Matilde Serao

“ Let beautiful Naples resuscitate from this day, in all its beauty, goodness, and strength, this unfortunate city which has had its night of Chetsemane, sweating blood, but is now a stronger, younger and greater conqueror.
Let us live again for our country for our families, and for ourselves. Let us live again that we may help all our unfortunate brothers to live anew: let us live again in the fervor of actions in the ardor of will towards a great [125] good, not only in ourselves not around us only, but beside ourselves and much farther, towards all those who suffered unjustly and cruelly. ”

“ It has trusted two men of intelligence, two men of will, the Duke of Aosta and General Tarditi; it has put its trust in the obedience, abnegation, heroism of the chiefs and of the soldiers; it has added to this sane, serious, and practical civil element, and has given much money, it has adhered to all requests, it has answered to all demands. Ready help is active, there where life is. How long will all this last? And can it last? And must it last? The salvation of to day is done! Man has saved man! Those who had power, intellect, good will, ardor, enthusiasm have given it all! ”

“ But while we climb up towards the lava, the mouth of Vesuvius above our heads, roars and thunders. A great column of white, gray, and black smoke stands erect on the cone, and notwithstanding the full day light, we see through those dark and light clouds, long flames arising as through a veil, and showers of sparkles fall in a mass of fire around the mouth, towards our right. The mountain thunders, and breathes as a colossus, it sparkles terribly, dashing stones of fire, masses of fire, rocks of fire every where. ”

“ Save the land, you men of good will. Save it in all its modest and imposing forms: save the little orchard, and the small tract, the garden, the humble edge which closes the large field, save the land of the poor farmer, of the modest peasant, of the small land-owner, fertil or steril as it may be. Modest peasant, save the land, [160] no matter how it is, rich or poor; the land is always the land, the spring of life, the earth which is flour, vegetables, the earth which is life itself! ”

“ The charming towns of Portici, Resina, Torre del Greco, are now completely abandoned, not a soul is left there. They look as dead towns, quite as if dead and deserted since many and many years—Nobody is there to tell us the panic, the terrible panic that has set these people flying for safety, but we know it, we can easily imagine it since we see with our mortal eyes, abandon and death every where. ”

“ Let religion glorify itself in this civilised work of peace in the minds of this population. Let yourself and your clergy have the merit as Christian and as Neapolitan citizen, to calm this delirium of fright and give back tranquillity to all this population in confusion. Repeat, repeat to these poor people, that for them and their families no danger is to be feared, and people will believe it. Let this noble and great, work be one of those beautiful and glorious social events, of which religion has always been and is always capable when any misfortune has befallen to this city. ”

“ The house is burning little by little. The shutters, the doors, all wooden things in contact with the lava, are beginning to burn, then it will be the turn of the beams, of the sustaining [210] arches and the walls; every thing will be consumed to ashes, and only some ruins will remain.
How long will it take? Who knows? The work of fire is silent and tenacious like a human vengeance. After an hour's march we abandon the poor, deserted dwellings, irremessibly condemned, vowed to death, yonder in the great sea of lava, and we get back in the main road, full of dust, leading to Boscotrecase. ”

“ Every path either steep or easy, is now getting black with people.
But in the great silence of this crowd, in that immense silence, only the roaring of the Vulcano tells the story of this great telluric cataclism. Are we not feeling, perhaps, the earth trembling under our steps? The mountain lightens in flames, getting redder and redder, more brilliant and dazzling every moment. Here in this great valley, once formed by another eruption, here were vines, and olives grew on old lavas of remote times, here is the lava of yesterday. ”

“ These immense clouds now gray, now livid, now reddish now black, towering over our heads, stretching from Vesuvius till here, covering the sea, the city, hiding the sun, darkening the air, these clouds, which will later fall in a long and heavy shower of cinders, these clouds which science and experience declares perfectly innocent it is true, and which enfold the whole city, oppressing it, and giving it such gloomy look, are terrifying, and frightening every body. ”

“ Men of good will, women of good will, each as one may, as one knows, as one must, put your energy, your patience and all your virtues in a sublime effort to mitigate this calamity, to fight it, and, at last, with the help of God and that of men, to conquer it. Let every man find all his strength, forgetting himself and his own small, and perhaps miserable interests, and let the sense of charity become heroic in all those who have some will, strength, courage, and valor. ”

“ But what, and who will save to-morrow man and his house, man and his descendence, man and his bread, man and his field?
Who and what will create a new life firm, continued, of constant evolution?
One is the secret: this country must be saved. Oh men! who are tenderly concerned over the despair of nearly ten thousand people, oh! men of heart and mind, give, give food to all these unfortunate beings, to these poor people who have nothing to do, to the women, to the old people, to the children! ”

“ But did Resina, Portici, and Torre del Greco, ever live? Did these windows, these doors ever open? Were there ever people in these houses, in these streets? Like an immense colossus [55] the pine of smoke rises on the mountain, and everything is shut out from our sight on account of the ashes, clouds, and vapors filling the air. Only the lightning is visible, the thousand flashes cutting the livid and opaque gray. And life is only there on the mountain of horrors, whilst here nothing more is living. ”

“ Every day has its morrow and it is this morrow that we sadly and simply have gone to seek there where the ruins of country and villages have been left. Another sentiment has urged me and the other pilgrims of this humble duty, the thought that now, little by little, the violent crisis being calmed down and passed, people may forget all this great trouble! We are so willingly careless here when deep sorrow has passed, and the sun shines on human misfortunes. We forget so easily the pains and troubles of others, when the pang of their sorrow is ended. ”

“ There he stood before the lava advancing near him: he was there alone, perhaps to keep the little fence from being broken down by the frivolous curiosity of the crowd. Here in the barracks the soldiers are sheltering those who are running away, giving them food and courage, and with the same courage and heart, they gather to them all lost children. Oh unknown heroes! oh our own heroic brothers! oh! our heroic own sons, here through you, the honor of humanity is saved. For you we are still left to believe that the most admirable virtues can still live in the heart of men. ”

“ Let nobody start panic in Naples, in this city which must revive and begin again its work and energy. If a whole city like ours, a whole region, a whole population, from a prince of the House of Savoia to the humblest of soldiers must fall at the mercy of a frightened panic-stricken man, of an official whose business is to be forever mistaken, we would like to know if such absurd thing must be tolerated, if such thing has to continue. ”

“ We feel as if we had been walking for centuries in this hard, rough, horrible street: we feel as if we had to stop at every step and rest; at last, we reach the new Pompei, Ottaiano.
An untold horror of devastation is around us. The most beautiful as well [75] as the poorest houses have tumbled down under the weight of the cinders and stones, and everywhere you see a precipice of bricks, beams, and rocks: it is the death-like solitude of the places where death has passed. A gentleman from Ottaiano, who has just returned here to give some help, tells us all about the catastrophe. ”

“ Going towards Somma While we run at all speed with the elegant automobile a kind friend has lent us towards the other Vesuvian countries not touched by the lava, but about which all kind of sad reports reach us, we hear on all sides the same selfish expressions, the same striking, and wounding words. Where are you going? Where do you wish to go? Are you mad? You cannot go any farther up, there is lava, there are stones, lapillus, ashes! ”

“ Yes also Torre Annunziata is dead! All the houses are closed, all the working shops are deserted. Foundries, manufactures, establishments, all is closed. Never could we have believed that in a single hour, in a short hour of desperate panic, all this could have happened, and that this town this magnificent instrument of work and industry, should be stopped and destroyed like the pines up yonder, in the great valley of the Oratorio at Boscotrecase.
At mid-night, the nine tenth of the population, at the terrible cry that the lava is advancing towards the city, begin to escape. ”

“ The lava is yonder, on the livid background, darkened by the clouds wrapping up the mountain, there where a large white smoke arises, pushed by the wind. It is the road which leads to Boscotrecase, the same road which day before yesterday, while laughing and jesting, we saw full of carriages, cabs, and merry people. Now, all is changed. From that road the lava [58] has come down. The great white smoke leads us, while the wind blows harder. We see trees bending down, they are cypress, the rich cypress of the cemetery of Torre Annunziata, one of the neatest, most poetical cemeteries I ever saw. ”

“ Women, old people, children [37] draw imprudently near, bend over, plunge theirs sticks, their umbrellas in the furnace, with a daring and audacity nearing madness. And Vesuvius continues to roar quite over us. Way up go the flames of the crater, while night falls.
Before us the brown and monstruous mass of the two still lavas, rises frightful and menacing. Terror seems now to take hold of peasants, gentlemen, indigens, Neapolitans, foreigners. A hush of tragedy is over that country of tragedy, with the hardly conjured danger of this night, and the imminent danger of to-morrow. ”

“ Listen God of goodness, father of the unfortunate, of the miserable, of the poor, of those who are running away, grant the desolate, desperate, hopeful trusting prayers of those who ask of you the end of this terrible cataclysm. Sinners and innocents are begging you oh Lord of all Charities, children, women, old people, men who have lived too much, and young ones who have [44] not lived enough, and together they implore you to let this tremendous sea of fire, stones, lapillus, and ashes be stopped. ”

“ Let all those who can think and act fight against this destruction, let them try to master it and to render it less terrible than it is, let the people go not only through frivolous curiosity to the places where the scenes of the Vesuvian catastrophe in all their horror are going on, but let them go with eyes of compassion, and earth souls full of charity. ”

“ You will well understand, what this rolling red river must have been in the fatal night, with the black sky shrouded with sun, crowned with lightnings like a revengeful divinity, this slow and voracious river, which has swallowed up half a country. You will well understand, how a picturesque little village can have been destroyed in its rich lands, in one of its fractions, in its first houses. ”

“ Build, rebuild roofs and hearths that they may find a shelter, but the house will perhaps be empty, [159] and the hearth fireless. Have the streets cleared free from the rocks, lapillus, and cinders which the fury of the vulcano has brought down, but these streets will be deserted and sad. Reform the social life with its laws and regulations, but all that will be a dead letter. Ah! all is useless if the country is not saved. The land which gives bread and fire, the land which gives life must be saved in all its region so terribly damaged. This land alone knows the secret of its resurrection. ”