? It took money, my dear sir, large quantities of money to pay off the naval officials at Marsala. And General Landi, after a day at Calatafimi when everything was still in the balance, had enough fresh troops to see off those volunteers. But instead he retreated to Palermo! It is said, you know, that they've tipped him fourteen thousand ducats. And his superiors? General Ramorino was shot by firing squad in Piedmont some twelve years ago for far less than that—not that I'm particularly fond of the Piedmontese, but they do understand a thing or two about military matters. Yet Landi was simply replaced by Lanza, who, I reckon, had already been paid off. In fact, look at this famous conquest of Palermo...Garibaldi had reinforced his band with three thousand five hundred scoundrels rounded up from among Sicily's convicts, and Lanza had around sixteen thousand men—yes, sixteen thousand. And rather than using them en masse, Lanza sent them off against the rebels in small groups, and they were overwhelmed—inevitably—not least because various local turncoats were paid to shoot at them from the rooftops. Here at the port, Piedmontese ships unload rifles for the volunteers under the eyes of the Bourbon ships, and on land Garibaldi is allowed to reach Vicaria prison and the forced labor camp where he liberates another thousand common criminals, recruiting them into his band. And I can hardly tell you what is now happening in Naples. Our poor sovereign is surrounded by wretches who have already received their money and are sapping the ground from under his feet."

"Where does all this money come from?"

"Most reverend Father! I am astonished that you in Rome know so little! It is English Freemasonry! Can't you see the connection? Garibaldi a Mason, Mazzini a Mason, Mazzini exiled in London in contact with the English Masons, Cavour a Mason who receives orders from the English lodges, all Garibaldi's men are Masons. The plan is not so much to destroy the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies but to inflict a fatal blow on His Holiness, because it is clear that, after the Two Sicilies, Vittorio Emanuele also wants Rome. You believe the yarn about these volunteers setting off with ninety thousand lire in their pockets, which would hardly be enough to feed that band of gluttons and drunkards during the voyage? Just look at the way they're devouring Palermo's last supplies of food and pillaging the surrounding countryside. The fact is the English Freemasons have given three million French francs to Garibaldi in gold Turkish piasters, which can be spent anywhere in the Mediterranean!"

"And who is looking after the gold?"

"The general's trusted Freemason, Captain Nievo, a young whippersnapper, not yet thirty years old, who is no less than the official paymaster. But these devils are paying off generals, admirals and anyone you like, while poor people starve. The peasants were expecting Garibaldi to divide up their masters' estates, and instead the general has sided with those who own land and money. Mark my words, those young ruffians who went off to risk their lives at Calatafimi, as soon as they realize nothing has changed, will start shooting at the volunteers, and with the very same rifles they've stolen from the dead."

Abandoning the cassock, I wandered about the city in my red shirt and happened upon a monk, Father Carmelo, on the steps of a church. He said he was twenty-seven but looked forty. He wanted to join us, he confided, but something was holding him back. I asked him what it was—after all, there had been friars at Calatafimi.

"I would come with you," he said, "if I was sure you were doing something truly great. All you can say is that you want to unite Italy so as to create one country. If the people are suffering, they will suffer whether united or divided, and I don't know if you'll be able to stop that suffering."

"But the people will have freedom and schools," I told him.

"Freedom is not bread, nor are schools. Perhaps such things are enough for you up there in Piedmont, but not for us Sicilians."

"What do you want, then?"

"Not a war against the Bourbons, but a war by the poor against those who are starving them, who aren't just at court, but all over the place."

"And that includes you monks, whose monasteries and lands are everywhere?"

"Yes, it includes us—indeed us first, before everyone else! But with the Gospel and with the Cross. Then I'd come. Your way is not enough."

From what I'd learned at university about the famous Communist Manifesto, this monk must be one of them. I understand so little about this island of Sicily.

***

Perhaps because I have been obsessed by the idea since my grandfather's time, I began to wonder whether the Jews were also involved in this conspiracy to support Garibaldi. They are nearly always involved somehow. So I went back to see Musumeci.

"But of course," he said. "First of all, while not all Masons are Jews, all Jews are Masons. And what about Garibaldi's men? I was amused to look at the list of volunteers at Marsala, published 'in honor of those gallant men.' And there I found names such as Eugenio Ravà, Giuseppe Uziel, Isacco D'Ancona, Samuele Marchesi, Abramo Isacco Alpron, Moisé Maldacea and Colombo Donato, formerly known as Abramo. Do you suppose they're good Christians with names like that?"

***

(16th June) I went to visit Captain Nievo, carrying the letter of introduction. He's a young blade with a pair of well-groomed whiskers and a tuft beneath his lip, who cultivates the attitude of a dreamer. A mere pose—while we were speaking, a volunteer came in to ask about some blankets to be collected, and like an officious bookkeeper he reminded him that his company had already been given ten the previous week. "Are you eating blankets?" Nievo asked. "If you want to eat any more, I'll send you off to a cell to digest them." The volunteer saluted and disappeared.

"You see what work I have to do? They'll have told you I'm a man of letters. And yet I have to supply soldiers with money and clothing, and order twenty thousand new uniforms because every day new volunteers arrive from Genoa, La Spezia and Livorno. Then there are pleas for money—counts and duchesses who want an allowance of two hundred ducats a month and think that Garibaldi is the archangel of the Lord. Everyone here expects matters to be sorted out from above. It's not like the north—if we want something, we get going and do it. They've entrusted the coffers to me, perhaps because I graduated from Padua in civil and canon law, or because I'm not a thief, which is a great virtue on this island where prince and shyster are one and the same."

He clearly enjoyed playing the absent-minded poet. When I asked him whether he'd already been made colonel, he said he didn't know. "The situation here is rather confused," he said. "Bixio is trying to impose the sort of discipline you find in Piedmont, as if it were a military academy, but we're just a band of irregular troops. Leave out such trifles, however, if you're writing articles for Turin. Try to convey the true excitement, the enthusiasm everybody feels. There are people here who are laying down their lives for something they believe in. The rest are treating it as an adventure in colonial lands. Palermo's an amusing place to live: people gossip here as they do in Venice. We are admired as heroes, and two spans of red smock and seventy centimeters of scimitar make us desirable in the eyes of many beautiful women whose virtue is but skin deep. There's hardly an evening when we don't have a box at the theater, and the sherbets are excellent."

"You tell me you have to deal with so many expenses, but how do you manage on the little you had when you left Genoa? Are you using the money you impounded at Marsala?"

"That was small change. No, no, as soon as we arrived in Palermo, the general sent Crispi to draw money from the Bank of the Two Sicilies."

"Yes, I heard. There was talk of five million ducats ..."

At that point the poet became the general's trusted deputy once again. He gazed up at the sky. "They say all sorts of things, you know. But you must remember the donations from patriots throughout Italy and, I should say, throughout Europe—and write that in your newspaper in Turin, for those who haven't been keeping up with events. But the most difficult business is keeping the books in order, because when this officially becomes the Kingdom of Italy I'll have to hand everything over to His Majesty's government, accounting for every cent."

And what will you do with those millions from the English Masons, I thought to myself. Or perhaps you, Garibaldi and Cavour are all agreed—the money's there but not to be talked about. Then again, perhaps the money's there and you know nothing about it—you're the front man, the virtuous little fellow whom they (whoever they are) are using as a cover, and you imagine all these battles have been won by the grace of God alone. I still wasn't clear about the man. The only note of sincerity I found in his words was his bitter regret that while, over those weeks, the volunteers had been heading, victory after victory, toward the eastern coast and preparing to cross the strait into Calabria and on to Naples, he had been ordered to remain behind the lines, keeping the accounts in Palermo, and he was champing at the bit. Some people are like that. Instead of being thankful that fate had offered him fine sherbets and pretty women, he wanted his cloak to be peppered with more bullets.

I have heard it said that over a billion people inhabit this earth. I don't know how anyone could count them, but from one look around Palermo it's quite clear that there are too many of us and that we're already stepping on each other's toes. And most people smell. There isn't sufficient food. Just imagine if there were any more of us. We therefore have to cull the population. True, there are plagues and suicides, capital punishment, those who challenge each other to duels and who get pleasure from riding at breakneck speed through woods and meadows. I've even heard of English gentlemen who go swimming in the sea and, of course, drown. But it is not enough. Wars are the most effective and natural way imaginable for stemming the increase in human numbers. Once upon a time, when people went off to war, didn't they say it was God's will? But to do so, you need people who want to fight. If no one wants to fight, no one will die. Then wars would be pointless. So it's vital to have men like Nievo, Abba and Bandi who want to throw themselves in the line of fire. Others like me can then live without being harassed by so many people breathing down our necks.

In other words, although I don't like them, we do need noble-spirited souls.

***

Next I called on La Farina, presenting my letter of introduction.

"If you're expecting me to give you some good news to send to Turin," he said, "you can forget it. There's no government here. Garibaldi and Bixio think they're in charge of Genoese people like them, not Sicilians like me. In a country that has no conscription, they actually thought they could call up thirty thousand men. In many towns there were serious revolts. They've decreed that all former royal officials are disqualified from local councils, but they are the only ones who can read and write. The other day some rabid anticlericalists suggested burning down the public library because it had been founded by Jesuits. The governor of Palermo is a youngster called Marcilepre, of whom no one's ever heard. In inland areas, crimes of every kind are being committed, and those who should be keeping order are often murderers themselves—control is now in the hands of out-and-out brigands. Garibaldi is an honest man but unable to see what is happening under his nose. From a single consignment of horses requisitioned in the province of Palermo, two hundred have disappeared! Permission to assemble a battalion is given to anyone who asks, so we have some battalions, complete with brass band and officers, with only forty or fifty soldiers at most! The same job is given to three or four people. All of the judges in Sicily have been sacked, and the civil, criminal and commercial courts have been replaced with military commissions that judge everything and everyone, as in the time of the Huns. Crispi and his band say that Garibaldi doesn't want civilian courts because judges and lawyers can't be trusted, that he doesn't want a parliament because its members use the pen rather than the sword, that he doesn't want a police force because citizens must arm and defend themselves. I have no idea whether this is true—I'm no longer able to confer with the general."

On the 7th of July I heard that La Farina had been arrested and sent back to Turin on Garibaldi's orders, evidently urged on by Crispi. Cavour no longer has an informer. All will depend, then, on my report.

It's pointless now to dress as a priest to collect information: there's plenty of gossip in the taverns, and it's sometimes the volunteers themselves who complain how badly things are going. I hear that around fifty of the Sicilians who enlisted with Garibaldi's men when they arrived in Palermo have deserted, some taking their weapons with them. "They're peasants who flare up like straw and quickly tire," explains Abba. The council of war passes death sentences on them but then lets them wander off where they choose, provided it's far away. I try to understand the true feelings of these people. The excitement that prevails throughout Sicily is entirely dependent on the fact that this land is godforsaken, sun-scorched and waterless (apart from the sea), with a few prickly fruits. Then, in a country where nothing had happened for centuries, Garibaldi and his followers arrive. It's not that the people support him, or that they still support the king whom Garibaldi is overthrowing. They are simply intoxicated by the fact that something different is going on—and everyone interprets "different" as they please. Perhaps this great wind of change is just a south wind that will lull everyone back to sleep.

***

(30th July) Nievo, with whom I have now become quite friendly, confides in me that Garibaldi has received a formal letter from Vittorio Emanuele ordering him not to cross the strait. But the order is accompanied by a secret message from the king, saying more or less: "I wrote the first message to you as king, but now I'm advising you to reply that you'd like to follow my advice but your duty to Italy prevents you from making any effort not to help the people of Naples when they appeal to you to liberate them." The king is double bluffing, but against whom? Against Cavour? Or against Garibaldi himself, whom first he orders not to cross to the mainland, then encourages to cross...and after he has done so, the king will punish him for his disobedience by marching his troops from Piedmont down to Naples?

"The general is too naive, he'll fall into a trap," says Nievo. "I'd like to be with him, but it's my duty to stay here."

This man is highly intelligent, but I've realized he too is fired by adoration for Garibaldi. In a moment of weakness he let me see a slim volume of his poetry that had just arrived, titled Amori garibaldini, printed up north without his being able to check the proofs.

"I hope my readers will allow me in my role as hero to be a bit of a brute. Here they've done all they can to demonstrate this by leaving a number of shameful printing errors."

I read one of his compositions, dedicated to Garibaldi, and have come to the conclusion that Nievo must indeed be a bit of a brute:

 

In his eyes such strange appeal
It fills each mind with splendor
That people feel the urge to kneel
And incline their heads in prayer.
Around the crowded city squares,
Courteous, human as he passes
Tending his hand left and right
To the assembled lasses.

 

Everyone here is going mad over this bowlegged little man.

 

 

In his eyes such strange appeal / It fills each mind with splendor / That people feel the urge to kneel / And incline their heads in prayer.

***

(12th August) When I visit Nievo to ask whether it is true what they say about Garibaldi and his men having landed on the coast of Calabria, I find him in low spirits, almost in tears. News has reached him from Turin that there are unpleasant rumors about the way he's handling matters.

"But I keep everything noted down here," and he slams his fist on the account books, bound in red cloth. "Every receipt and every expense. And if anything has been stolen, my accounts will show it. When I hand this over to the appropriate authorities, several heads will roll. Not mine."

***

(26th August) I am no strategist, but from the news I receive I think I can see what is going on. Certain ministers in Naples, spurred on by Masonic gold or by their conversion to the Savoy cause, are plotting against King Francesco. A revolt is about to take place in Naples, the rebels will ask the Piedmont government for help, and Vittorio Emanuele will come south. Garibaldi seems not to be aware of anything, or perhaps he's aware of everything and is hastening his maneuvers so he can reach Naples before Vittorio Emanuele does.

***

I find Nievo in a rage, waving a letter. "Your friend Dumas," he says, "plays at being Croesus, then imagines that I am Croesus! Look what he's written—and he has the gall to say he's doing it in the general's name! Swiss and Bavarian mercenaries around Naples, hired by the Bourbons, smell defeat and are offering to desert for four ducats a head. And there are five thousand of them, which means twenty thousand ducats, or ninety thousand francs. Dumas, who had seemed to be his own Count of Monte Cristo, doesn't have that much, and grandly offers the paltry sum of one thousand francs. He says they'll collect three thousand from patriots in Naples, and asks if by any chance I would put up the rest. Where does he think I would get such a sum?"

He offers me a drink. "You see, Simonini, everyone is getting excited about the landings on the mainland, and no one seems to know anything about a tragedy that will weigh shamefully on the history of our expedition. It took place at Bronte, near Catania, a town of ten thousand inhabitants, mostly sharecroppers and shepherds, still slaves to a system akin to medieval feudalism. The whole area had been presented as a gift to Lord Nelson, along with the title of Duke of Bronte, and in any event the land had always been in the hands of a few wealthy people, or galantuomini, as they are called down there. The people were exploited and treated like animals—they couldn't even go into the landowners' woods to gather wild plants for food and had to pay a toll when they went into the fields. When Garibaldi arrives, these people imagine that the time has come for justice and that the land will be returned to them. They form committees of so-called liberals, and the leading figure is a lawyer named Lombardo. But Bronte is owned by Nelson's English heirs, and the English had helped Garibaldi at Marsala. So whom should he support? At this point the people stop listening to Avvocato Lombardo and other liberals and lose all control, triggering a popular riot, a mass slaughter, and they massacre the landowning gentry. They've done wrong, that's perfectly obvious, and among the rebels were also ex-convicts—with the havoc reigning on the island, many rogues had been set free who ought to have been kept inside...But it all happened because of our arrival. Under pressure from the English, Garibaldi sends Bixio to Bronte, and he's not a man to beat around the bush. He orders a siege, begins harsh reprisals against the population, hears the allegations made by the gentry and identifies Avvocato Lombardo as the ringleader of the riot, which isn't true, but that doesn't matter. An example had to be made, and Lombardo is executed by a firing squad, along with four others, including a wretched lunatic who long before the massacres had been walking the streets shouting insults against the gentry without upsetting anyone. Apart from my sadness over this cruelty, the whole business affects me personally. You understand, Simonini? On the one hand, news of such actions is reaching Turin, from which we appear to be colluding with the old landowners; on the other hand, there are those rumors I told you about concerning money. You don't need much to put the two together: landowners pay us to shoot the poor wretches, and we enjoy ourselves here on their money. And see how people are dying around us all the time. It augurs ill."

***

(8th September) Garibaldi has entered Naples without meeting any resistance. He's obviously getting rather cocky, because Nievo says he has asked Vittorio Emanuele to dismiss Cavour. Turin will now be needing my report, and I realize it must be as unfavorable as possible to Garibaldi. I will have to exaggerate the Masonic gold, portray Garibaldi as irresponsible, play up the Bronte massacre, refer to other crimes, embezzlement, extortion, corruption and general extravagance. I will use Musumeci's account to describe the behavior of the volunteers, carousing in the convents, deflowering maidens (perhaps nuns as well—there's no harm in laying on the color).

 

 

Garibaldi has entered Naples without meeting any resistance.

 

I'll then produce a few orders requisitioning private property. A letter from an anonymous informer telling me about frequent dealings between Garibaldi and Mazzini via Crispi, and about their plans for establishing a republic, even in Piedmont. In other words, a good strong report to put Garibaldi into a tight corner. Not least because Musumeci gave me another good point to include: Garibaldi's men are for the most part a band of foreign mercenaries. These thousand men comprise adventurers from France, America, England, Hungary and Africa too, the dregs of every nation, and many were buccaneers with Garibaldi himself in the Americas. It's enough to hear the names of his lieutenants: Turr, Eber, Tukory, Teloky, Magyarody, Czudafy, Frigyesy (Musumeci spat out these names as best he could, and apart from Turr and Eber, I've never heard any mention of the others). Then there were Poles, Turks, Bavarians and a German called Wolff, commander of the German and Swiss deserters who had previously served the Bourbons. And the English government provided Garibaldi with Algerian and Indian battalions. Hardly Italian patriots! Out of a thousand, only half were Italians. Musumeci is no doubt exaggerating, because all around I hear Venetian, Lombard, Emilian and Tuscan accents, and I haven't seen a single Indian. But I don't think it will do any harm to play up this hodgepodge of races.

Of course I've also added a few references to the Jews working hand in glove with the Masons.

I think the report should reach Turin as soon as possible, and it mustn't fall into the wrong hands. I've found a Piedmontese naval vessel about to return to the Kingdom of Piedmont, and it won't take much to forge an official document ordering the captain to land me at Genoa. My stay in Sicily ends here, and I'm sorry I won't see what is going on in Naples and beyond, but I wasn't here to enjoy myself, nor to write an epic. At the end of these travels I remember with pleasure only the pisci d'ovu, the babbaluci a picchipacchi (a way of cooking snails), and the cannoli...Ah, the cannoli! Nievo also promised to let me taste a certain swordfish a' sammurigghu, but there wasn't enough time, so all I can savor is the aroma of its name.