Christ Stopped At Eboli The Story Of A Year

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LevI

Chris ' stopped" at Eboii

CHRIST STOPPED AT EBOLI

X*

STOPPED AT EBOLI

THE STORY OF A YEAR

BY

CARLO LEVI

Translated from the Italian by Frances Frenaye

FA REAR, STRAUS AND COMPANY
NE W YORK * 1947

Copyright 1947, by Farrar, Straus and Company, IIXQ.

All rights reserved, including the right

to reprint this book or portions thereof

in any form.

Manufactured in the United States of America

by H. Wolff, New York
Designed by Stefan Salter

CHRIST STOPPED AT EBOLI

Because of his uncompromising opposition to Fascism,
Carlo Levi was banished at the start of the Abyssinian War
(1935) to a small primitive village in Lucania, a remote
province of southern Italy. In this region, which remains
unknown not only to tourists but also to the vast majority
of Italians, Carlo Levi, a painter, doctor, and writer, lived
out a memorable time.

1YJL ANY years have gone by, years ol war and of what
men call History. Buffeted here and there at random I have
not been able to return to my peasants as I promised when
I left them, and I do not know when, if ever, I can keep my
promise. But closed in one room, in a world apart, I am
glad to travel in my memory to that other world, hedged in
by custom and sorrow, cut off from History and the State,
eternally patient, to that land without comfort or solace,
where the peasant lives out his motionless civilization on
barren ground in remote poverty, and in the presence of
death,

"We're not Christians," they say. "Christ stopped short
of here, at Eboli." "Christian," In their way of speaking
means "human being," and this almost proverbial phrase
that I have so often heard them repeat may be no more
than the expression of a hopeless feeling of inferiority.
We're not Christians, we're not human beings; we're not
thought of as men but simply as beasts, beasts of burden,
or even less than beasts, mere creatures of the wild. They
at least live for better or for worse, like angels or demons, in
a world of their own, while we have to submit to the world
of Christians, beyond the horizon, to carry its weight and to
stand comparison with it. But the phrase has a much deeper

meaning and, as is the way of symbols, this is the literal one.
Christ did stop at Eboli, where the road and the railway leave
the coast of Salerno and turn into the desolate reaches of
Lucania. Christ never came this far, nor did time, nor the
individual soul, nor hope, nor the relation of cause to effect,
nor reason nor history. Christ never came, just as the Romans
never came, content to garrison the highways without pene-
trating the mountains and forests, nor the Greeks, who flour-
ished beside the Gulf of Taranto. None of the pioneers of
Western civilization brought here his sense of the passage of
time, his deification of the State or that ceaseless activity
which feeds upon itself. No one has come to this land except
as an enemy, a conqueror, or a visitor devoid of understand-
ing. The seasons pass today over the toil of the peasants,
just as they did three thousand years before Christ; no
message, human or divine, has reached this stubborn pov-
erty. We speak a different language, and here our tongue
is incomprehensible. The greatest travelers have not gone
beyond the limits of their own world; they have trodden
the paths of their own souls, of good and evil, of morality
and redemption. Christ descended into the underground hell
of Hebrew moral principle in order to break down its doors
In time and to seal them up into eternity. But to this shadowy
land, that knows neither sin nor redemption from sin, where
evil is not moral but is only the pain residing forever in
earthly things, Christ did not come. Christ stopped at Eboli.

JL ARRIVED at Gagliano one August afternoon in a rat-
tling little car, I was wearing handcuffs and I was escorted
by two stalwart servants of the State with vertical red bands
on their trousers, and expressionless faces. I arrived reluc-
tantly and ready for the worst, because sudden orders had
caused me to leave Grassano where I had been living and
where I had learned to know the region of Lucania. It had
been hard at first. Grassano, like all the villages hereabouts,
is a streak of white at the summit of a bare hill, a sort of
miniature imaginary Jerusalem in the solitude of the desert.
I liked to climb to the highest point of the village, to the
wind-beaten church, where the eye can sweep over an end-
less expanse in every direction, identical in character all
the way around the circle. It is like being on a sea of chalk,
monotonous and without trees. There are other villages,
white and far away on the tops of their hills, Irsina, Craco,
Montalbano, Salandra, Pisticci, Grottole, Ferrandina, the
haunts and caves of the brigands; and beyond the reach of
vision lies the sea, and Metaponto, and Taranto. I felt that
I had come to understand the hidden virtues of this bare
land and to love it; I had no mind to change. I am by nature
sensitive to the pangs of separation and for this reason I
was anything but well disposed toward the new village where
I had to adapt myself to living. I looked forward, however,
to the trip from one locality to the other and to the chance of
seeing places I had heard so much about, and had pictured
in fancy, beyond the mountains hemming in the Basento
Valley. We went by the precipice where a year earlier the

village band of Grassano, on the way back late at night from
playing in the square at Accettura, had been lost. Ever since
that night the dead band-players meet at midnight at the foot
of the precipice to blow their horns, and shepherds skirt the
neighborhood in holy terror. But we passed by in broad day-
light; the sun was bright, a wind from Africa scorched
the earth, and not a sound came from the wastes of clay
below.

At San Mauro Forte, just a little higher up on the moun-
tain, I saw on the outskirts of the village the poles where
for years the heads of brigands were exposed to view, and
then we entered the Accettura Forest, one of the few bits left
of the wooded land that once included all of Lucania. The
definition of Lucus a non lucendo really holds true today
when Lucania, the woodland, is quite bare. To see trees again
at last, and fresh undergrowth, and green grass, and to smell
the leaves was for me like a visit to fairyland. This was the
kingdom of the brigands, and the mere remote memory of
them causes the traveler to cross it even today with a mixture
of fear and curiosity. But the kingdom is a narrow one and
we soon left it behind as we went up to Stigliano, where Mark,
the ancient crow, has been for centuries in the village square,
like a local god, spreading his black wings above the cobble-
stones. After Stigliano we went down into the valley of the
Sauro River with its bed of white stones and an island, now
renowned for Prince Colonna's fine olive trees, where a bat-
talion of bersaglieri troops was wiped out when the brigands
of Boryes marched on Potenza. Here, at a crossroads, we left
the route to the Agri Valley and turned to the left on a re-
cently built narrow road.

Farewell, Grassano; farewell, country seen from afar or
in the imagination I We had crossed to the other side of the

mountains and were leaping up to Gagliano, where only a
short time before the wheel of no vehicle had ever come. At
Gagliano the road ends. My impression was an unpleasant
one. At first sight the village did not seem to be a village at
all, but merely a group of scattered white houses, slightly
pretentious in their poverty. It was not on the summit of a
hill, like the others, but perched on a sort of jagged saddle
rising among picturesque ravines; as I first saw it there was
lacking the severe and terrible aspect typical of the settle-
ments in these parts. There were a few trees and a spot of
green by the way where we had come in, and this very soften-
ing of character was displeasing to me. I was accustomed by
now to the bare and dramatic austerity of Grassano, to its
creviced plaster walls and its mysterious and meditative
silence. The country air apparently hanging over Gagliano
seemed to me to strike a false note in this land which had
nothing of the countryside about it. And then, perhaps out
of vanity, it seemed to me inappropriate that the place where
I was condemned to live should not appear shut in, but spread
out and almost welcoming. A prisoner may find greater con-
solation in a cell with romantic, heavy iron bars than in one
that superficially resembles a normal room. But my first
impression was only in part correct

I was unloaded from the car and turned over to the village
clerk, a spare man, hard of hearing, with pointed black
whiskers on a yellowish face, who wore a hunter's jacket.
When I had been presented to the mayor and to the sergeant
of the carabinieri police and had said goodbye to my guards,
who were anxious to be on their way, I found myself alone in
the middle of the road. It was then that I became aware that
I had not properly seen the village upon my arrival, because
it wound its way like a worm on either side of the single

street, which sloped abruptly down the narrow ridge between
two ravines, then climbed up and down again between two
other ravines, and came to an abrupt end. The countryside
which I thought I had seen at the very beginning was no
longer visible. At every turn there were steep slopes of white
clay with houses hanging from them as if they were poised
in the air, and all around there was still more white clay,
with neither trees nor grass growing upon it, eroded into a
pattern of holes and hillocks like a landscape on the moon.
Almost all the houses appeared to teeter over the abyss, their
walls cracked and an air of general fragility about them.
Their doors were framed with black pennants, some new,
others faded by sun and rain, so that the whole village looked
as if it were in mourning or decked out for an All Souls' Day.
I found out later that it was customary to drape with these
pennants the door of a house where someone had died and
that they are left hanging until time and the weather fade
them out altogether.

There are no shops, properly speaking, in the village, and
no hotel. The clerk had directed me, until I should find lodg-
ings of my own, to his widowed sister-in-law, who had a room
for occasional visitors and would give me my meals as well.
Her house was near the entrance to the village, only a few
steps from the town hall. Before examining my new residence
more carefully, I entered the black-framed door of the
widow's house, carrying my bags and followed by my dog
Barone, and sat down in the kitchen.

The air was black with thousands of flies, and other thou-
sands covered the walls; an old yellow dog was stretched
out on the floor with an air of infinite boredom. The same
boredom and a sort of disgust, born of the experience of in-
justice and horror, were reflected on the widow's pale face.

8

She was a middle-aged woman, dressed not as a peasant but
in the manner of the fairly well-to-do, with a black veil on
her head. Her husband had come to a bad end three years
before. A peasant witch-woman had drawn him into her toils
by means of love potions, and he had become her lover. A
child was born to them, and because at this point he wished
to break off their sinful relationship she had given him
poison. His illness was long and mysterious; the doctors
found no name for it. Gradually his strength melted away;
his face grew dark until the skin was the color of bronze and
finally quite black; then, at last, he died. His widow was left
with a ten-year-old son and very little money, and so she
rented a room to strangers. Her position was midway between
that of the peasants and that of the gentry; she displayed the
poverty of the one class and the good manners of the other.
The boy had been sent to a seminary in Potenza for his school-
ing. When I came, he was at home for a holiday, a silent,
gentle, and obedient lad, already set apart by his religious
education, with his head shaved and a gray school uniform
buttoned up around his neck.

I had been only a short time in the widow's kitchen and
had just begun to question her about the village when there
was a knock at the door and a group of peasants asked
timidly if they might come in. There were seven or eight of
them, wearing black hats and with an unusual seriousness in
their dark eyes.

"Are you the doctor that has just arrived?" they asked me.
"Come, there is someone in a bad way."

They had learned of my arrival at the town hall and had
heard that I was a doctor. I told them that I was a doctor, to
be sure, but I had not practiced for many years, that there
must be a doctor on call in the village and that for this

reason I must refuse them. They answered that there was
no doctor and that their friend was dying.

"Is It possible that there's no doctor?'*

"None."

I was greatly embarrassed and uncertain whether, after
so many years away from medicine, I could be useful. But
how was I to resist their pleas? One of them, an old man with
white hair, came close to me and took my hand as if to kiss
it. I drew back and blushed with shame, as I was to do on
many more occasions during the following year when other
peasants made the same gesture. Was this an entreaty or a
remnant of feudalism? I got up and followed them to where
the sick man lay.

The house was near at hand. The patient was lying on a
sort of stretcher near the door, completely dressed, with his
hat and shoes on. The room was dark and I could just make
out in the shadows the figures of weeping women. A small
crowd of men, women, and children followed me in from the
street and stood in a circle around me. From their broken
sentences I gathered that the man had just been brought back
into the house after they had taken him fifteen miles on a
donkey to Stigliano to see a doctor There were doctors at
Gagliano but they were not decent Christians, they said. The
doctor at Stigliano had told him to go back and die in his
own house. Here he was and I should try to save him. But
there was nothing I could do, for he was very near the end.
The hypodermics I had found at the widow's house were of
no avail, although, in order to satisfy my conscience, I tried
hopelessly to revive him. He had suffered an acute attack of
malaria, the fever had soared above every limit, and his body
could endure no more. With his face an earthy color he lay
limp on the stretcher, breathing with difficulty, and unable to

10

speak, surrounded by the wailing of his friends. In a little
while he was dead. The onlookers made way for me and 1
went out alone to the square where the view widens over
ridges and valleys in the direction of Sant* Arcangelo. The
sun was setting behind the mountains of Calabria and, as
the shadows overtook them, the peasants, dwarfed by dis-
tance, scurried along paths cut through the day toward
their homes.

JL H E scpiare was no more than a widening of the single
street at the level stretch that marked the end of Upper Gag-
liano, the higher part of the village. After this stretch came
a short ascent and then another downward slope through a
smaller square to Lower Gagliano, which ended on the edge
of a landslide. There were houses on only one side o the
main square; the other side was bounded by a low wall over
a precipice known as the Fossa del Bersagliere, because in
earlier days a captured bersagliere from Piedmont had been
thrown down into the ditch by brigands.

It was dusk, crows were flying across the sky, and the
gentry were arriving in the square for their customary gossip.
Here they strolled up and down every day at this time, stop-
ping to sit on the wall with their backs to the dying rays of
the sun while they smoked cheap cigarettes and waited for
the evening breeze. On the other side, leaning up against
their houses, stood the peasants back from the fields, but the
sound of their voices did not cross the square.

11

The mayor recognized me and called me over. He was an
overgrown, corpulent young man with a lock of oily black
hair tumbling over his forehead, a yellowish, beardless face
and darting black eyes both insincere and self-satisfied in
expression. He wore high boots, checked riding breeches, and
a short jacket, and his hands were toying with a small whip.
He was known as "Professor" Luigi Magalone, but he was
only an elementary school teacher, and his chief job was to
watch over the political prisoners sentenced to compulsory
residence in Gagliano. This job he performed with gusto and
zeal, as I soon had a chance to observe. Had he not been
described by His Excellency the Prefect (he lost no time
in telling me this in the emasculated falsetto voice that
issued in a complacent squeak from his immense body) as
the youngest and most Fascist mayor in the province of
Matera? Upon this I had to congratulate the professor, and
he in turn told me something about the village and advised
me how to behave. There were quite a few political prisoners
here, a dozen in all. I was not to see them ; this was forbidden.
Anyhow they were of no account, workers and such, whereas
it was plain to see that I was a gentleman.

I realized that the professor was proud to exercise his
authority for the first time over a gentleman, a painter, a
doctor, a man of some culture. He too was cultivated, he
hastened to assure me; he wanted to treat me well because we
were of the same class. But how in the world had I got myself
arrested? And this year, of all years, when our country was
on the road to greatness? There was a slight hesitation in
this last statement, for the war against Abyssinia had hardly
begun. "Let us hope that all goes well." "Yes, let us hope so."
But I should be comfortable here; the village was heathful
and prosperous. There was only a bit of malaria, nothing

12

co speak of. Most of the peasants owned their land and very
few of them were listed as indigent. The village was one of
the richest in all the province. But I must be very wary; there
were many evil tongues. I had better trust no one. He, him-
self , had many enemies. He had heard that I had taken care
of a certain peasant. My coming was a stroke of luck since
I could act as a doctor. I would prefer not to do so? I must,
absolutely. His old uncle, Dr. Milillo, was just walking up
from the other end of the square; he was the official practi-
tioner. But I need not worry; he would see to it that his uncle
did not object to my competing with him. His uncle was of
no importance anyhow. I should look out, rather, for the
other doctor who was pacing up and down some distance
away; he was quite unscrupulous. It would be a good thing
if I were to take all his patients away from him ; the professor
would stand up for me.

Dr. Milillo approached timidly. He appeared to be a
little under seventy, with the flabby cheeks and kind watery
eyes of an old hunting dog. There was an awkwardness in
his movements that was natural rather than the result of his
age. His hands shook and words came out brokenly between
his upper lip, which was exaggeratedly long, and the hang-
ing lower one. My first impression was that he was a good man
gone completely to seed. It was obvious that he was not very
happy over my arrival, and I sought to reassure him. I had
no intention of practicing medicine; I had gone today to the
dying man because his case was desperate and I knew noth-
ing of the local doctors. The doctor was visibly cheered by
what I said and, like his nephew, he felt obliged to make
a show of his culture, searching the corners of his mind
for outdated medical terms left over from his years at the
university. They were like war trophies forgotten in an attic.

13

Only one thing was clear from Ms stammerings: that he no
longer had the slightest knowledge of medicine, if he had ever
had any. The glorious teachings of the Neapolitan School had
faded away from his memory and melted into the monotony
of a prolonged everyday indifference. Remnants of his lost
ability floated senselessly amid the wreckage of his lassitude,
on an ocean of quinine, the sovereign remedy for every ill.
I rescued him from the dangerous subject of science and
questioned him about the village, its inhabitants and the
life they led,

"Good people, but primitive. Above all look out for the
women. You're a young man and a handsome one. Don't take
anything from a woman. Neither wine nor coffee; nothing
to eat or drink. They would be sure to put a philter or love
potion in it. The women here will certainly take a fancy to
you and all of them will make you such philters. Don't accept
anything from the peasant women. The mayor knows Pm
right. These potions are dangerous. Unpleasant to the taste,
in fact disgusting. Do you want to know what they are
made of?" And the doctor, overjoyed to have at last remem-
bered a correct scientific term, bent over to whisper
stammeringly into my ear: "Blood, ca-ta-menial b-blood."
The mayor laughed in his throat, like a chicken. "They put
herbs into it and murmur some abracadabra, but that's the
main ingredient. They're just ignorant women. They put
it everywhere, in drinks, in chocolate, in sausages, perhaps
even in their bread. Yes, catamenial. Take care!"

Alas, how many philters did I unwittingly drink during
the year! Of course I didn't take the advice of either uncle
or nephew; every day I braved the peasants' coffee and their
wine, even if a woman made them ready for me. If there
were philters in it they must have counteracted each other.

14

Certainly they did me no harm; perhaps in some mysterious
w$y they helped me to penetrate that closed world, shrouded
in black veils, bloody and earthy, that other world where
the peasants live and which no one can enter without a
magic key.

The evening shadows came down from Mount Pollino. All
the peasants had come back to the village, fires were lit in
the houses, and from all around there were voices and the
noise of goats and donkeys. By now the gentry had com-
pletely filled the square. The solitary doctor, the mayor's
enemy, was consumed with a desire to make my acquain-
tance. He walked in ever smaller circles around and around
us, like a diabolical black poodle. He was an elderly man,
stout but of erect carriage, with a pointed gray beard and
a moustache that came down over a wide mouth full of
irregular yellow teeth. The expression on his face was one
of spiteful mistrust and chronic ill-concealed anger. He wore
glasses, a sort of black top hat, a worn black frock coat, and
frayed black trousers. He was swinging a huge black cotton
umbrella which I often saw him carrying later, with great
dignity, in winter and summer, sunshine and rain, open
straight above his head, like a canopy over the tabernacle
of his authority. Dr. Gibilisco was furious and his author-
ity, alas, seemed considerably shaken.

"The peasants pay no attention to us. They don't even
call us when they are sick," he, said, with the bitter and
choleric tone of a pontiff denouncing a new heresy. "Or else
they won't pay. They want to be looked after and not to
pay for it. But they'll find out. You saw the fellow today
who wouldn't call us? He went to Stigliano. He called you.
Then he died, and it's a good thing he did."

On this point Dr. Milillo agreed, with moderation:

15

They're stubborn as mules. Ah, yes. They like their
own way better. We give them quinine and more quinine,
but they won't take it. There's no cure for their mulish-

ness."

I tried to persuade Dr. Gibilisco that I had no intention
of setting myself up as his rival, but his eyes were doubtful
and suspicious, and his anger did not cool.

"They don't trust us. They don't trust the pharmacy. Of
course there's not a complete stock of drugs, but we can
make one thing do for another. If there's no morphine, then
we use apomorphine."

Gibilisco, too, was eager to display his knowledge. But
I soon reached the conclusion that his ignorance was even
deeper than that of old Milillo. He knew nothing at all and
was talking at random. One thing he did know: the peasants
existed merely in order that Gibilisco should visit them and
succeed in getting money and food for his visits. Those on
whom he laid his hands must pay for those who escaped
him. The science of medicine was to him a privilege or jus
necationis, a feudal right over the life and death of the
peasants, and because his poor patients rebelled against this,
he was devoured by a continuous and bestial rage against
their tribe. If the consequences were not always fatal it was
not for any lack of good intentions on his part, but merely
because, in order to do a Christian to death with artistry, a
smattering of science is necessary. The use of one medicine
rather than another was indifferent to him; medicines he
neither knew nor cared to know, regarding them simply as
weapons for defending his privilege. A warrior may arm
himself, in order to be feared, with what weapons he chooses :
crossbows, swords, scimitars, pistols, or even Malayan dag-
gers* Gibilisco's privilege was an hereditary one; his father

16

and his grandfather before him had been doctors. His
brother, who had died the previous year, was, as a matter
of course, the druggist. There was no one to take over the
pharmacy and it should rightly have been closed. But
through the offices of a friend at the prefecture of Matera,
permission had been obtained to keep it open for the wel-
fare of the local population, until its reserves of drugs should
be exhausted. In charge were the druggist's two daughters,
who had not studied pharmaceuticals and could not
be licensed to dispense poisons. The reserves, of course,
would never come to an end; some powder or other would
replenish the half-empty boxes, and there would be less
danger attached to an error in measuring out the prescrip-
tions. But the peasants were stubborn and mistrustful. They
would go neither to the pharmacy nor to the doctor; they did
not recognize the feudal right. And malaria, quite rightly,
killed them ofE.

I found out something about the gentlemen who were
strolling about or sitting silently on the wall. The glittering
sergeant of the carabinieri passed by. He was a handsome
young fellow from Apulia, with pomaded hair and an un-
pleasant face, dressed in a close-fitting, narrow-waisted uni-
form and highly polished shoes, perfumed, always hurried
and disdainful. I had little to do with him; he looked at me
from a distance as if I were a dangerous criminal. He had
been here three years, they told me, and already he had
salted away forty thousand lire. He earned ten lire at a time
by the prudent assertion of his authority over the peasants.
His mistress was the midwife, a tall thin woman, slightly
twisted to one side, with large, bright, languorous, romantic
eyes and a long horselike face. She had the air of being
constantly busy, and her speech and gestures were senti-

17

mental and overdone like those of a small-town cafe singer.
The sergeant, who was the mayor's right-hand man, stopped
to talk to him for a moment. I was to see them often in
lengthy and mysterious consultation, perhaps upon the
hest means of keeping order and increasing the majesty of
the law. Then he walked away, looking straight through
us, and went toward the house of his mistress, down the

way.

Or perhaps he went instead to the beautiful maffiosa, the
woman bandit from Sicily, who lived in forced residence
in the house behind the midwife's. She was a splendid crea-
ture, dusky and rose-colored, whom no one ever saw because,
in accordance with her native customs, she hid her beauty
indoors and, the better to shield her modesty, she managed
to go only once a week instead of every day to sign her name
at the town hall. The sergeant, it appeared, paid her court
in a manner as gallant as it was threatening. Although the
chaste Sicilian was reputed to be invincible, and rumor had
it that many a man in Sicily was ready to defend her honor,
her veiled beauty was hard put to it to withstand the power
of the law in person.

The three gentlemen in the middle of the square, wear-
ing old-fashioned, black, double-breasted waistcoats and
smoking silently with an air of mournful dignity about them,
were landowners. And the slender old man with an intel-
ligent face, standing alone, was Mr. S., a lawyer and the
richest man in the village, a good man with an air of melan-
choly tinged with mistrust and scorn of the world he had
to live in. His only son had died the year before, and from
that day on his beautiful daughters, Concetta and Maria,
had not set foot outside the house, not even to go to mass.
It is the custom hereabouts, at least in the upper class, for

18

girls to stay shut up three years for the death of a fathei
and one for that of a brother. The old man with a long white
beard hanging down over his chest, next to the lawyer, was
the retired postmaster, a crony of Dr. Gibilisco. His name
was Poerio, and he was the only survivor of a branch native
to Gagliano of the famous patriot family. He was deaf and
very ill, unable to pass water and grown extremely thin. He
was apparently very close to death.

These bits of information were furnished me by P., a
cheerful young lawyer who had joined our group. He told
me right away that he had taken his degree a few years be-
fore at the University of Bologna. Not that he was a studious
boy or was consumed by professional ambition. Quite the
contrary. But an uncle had left him his house and lands on
the condition that he study at the university, and this was
how he came to go to Bologna. Those student days had beer
the great adventure of his life. After he had taken his degree
and come back to the village to enjoy his inheritance he hac
married an older woman and found himself unable to ge*
away again. All that he did the whole day long was tc
try to continue his student life in these peasant sur
roundings. How was he to while away his hours and days'i
With card games, gambling for drinks, chatting in the square
and evenings spent in various wine cellars. He had lost mos
of the money left him by his uncle at gambling while he wai
still at Bologna, before it was really his; now his lands wer<
mortgaged, his income meager, and his family growing. Bu
he was still the student of Bologna, rakish and gay. The noisi
fellow on the other side of the square was his companioi
at drinking and cards, the substitute schoolteacher. Thi
evening he was quite drunk, and such was his usual con
dition from early morning through the day. But he carrier

19

his wine badly and soon became choleric and quarrelsome.
When he held forth at the school his shouting could be heard
from one end of the village to the other.

All of a sudden everyone rose and moved toward the post
office. The old woman letter-carrier appeared on the crest of
the road with the sack of letters and papers that she fetched
every day with a mule from the crossroad at the Sauro River
where, after a series of jolts and hairpin turns, a rattling bus
deposited travelers from faraway Matera to the Agri Valley.
To the post office, then, went all those who had crowded the
square, to wait for Don Cosimino, a keen-faced hunchback,
to open the sacks and distribute the mail. This was the eve-
ning ceremony, which no one ever missed and in which I,
too, was to participate every day the year around. The little
crowd waited outside while the mayor and the sergeant, with
the excuse of official business, went in and looked with curi-
osity at everyone's letters. On this, my first evening, how-
ever, the mail was late. Night was falling and I was not
allowed to stay out after dark. I saw the priest arrive, limp-
ing, a thin little man with a large red tassel on his hat. No
one greeted him. Then I really had to go. I whistled to
Barone, my dog, who frisked ahead of me, in ecstasy
over the smells of the dogs, sheep, goats and birds of
his new home, and walked slowly up toward the widow's
house.

The Fossa del Bersagliere was filled with shadows, and
darkness shrouded the purple and black mountains that on
every side embraced the horizon. The first stars were out and
beyond the Agri shone the lights of Sant'Arcangelo and,
farther away and barely visible, those of some other village*
Noepoli, perhaps, or Senise. The path was narrow and in
the doorways the peasants sat among the enveloping shadows.

20

From the dead man's house came the wails of women. An in-
distinct murmur spun around me in wide circles; beyond lay
a deep silence. I felt as if I had fallen from the sky, like a
stone into a pond.

4

THE people of this village are decent people!" I
thought to myself while I waited in the widow's house for
my supper. The good woman had lit a fire under the sauce-
pan because she thought I must be tired from my trip and in
need of something hot. Even the rich seldom made a fire in
the evening, but contented themselves with left-overs from
their noon dinner, a little bread and cheese, a few olives,
and the usual dried figs. As for the poor, they 1 ate plain
bread the whole year around, spiced occasionally with a care-
fully crushed raw tomato, or a little garlic and oil, or a
Spanish pepper with such a devilish bite to it that it is known
as a diavolesco.

"The people of this village are decent people.* 7 My first im-
pressions were not quite clear and I had not yet penetrated
all the secrets of local politics and passions. But I had been
struck by the gravity of the gentry assembled in the square
and by the rancor, scorn, and mistrust inherent in their
conversation. Because they had freely revealed their primi-
tive hates, with none of the reserve they might have been
expected to maintain in the presence of a stranger, I had
been immediately informed of the vices and weaknesses of

21

their fellows. Although I could not yet be quite sure, it ap-
peared that here, as in Grassano, the hate they felt for each
other divided them into two factions. And as in Grassano,
and everywhere, else in Lucania where the upper classes
had heen held back by ineptness or poverty or premature
marriage or family interests or some other fateful necessity
from emigrating to the paradise of Naples or Rome, they had
f unneled their disappointment andjtheir mortal boredom into
a generic rage, a ceaseless hate.

Their life was a continuous renewal of old resentments
and a constant struggle to assert their power over all those
who shared the parcel of land where they had to stay. Gagli-
ano was a tiny village far from the traffic of men; the pas-
sions that reigned there were simpler and more primitive

but no less intense than those of the world without. It should

*

not be very difficult, I thought to myself, to find the key to
them.

Grassano was a larger place, on a main thoroughfare, not
far from the capital of the province. There was not the same
everyday rubbing of shoulders among the inhabitants, and
passions were better hidden, more moderate in appearance,
and involved in greater complexities. The secrets of Grass-
ano had been revealed to me from the very beginning of
my stay there by one of their most ardent participants. How
should I come to know the secrets of Gagliano? I was to
live there three years, a time bordering on infinity. It was a
closed world, in which the rivalries and hates of the gentry
made up the sum of daily events. Already I had seen in their
faces how deep and violent these were; they were at the same
time paltry and intense, like the motives of a Greek tragedy.
Like Stendhal's heroes, I had to lay my plans so as not to ex-
pose myself to error. In Grassano my mentor had been the

22

head of the Fascist Militia, Lieutenant Decunto. Who would
be his counterpart in Gagliano?

When Lieutenant Decunto, the local commander of the
Militia, had summoned me peremptorily the day after my
arrival from Regina Coeli, the prison in Rome, I was afraid
that new troubles were in store for me. I had hardly seen
my surroundings and I did not know what was happening
in the world at large or how high feeling ran in Grassano in
regard to the imminent war with Abyssinia. In the tiny room
that served him as an office, I found a short, blond, courteous
young fellow with a bitter expression around his mouth and
evasive light-blue eyes that waywardly refused to look,
straight at anything, not because their owner was afraid, but
because he was either ashamed or disgusted. He had called
me simply because, like himself, I was a reserve army officer
and he wanted to know me. He hastened to tell me that
although he commanded the Militia he had nothing to do
with the police, the carabinieri, the mayor, or the local Fascist
Party leader. This last was a criminal and the rest fit com-
panions. Life in Grassano was impossible, but there was
nothing to be done about it. Everyone was ambitious, thiev-
ing, dishonest, and violent. He must get away from here,
or else he would die. He had applied for enlistment as a
volunteer in Africa. Never mind if the whole venture turned
out badly; he had little to lose.

"We're playing for all or nothing," he said, looking be-
yond me. "This is the end, do you understand? The end. If
we win, things may improve, who knows. But England won't
allow it. We'll break our head against a stone wall. This is
our last card. And if our luck doesn't turn , . /' Here he
made a gesture descriptive of the end of the world. "We
shan't succeed; you'll see. But it doesn't matter. We can*t go

23

on like this. You're to be here some time. You're a stranger
to local conditions and you can judge for yourself. After
youVe seen what life here is like, you'll concede that I was
right. . . "

I remained silent and unconvinced. But later I had to admit
that, even if it was Lieutenant Decunto's job to watch over
me, he was sincere and his pessimism was by no means an
affectation. He took a liking to me because I was an outsider
and to me he could freely express his resentments. Every
time that I climbed up to the church at the summit of the
village and stood in the wind to contemplate the desolate
landscape, he would appear at my side. His light hair and
gray uniform gave him the air of a ghost. Without looking
at me he would begin to talk. He was, he said, only the last
link in a chain of hates that went back for generations, a
hundred years, two hundred years, or more, perhaps for-
ever. He was bound up in these inherited passions. There
was nothing he could do about it except to eat his heart out.
Here they had hated each other for centuries and would go
on hating, among the same houses, before the same white
stones of the Basento Valley and the same caves of Irsina.
Now, of course, they were all Fascists. But that meant noth-
ing. Once they had all been partisans of Nitti or Salandra,
for or against Giolitti, of the Right or of the Left, for the
brigands or against the brigands, followers of the Bourbons
or liberals, and in times still more remote, divided in other
ways. But in the very beginning there were the decent people
and there were the brigands; the sons of the decent people
and the sons of the brigands. Fascism had not made much
of a change. In fact, before Fascism, when there were
various parties, the respectable could stick together under
one flag, set themselves apart from the others and wage

24

a political battle. Now they could have recourse only to
anonymous letters, corruption, and the exercise of pres-
sure on the prefecture. For all of them were bound up with
Fascism.

"You see, I come from a family of liberals; my great-
grandfather was in prison under the Bourbons. But do you
know who the local Fascist Party leader is? He's the son
of a brigand. Yes, the son of a brigand. And the band of his
supporters, who rule over the village, is of the same caliber.
It's the same thing at Matera. N., the National Councillor, is
of a family that supported the brigands. And Baron Colle-
fusco, the great landowner and proprietor of the palace in
the main square, who is he? He lives in Naples, as everyone
knows, and never comes to these parts. You don't know him?
The barons of Collefusco in 1860 were the real brigand
leaders. They paid the brigands and armed them." His nar-
row blue eyes sparkled with hate. "I see you sitting very
often on the stone bench in front of the palace. A hundred
years ago or more the baron's great-grandfather used to sit
on that same bench, taking the air every evening, just as you
do. He used to hold a small child in his arms, the baron's
grandfather, who became a deputy to Parliament and a sup-
porter of the brigands in his turn. On that bench the old
man was murdered, by a relative of my great-grandfather.
He was a druggist by the name of Palese, the brother of a
doctor. There are still some of the doctor's great-grandsons
in Potenza, and here in Grassano we Decuntos are of the
same family.

"This is how it happened. At that time there was a group of
carbonari, or liberal conspirators, among them the two
Palese brothers, a Lasala, of the same family as the carpen-
ter whom you know, a Ruggiero, a Bonelli, and a number

25

of others. Baron Collefusco, the pretended liberal, belonged
to It, too. But the baron was a spy; he had joined the group
only in order to report on it to the police. One fine day they
held a meeting to plan a future course of action. As soon as
the meeting was over, the baron went home, called a trusted
servant, mounted him on his best horse, and sent him with a
letter containing the names of all the conspirators to the
Governor of Potenza. But the servant was seen as he rode
away. They had reason to suspect him: what could he be
up to on the road to Potenza at that hour on the fastest horse
in the village? There was no time to be lost; they must follow
him and stop him in order to ascertain whether they had
been betrayed.

"Four carbonari set off on horseback but the baron's horse
was better than theirs and had an hour's head start. The
four of them took narrow paths and short cuts and they
galloped so hard all night long that they overtook the serv-
ant just at the gates of Potenza by the edge of a wood. They
shot at his horse from a distance while they were still in
the saddle, and the horse fell. They took the servant, tied
him to a tree, searched him and found the baron's letter.
Then they left him there, tied up, without killing him, and
returned at full speed to Grassano. The traitor must be pun-
ished. The carbonari held a meeting and drew lots to see
who should kill the baron. The job fell to Doctor Palese, but
his brother, the druggist, who was a better shot and a
bachelor, asked to replace him. In those days there were no
houses opposite the palace, only a tall oak tree at the edge
of a field. It was evening. The druggist hid with his gun
behind the oak and waited for the baron to come out for a
hreath of air. There was a full moon in the sky. The baron
appeared, but he had the child in his arms, and he sat down

26

on the stone bench in order to bounce him up and down
on his knees. The druggist held fire, unwilling to hit the in-
nocent child, but when he saw that the child was going to
stay, he had to make up his mind. He was a first-rate shot
and he hit the baron in the center of his forehead at the
very moment when the child was hugging him. Of course
the liberals all went into hiding, but they were arrested and
sentenced. The druggist died in prison in Potenza.

"The doctor also was in prison for many years and might
have died there, too, had it not come about that the Gov-
ernor's wife suffered complications in childbirth and was
near death. None of the doctors in Potenza could help her,
but finally someone thought of calling the doctor who lay
there in prison. He came and saved both the Governor's wife
and her infant son. As soon as she was well, she went to
Naples and threw herself at the feet of the Queen. The doc-
tor received a pardon, but rather than return to Grassano he
chose to stay in Potenza, and there his descendants are living
today. The little boy whom the druggist took such good
care to miss became later, as I have told you, Grassano's
first deputy to Parliament. He, too, pretended to be a liberal
while at the same time he lent a hand to the brigands. His
son, the present baron, never comes here, but he is the secret
protector in Rome of the ruling clique of Grassano, all of
them sons of brigands. 5 '

I never found out whether the details of this story were
true. It ennobled, after a fashion, the feuds still extant among
the first families of Grassano, by tracing their origin back
to remote times and endowing them with causes to some
extent idealistic. But their real significance did not lie here.
The rivalries of the gentry did not derive from an hereditary
motive of vendetta, nor was the struggle at bottom a political

27

one between conservative and progressive elements, 'al-
though at times it took on this form. Each side, of course,
accused the other of the worst crimes. Lieutenant Decunto's
stories were repeated to me, with a quite different emphasis,
hy members of the faction in power.

The truth is that the internecine war among the gentry is
the same in every village of Lucania. The upper classes have
not the means to live with decorum and self-respect. The
young men of promise, and even those barely able to make
their way, leave the village. The most adventurous go off
to America, as the peasants do, and the others to Naples or
Rome; none return. Those who are left in the villages are
the discarded, who have no talents, the physically deformed,
the inept and the lazy; greed and boredom combine to dispose
them to evil. Small parcels of farm land do not assure them
a living and, in order to survive, these misfits must dominate
the peasants and secure for themselves the well-paid posts of
druggist, priest, marshal of the carabinieri, and so on. It is,
therefore, a matter of life and death to have the rule in their
own hands, to hoist themselves or their relatives and friends
into top jobs. This is the root of the endless struggle to ob-
tain power and to keep it from others, a struggle which the
narrowness of their surroundings, enforced idleness, arid a
mixture of personal and political motives render continuous
and savage. Every day anonymous letters from every village
of Lucania arrived at the prefecture. And at the prefecture,
they were, apparently, far from dissatisfied with this state
of affairs, even if they said the contrary.

"In Matera they pretend that they wish to moderate our
quarrels," Lieutenant Decunto told me. "But in reality they
do all they can to foment them. Such are the instructions they
have from Rome. In this way they hold us all through either

28

hope or fear in the palm of their hands. But what have we
to hope for?" Here he made his characteristic gesture sig-
nifying absolute nothingness. "This is no place to live. A
man must get away. Now we are going into Africa. It's our
last chance."

The lieutenant's face turned gray when he spoke in this
vein, and his evasive eyes were white with impotent rage,
their expression became desperate and evil. He belonged
completely to these people, to their hates and passions, he
was one of them and he was eating his heart away. There was
in him a grain of conscience and of dismay. Like all the rest
he believed in the African adventure, in the "living space"
necessary to a degenerate dominating class. At the same
time he was aware, in a primitive and sentimental fashion,
of the decay and spiritual poverty around him, and he saw
the war as an escape, an escape into a world of destruction.
At bottom what drew him most to the adventure was his
premonition of defeat and annihiliation. This was clear
from the tone in which he repeated: "It's our last card." The
gleam of conscience that set him apart from his fellow-
citizens was manifest only in a deep and shameful contempt
for himself. To the hates of the gentry he added self -hate and
it was clear to anyone observing him closely that this made
him more spiteful and bitter than the rest, capable, indeed,
of any evil. It was not out of keeping with the naiVe and over-
simplified views of this young man of good family that he
should rob, kill, play the part of a spy, and perhaps even die
as a hero, because of his fundamental despair. Here lay the
meaning to him of the war In Africa. If it ended badly, what
did it matter? Let the whole world perish in order to efface
even the memory of Grassano, white on the moutain top, with
its gentry and its brigands.

29

the flickering, baleful light of conscience in Lieu-
tenant Decunto," I thought to myself while I waited in the
widow's kitchen for my supper, "is something rare, perhaps
even unique." I had not seen it reflected in any of the dull,
malicious, and greedily self-satisfied faces of my new ac-
quaintances in the square. Their passions, it was plain to see,
were not rooted in history; they did not extend beyond the
village, encircled by malaria-ridden clay; they were multi-
plied within the enclosure of half a dozen houses. They had
an urgent and miserable character born of the daily need
for food and money, and they strove futilely to cloak them-
selves in the genteel tradition. Penned up in petty souls and
desolate surroundings, they seethed like the steam pressing
against the lid of the widow's saucepan where a thin broth
was whistling and grumbling over a low wood fire. I looked
into the fire, thinking of the endless chain of days that lay
ahead of me when my horizon, too, would be bounded
by these dark emotions.

The widow, meanwhile, put bread and a jar of water on
the table. The bread was of the characteristic black variety
made of hard wheat in great loaves weighing five or ten
pounds. They lasted a whole week, the mainstay of rich and
poor alike, round like the sun or like a Mexican calendar-
stone. I began to slice it, with a gesture I had already learned,
holding it against my chest and drawing the sharp knife to-
ward me, taking care not to cut my chin. The jar, like those
in use at Grassano, was of the amphora type made in Fer-
randina that the peasant women cany on their heads, of

30

reddish yellow terra cotta with curves like those of an archaic
figurine of a woman, with a narrow waist, rounded breast
and hips, and handles like two small arms.

I sat alone at the table in front of the heavy hand-woven
linen cloth, but the room was not empty. Every now and
then the door on the street opened and neighbor women came
in. They came on various pretexts, to bring water or to ask
whether they should take the widow's washing to the river
the next day. They stayed far away from my table, near the
door, close to one another, all twittering together like birds.
They were pretending not to look at me but every now and
then their black eyes darted a curious glance from under their
veils in my direction and then darted away again like wood-
land animals. Because I was not yet used to their dress (a
poor sort of costume in no way equal to the famous varieties
worn at Pietragalla and Pisticci) they seemed to me all
alike, with their faces framed by a veil folded several times
and falling over their shoulders, plain cotton blouses, wide,
dark bell-shaped skirts that went halfway down their legs,
and high boots. They stood erect with the stately posture of
those accustomed to balancing heavy weights on their heads,
and their faces had an expression of primitive solemnity.
Their motions were grave but without womanly grace, like
the weighty glances cast by their curious black eyes. They
did not seem to me like women, but like the soldiers of a
strange army, or rather like a fleet of dark round boats wait-
ing all together for the wind to inflate their white sails. As I
was looking at them and trying to understand what they
were saying in a dialect that was new to me, there was a
knock at the door, whereupon they took leave amid an un-
dulating movement of veils and skirts, and a new figure
entered the kitchen.

31

This was a young man with a small red moustache, carry-
ing a long case in brown leather. He was badly dressed and
his shoes were covered with dust, but he wore a shirt and
tie and on his head a strange high-crowned cap with an oil-
cloth visor, of the kind once worn by academicians. Against
its gray background were sewn two conspicuous letters cut
out of orange felt: U.E. for Ufficiale Esattoriale or tax col-
lector, as he told me when I asked him their meaning. He
put the leather case down carefully, sat down at my table,
took some bread and cheese out of his pocket, asked the
widow for a glass of wine, and began to eat his dinner. His
office was in Stigliano, but he came often to Gagliano to dis-
charge his duties.

This evening he was late and he had to spend the night at
the widow's, as he had more work to do in the neighborhood
the next day. He was reluctant to speak of his business, but
he took pleasure in showing me immediately what was in
his leather case. It was a clarinet. He could never be parted
from it but always carried it with him when he went in pur-
suit of the peasants' money. He had to make a living and
this was his job, but his heart was elsewhere, in his music.
He was not yet perfect, for he had studied only a year, but
he practiced continually. Yes, he would play me a piece,
because he could see that I was a connoisseur, but only one;
it was late and he wanted to call on an old friend. The bread
and cheese were finished and there was nothing more to
eat. The clarinet gave forth the fragile and indecisive notes
of a current song and the dogs supplied a rumbling ac-
companiment.

As soon as the musical tax collector had gone out and we
were alone, the widow made abundant excuses for the neces-
sity of sharing my room with a stranger. There was no other

32

choice. "But he's a decent fellow ; he's clean and not a peas-
ant." I assured her that I should make out perfectly well
in his company. By now I was used to such random room-
mates. At Grassano, when I lived at Frisco's inn, I had a
different one almost every night. There were two rooms in
all, and when one was full mine was on call. Many strangers
stopped for the night because Grassano was on the main road
and Frisco's inn was known as the best in the province. In
fact, travelers with business at Tricarico chose to come all
the way back to Grassano at night rather than stay at the
miserable tavern of that episcopal seat.

I had, then, in my room traveling salesmen from Apulia,
Neapolitan pear-growers, teamsters, and all sorts of others.
Very late one night, when I was already in bed, I heard the
unaccustomed roar of a motorcycle, and when the rider ap-
peared in my room, his cap covered with dust, he turned
out to be Baron Nicola Rotunno of Avellino, one of the richest
landowners of the province. With his lawyer-brother he
owned extensive tracts of land around Grassano, Tricarico,
Grottole, and many other townships of the Matera region, and
he went about on a motorcycle to collect from his agents the
money yielded by the sale of the crops and to press the peas-
ants for the payment of their debts, debts which they con-
tracted in order to get through the year, but which amounted
to far more than their yearly earnings and which piled up
until no season was favorable enough to liquidate them. The
baron, a thin, beardless young man with a pince-nez, shared
his brother's reputation for ruthlessness. He would go after
a peasant for a debt of a few lire; he drove a hard bargain,
knew how to choose land agents faithful to his interests, and
wasted pity on no one. He was a devout churchman and wore
in his buttonhole, instead of the usual Fascist Party emblem,

33

the round badge of Catholic Action. To me he was exceed-
ingly kind. When he heard that I was a political prisoner, he
immediately offered to obtain my freedom through the good
offices of a lady intimate with Senator Boechini, the head
of the national police. This lady, like himself, came from
Avellino, and she shared his particular devotion to the
Madonna worshiped in a famous shrine near this city.

We began to talk of saints and shrines, especially of San
Rocco di Tolve, whose powers I had come to know by per-
sonal experience of his favors. Tolve is a village near Po-
tenza, and the pilgrimage directed there every August had
just recently taken place. Men, women, and children came
from the neighboring provinces on foot or by donkey, walk-
ing day and night. San Rocco awaited them, poised in mid-
air, above the church. "Tolve is mine and I will protect it,"
he says in a popular print, which shows him dressed in
brown with a halo of gold against the blue sky over the
village.

Grassano, too, had a kindly saint for a patron, a resplen-
dent San Maurizio in the lower church, armed to the teeth,
a magnificent warrior in papier-mache of the sort still made
so skilfully today in Bari. From San Maurizio, we passed
to the companion of his warlike exploits and of his beatitude
and to other saints, including Saint Augustine and his City
of God, and finally to talk of the Gospels. The baron appeared
to be surprised and pleased at my knowledge of matters with
which he had not supposed I was acquainted. It was very
late, and my eyes were half -shut with sleepiness when I saw
the baron rise up suddenly in his bed, take his pince-nez
from his bed-table and thrust it upon his nose, jump down
to the floor, and silently approach my bed, enshrouded, like
a ghost, in a long white nightshirt which came down almost

34

to his bare feet. When he was close to me he made a great
sign of the cross over me with his hand and said in a solemn
and emotional voice: "I bless you in the name of the Child
Jesus. Good night." With which he made the sign of the cross
again, got back into bed, and put out the light. Protected by
the unexpected blessing of the wealthy baron, I fell asleep
promptly, only to wake up at dawn as usual to the angelic
sound of the bells on the sheep going to pasture and the
diabolical noise made by Frisco, the landlord, as he roused
in stentorian tones his drowsy offspring.

The widow's spare room, which I was to share that night
with the tax collector, was far gloomier than the one I had
occupied at Frisco's inn. It was long, narrow, and dark with
a small window at one end, and the plastered walls were
gray and encrusted with dirt. There were three cots, a chipped
basin and jug in one corner, and an unsteady chest of drawers
opposite the beds. A light bulb black with the traces of flies
emitted a pale yellow gleam. Flies swarmed everywhere in
the suffocating heat. The window was closed in order to keep
out the mosquitoes but I had hardly laid my head on the
pillow when I heard them hissing on every side, a frighten-
ing sound in this malarial country.

Meanwhile my roommate arrived, hung his cap on a nail
opposite my bed, put his clarinet case on the chest of drawers^
and undressed. I asked him about the progress of his work
here in Gagliano.

"Very bad," he said. "Today I came to make seizures.
They don't pay their taxes. And when I come to seize their
chattels, there's nothing to be had. I went to three houses
and there was no furniture in any of them, except for beds,
and we can't touch them. I had to be satisfied with a goat and
a few pigeons. They haven't enough to pay for even the

35

revenue stamps on the change of title. Tomorrow I've two
other places to go; here's hoping I've better luck. It's a dis-
grace, the peasants simply don't want to pay. Most of them
here in Gagliano own a bit of land, even if it's two or three
hours* walking distance from the village; sometimes, of
course, it's poor soil and yields them practically nothing.
The taxes are heavy, it's true, but that's not my affair; I
didn't lay down the taxes, my job's merely to collect them.
You know how the peasants are, they claim that every year's
a bad one. They're loaded down with debts, they have
malaria and they've no food. But I'd be in a pretty fix if
I listened to them. I have a job to do. Well, they don't pay,
and I have to seize what I can lay my hands on, stuff that's
quite worthless. Sometimes I come all this way for a few
bottles of oil and a little flour. And with that they scowl at
me; there's hate in their eyes. Two years ago, at Missanello,
they shot at me. Mine's an ugly business. But a man's got to
live."

I saw that the subject was distasteful to him and by way
of consolation I began to speak of music. He wanted to write
songs, to enter them in a competition, and, if he won a prize,
to leave the business of tax-collecting. Meanwhile he played
the clarinet in the band at Stigliano. I asked him about the
folk songs of the region, whether he could teach me any of
them, or with his talent, write them down for me. He asked me
if I wanted to hear "Little Black Face," * or some other tune
of the day. No, I was after the peasants' songs. He stopped
to think, as if the idea were new to him. He could write down
the notes of a song for me if he picked them out one by one on
the clarinet. But he couldn't remember ever having heard the
peasants sing. At Viggiano they sang and made music, but not

* Sang in vogue during the Abyssinian War.

36

in these parts. There might be some church song; he would
find out. Indeed, I myself noticed the same lack. No voice
broke the silence of the land, either in the morning when
the peasants went off to work, or under the noon sun, or in
the evening when the long black lines of them made their
way back to their homes in the hills with their donkeys and
goats. Only once, in the direction of the Basento River, I
heard the wail of a reed pipe, to which another made answer
from the mountain opposite. Two shepherds from, a
distant region were going with their flock from village to
village and calling to each other. Here the peasants did
not sing.

My companion made no further response; I could hear
the regular whistle of his breathing against the ceaseless buzz
of the flies, made restless by the heat. A narrow ray of light
filtered through the closed window from the crescent moon;
It struck the letters ILK on the cap hanging on the wall
opposite my bed, and I stared at them through the darkness
until my eyes closed and I was asleep.

JL W A S not awakened early in the morning by the sheep
bells as I had been at Grassano, because here there were
neither shepherds nor pastures, but by the beat of donkey
hoofs on the paving stones and the bleating of goats. This was
the daily pilgrimage, and the peasants got up while it was
still dark to travel three or four hours to their fields, in the

37

direction of the malarial banks of the Agri and the Sauro
or the slopes of faraway hills. The room was flooded with
light and the initialed cap was gone. My roommate must
have left at dawn to bring the comforts of the Law to the
peasants' homes before their owners left for the fields; per-
haps by this time he was already on the way back to Stigliano,
with the visor of his cap glistening in the sun, his clarinet
in one hand and a goat trailing on a leash behind him.

From the door I could hear a sound of women's voices
and the crying of a child. A dozen women with children in
their arms or standing beside them were waiting patiently for
me to get up. They wanted to show me their offspring and
have me attend to them. The children were pale and thin with
big, sad black eyes, waxen faces, and swollen stomachs
drawn tight like drums above their thin, crooked legs.
Malaria, which spared no one in these parts, had already
made its way into their underfed rickety bodies.

I was anxious to avoid looking after the sick because this
was not my profession and I was aware of my deficiencies. I
realized, moreover, that to do so would draw me into in-
voluntary conflict with the already established and jealously
guarded world of interests of the local gentry. But this morn-
ing I saw that it would be difficult for me to resist. The
scene of the day before began all over again. The women
supplicated me, calling down blessings on my head and
kissing my hands. Their faith and hope in me were absolute
and I could only wonder at them. The sick man of the pre-
ceding day had died and I had been powerless to help him,
yet the women claimed to see that I was not a fifth-rate
doctor like the others but a godd Christian who could help
their children. Perhaps I owed their esteem to the natural
prestige of a stranger whose faraway origin makes him a

38

sort of god, or else to their perception that, in spite of the
hopelessness of his case, I had really tried to do something
for the dying man and that I had looked at him first with
real interest and later with genuine sorrow. I was astonished
and shamed by their confidence, which was as complete as
it was undeserved. Finally I sent them away with a few words
of advice and followed them out of the dark house into the
dazzling morning sunlight. The shadows cast by the village
houses were black and still, the hot wind blowing through
the ravines raised clouds of dust, and in the dust dogs lay
scratching their fleas.

I wanted to take stock of the limits beyond which I was not
allowed to go, although I already knew that they coincided
with the boundaries of the village; to reconnoiter my island,
since the surrounding lands were forbidden territory, beyond
the pillars of Hercules. The widow's house lay at the upper
end of the village where the road widened and came to an
end in front of the church, a little white church hardly larger
than the houses around it. The priest stood at the door threat-
ening with his stick a group of boys a few steps away who
were ridiculing him and making faces at him, while some
of them leaned over to pick up stones which they plainly
intended to throw in his direction. Upon my arrival, the boys
scattered like sparrows. The priest cast an irate look after
them, brandishing his stick and shouting: "Cursed, heathen
boys, 111 excommunicate you!"

"There's no grace of God in this village/ 5 he said, turn-
ing toward me. "No one comes to church but the boys, and
they come to play. You saw them, didn't you? I say my mass
to empty benches. The people are not even baptized. And
there's no way of getting them to pay a penny from the yield
of their miserable fields. I've not yet had the tithes from last

39

year. Yes, they're a fine decent lot, the people of this village;
you'll see that for yourself."

He was a thin little old man with steel-rimmed glasses
hanging over a pointed nose, overshadowed by the red tassel
which hung from his hat. Behind the glasses were sharp eyes
which passed quickly from an obsessed stare to a keen
sparkle. His thin lips were turned down in an expression of
habitual bitterness. Below his rumpled, dirty habit, half
unbuttoned and covered with spots, he wore dusty, down-
at-the-heel boots. There was an air about him of weariness
and ill-tolerated poverty, like the ruins of a burned hovel,
charred and overgrown with weeds. Don Giuseppe Trajella
was not loved by anyone in the village, and the evening before
I had heard the local gentry curse at him roundly. They
abused and reviled him, set the urchins against him, and
complained of him to the prefect and the bishop.

"Look out for the priest!" the mayor had told me, "He's
a disgrace to the village and a living profanation of the
House of God. He's perpetually drunk. We haven't yet man-
aged to get rid of him, but we hope to throw him out soon,
or at least to have him shifted to Gaglianello, another area
of the township, which is his real parish. He's been here for
some years, as a penance. He was a professor at the seminary
and they sent him to Gaglianello to punish him for taking
certain liberties you know what I mean with his students.
He has no real right to be at Gagliano, but we've no other
priest. The punishment, you might say, is visited upon

us."

Poor Don Trajella! Even if the devil himself had tempted
him when he was young, that time was long past and for-
gotten. Now he could hardly stand on his feet; he was only
a poor persecuted and embittered old man, a stricken sheep

40

beset by a pack of wolves. But even in Ms decay it was
apparent that in the days when he taught theology at the
seminaries of Melfi and Naples, Don Giuseppe Trajella of
Tricarico must have been a good, intelligent, witty, and
resourceful man. He had written lives of the saints, made
paintings and sculptures, and taken a lively interest in what
was going on in the world, when sudden disgrace struck him,
cut him off from everything, and cast him like a shipwreck
upon this remote and inhospitable shore. He had let himself
go with a vengeance, taking a bitter delight in increasing his
misery. He had never touched a book or a paintbrush again.
With the passing of the years only one of his former passions,
rancor, remained, and this had become a veritable fixation.
Trajella hated the world because the world persecuted him.
He lived alone, speaking to no one, with his mother, an old
woman of ninety, now weak-minded and helpless. His only
consolation beside, perhaps, the bottle was to write Latin
epigrams against the mayor, the carabinieri, the authorities
in general, and the peasants.

"The people here are donkeys, not Christians,' 5 he said*
beckoning me to enter the church. "You know Latin, of
course, don't you?"

Gallianus, Gollianellus
Asinus et asellus
Nihil aliud in sella
Nisi Joseph Trajella

Gagliano and Gaglianello
Are a donkey and its young;
On a saddle between them
Joseph Trajella is hung.

41

The church was merely a large room with plastered walls,
dirty and neglected, with an unadorned altar on a wooden
platform at one end and a small pulpit on the side. The
cracked walls were covered with seventeenth-century paint-
ings on peeled and torn canvas, hung with no apparent pat-
tern in several irregular rows.

"These come from the old church; they were all we could
save. Look at them, since you're a painter. But they're not
worth much. The present church was only a chapel then. The
real church, the Madonna of the Angels, was at the other
end of the village, where you can still see the landslide. The
church gave way suddenly and caved in three years ago.
Luckily it was night; we had a narrow escape. Here there
are landslides all the time. When it rains the ground gives
way and starts to slide, and the houses fall down. Some fall
every year. People make me laugh with their talk of sup-
porting walls. In a few years this village will have ceased to
exist; it will all be carried away. It had rained for three days
when the church went. But it's the same thing every winter,
some disaster, great or small, overtakes this village and
every other one in the province. There are no trees and no
rocks; the clay simply melts and pours down like a rushing
stream, carrying everything with it. This winter you'll see
for yourself. But for your sake I hope you won't still be here.
The people are worse than the soil. I hate the mob. Odi
profanum vulgus . . /' The priest's eyes shone behind his
glasses. "Well, we've had to make out with this old chapel.
There's no bell-tower; the bell is outside, attached to a post.
The roof needs repairs; the rain comes in. Already we've had
to stave it up. Do you see the cracks in the walls? But where
am I to get the money? The church is poor and the village is
poorer. Besides, they're not Christians; they've no religion

42

at all. They don't even bring me the customary tribute, much
less the money for a bell-tower. The mayor, Don Luigi, and
the others agree that nothing should be done. Druggists, they
call themselves. You'll see the public works they go in for!
You'll see!"

My dog, Barone, unaware of the holiness of the place, and
tired of waiting for me, stuck his head in the door and barked
happily. I could neither quiet him nor chase him away. I took
leave of Don Trajella and made my way along the road
running to the left of the church, by which I had traveled the
day before, toward a few outlying houses at the extremity
of the village. This was the region whose green trees had
seemed to me mild and welcoming as we passed rapidly by
in a car, but now under the fierce morning sun the green
appeared to have melted into the dazzling gray of walls and
earth. A group of houses stood in untidy fashion on either
side of the road, surrounded by shabby vegetable gardens
and a few sparse olive trees. The houses were nearly all of
only one room, with no windows, drawing their light from the
door. The doors were latched because the men were in the
fields; in the doorways young women dandled their babies or
old women spun wool. They waved and looked after me with
wide-open eyes. Here and there was a house with a second
story and a balcony, where the front door was not made of
worn black wood, but had a conspicuous coat of shiny varnish
and was decked out with a brass doorknob. Such houses be-
longed to the "Americans." Among the peasants* shacks
stood one narrow, long, single-story building of recent con-
struction, in so-called modern or suburban style. This was
the barracks of the carabinierL Around the houses and on the
road, several sows, surrounded by their progeny of piglets,
with the wizened faces of greedy and lustful old men,

43

grubbed suspiciously and savagely in piles of rubbage and
garbage. Barone drew back, growling and curling his lips,
his hair standing on end in a sort of strange horror.

Beyond the last house of the village, where the road, after
a brief rise, began to go down to the Sauro Valley; there was
an uneven open space spotted with melancholy yellow grass.
This was the sports field, instituted by the mayor, Magalone.
Here the Fascist Scout organization was supposed to exer-
cise, and the general population to hold patriotic gatherings.
To the left a path wound up an adjacent olive-covered slope
to an iron gate between two pillars, which marked either
side of the beginning of a low brick wall. Behind the wall
stood two slender cypress trees and through the gate one
could see tombstones, white in the sun. The cemetery was
the highest point of the territory where I was allowed to cir-
culate. Here the view was wider and less squalid than from
any other place. I could not see all of Gagliano, which lay
hidden like a long snake stretched out among the stones, but
the yellowish-red roofs of the higher part of the village, seen
among the gray leaves of the olive trees as they moved in the
breeze, appeared less motionless than usual and almost alive.
Behind this colorful foreground the wide desolate stretches
of clay seemed to wave in the heat, as if they were suspended
in mid-air, and above their monotonous whiteness passed the
shifting shadows of the summer clouds. Lizards lay without
moving on the sunny wall and two grasshoppers answered
each other fitfully, as if they were practicing the parts of a
song, and then suddenly fell silent.

Since I was not allowed to go beyond this point, I went back
to the village by the same way I had come. I passed in front
of the church and the widow's house, and went on down to
the post office and the Fossa del Bersagliere. The mayor and

44

schoolmaster was at this moment exercising his teaching
function. He was sitting on a balcony just off the classroom
and having a smoke while he looked at the people in the
square below and democratically hailed the passers-by. He
had a long cane in his hand, and, without moving from his
chair, he restored order within by striking through the
window with astonishing accuracy at the heads or hands of
such boys as had taken advantage of his absence to make a
rumpus.

"A fine day. Doctor!" he shouted to me when he saw me
appear in the square. From his vantage point on the balcony
with the cane in his hand he had reason to feel that he was
the ruler of the village, a kindly, popular and just ruler,
who missed nothing of what was going on.

"I didn't see you this morning. Where have you been?
For a walk? Up to the cemetery? Good for you; get on with
your walk! Amuse yourself as best you can! And come here
to the square this afternoon about half -past five. I dare say
you'll have a nap first. I want you to meet my sister. Where
are you going? To the lower part of the village? Are you
looking for lodgings there? My sister will find you some-
thing; have no fear. A man like you can't do with just a
peasant house. We'll turn up something better than that,
Doctor! Here's wishing you a pleasant walk!"

After the square, the road rose to a slight elevation and
then went down to another much smaller square surrounded
by low houses. In the middle of this square there was a
strange monument, almost as high as the houses around it
and endowed by the narrowness of the place with a certain
solemnity. It was a public toilet, the most modern, sumptu-
6us, and monumental toilet that can be imagined, built of
concrete, with four compartments and a weatherproof over-

45

hanging roof, of the type that has only recently been put
up in the big cities. On one wall stood out in huge block
letters an inscription of the makers* name, familiar to city-
dwellers: "Renzi & Co., Turin." What strange circumstances,
what magician or fairy had borne this marvelous object
through the air from the faraway North and let it fall like
a meteorite directly in the middle of this village square, in
a land where for hundreds of miles around there was no
water and no sanitary equipment of any kind? It was a by-
product of the Fascist government and of the mayor, Maga-
lone, and, judging by its size, it must have cost the yield of
several years of local taxes. I looked inside: a pig was drink-
ing the stagnant water at the bottom of one receptacle; two
children were floating paper boats in another. In the course
of the year I never saw it serve any other function. I saw no
one enter it but pigs, dogs, chickens, and children except
on the evening of a feast day in September, when a few peas-
ants climbed up on the roof to get a better view of the fire-
works. Only one person put it to the use for which it was
intended, and that was myself. Even so I must confess that
I did so less from necessity than on account of a certain
homesickness,

In one corner of the square, which barely escaped falling
within the long shadow cast by the monument, a lame man,
dressed in black with a wizened, solemn, almost priestly
face, as thin as that of a polecat, was blowing like a pair of
bellows into the body of a dead goat. I stopped to look at
him. The goat had been killed shortly before right in the
square and laid out on a board supported by two wooden
trestles. The lame man had made only one incision in the
skin, on a hindleg just above the foot. Here he had set his
lips and was blowing with all his might and main while h

46

pulled the skin away from the flesh. To see him attached in
this way to the animal, whose form was gradually inflated,
while he seemed silently to grow thinner and thinner as he
emptied himself of his breath recalled some strange sort of
metamorphosis whereby a man is changed into a beast. When
the goat was swollen up like a balloon the lame man held
the leg tightly in one hand, removed his mouth from the foot
and wiped it with his sleeve, then quickly peeled off the skin
as if it were a glove until the goat was left stripped and naked
on its board, like a saint, looking up at the sky.

"This way the skin can be preserved and made into a
flask," the lame man explained gravely while his nephew, a
gentle and taciturn boy, helped him to quarter the animal
"This year there's plenty to do. The peasants are slaughter-
ing all their goats. They've no other choice, since they can't
pay the tax on them."

The government, it seems, had just discovered that goats
were harmful to the crops because they had a way of nibbling
at growing things, and a law had been made covering every
town and village in the nation which set a tax on goats
equivalent almost to their market value. Thus the goats were
smitten while the crops were saved. But around Gagliano, for
instance, there was no farming, and the goats were the peas-
ants' only source of revenue, because they lived off nothing,
leaped over the banks of bare clay, browsed on thorny bushes,
and did without the pastures essential to cattle and sheep.
The goat tax then, was a catastrophe, and because the peas-
ants had no money to pay it there was nothing they could do
about it. They could only kill off the goats and that left them
without milk and cheese. The lame man was an impoverished
landowner, but he was proud of his social standing and of
the variety of trades he plied for a living, among them th*

47

immolation of the goats. Thanks to the tax, I was able to get
meat from him all through the year, whereas formerly, he
told me, I should have had to get along with having it very
rarely. He was also caretaker for several property owners
who did not live in the village, he kept an eye on the peasants,
served as auctioneer, arranged marriages, and knew every*
one in the neighborhood. Rarely did he fail to put in,a silent
appearance at any event, great or small, with his lame leg,
his black suit, and a foxy expression on his face. He was
intensely curious, but sparing of words ; his sentences stopped
short as if to imply that he knew a great deal more than
he could say, and he brought them out in a solemn and
dignified manner that belied the gay meaning of his name^
Carnovale.

When he heard that I was searching for lodgings, possibly
large and light enough for painting, he thought hard for a
moment and then said I might take the house of his cousins,
with whose names I was perhaps acquainted because they
were well known physicians in Naples. I might rent part of
the house, two or three rooms. He would write to them at
once and I should consider myself lucky, because no other
house in the village could possibly suit me so well. The place
was empty, but he could let me have a bed and other neces-
sary furnishings. Meanwhile, if I wanted to see the house, he
would send his nephew to unlock it and show it to me. I went
with the boy, who was serious, melancholy, and clothed in
black just like his uncle.

The road sloped down beyond the square as far as to where
the ravines on either side left no room for any houses between
them; here it ran along a narrow ridge between two low walls
with a sheer drop below them. This stretch of a hundred
yards or so between Upper and Lower Gagliano was exposed

48

to a continual violent wind. Halfway across, where the
ridge widened slightly, was one of Gagliano's two fountains,
the second being at the higher end of the village near the
church, where I had been in the morning. This fountain,
which provided water for all of Lower Gagliano and a good
part of the upper village, was surrounded, as I was to see
it at every hour of the day, by a crowd of women. They were
grouped around the fountain, old and young, some standing
and others sitting, all of them with small wooden barrels
balanced on their heads and carrying terra cotta jars of the
Ferrandina make.

One by one they approached the fountain and waited
patiently for the slender stream of water to fill the recep-
tacles. Their wait was a long one; the wind stirred the white
veils that fell over their backs, which were straight and
taut as they balanced the jars on their heads with easy grace.
They stood motionless in the sunlight like a flock of animals
at pasture and even smelled like them. I heard a vague, con-
tinuous sound of voices, an uninterrupted murmur. Not one
of them moved as I went by, but I felt the impact of dozens
of black eyes following me with a fixed, intense stare until
I had passed the narrow ridge and started the short ascent
to the built-up section of Lower Gagliano, before the road
went down again toward the caved-in church and the land-
slide.

We soon came to the house we were looking for, by far
the most impressive structure in the whole village. From
the outside it looked decidedly gloomy with its blackened
walls, narrow barred windows, and all the marks of long
neglect. It had been the home of a titled family which had
gone away long ago; then It had served as a barracks for the
carabinieri until they had moved to their newly-built mod-

era headquarters, and the filth and squalor of the walls
inside still bore witness to its military occupation. The draw-
ing room had been cut up into dark prison cells, with high
grated windows and heavy chains on the doors. The doors,
swollen by rain and ice, could no longer be closed and the
windowpanes were all broken; a thick layer of dust blown
in by the wind covered everything in sight. Strips of plaster
and cobwebs hung down from the gilded and painted ceiling;
the black and white tiles of the floor, originally laid in a
pattern, were loose, and stalks of gray grass had pushed up
through the cracks.

As we went from room to room, we were greeted by a
quick, furtive sound like that of frightened animals running
to shelter. I threw open a French window and went out on a
balcony that had a crumpled eighteenth-century iron railing.
When I stepped out of the darkness I was almost blinded by
the sudden dazzling light. Below me lay a ravine; straight
ahead, with nothing to block my view, infinite wastes of white
clay, with no sign of human life upon them, shimmering in
the sunlight as far as the eye could see until they seemed to
melt away into the white sky. Not a single shadow broke the
monotony of this sea on which the sun beat down from
directly overhead. It was high noon, time to go home.

How could I manage to live in this noble ruin? But there
was a melancholy enchantment about the place; I could pace
up and down on the loose tiles ; and as nighttime companions
I preferred bats to the tax collectors and bedbugs of the
widow's abode. Perhaps, I thought, I could have new glass
put in the windows, have a mosquito net sent from Turin to
protect me from malaria, and give back some life to the
rough and crumbling walls. I told the lame man, who was
waiting in the square with his quartered goat, to write to

50

Naples, and I walked back up to my temporary lodg-
ings.

When I came to the Fossa del Bersagliere I saw a tall, fair-
haired, well-built young man, wearing a short-sleeved city
shirt, come out of the narrow door of a run-down house with
a plate of steaming spaghetti in his hand. He crossed the
square, put the plate down on the wall that bordered this
side of it, whistled loudly, and finally returned whence he
had come. Out of curiosity I stopped to look from a distance
at the abandoned spaghetti. Suddenly from a house across
the way appeared another young man, tall, dark, and very
handsome, with a pale, melancholy face, and dressed in a
well-tailored gray suit. He went to the wall, picked up the
plate of spaghetti and retraced his steps. Just before going
into his house, he cast a wary eye about the deserted square,
then turned toward me, smiled, and waved his hand in a
friendly way before he stooped to enter the low door and
disappear from view. Don Cosimino, the hunchback post-
master, was just closing his office for lunch and from his
hidden corner he, too, had witnessed this scene* Aware of
my astonishment, he gave me an understanding nod, and I
perceived a certain sympathy in his keen, sorrowful eyes.

"This performance takes place every day at the same
time/' he told me. "They're two political prisoners like you.
The fair-haired one is a Communist mason from Ancona, a
very fine fellow. The other is a student of political science
from Pisa; he was an officer in the Fascist Militia and he's
a Communist, too. He comes from a humble family, but they
don't give him any subsistence money because his mother
and sister are schoolteachers and they are supposed to make
enough to support him. Originally those who were here in
compulsory residence could make friends among themselves*

51

but a few months ago Don Luigi Magalone gave orders that
they were not even to see one another. These two used to
cook their meals together in order to save money, but now
they take turns at cooking, and every day one of them leaves
the other's meals on the wall to be called for as soon as he is
out of sight. If they were by chance to meet, think what a
danger there would be to the State!"

We walked toward the upper part of the village together.
Don Cosimino lived with his wife and several children not
far from the widow's house.

"Don Luigi has an eye out for these things; he's a great
one for discipline. He and the sergeant think them up to-
gether. With you I hope it will be different. Don't take things
too hard, anyhow, Doctor." Don Cosimino looked up at me
consolingly:

"They can't help playing up to the part of policemen, and
they stick their noses into everything. The mason got himself
in trouble. He was talking to some peasants, and he tried to
tell them about Darwin's theory that men are descended from
monkeys. I'm no follower of Darwin, myself," and Don
Cosimino smiled maliciously, "but I don't see anything
wrong with such things if you believe them. Well, of course,
Don Luigi came to know about it. He made a dreadful scene;
you should have heard him shout! He told the mason that
Darwin's ideas were contrary to the Catholic religion, that
Catholicism and Fascism were one and the same, and that
to talk about Darwin amounted to anti-Fascism. He even
wrote to the police at Matera that the mason was carrying on
subversive propaganda. But the peasants like the fellow; he's
obliging and can turn his hand to almost anything." We had
reached Don Cosimino's house. "Cheer up," he said. "You've
just come and you'll have to get used it it. But it will all be

52

over one day." Then, almost as if he were afraid that he had
said too much, the kindly hunchback abruptly murmured
goodbye and left me.

7

JL H AT afternoon the mayor was waiting in the square to
take me to meet his sister. Donna Caterina Magalone Cus-
cianna was expecting us; she had prepared coffee and home-
made cakes for our benefit. She welcomed me very cordially
at the door and led me into the drawing room, simply fur-
nished, with gee-gaws strewn around: cushions with a clown
design and stuffed dolls. She asked after my family, ex-
pressed pity for my loneliness, assured me that she would
do all she could to render my stay less unpleasant; in short
she was the soul of amiability. She was a woman some thirty
years old, small and stout, with a certain facial resemblance
to her brother, but with a stronger-willed and more intense
look about her. Her hair and eyes were jet black, while her
yellowish and shiny skin and neglected teeth gave her an
unhealthy appearance. She was dressed like a busy house-
wife, with her clothes somewhat disarrayed from working in
the heat. She spoke with a high, rasping voice, in an affected
manner:

"Youll be happy enough here, Doctor. I shall look out for
a house for you. There's nothing free at the moment but there
will be soon. You need a comfortable place with a room to
receive your patients. And 111 find you a servant, too. Try

53

one of these cakes. Of course you're used to greater delica-
cies. Your mother can probably do better. These cakes are
country style* And how did you ever come to be sent here?
It must have been a mistake. Mussolini can't know every-
thing that's going on and there must be men around him who
get things wrong no matter how conscientious they may be.
And in a big city a man makes enemies. In these parts we
even have some Fascists in compulsory residence. Arpinati,
the Party Secretary of Bologna, is in a village not far from
here, but he's free to come and go'as he chooses. Now there's
a war on. My husband went as a volunteer; with his position,
of course, he had to set a good example. Well, ideas are not
so important; it's our country that matters. You, too, are
for Italy y aren't you? It must have been all a mistake to send
you here. But we're very lucky to have you."

Don Luigi, with a noncommittal air about him, was silent,
and a little later, saying that he had business to attend to,
he went away. After we were left alone Donna Caterina filled
my Japanese cup with coffee and asked me to taste her home-
made quince jam, plying me the while with exaggerated com-
pliments and promising me her help in obtaining whatever I
might need. I wondered what her motive was : natural cor-
diality, a womanly and maternal protective instinct, or a
desire to display her social prominence and her culinary
ability to a gentleman from the North. There was something
of all these: cordiality, maternal instinct, social ambition
and culinary ability, indeed Donna Caterina made ex-
cellent jams, preserves, cakes, baked olives, dried figs stuffed
with almonds, and sausages with Spanish peppers. But there
was something else besides: a definite personal ambition into
which my unexpected arrival somehow fitted, a passion which
my arrival revived as a sudden wind fans a dying fire.

54

"Yes, It's luck for us that you've come. You're to stay three
years? Of course you'd rather leave sooner and for your
sake I hope that you do, but as far as we're concerned I should
like you to stay. This isn't such a bad place; all of us are good
Italians and good Fascists. Luigi is mayor and my husband
was the local Party leader. Fm taking his place while he's
away; there's really not much work to do. You can feel quite
at home here. And we shall at last have a decent doctor,
instead of having to take a trip every time we're ill. By the
way, I'd like you to look at my father-in-law, who lives with
me. Uncle Giuseppe, that is, Dr. Milillo, is old and it's time
for him to retire. And the other man, who's poisoning the
countryside with the drugs dispensed by his two nieces, will
poison us no longer. He and those vile "women, those . ,
sluts!"

Donna Caterina's voice had suddenly risen to a high pitch
of exasperation; there was no doubt about it, the concealed
passion which she could not disguise was hate, single-minded
hate in the form of a fixation. Because she was a woman and
there was nothing else in her mind, this hate was down-to-
earth, resourceful and creative. Donna Caterina hated the
"vile women" who kept the pharmacy, she hated their uncle,
Dr. Concetto Gibilisco, she hated the whole clan of relatives
and cronies around him, and the officials in Matera who pro-
tected him.

I had been sent by Divine Providence; little did it matter
what was the political pretext for my arrival since my real
use was to serve as an instrument of her hate. I was to turn
Gibilisco into the street, to close the pharmacy or at least
to take it away from his nieces.

Donna Caterina was an active and imaginative woman,
and she, in reality, ran the village. She was more intelligent

55

and stronger-willed than her brother and she knew that she
could do with him what she wanted as long as she left
him an appearance of authority. She neither knew nor cared
about Fascism; in her mind, to be the local Party leader was
simply a means of holding the reins of power. As soon as she
had heard of my arrival she had laid a plan, imposed it upon
her brother and, with greater difficulty, upon her uncle as
well. She thought that I was keen on practicing medicine and
earning all I could out of it; it was up to her to encourage me
and to persuade me that with their backing I should not run
into trouble; that, in fact, my success depended on their sup-
port. She had to show me every courtesy and at the same time
to make me aware of her power, in order that I should not by
any mischance fall in with their enemies. Don Luigi, whose
custom it was to treat his political prisoners severely, was
afraid to compromise himself by dealing with me too
kindly; he had been unwilling to ask me to his house lest
his enemies report him to those higher up, and for this
reason she had intervened and tried to win me over to their
side.

Donna Caterina's grudge was but one facet of the typical
feud existing between the two groups of leading families,
and perhaps here, as at Grassano, it could be traced back to
a previous epoch. Perhaps, although I never found out for
certain, a century earlier the Gibiliscos, who came of a
medical family, were liberals and the Magalones, who were
of more recent and humbler vintage, had connections with
the partisans of the Bourbons and the brigands. Aside from
this traditional enmity, however, Donna Caterina had reasons
all her own for hating the Gibiliscos. Through indiscretions
on her part and the gossip of the village women it did not
take me long to find out why. Donna Caterina's husband,

56

Nicola Cuscianna, schoolteacher, Party leader and right-
hand man of his sister and brother-in-law in running the
village, was a big fellow with an arrogant and stupid mili-
tary type of face. His photograph in the uniform of a captain
dominated the drawing room. He had been bewitched by
the beautiful black eyes, the peaches-and-cream complexion,
and the tall, sinuous body of the druggist's daughter, in spite
of the fact that she belonged to the hostile camp. Whether
they were actually lovers or whether this story was exag-
gerated by loose talk I never knew, but Donna Caterina was
convinced that they were. Donna Caterina was no longer
young, and her rival's youth and beauty could not but cause
her to tremble. The supposed lovers were never able to see
one another in so small a village, where a thousand eyes
watched them, including the ever vigilant eyes of Donna
Caterina, who never for a moment let them out of her sight.
In the jealous imagination of the betrayed wife there was
only one way they could satisfy their overwhelming passion:
she, Donna Caterina, must die and then they would be free
to marry. The dark-haired siren and her insignificant blonde
sister were the undisputed and incompetent proprietors of
the pharmacy, although they had no right to run it, and the
whole neighborhood grumbled and stood in fear of their
careless measurement of prescriptions. The means for get-
ting rid of Donna Caterina, then, were right at hand: poison.
Poison would take effect without danger of discovery, be-
cause, of the two local doctors, one was their uncle and prob-
ably their accomplice, while the other, because he was in his
dotage, could not possibly notice anything wrong. Donna
Caterina would die and the lovers, unpunished and happy,
would laugh together over her grave.

How much truth, I wondered, lay behind this picture of

57

crime in Donna Caterina's imagination? What secret clues,
what discovered love letters, what veiled references in the
course of their everyday life had aroused in her violent and
jealous spirit first a doubt and then a certainty which came
to be an obsession? I did not know, but Donna Caterina be-
lieved in the product of her fancy and she laid the blame for
the future crime not so much upon her husband, who had
been bewitched, as upon her rival and all those who had
anything to do with her. The long-standing feud and the
struggle for power over the village, with the addition of this
personal grudge, became fierce and violent. The poisoner
and her family must pay dearly for their crime.

As to her husband, Donna Caterina knew how to handle
him. There was to be no scandal, no one must have the
slightest suspicion. In the privacy of their own four walls
Donna Caterina accused him every day of adultery and mur-
der, and forbade him access to her bed. The powerful and
feared Party leader of Gagliano lost every bit of his arro-
gance as soon as he entered his own house, where in the
darting black eyes of his wife he was a hopeless reprobate
and unforgivable sinner, and he had to settle down to a
solitary sleep on a couch in the drawing room. This sad life
went on for six months until there appeared a last chance for
redemption: the war with Abyssinia.

The humiliated sinner enrolled as a volunteer with the
idea that in this way he might expiate his sins, Reconcile him-
self with his wife when he came back, and meanwhile obtain
the pay of a captain, which was considerably higher than his
salary as a schoolteacher. His example, unfortunately, was
not followed. Captain Cuscianna and Lieutenant Decunto
of Grassano, of whom I have spoken, were the only volun-
teers from their respective villages. But few as are the bene-

58

ficiaries, even war has its uses. Captain Cuscianna was con-
sidered a hero and Donna Caterina a hero's wife, a distinction
of which none of the opposing faction could brag to the
authorities at Matera. Now I had appeared upon the scene,
obviously sent by Divine Providence in order to help Donna
Caterina wreak vengeance upon her enemies.

"Luigino wanted to enlist, too, along with my husband.
They're just like brothers, always together, always standing
up for one another. But Luigino's health is poor; half the
time he's ill. It's a good thing that we have you here. Then
if he were gone who would be left here to keep order and
carry on propaganda?"

While Donna Caterina was speaking, her father-in-law,
Don Pasquale Cuscianna, attracted by the smell of the fresh
cakes, came into the room with short, slow, awkward steps.
He was wrapped in a cloak, with a quilted skull-cap on his
head and a pipe in his toothless mouth. He was an obese,
heavy, deaf old man, greedy and grasping like an enormous
silk-worm. He, too, had been a schoolmaster before his retire-
ment. Indeed, Gagliano, like all of Italy, was in the hands
of schoolmasters. Don Pasquale was generally respected. He
spent the day sleeping and eating, or else sitting on the wall
at one side of the square to smoke. His daughter-in-law had
told me that he was ailing: he had an affliction of the prostate
gland and possibly a touch of diabetes, which did not pre-
vent him, however, from falling promptly upon the left-over
cakes and wolfing them voraciously. Then he hoisted himself
with grunts of satisfaction into a chaise longue, pretended
with an occasional mutter to join our conversation, of which
on account of his deafness he could hear not a word, and
soon, mumbling and puffing in turn, he fell asleep.

I was about to go when two girls of about twenty-five, a

59

fairly advanced age in these parts for the marriageable,
rushed into the room, shrieking, jumping, gesticulating,
making exclamations of astonishment, raising their arms to
heaven, and embracing Donna Caterina. They were stocky
and plump, as dark-skinned as coal sacks, with short, curly,
flying black hair, fiery black eyes,- and black hairs above
their full lips and on their continually moving arms and legs.
These were Margherita and Maria, the daughters of Dr.
Milillo ? whom Donna Caterina had sent for in order to intro-
duce them to me. The girls had painted their lips with a thick
coat of garish lipstick for the occasion, covered their faces
with white powder, put on high-heeled shoes, and lost no
time in coming. They were good girls at heart, incredibly
ingenuous and ignorant, without a thought in their heads.
Everything astonished them; they exclaimed shrilly over my
dog, my suit, and my painting with the nervous motions of
two black grasshoppers. Then they began to talk about cakes
and cooking in general and Donna Caterina praised their
housekeeping abilities to the skies. Probably in her mind
Margherita and Maria were to serve the double purpose of
persuading their uncle, Dr. Milillo, to look upon me with
benevolence and of allying me definitely with her family.
What worthier object of a man's desires could there be, in
these surroundings, than a doctor's daughter? Donna
Caterina had asked me whether or not I was engaged to be
married, and she could easily check the truth of my negative
reply through the private censorship which her brother exer-
cised over the mail.

The two hapless girls, who, like me, were the unconscious
instruments of a higher power, had with them a boy of about
eighteen. He was badly dressed, with a yellowish stupid face
and a pendulous lower lip, and he stood, silent and dull, in

60

a corner. This was their brother, the only male of the Milillo
line. The old doctor, who meanwhile had put In an appear-
ance, confided in me that although he was a good boy he was
a source of considerable worry because he had been left
mentally retarded after a brain fever and there was no way
of getting him to study. He had sent him to a high school, an
agricultural school, and other institutions, without success.
Now the boy was about to go away to start a course of training
for noncommissioned officers of the carabinieri and he could
think of nothing but the uniform. This was not the future that
his father had dreamed of for him, but none the less it meant
a good position. On this point I could not take issue with
the doctor; the poor defective would make a harmless
sergeant.

Donna Caterina changed the subject, for her uncle's bene-
fit, to my medical skill. To my efforts to convey to her that I
was interested only in painting, she paid not the slightest
attention. The doctor, with his usual embarrassed stammer,
advised me strongly, if I attended the sick, not to deprive
myself of my due by a generosity which was sure to be taken
for weakness. Everyone tried to get out of paying the doctor,
but the fees were obligatory and set by the government; a
doctor must see to it that they were kept up, out of a sense of
duty toward his colleagues and a respect for general stand-
ards, and so on. The old man belonged only passively to the
political faction led by his nephew and niece and he shared
their ambition only because they were his relatives ; as Donna
Caterina and Don Luigi said, he was "too kind.'* He was a
former follower of Nitti and in private he occasionally de-
plored the mayor's Fascist tenets and criticized his love of
display, his air of authority, and his tendency to play the
policeman. But in the long run, for the sake of peace and

quiet, he Bad reconciled himself to these things and even
turned them to his own advantage.

Under the spur of his niece and nephew and perhaps with
a look to the best interests of his daughters, he would consent
not to block my way, but he had no intention of being taken
for an old man of no account who could be maneuvered to
suit their whims ; no, he had his honor and his self-respect.
I had, therefore, to listen to a number of complicated ex-
planations of the lay of the land and to his paternal and per-
sonal advice. I was to make sure that I was paid, to respect
the established fees and not to believe the tales of the peas-
ants, because they were ignorant liars and the more you did
for them the more ungrateful they were. He had lived in the
place for more than forty years, looking after them all and
showing them every kindness, only to be repaid by their say-
ing that he was senile and incompetent. Whereas he was
anything but senile. It was sad to see the peasants' ingrati-
tude. And their superstitions. And their stubbornness. And
so on, and so on.

It was dusk when at last I managed to escape from the
vacuous stammering of the doctor, the enthusiastic squeals
of his daughters, the grunts of Don Pasquale, and Donna
Caterina's hinting smiles. The peasants were coming up the
road with their animals and surging into their houses, as
they did every evening,, with the monotony of a ceaseless tide,
in a dark, mysterious world of their own where there was no
hope. As for the others, the gentry, I already knew them too
well and I had a feeling of disgust for the clinging contact
of the ridiculous spiderweb of their daily life, a dust-covered
and uninteresting skein of self-interest, low-grade passion,
boredom, greedy impotence, and poverty. Today and tomor-
row and always, as I trod the only street of the village, I

62

should have to see them gather In the square and to listen
indefinitely to their envious complaints. What in the world
was I doing in this spot?

The sky was a mixture of rose, green, and violet, the
enchanting colors of malaria country, and it seemed far, far
away.

8

1 STAYED three weeks in' the widow's house, waiting to
find other quarters. The summer was at its dreary pinnacle;
the sun seemed to have come to a stop straight overhead and
the clayey land was split by the burning heat. In its thirsty
crevices nested the deadly poisonous, stubby snakes which
the peasants call cortopassi, "short-steps": Cortopassi, COT-
topassi, ove te trova Id te lassL Snake in the grass ; let lie and
pass. A continual wind dried up men's bodies, and the days
went by monotonously under the pitiless light until sunset
and the cool of the evening. I sat in the kitchen gazing at
the random flight of the flies, the only token of life in the
motionless silence of the dog days. My eyes focused lazily on
the thousands of stationary, buzzing black dots which cov-
ered the greenish-blue wooden shutters. Every BOW and then,
one of the back dots suddenly disappeared in the whir of an
abrupt and invisible flight, and its place was taken by a very
bright white point, ringed with gold, like a tiny star, whose
light gradually died away. Then another fly took off into the
air and another star came out on the blue of the shutters* At

63

last Barone, who lay asleep at my feet, was awakened by a
dream; he jumped to his feet and caught a fly on the wing,
breaking the silence with the violent snapping of his
jaws.

Strings of figs hung from the balcony railing, black with
flies that were busy sucking the last moisture from them
before the blazing sun dried them out altogether. Out on
the street, on wide-rimmed tables below the black pennants
decorating the front doors, blood-red liquid masses of tomato
conserve lay drying. Swarms of flies walked without wetting
their feet over the portions already solidified, in numbers as
vast as those of the children of Israel, while other swarms
plunged into the watery Red Sea, where they were caught
and drowned like Pharaoh's armies as they hotly pursued
their prey. The pervading silence of the countryside hung
heavily over the kitchen, and the monotonous buzzing
of the flies marked the passing hours with an endless re-
frain.

All of a sudden the bell began to ring out from the church
near by, in honor of some unknown saint or as a summons
to some unattended function, and its lament filled the whole
room. The bell-ringer, a ragged, barefoot boy of about eight-
een, with a hypocritical, thieving smile, rang the bell ac-
cording to an interminable, mournful fancy all his own, in
the rhythm of a funeral march. My dog, who was sensitive
to the presence of spirits, could not bear this lugubrious
sound and at the first note he began to howl in pain, as if
death were brushing our shoulders. Or was there something
of the devil in him that was ruffled by this sacred music?
Anyhow I had to get up and take him outside in order to
quiet him. Big, hungry fleas in search of a refuge jumped
on the white paving-stones ; ticks hung in ambush from blades

64

of grass. The village seemed empty of men; the peasants
were" in the fields and the women were hidden behind half-
closed doors. The street sloped down between the houses
that bordered it and the ravines behind them all the way to
the landslide without a fragment of shade. I climbed slowly
in the opposite direction, toward the cemetery, in search of
the slender olive trees and the cypresses.

An animal-like enchantment lay over the deserted village.
In the midday silence a sudden noise revealed a sow rolling
in a pile of garbage; then the echoes were awakened by
the shattering outburst of a donkey's braying, more reson-
ant than the church bell in Its weird, phallic anguish.
Roosters were crowing; their afternoon song had none of
the glorious shrillness of their early morning call, but re-
flected rather the bottomless sadness of the desolate country-
side. The sky was filled with black crows and, above them,
circling hawks; their still, round eyes seemed to follow me.
Invisible animal presences continued to make themselves
felt in the air until finally a goat, the queen of the region,
jumped with its bow legs from behind a house and stared
at me with blank yellow eyes. Some half-naked, ragged chil-
dren were chasing it; among them a four-year-old girl wear-
ing the habit, wimple, and veil of a nun, and a five-year-old
boy in the cowl and cord of a monk. It is a local custom for
parents, in fulfilment of a vow, to dress them thus, In a
miniature of religious garb or like the princelings painted
by Velasquez. The children wanted to ride the goat; the little
monk seized its beard and put his arms around Its face, the
nun tried to get up on its back, while the others held Its horns
and tall. For a moment they all managed to straddle it until
the beast jumped abruptly, shook Itself, tossed them Into
the dust, and stopped to look at them with an evil smile. Hie

65

children picked themselves up, recaptured the goat, and
mounted it again; the goat ran away, jumping wildly, until
the whole lot of them disappeared around a curve.

The peasants say that there is something satanic about
goats. This is true of all the animal world, and of the goat in
particular. Not that it is wicked or has anything to do with
the devils of the Christian religion, in spite of the fact that
they often show themselves in its guise. It is demoniacal like
every living thing, and even more so than the rest, because
some strange power lurks behind its animal exterior. To the
peasants the goat represents the ancient satyr, indeed a liv-
ing satyr, lean and hungry, with curling horns, a crooked
nose, and pendulous teats or male organ; a poor, hairy,
brotherly, wild satyr, looking for grass on the edge of a
precipice.

Under the gaze of these eyes, neither human nor divine,
and accompanied by these mysterious powers, I climbed
slowly toward the cemetery. But the olive trees gave no
shade; the sun pierced their delicate foliage as if it were
lacework. I decided to go through the broken-down gate into
the enclosure of the cemetery proper; here was the only cool
and private spot in the village, and perhaps the least melan-
choly as well. As I sat on the ground, the dazzling reflection
of light from the clay disappeared behind the wall; the two
cypresses swayed in the breeze and clusters of roses bloomed
among the graves, a strange sight in this flowerless land. In
the middle of the cemetery there was a ditch, a yard or two
deep, neatly cut out of the dry earth in readiness for the
next dead body. A ladder made it easy to get in and out of
this open grave, and I had made it my custom on these
hot days when I came up here to lower myself into it and
lie down. The earth was smooth and dry, and the sun had

66

not burned it. I could see nothing but a rectangle of clear
sky, crossed occasionally by a wandering white cloud; not
a single sound reached my ears. In this freedom and solitude
I spent many hours. When my dog tired of chasing lizards
on the sunny wall he peered questioningly into the ditch,
then lowered himself down the ladder, curled up at my feet
and soon fell asleep. I, too, listening to the cadence of his
breathing, eventually let my book fall from my hand, and
closed my eyes.

We were awakened by a strange voice, without sex, or tone,
or age, mumbling incomprehensible words. An old man was
leaning over the edge of the grave and talking to me through
his toothless gums; I could see him against the sky, tall and
a little bent, with long, thin arms like the vanes of a wind-
mill. He was almost ninety, but his face gave an effect of
timelessness ; it was shapeless and wrinkled like a dried-up
apple; two magnetic bright blue eyes shone out from among
the folds of flesh. Not a single strand of beard grew or had
ever grown on his chin, and this gave an odd effect to the
texture of his skin. He spoke a dialect other than that of
Gagliano, a mixture of tongues; lie had lived in a number
of places, with the idiom of Pisticci predominant, because
there, in faraway times, he was born. This mixture, the tooth-
lessness that garbled his words, and the terse and proverbial
form of his speech at first made it hard for me to under-
stand him, but as I gradually caught on, we held long con-
versations together.

I never knew whether he really listened to me or whether
he simply followed the mysterious skein of Ms own thoughts,
which seemed to issue forth from the shadowy, remote
reaches of a primitive world. This indefinable being wore a
torn, dirty shirt open over his hairless chest, which Bad a

67

prominent breastbone like that of a bird. On his head he
wore a reddish cap with a visor, perhaps the badge of one
of his many public functions; he was now both grave-digger
and town crier. At all hours of the day he went through the
village street, blowing a trumpet, beating a drum which he
wore hung about his neck and calling out in his unhuman
voice the news of the day: the arrival of a peddler, the
slaughter of a goat, an edict of the mayor, the hour set for
a funeral. And it was he who carried the dead to the ceme-
tery, dug their graves and buried them.

These were his normal activities, but behind them lay an-
other existence, filled with a dark, impenetrable power.
The women teased him when he went by, because he had no
beard, and rumor had it that he had never made love all
his life long. "Coming to bed with me tonight?" they called
from the doorways, laughing and hiding their faces in their
hands. "Why do you leave me to sleep alone?" They teased
him, but at the same time he inspired them with respect and
something like fear. The old man had a secret talent: he was
in touch with forces below the earth, he could call up spirits,
and he had a power over animals. His original trade, before
old age and vicissitude had brought him to Gagliano, was
that of wolf -tamer. He could either make the wolves come
down into the villages, or keep them away, as he wished;
they simply could not resist him, but had to bend to his
will.

People said that when he was young he wandered over
the mountains followed by savage wolf-packs. This talent
caused him to be held in high esteem, and when the winter
was severe, various villages called upon him to keep away
the woodland beasts that cold and hunger drove to invade
them. Every kind of animal was susceptible to his power, al-

68

though he could not wield it over women; and not only ani-
mals but the elements and the spirits that dwell in the air
as well. In his youth he could mow as much wheat in a day
as fifty men because an invisible presence worked for him.
At the end of the day when the other peasants were covered
with dirt and sweat, their backs aching from fatigue and
their heads buzzing from exposure to the sun, the wolf -tamer
was as fresh as he had been in the morning.

I climbed out of my ditch to speak to him and offered
him a cigar, which he put into a blackened holder made from
the right hindleg of a buck rabbit. As he leaned on his
shovel for he was always digging new graves he bent
over to pick up a human shoulder blade, which he held for
a while in his hand while he talked and then tossed aside.
The ground was full of calcified bleached bones which
flowered out of graves worn away by rain and sun. To the
old man these bones, the dead, animals, and spirits were all
familiar things, bound up, as indeed they were to everyone
in these parts, with simple everyday life. "The village is
built of the bones of the dead/' he said to me in his thick
jargon, gurgling like a subterranean rivulet suddenly
emerging among the stones, and twisting the toothless hole
that served him for a mouth into what might have been
meant for a smile. Whenever I tried to make him explain
what he meant he paid no attention, but laughed and re-
peated exactly what he had said before, with not a word
added to it: "That's it; the village is built of the bones of
the dead." The old "man was quite right, whether he meant
these words literally or symbolically, as a figure of
speech.

A short time later^ when the mayor ordered an excavation
made not far from the widow's house for the foundations

69

of a small building to house the Fascist Scout organization,
thousands of bones were turned up instead of dirt, and for
days wagons carried these ancestral remains through the
village and dumped them down the Fossa del Bersagliere.
The bones from the tombs which had lain under the pave-
ment of the fallen church, the Madonna of the Angels, were
of more recent vintage. Some of them still had vestiges of'
flesh or parchment-like skin attached to them, and the dogs
fought over them whenever they dug them up; they ran up
the village street barking madly in the pursuit of one of
their number with a tibia in his mouth. Here where time has
come to a stop, it seemed quite natural that bones of all ages,
recent, less recent, and very ancient, should turn up all to-
gether at the traveler's feet. The dead of the Madonna of the
Angels, in their ruined tombs, were the most unfortunate.
Not only did birds and dogs disperse their remains,
but other and more terrifying presences visited the dread-
ful, slimy hole under the ruins where they had come to
rest.

One night some few months or few years before (he
sould not tell me exactly when, because his notions of time
were vague) the wolf-tamer, on his way back from Gag-
lianello, had just reached a slight rise of ground across from
ihe church, known as the Mound of the Madonna of the An-
gels, when he felt a strange weariness in his body and had to
sit down on \ke steps of a small side-chapel. He could not get
up again and go on his way; someone was holding him
back. The night was black and the old man could not see
through the darkness, but from the ravine a bestial voice
called him by name. A devil, who had settled down there
among the dead, forbade him to go farther. The old man
made the sign of the cross and the devil began to gnash his

70

teeth and to cry out In pain. Among the shadows the old
man made out for a second the form of a goat, which leaped
with terror over the ruins and disappeared. The devil fled
howling down the ravine, "Uuuuuhhhh!" he bayed as he
vanished. All at once the old man felt free and strong again,
and a few steps brought him into the village. He had had
endless adventures of the sort and when I drew him out he
told them to me without ascribing to them the least im-
portance. He had lived so long that it was inevitable such
meetings should have been numerous.

He was so old that in the days of the brigands he was
already a full-grown young man. I could never find out
for certain whether, as was most likely, he had been one
of them, but he had known the famous Ninco Nanco and
he described to me as if he had seen her only the day before
this brigand's consort, Maria 'a Pastora, who was, like him-
self, from Pisticci. Maria 'a Pastora was a beautiful peas-
ant woman who lived with her lover in the wooded moun-
tains, fighting and robbing at his side, clad like a man, and
always on horseback. Ninco Nanco's band was the crudest
and most daring of the region, and Maria 'a Pastora took
part in the raids on farms and villages, the highway rob-
beries, the division of spoils, and the murders for revenge.
When Ninco Nanco tore out with his bare hands the heart
of the bersagliere who had captured him, Maria 'a Pastora
handed him his knife. The grave-digger remembered her
distinctly, and there was pleasure in his strange voice when
he told me how beautiful she was, with the pink and white
coloring of a flower and black braids that hung down to her
feet, as she sat straight, astride her horse. Ninco Nanco was
killed, but the old man did not know what had been the end
of Maria *a Pastora, goddess of the peasant war. She neither

71

died nor was captured, he told me; she was seen at Pisticci,
swathed in black, then she disappeared on horseback into
the woods and was never heard of again.

9

1 D I D not go to the cemetery only to seek rest and
solitude and to listen to stories. This was the one place, within
bounds, that was not built up and where a few trees broke
the geometrical outline of the peasants' huts. For this reason
it was the first subject I chose for a picture. I went out with
my canvas and brushes when the sun started to go down,
set up my easel in the shade of an olive tree or behind the
cemetery wall and started to paint.

The first time I did this, a few days after my arrival, my
occupation appeared suspect to the sergeant, who immedi-
ately informed the mayor and meanwhile, in order to be
on the safe side, sent one of his men to watch me. The cara-
biniere stood stiffly a few steps behind me and looked at
my work from the first to the last stroke of the brush. It is
tiresome to paint with someone looking over your shoulder,
even if you're not afraid of evil influences (as they say was
the case with Cezanne), but in spite of all I could do he was
not to be budged; he had his orders. Gradually the expres-
sion of his stupid face shifted from inquiry to interest and
finally he asked me whether I would be able to make an en-
largement in oils of a photograph of his dead mother, this
being to a carabiniere the apex of art. The hours went by,

72

the sun set, and objects took on the enchantment of twilight,
seeming to shine with a light of their own, from within rather
than from without. An enormous, transparent, unreal moon
hung in the rose-tinted sky over the gray olive trees and the
houses lower down, like a cuttlefish bone corroded by the
salt of the ocean. At this time I had a particular feeling for
the moon, because for many months I had been shut up in
a cell where I could not see it, and to find it again was a
pleasure. As a greeting and a token of regard I painted it,
round and light in the center of the sky, to the astonishment
of the carabiniere.

At this point the twin masters of the village came to inspect
my work, the decorous sergeant in his impeccable uniform
with a sword at his side, and the mayor, all compliments
and smiles and affected benevolence. Don Luigi, of course,
was a connoisseur and wanted me to know it; he was un-
sparing in his praise of my technique. Besides, it was flatter-
ing to his local pride that I should find his native place
worthy of painting. I took advantage of his satisfaction to
suggest that if I were to do justice to its beauties I should
have to go a little farther away from the village limits. The
mayor and the sergeant were unwilling to commit themselves
to breaking the rules, but little by little in the course of the
following weeks we reached a sort of tacit agreement which
enabled me, for the purpose of painting, to go two or three
hundred yards out of bounds. I owed this privilege less to
respect for art than to Donna Caterina's intrigues and her
desire to please me and to her brother's panicky fear of
falling ill. Don Luigi was perfectly well. Aside from a
glandular disturbance which showed itself in his sadistic
and infantile disposition but had no physical effects except
a high-pitched voice and a tendency to obesity, he was burst-

73

Ing with health. However, to my good fortune, he was con-
tinually prey to the fear of illness : today it was tuberculosis,
tomorrow heart trouble, the next day stomach ulcers; he
counted his pulse, took his temperature, examined his tongue
in the mirror, and every time we met I had to reassure him.
At last the hypochondriac had a doctor at his beck and call.
And so I could go a little afield to paint from time to time,
not too often and not so far that I should be out of sight. The
whole thing was to be at my own suggestion and my own
risk since he Ead many enemies who might write anonymous
letters to Matera, putting him in a bad light because he had
made me this concession.

I gained very little breathing-space. The place was
hemmed in by ravines, and apart from the walk leading
out of the cemetery, beyond which I could not venture with-
out going downhill and out of sight, only two paths led away
from the village. One led up and down along the crest of
the ravine from Gagliano to Gaglianello, and in this direc-
tion I could go as far as the Mound of the Madonna of the
Angels, where the devil had appeared to the old grave-dig-
ger, not far from the last village houses. A narrower path,
only a few feet wide, branched off from this to the right and
went down in a series of steep zigzags to the bottom of the
chasm two hundred yards below. This was the dangerous
passageway that most of the peasants took every day with
their donkeys and goats, when they went to their fields down
by the Agri Valley, and again at night when they came back,
bent over like the damned under their loads of wood or
fodder. The other path was at the higher end of the village;
it ran off to the right of the church, near the widow's house,
to a little spring, which until a few years before was Gagli-
ano's only supply of water, A thin stream came out of a rusty

74

pipe and fell into a wooden trough in which the women
still came at times to wash; after it spilled over from this
there was nothing to drain it off and it made a marshy spot
where mosquitoes bred. The path continued through fields
of stubble dotted with occasional olive trees and lost itself
in a labyrinth of mounds and holes in the white clay, which
ended abruptly at a precipice not far from the Sauro River.
Here I used to walk and paint and here one day I met a
poisonous snake, but the loud barking of my dog warned
me of its approach.

The strange and broken outline of this terrain made
Gagliano into a sort of natural fortress, with a limited num-
ber of entrances and exits. The mayor took advantage of
this lay of the land during days of what was supposed to
be patriotic frenzy. He then called public meetings in order,
he said, to brace up the morale of the people, herding them
into the square to listen to radio broadcasts by the leaders
who were then laying plans for the war with Abyssinia. When
Don Luigi decided to call one of these gatherings he sent
the old town crier and grave-digger through the street the
evening before with his trumpet and drum, and the ancient
voice was heard to shout a hundred times over, in front of
every house, on one high, impersonal note: "Tomorrow
morning at ten o'clock, everyone come to the square
in front of the town hall to hear the radio! Nobody stay

away!'

"We'll have to get up two hours before sunrise/' muttered
the peasants, unwilling to lose a working day, although they
knew that Don Luigi would station carabinieri and Fascist
Scouts at every exit from the village with orders not to let
anyone by. Most of them managed to leave for the fields
while it was still dark and the watchers had not yet arrived,

75

but the late risers had to take their stand in the square with
the women and school children, just below the balcony , from
which cascaded the rapt and visceral eloquence of the mayor.
They stood there with their hats on, sober and mistrustful,
and his speechmaking poured over them without leaving a
trace.

The gentry were all Party members, even the few like Dr.
Milillo who were dissenters. The Party stood for Power, as
vested in the Government and the State, and they felt en-
titled to a share of it. For exactly the opposite reason none
of the peasants were members; indeed, it was unlikely that
they should belong to any political party whatever, should,
by chance, another exist. They were not Fascists, just as they
would never have been Conservatives or Socialists, or any-
thing else. Such matters had nothing to do with them; they
belonged to another world and they saw no sense in them.
What had the peasants to do with Power, Government, and
the State? The State, whatever form it might take, meant
"the fellows in Rome/* "Everyone knows/' they said, "that
the fellows in Rome don't want us to liye like human beings.
There are hailstorms, landslides, droughts, malaria and
... the State. These are inescapable evils ; such there al-
ways have been and there always will be. They make us kill
off our goats, they carry away our furniture, and now they're
going to send us to the wars. Such is life!"

To the peasants the State is more distant than heaven and
far more of a scourge, because it is always against them.
Its political tags and platforms and, indeed, the whole struc-
ture of it do not matter. The peasants do not understand them
because they are couched in a different language from their
own, and there is no reason why they should ever care to
understand them. Their only defense against the State and

76

the propaganda of the State is resignation, the same gloomy
resignation that bows their shoulders under the scourges of
nature.

For this reason, quite naturally, they have no conception
of a political struggle; they think of it as a personal quarrel
among the "fellows in Rome." They were not concerned with
the views of the political prisoners who were in compulsory
residence among them, or with the motives for their coming.
They looked at them kindly and treated them like brothers
because they too, for some inexplicable reason, were victims
of fate. During the first days of my stay whenever I hap-
pened to meet along one of the paths outside the village an
old peasant who did not know me, he would stop his don-
key to greet me and ask in dialect: "Who are you? Where
are you going?" "Just for a walk; Fm a political prisoner,"
I would answer. "An exile? (They always said exile in-
stead of prisoner.) Too bad! Someone in Rome must have
had it in for you." And he would say no more, but smile
at me in a brotherly fashion as he prodded his mount into
motion.

This passive brotherliness, this sympathy in the orig-
inal sense of the word, this fatalistic, comradely, age-old
patience, is the deepest feeling the peasants have in com-
mon, a bond made by nature rather than by religion. They
do not and can not have what is called political awareness,
because they are literally pagani, "pagans/' or countrymen,
as distinguished from city-dwellers. The deities of the State
and the city can find no worshipers here on the land, where
the wolf and the ancient black boar reign supreme, where
there is no wall between the world of men and the world of
animals and spirits, between the leaves of the -trees above
and the roots below. They can not have even an awareness

77

of themselves as individuals, here where all things are held
together by acting upon one another and each one is a power
unto itself 5 working imperceptibly? where there is no barrier
that can not be broken down by magic. They live submerged
in a world that rolls on independent of their will, where man
is in no way separate from his sun, his beast, his malaria,
where there can be neither happiness, as literary devotees
of the land conceive it, nor hope, because these two are ad-
juncts of personality and here there is only the grim passivity
of a sorrowful Nature. But they have a lively human feeling
for the common fate of mankind and its common acceptance.
This is strictly a feeling rather than an act of will; they do
not express it in words but they carry it with them at every
moment and in every motion of their lives, through all the
unbroken days that pass over these wastes,

"Too bad! Someone had it in for you.' 9 You, too, are sub-
ject to fate. You, too, are here because of the power of ill
will, because of an evil star; you are tossed hither and yon
by the hostile workings of magic. And you, too, are a man;
you are one of us. Never mind what motives impelled you,
politics, legalities, or the illusion of reason. Such things as
reason or cause and effect, do not exist; there is only an
adverse fate, a will for evil, which is the magic power of
things. The State is one shape of this fate, like the wind that
devours the harvest and the fever that feeds on our blood.
There can be no attitude toward fate except patience and
silence. Of what use are words? And what can a man do?
Nothing.

Armed, then, with silence and patience, taciturn and im-
penetrable, the few peasants who had not escaped to the
fields attended the gathering in the square. They seemed
not to hear the blithe trumpeting of the radio, which came

78

from too far away, from a land of ease and progress, which
had forgotten the existence of death and now called it up
as a joke, with the frivolity of an unbeliever.

JLJ Y THIS time I knew a good many of the peasants of
Gagliano. At first sight they all seemed alike, short, sun-
burned, with dull, expressionless black eyes like the empty
windows of a dark room. Some I met in the course of my brief
walks, others nodded to me from their doorways in the eve-
ning, but most of them came to me for medical treatment. I
had to resign myself to carrying out the functions of a doctor,
but at first I worried like a novice about the welfare of my
patients and I was disturbed by a consciousness of my own
inadequacy. Their ingenuous, blind confidence in me called
for some return, and, against my will, I took their suffer-
ings upon myself and felt responsible for them. Luckily I
had a medical education behind me, but I had never prac-
ticed, and here I had neither books nor instruments at hand.
My attitude was neither impersonal nor scientific; in fact, I
must confess that I was in a state of continual anxiety.

Hence a brief visit from my sister who is a very able doc-
tor, as well as a kind and intelligent woman, was particularly
precious to me. I learned of her unexpected coming through
a telegram which arrived just in time for me to send a car
to pick her up where the bus stopped at the crossroads by
the Sauro River. The car was Gagliano's only motor vehicle,

79

a rattling old Fiat, the property of a mechanic, an "Amer-
ican," a big light-haired fellow with a motor cylisfs cap OB
his head. He was notorious in the village for an enormous
detail of his anatomy, similar to that which gossip in France
attributes to Herriot; it made him desirable, perhaps, but
in any case dangerous, to women. In spite of or on acount
of this peculiarity he had the reputation of a peasant Don
Juan, and it was difficult for his unfortunate sweethearts
to conceal their illicit passion from his wife's jealousy and
the curiosity and amusement of the village. He had pur-
chased the car with the last of the savings he had brought
back from New York, hoping that public demand for his
services would enable him to turn it to profit. But he made
no more than a trip or two every week, usually to take
the mayor to the prefecture in Matera, or to accommodate
the tax collector or the carabinieri; occasionally to trans-
port a sick person to Stigliano or to call for freight there.
The village authorities were seriously considering at the
time the advisability of using this car instead of a mule to
call every day for the mail; by so doing they would set up
a regular service for travelers coming or going by bus. But
because a man's time and labor were unimportant in these
parts and cost practically nothing, there was quite a differ-
ence in the expense, and perhaps, also, various family and
social relationships had to be taken into account; in any
case the question was postponed from day to day, and when
I left it was still unsettled. From time to time, when he went
to pick up someone at the bus stop the mechanic brought
the mail back with him and it was distributed several hours
earlier than usual. People knew when this was going to hap-
pen and a small crowd waited in front of the church for the
return of the car. When its loud rattle could be heard com-

80

ing around the curve they all surged forward to enjoy the
novelty of the sight*

Thus it was in the midst of this expectant public that the
familiar figure of my sister, who seemed to come from very
far because I had not seen her for so long, stepped out of
the car. Her precise gestures, simple dress, frank tone of
voice, and open smile were just as I had always known them,
but after long months in prison and the days I had spent in
Grassano and Gagliano they seemed like the sudden living
apparition of a world existent only in memory. Those pur-
poseful gestures and that ease of motion belonged to a place
infinitely removed from this one, and they were quite in-
credible here. I had not yet appreciated this elementary
physical difference; her arrival was that of an ambassadress
from one country to another one, a country this side of the
mountains.

After we had embraced and she had given me messages
from my mother, father, and brothers and we were alone,
away from public staring, in the widow's kitchen, I ques-
tioned my sister, Luisa, impatiently. She gave me news of
my family and friends and of what had gone on in the world
at large during my absence; we talked of books and paint-
ings and what people we knew and people in general were
thinking and saying and doing in Italy. These were the things
I cared most for, the things that occupied my thoughts every
day, just as if they were close at hand. But now when they
were brought before me in words they seemed to belong to
another pferiod of time, to have a different rhythm, and to
obey laws that here would be considered foreign, as if they
were of a land farther away than China or India. All at once
I understood how it was that these two periods were her-
metically shut off from one another, that these two civiliza-

81

tions could have no communication except by a miracle. I
realized why the peasants looked on strangers from the
North as visitors from another world, almost as if they were
foreign gods.

My sister had come from Turin and she could stay for
only four or five days.

"I wasted entirely too much time getting here/' she said,
"because I had to come by way of Matera in order to have
the police there stamp my permit to visit you. Instead of
coming directly through Naples and Potenza, which would
have taken me only two days I had to take the roundabout
route via Bari to Matera, and at Matera I lost a whole day
waiting for the bus. What a place that is! From the glimpse
I had of Gagliano just now Fd say it wasn't so bad ; it couldn't
be worse than Matera, anyhow."

She was horrified and frightened by what she had seen.
I told her that the violence of her reaction must be due to
the fact that she had never before been in these parts and
that Matera had been the scene of her first meeting with this
landscape and the desolate race of men that lived in it.

"I didn't know this part of the country, to be sure," she
answered, "but I did somehow picture it in my mind. Only
Matera* . . . Well, it was beyond anything I could pos-
sibly have imagined. I got there at about eleven in the morn-
ing. I had read in the guidebook that it was a picturesque
town, quite worth a visit, that it had a museum of ancient art
and some curious cave dwellings. But when I came out of
the railway station, a modem and rather sumptuous affair,
and looked around me, I couldn't for the life of me see the
town; it simply wasn't there. I was on a sort of deserted
plateau, surrounded by bare, low hills of a grayish earth
covered with stones. In the middle of this desert there rose

82

here and there eight or ten big marble buildings built in the
style made fashionable in Rome by Piacentini, with massive
doors, ornate architraves, solemn Latin inscriptions, and
pillars gleaming in the sun. Some of them were unfinished
and seemed to be quite empty, monstrosities entirely out of
keeping with the desolate landscape around them. A jerry-
built housing project, for the benefit, no doubt, of govern-
ment employees, which had already fallen into a state of
filth and disrepair, filled up the empty space around the
buildings and shut off my view on one side. The whole thing
looked like an ambitious bit of city planning, begun in haste
and interrupted by the plague, or else like a stage set, in
execrable taste, for a tragedy by d'Annunzio. These enor-
mous twentieth-century imperial palaces housed the prefec-
ture, the police station, the post office, the town hall, the
barracks of the carabinieri, the Fascist Party headquarters,
the Fascist Scouts, the Corporations, and so on. But where
was the town? Matera was nowhere to be seen,

"I decided to attend at once to my business. I went to
the police station, of resplendent marble without but dirty
and bug-ridden within, its ill-kept rooms piled up with dust
and sweepings. I was received, for the purpose of getting
a stamp on my permit, by the assistant chief, who was also
the head of the local political police. I was worried about
the danger of malaria and so I asked him whether there
was any chance of your being transferred to a healthier cli-
mate. Another officer who was in the room burst into the
conversation abruptly: 'Malaria? There isn't any such thing.
It's all imagination. One case a year, perhaps. Your brother
is quite well off where he is.' But when he realized that I
was a doctor he was silent, and Ms superior answered me in
an entirely different tone: There's malaria everywhere/ he

83

said. 'We can transfer your brother, if you like, but he'll find
conditions just the same as at Gagliano. There's only one
place in the whole province that's free of malaria, and that's
Stigliano, because it's almost three thousand feet above sea
level. Perhaps later we can send him there, but for the time
being it's impossible.' (I caught on to the fact that only dis-
sident Fascists were sent to Stigliano.) 6 No, your brother had
better stay put. Look at us ; we live here in Matera, and we're
not political prisoners. And it's no better here, as far as
malaria is concerned, than at Gagliano. If we can stick it,
then he can stick it too.'

"To this argument there was really no answer, so I pur-
sued the matter no further, and went out. I wanted to buy
you a stethoscope as I had forgotten to bring one from Turin
and I knew that you needed one for your medical practice.
Since there were no dealers in medical instruments I decided
to look for one in a pharmacy. Among the government build-
ings and the cheap new houses I found two pharmacies, the
only ones, I was told, in the town. Neither had what I was
looking for and what's more their proprietors disclaimed
all knowledge of what it might be. 'A stethoscope? What's
that?' After I had explained that it was a simple instrument
for listening to the heart, made like an ear trumpet, usually
out of wood, they told me that I might find such a thing in
Bari, but that here in Matera no one had ever heard of it.

"By now it was noon and I repaired to the restaurant that
was pointed out to me as the best in town. There, all at one
table with a soiled cloth on it and napkin rings that showed
they came there every day, sat the assistant chief of police
with several of his subordinates, looking bored to tears. You
know that I'm not hard to please, but I swear that when I got
up to leave I was just as hungry as when I came.

84

"I set out at last to find the town. A little beyond the sta-
tion I found a street with a row of houses on one side and on
the other a deep gully. In the gully lay Matera. From where
I was, higher up, it could hardly be seen because the drop
was so sheer. All I could distinguish as I looked down were
alleys and terraces, which concealed the houses from view.
Straight across from me there was a barren hill of an ugly
gray color, without a single tree or sign of cultivation upon
it, nothing but sun-baked earth and stones. At the bottom
of the gully a sickly, swampy stream, the Bradano, trickled
among the rocks. The hill and the stream had a gloomy, evil
appearance that caught at my heart. The gully had a strange
shape: it was formed by two half -funnels, side by side, sepa-
rated by a narrow spur and meeting at the bottom, where
I could see a white church, Santa Maria de Idris, which
looked half -sunk in the ground. The two funnels, I learned,
were called Sasso Caveoso and Sasso Barisano. They were
like a schoolboy's idea of Dante's Inferno. And, like Dante,
I too began to go down from circle to circle, by a sort of mule
path leading to the bottom. The narrow path wound its way
down and around, passing over the roofs of the houses, if
houses they could be called. They were caves, dug into the
hardened clay walls of the gully, each with its own fagade,
some of which were quite handsome, with eighteenth-century
ornamentation. These false fronts, because of the slope of
the gully, were flat against its side at the bottom, but at the
top they protruded, and the alleys in the narrow space be-
tween them and the hillside did double service: they were
a roadway for those who came out of their houses from above
and a roof for those who lived beneath. The houses were
open on account of the heat, and as I went by I could see into
the caves, whose only light came in through the front doors.

85

Some of them had no entrance but a trapdoor and ladder.
In these dark holes with walls cut out of the earth I saw a
few pieces of miserable furniture, beds, and some ragged
clothes hanging up to dry. On the floor lays dogs, sheep,
goats, and pigs. Most families have just one cave to live in
and there they sleep all together; men, women, children, and
animals. This is how twenty thousand people live.

"Of children I saw an infinite number. They appeared
from everywhere, in the dust and heat, amid the flies, stark
naked or clothed in rags ; I have never in all my life seen such
a picture of poverty. My profession has brought me in daily
contact with dozens of poor, sick, ill-kempt children, but I
never even dreamed of seeing a sight like this. I saw chil-
dren sitting on the doorsteps, in the dirt, while the sun beat
down on them, with their eyes half -closed and their eyelids
red and swollen; flies crawled across the lids, but the chil-
dren stayed quite still, without raising a hand to brush them
away. Yes, flies crawled across their eyelids, and they
seemed not even to feel them. They had trachoma. I knew
that it existed in the South, but to see it against this back-
ground of poverty and dirt was something else again. I saw
other children with the wizened faces of old men, their
bodies reduced by starvation almost to skeletons, their heads
crawling with lice and covered with scabs. Most of them had
enormous, dilated stomachs and faces yellow and worn with
malaria.

"The women, when they saw me look in the doors, asked
me to come in, and in the dark, smelly caves where they lived
I saw children lying on the floor under torn blankets, with
their teeth chattering from fever. Others, reduced to skin and
bones by dysentery, could hardly drag themselves about.
I saw children with waxen faces who seemed to me to have

86

something worse than malaria, perhaps some tropical dis-
ease such as Kaia Azar, or black fever. The thin women,
with dirty, undernourished babies hanging at their flaccid
breasts, spoke to me mildly and with despair. I felt, under
the blinding sun, as If I were in a city stricken by the plague.
I went on down toward die church at the bottom of the gully;
a constantly swelling crowd of children followed a few steps
behind me. They were shouting something, but I could not
understand their incomprehensible dialect. I kept on going;
still they followed and called after me. I thought they must
want pennies, and I stopped for a minute. Only then did I
make out the words they were all shouting together: *Signo~
rina, dammi 9 u chinl! Signorina, give me some quinine!* I
gave them what coins I had with me to buy candy, but that
was not what they wanted; they kept on asking, with sorrow-
ful insistence, for quinine. Meanwhile we had reached Santa
Maria de Idris, a handsome baroque church. When I lifted
nay eyes to see the way I had come, I at last saw the whole
of Matera, in the form of a slanting wall. From here it
seemed almost like a real town. The f agades of the caves were
like a row of white houses; the holes of the doorways stared
at me like black eyes. The town is indeed a beautiful one,
picturesque and striking. I reached the museum with its
Greek vases, statuettes, and coins found in the vicinity. While
I was looking at them the children still stood out in the
sun, waiting for me to bring them quinine."

Where should my sister put up? The lame goat-killer had
received an answer from Naples. They weren't anxious to
rent the house, but they might let me have a room or two
at the veiy high price, for which they apologized, of fty lire
a month. Lodgings In the back country, they said, were at a

87

premium, because people were expecting war to be declared
and they feared a bombardment from the British fleet. The
owners, or their friends, might take refuge in Gagliano.
Meanwhile I had lost my enthusiasm for this crumbling and
romantic dwelling, which I began to think was really not
fit to live in. The student from Pisa, the political prisoner
whom I had seen fetching his dinner from the wall, sent
word to me through a peasant that in a few days the rooms
would be free that he had taken for his mother and sister,
the schoolteachers. They had come to pay him a visit, but be-
cause they stayed in the house most of the time I had not seen
them about. He could not afford to keep the rooms for him-
self, and as soon as they were gone I could move in. The
lame man and Donna Caterina both approved. Meanwhile
my sister was obliged to share the widow's spare room with
me and to make acquaintance there with the insect life of
Lucania. After what she had seen of the caves of Matera
she swore that this melancholy room was a palace, and for-
tunately neither the tax collector nor any other visitor came
during the nights she was there.

My sister's visit was quite an event; the gentry turned out
to welcome her and Donna Caterina confided to her the
details of her liver complaint and her cooking secrets, and
treated her with extreme kindness. A lady from the North, so
simple in her ways and a doctor to boot; they had never seen
the like of her, and they were anxious to make a favorable
impression. The peasants accepted her more naturally.
Many of them had been in America ; they were not surprised
to see a woman doctor and of course they took full advantage
of her professional status.

Hitherto they had thought of me as a sort of man from
Mars, the only one of my species, and the discovery that I

88

had blood connections here on earth seemed somehow to
fill in their picture of me in a manner that pleased them. The
sight of me with my sister tapped one of their deepest feel-
ings: that of blood relationship, which was all the more
intense since they had so little attachment to either religion
or the State. It was not that they venerated family relation-
ship as a social, legal, or sentimental tie, but rather that
they cherished an occult and sacred sense of conimunality.
A unifying web, not only of family ties (a first cousin was
often as close as a brother) , but of the acquired and symbolic
kinship called comparaggio, ran throughout the village.
Those who pledged friendship to each other on the midsum-
mer night of June 23 and thus became compari di San
Giovanni were even closer than brothers ; their choosing and
the ritual initiation they went through made them members
of the same blood group and within the group there was a
sacred tie which forbade intermarriage. This fraternal tie,
then, was the strongest there was among them.

Toward evening, when my sister and I walked arm in arm
along the main street, the peasants beamed at us from their
houses; the women greeted us and covered us with benedic-
tions: "Blessed is the womb that bore you!" they called out
to us from the doorways; "Blessed the breasts that suckled
you!" Toothless old creatures looked up from their knitting
to mumble proverbs: "A wife is one thing, but a sister's
something more!" "Sister and brother, all to one another/'
Luisa, with her rational, city-bred way of looking at things,
never got over their strange enthusiasm for the simple fact
that I had a sister.

But what surprised and shocked her most was that no one
had any wish to improve the village. She had a constructive
temperament, sanguine, as the ancients would have it,

"solar," the astrologlsts would call it, and because her vigor-
ous kindness would brook no delay she spent her time talking
to me of what might be done and setting forth practical plans
for helping the peasants of Gagliano and the children of
Matera: hospitals, homes, a campaign against malaria,
schools., public works, government doctors, and perhaps
volunteers, a nation-wide drive for the benefit of these vil-
lages, and so on. She herself would gladly devote her time
to a cause that seemed to her so worthy; there was no time
to be lost; something must be done. She was quite right and
what she suggested was reasonable and fair, but things in
this part of the world are a good deal more complex than
they appear to the clear-thinking mind of a good man or
woman.

The four days of my sister's visit were soon over. When
the mechanic's small car bore her away in a cloud of dust,
around the curve behind the cemetery, the world of creative
activity and cultural values, of which I too had once been a
part and which, while she was with me, had put in a mo-
mentary reappearance, seemed to melt away, as if it were
sucked back into time, in the faraway cloud of memory.

JL W A S left with books, medicines, and good advice, and
all of them proved useful almost immediately. Quite apart
from those that are contagious a number of the most dis-
similar diseases seem to travel in cycles. For weeks there

90

may be no illness at all or only very light cases; then, when
something serious arrives it is certain to he followed by more
of the same kind.

One such period, the first since I had been in Gagliano,
came soon after my sister had gone away; there was a whole
series of difficult and dangerous cases which frightened me
considerably. Every illness, indeed, as I met with it here, had
an acute and fatal aspect, quite different from what I had
been accustomed to see in the orderly rows of beds at the
University Medical Clinic of Turin. Perhaps it was the
chronic anemia of those long afflicted wtih malaria, or under-
nourishment, or the lack of stamina and the passive resigna-
tion characteristic of the peasants, but, whatever the reason
may have been, from the very first days of a given illness the
most varied symptoms piled up, while the patient's face had
the drawn expression of final agony. I was perpetually aston-
ished to see cases that any good doctor would have branded
as hopeless improve and recover with the simplest kind of
care. It seemed as if some strange sort of luck were with me.

At this time I went to see the priest. He was subject to
intestinal hemorrhages, but, misanthropic as he was, he said
nothing and continued to walk about the village without
paying them the least attention. Don Cosimino, the kindly
postmaster, the only friend of the old man, who spent hours
in the post office reciting his epigrams, begged me to pay
him a friendly visit and at the same time see if there was
anything I could do for him.

Don Trajella lived with his mother in one large room, a
sort of cavern, in a dark alley not far from the church. When
I went in I found them both at dinner ; between them they had
but one plate and one glass. The plate was full of badly
cooked beans, the staple of their meal; sitting at one corner

of the uncovered table, mother and son took turns dipping
into them with old tin spoons. At the back of the room two
cots, separated by a tattered green curtain, were still un-
made. Piles of books were stacked up in disorder against
the walls, with chickens perched on top of them. Other
chickens flew and ran about the room, which had not been
dusted for who knows how long and had the suffocating smell
of a chicken-house. The priest showed a liking for me and
seemed to consider me, along with Don Cosimino, one of the
few people he could talk to because we were not among his
enemies. He greeted me cordially, and with a smile on his
keen, sorrowful face. He introduced me to his mother, beg-
ging me to excuse her lack of response, because she was
somewhat old and weak, vetula et infirma. Then he hastened
to offer me wine, which I had to accept in order not to hurt his
feelings, in spite of the fact that it was in. the glass that his
mother and he must have used for years without washing, at
least to judge from the black, greasy crust around the rim.
Don Trajella had no servant and by now he was so accus-
tomed to the filth that he no longer noticed it. After we had
spoken of his affliction he noticed that I was looking curiously
at his books and said:

"What do you expect? In a place like this there's no point
in reading. I had some fine books. Can you see? There are
some rare editions among them. When I came here the swine
that carried my books smeared them with tar, just to annoy
me. I lost all desire to open them and I left them just like that
on the floor; they've lain there for years."

I went closer. The books were covered with a layer of
dust and chicken dirt; here and th6re on the parchment
bindings there were spots of tar, left from the old outrage,
I picked up some of them at random; they were old seven-

92

teenth-century volumes of theology, casuistry, lives of the
saints and fathers of the Church, and the Latin poets. Before
the chickens had roosted on it he must have had the library
of a cultivated and enlightened priest. Among the books were
some crushed and tarred pamphlets written by Don Trajella
himself: historical and apologetical studies of San Calogero
of Avila.

"He is a little known Spanish saint/ 9 said the priest* "I
made a series of paintings at that time, temporibus illis, of
the various episodes of his life."

I insisted that he show them to me and finally he hauled
them out from under his bed, where, he said, he had left
them untouched since the day of his arrival. They were done
in tempera in a popular style, but they were effective, well-
composed pictures with a multitude of tiny, carefully drawn
figures, representing the birth, life, miracles, death, and
glory of the saint. He also brought out from under the bed
some painted baroque wood and terra cotta statuettes of
angels and saints which he had modeled with considerable
facility after the style of the seventeenth-century Neapolitan
creche. I congratulated him as a fellow-artist.

"I've done nothing ever since I've been here among the
heathen, in partibus infidelium^ bringing the sacraments of
Mother Church, as they say, to these heretics who will have
none of them. Once upon a time such things amused me. But
here they're quite impossible. There's no point in doing any-
thing in this place. Have another glass of wine^ Don Carlo,**

While I looked for a pretext to stave off another glassful,
bitterer than any conceivable philter, the old mother, who
had sat in her chair as quietly as if she were not there,
suddenly stood up, shouting and waving her arms. The
chickens took fright and began to flutter about the room.

93

on the beds, the books, and the table. Don Trajella tried to
chase them off the sheets, railing the while at "this Godfor-
saken country!" The chickens cackled louder than ever in
stupid terror, raising clouds of dust which shone in the beam
of sunlight coming in through the narrow aperture of the
half-raised window. I took advantage of the confusion to
make my way out, amid flapping wings and billowing black
skirts.

Don Trajella's predecessor (to my good luck, as it turned
out) had been quite a different sort, a fat, rich, gay priest,
somewhat of a rake, known for his excellent table and the
number of children he had begotten. He died, so rumor had
it, of overeating. The house where I took up my abode a few
days later, after the family of the student prisoner from Pisa
had gone, had been built by him and it was, in a manner of
speaking, the only civilized house in the village. He had
built it close by the old church, the Madonna of the Angels,
and after this had collapsed in the landslide, it was left close
to the edge of the precipice. There were three rooms, one
after the other. One entered the house, from an alley to the
right of the main street, through the kitchen, next came a room
where I put my bed, and then a larger room, with five win-
dows, which I used for a living room and studio. From a
door leading out of the studio four stone steps went down to
a small garden, with a fig tree in the center, closed at the
other end by a small iron gate. There was a little balcony off
the bedroom and a stair up the side of the house to a terrace
covering the whole roof, with a view that swept the horizon.
The house was a modest one, economically built and far from
beautiful; it had no character, neither the aristocracy of a
noble ruin nor the poverty of a peasant hut, but abounded
in the stuffy mediocrity of ecclesiastical taste. The studio

94

and the terrace had the colored tile floors to be found in many
a country sacristy, whose geometrical design was distasteful
to me because it constantly drew my eyes away from my
painting. The colors of the cheap tiles ran whenever they
were wet and Barone, who loved to roll on the floor, would
turn from a white dog into a rose-colored one. But the plaster
of the walls was in good condition, the doors were varnished
in blue, and there were green shutters.

Most important of all, in compensation for even the worst
defect, the late priest 9 s comfort-loving spirit had endowed the
house with one priceless treasure: a toilet, without running
water, of course, but none the less a real toilet, equipped with
a porcelain seat It was the only toilet in the village, and
probably there was not another one within a radius of fifty
miles. In the houses of the well-to-do there were still ancient
seats of monumental proportions in carved wood, minature
thrones with an air of authority about them. I was told, al-
though I never saw them with my own eyes, that there existed
pairs of matrimonial seats, side by side* for couples so de-
voted that they could not endure even the briefest separation.
The poor, of course, had nothing, and this lack made for
strange customs. In Grassano, at almost regular hours, in
the early morning and again in the evening, windows were
surreptitiously opened and the wrinkled hands of old women
were to be seen emptying the contents of chamber pots into
the street. These were "black magic** or bad luck tours. In
Gagliano the ceremony was neither as widespread nor as
regular; so precious a fertilizer for the fields could not be
wasted.

The complete absence of this simple apparatus in the
region created almost ineradicable habits, which, entwined
with other familiar ways of doing things, came to possess an

almost poetic and sentimental character. Lasala, the car-
penter, an alert "American," who had been mayor of Gras-
sano many years before and who kept in the depths of the
enormous radio-gramophone he had brought back with him
from New York along with recordings of Caruso and of the
arrival of the transatlantic flier, De Pinedo, in America, some
speeches commemorating the murdered Matteotti, told me
this story. A group of Immigrants from Grassano used to
meet every Sunday for an outing to the country after their
hard week's work in New York . . .

"There were eight or ten of us: a doctor, a druggist, some
tradesmen, a hotel waiter, and a few workers, all of us from
the same town and acquainted with each other since we were
children. Life is depressing there among the skyscrapers,
where there's every possible convenience, elevators, revolv-
ing doors, subways, endless streets and buildings, but never
a bit of green earth. Homesickness used to get the better of
us. On Sundays we took a train for miles and miles in search
of some open country. When finally we reached a deserted
spot, we were all as happy as if a great weight had been
lifted from our shoulders. And beneath a tree, all of us
together would let down our trousers . . . What joy! We
could feel the fresh air and all of nature around us. It wasn't
like those American toilets, shiny and all alike. We felt like
boys again, as if we were back in Grassano ; we were happy,
we laughed and we breathed for a moment the air of home.
And when we had finished we shouted together: 'Viva
f Italia! 9 The words came straight from our hearts."

My new house had the advantage of being at the lower
end of the village, out of sight of the mayor and his acolytes ;
at last I should be able to take a walk without running at
every step into the same people and the same conversation.

96

The gentry hereabouts, when they meet someone on the street,
do not say: "How are you?" Instead they greet him with the
question: "What did you haTe to eat today?" If their inter-
locutor is a peasant he answers silently with a gesture of one
hand brought up to the level of his face, turning slowly OB
its own axis, the thumb and little finger spread out and the
other fingers closed, which means: "Little or nothing." If he
is a man of position he lists in detail, the sorry dishes of his
dinner and asks after the fare of his friend. Then, if no
local feud or intrigue engages their passions, the conversa-
tion continues for some time with this exchange of gastro-
nomic confidences.

Now I should be able to stick my head out without ram-
ming my nose into the enormous stomach (so enormous as
to take up the whole street) of Don Gennaro, the local con-
stable and dog-catcher, the factotum and spy of the mayor,
who kept an eagle eye on the whereabouts of political pris-
oners and an ear cocked to hear what the peasants were say-
ing. Perhaps he was not a bad fellow at heart, but he was
obsequious toward the authorities and particularly Don
Luigi; he stubbornly enforced strange edicts aimed at regu-
lating pig and dog traffic, and pinned fines, for no good
reason, on women who had no money to pay them.

Above all, the house was a place where I could be alone
and work. I hastened, then, to take leave of the widow and
to begin a new life in my permanent home. The house be-
longed to the priest's heir, Don Rocco Macioppi, an unpre-
tentious, middle-aged landlord, agreeable, ceremonious,
somewhat of a church-mouse in glasses, and to his niece,
Donna Maria Maddalena, an old maid of twenty-five, who
had been educated in a convent at Potenza, and was pale,
anemic, and given to sighing. It was agreed that they should

97

keep the use of the garden for growing lettuce, and would
enter it by the outside gate, but that I should be free to walk
there at will. The house was nearly empty, but the owner and
the lame man, who was his friend, supplied me with the neces-
sary furniture. I brought with me several things I had just
sent for: a large easel and the armchair that went with it,
the one for painting and the other for looking at my pictures
while they were in progress. I was attached to both of these
to the point of not being able to get on without them; both
had followed me on my wanderings about the world.

There was also a box of recently arrived books, which
necessitated a special visit from the mayor and the sergeant.
Don Luigi sent word to me that he must be present when I
opened the box in order to make sure there were no forbidden
items and, with the assistance of his right-hand man, he
examined my volumes one by one. He did this, of course,
with the air of a man of learning, who cannot be surprised
by anything, wreathed in understanding smiles and content
with both his wisdom and his authority. Of forbidden books
there were none. But there was, for instance, an ordinary
edition of Montaigne.

"This is French, isn't it?" exclaimed the mayor, with a
wink intended to warn me against trying to pull the wool
over his eyes.

"Yes, Don Luigi, but the writer is an old-style French-
man!"

"Of course, Montaigne, the French Revolution, and all
that . . r

I tried very hard to convince him that there was nothing
subversive in these essays, but the schoolmaster knew what
he was talking about and smiled smugly in order to make
it quite clear that if he let me keep this book, which it was

98

his duty to confiscate, it was out of sheer benevolence and
sympathy for a fellow-savant.

The house was in order and my belongings in place. Now
I had to tackle the problem of finding a woman to do my
cleaning, fetch water from the fountain, and cook my meals.
My landlord, the goat-killer, Donna Caterina, and her nieces
were all in agreement: "There's only one woman that will do
for you. You mustn't take anyone else!" And Donna Caterina
said:

"111 talk to her and get her to come. She respects me and
she'll not say no."

The problem was more difficult than I had imagined. Not
because there weren't plenty of women at Gagliano, and
dozens of them eager for light work and good pay. But I
lived alone, without a wife or mother or sister, and it was
not fitting that a woman should enter my house unaccom-
panied. A very old and severe custom, which formed the
basis of the relationship between the sexes, forbade it. The
peasants consider love, or sexual attraction, so powerful a
force of nature that no amount of will-power can resist it.
If a man and a woman are alone in a sheltered spot, no
power on earth can prevent their embrace; good intentions
and chastity are of no avail. If, by chance, nothing comes
of their propinquity, it is just the same as if something had
come of it, because the mere fact of their being together
implies love-making. So great is the power of the god of
love and so simple the impulse to obey him that there is no
question of a code of sexual morals or even of social dis-
approval for an illicit affair. There were many unmarried
mothers, and they were neither snubbed nor pointed at with
scorn; at worst they might have difficulty finding a husband
within the village and have to look elsewhere or be content

99

with a fellow with a limp or some other physical short-
coming. But since there is no moral curb on unhridled desire,
custom intervenes and staves off the occasion of sin. No
woman can talk to a man except in the presence of others,
particularly if the man is unmarried. This taboo is extremely
rigid; the most innocent violation is tantamount to sin* The
rule applies to all women, because love is no respecter of
age.

I once attended a grandmother, a seventy-five-year-old
peasant woman, Maria Rosano, with clear blue eyes in a
kindly face. She had a heart disease whose symptoms were
very serious indeed and she felt extremely weak.

"I'll not get up from this bed again, Doctor. My time has
come," she said. Because I felt that luck was with me I
assured her of the contrary. One day, to cheer her up, I
said:

"You'll get well; never fear. You'll get up from this bed
without any assistance. A month from now youll be well,
and you'll come, quite alone, to my house at the other end
of the village, to pay me a visit."

The old woman did recover and a month later I heard a
knock at my door. Maria had remembered my words and had
come to thank and bless me, with her arms full of presents,
dbried figs, sausages, and homemade cakes. She was a pleas-
ant soul, full of common sense and motherliness; there was
wisdom in her words and a patient and understanding op-
timism in her wrinkled old face. I thanked her for the
presents and tried to engage her in conversation, but I soon
saw that the old woman was ill at ease; she stood first on
one foot and then on the other and glanced at the door as if
she were screwing up her courage to move toward it.

At first I did not understand, then I realized that she had

100

come alone. The other women who came to see me profes-
sionally or to call me to the house had always a friend with
them or at least a child, the company of the latter signifying
a bow in the direction of custom, while in reality reducing
it to nothing more than symbol. I suspected, then, that here
lay the reason for Maria's discomfort, and she admitted to
the truth of my suspicion. She considered me her benefactor
and savior and she would gladly have died for me, because
I had saved not only herself, an old woman with one foot in
the grave, but her favorite granddaughter too, from a bad
attack of pneumonia. And I had said that she should come,,
quite alone, to pay me a visit when she was well. I meant, of
course, that she would not need a helping hand, but she had
taken my words literally and had not dared to disobey. She
had made a real sacrifice for my sake in letting no one come
with her, and now she was upset because, in spite of her
obviously innocent intentions, she had violated custom. I
couldn't help laughing, and she laughed with me, but she
said that custom was older than either of us, and went away
content.

The rule does not exist that can stand up against necessity
or overwhelming passion. Hence custom, in this instance, was
reduced to a mere formality, but the formality was none the
less respected. Still the countryside was wide, life was
fraught with unexpected turns, and intriguing chaperones
and accommodating friends were not hard to come by. Be-
hind their veils the women were like wild beasts. They
thought of nothing but love-making, in the most natural way
in the world, and they spoke of it with a license and sim-
plicity of language that were astonishing. When you went
by them on the street their black eyes stared at you, with a
slanting downward glance as if to measure your virility,

101

and behind your back you could hear them pass whispered
judgments on your hidden charms. If you turned around they
buried their faces in their hands and peered at you between
their fingers. No real feeling went with this atmosphere of
desire that oozed out of their eyes and seemed to permeate
the village, except for one of enslavement to fate, to an ines-
capable higher power. Their love was blended, not with
hope or enthusiasm, but with resignation. The occasion was
fleeting and it should not be passed by; understanding was
swift and wordless.

All that people say about the people of the South, things
I once believed myself: the savage rigidity of their morals,
their Oriental jealousy, the fierce sense of honor leading to
crimes of passion and revenge, all these are but myths. Per-
haps they existed a long time ago and something of them is
left in the way of a stiff conventionality. But emigration has
changed the picture. The men have gone and the women have
taken over. Many a woman's husband is in America. For a
year, or even two, he writes to her, then he drops out of her
ken, perhaps he forms other family ties; in any case he dis-
appears and never comes back. The wife waits for him a year,
or even two; then some opportunity arises and a baby is the
result. A great part of the children are illegitimate, and the
mother holds absolute sway. Gagliano has twelve hundred
inhabitants, and there are two thousand men from Gagliano
in America. Grassano has five thousand inhabitants and
almost the same number have emigrated. In the villages the
women outnumber the men and the father's identity is no
longer so strictly important; honor is dissociated from pater-
nity, because a matriarchal regime prevails.

During the day, when the peasants are far away in the
fields, the villages are left to the women, queen bees reigning

102

over a teeming mass of children. Babies are adored and
spoiled by their mothers, who tremble for them at the slight-
est thing wrong, nurse them for years, and never leave them,
carrying them wrapped in black shawls on their backs or
in their arms when they come with jars balanced on their
heads from the fountain. Many of the babies die; the others
age prematurely, turn yellow and melancholy with malaria;
then they grow up to be men, go to war or to America, or else
stay in their native village, where they bear the yoke like
dumb animals, every day of the year.

If illegitimate children are no real disgrace to a woman,
they are, of course, even less of one to a man. Almost all
the priests have children, and no one sees in this fact any
dishonor reflected upon their calling. If God does not take
them to Himself when they are little, they are sent to school
at Potenza or MeliL The letter-carrier at Grassano, a spry
old man with a slight limp, and a fine handle bar moustache,
was renowned and revered in the village because, like Priam,
he was said to have fifty children. Twenty-two or twenty-
three of them belonged to his two or three wives; the rest,
scattered about the village and its surroundings, many of
them perhaps legendary, were attributed to him, but he paid
no attention to them and in many cases appeared to ignore
their existence. He was called "King," on account of either
his surpassing virility or his regal moustache, and his chil-
dren, of course, were known as "princes/'

The matriarchal structure of society, the primitive and
direct approach to love, and the want of balance between
the sexes following upon emigration had none the less to
combat a residue of family feeling, the strong consciousness
of blood relationship, and age-old customs tending to sepa-
rate men and women. The only women who could come to

103

work in my house were those in some way exempt from the
general rule, who had many children of unindentified
fathers, who, although they had not embraced prostitution
(no such trade existed in the village), displayed a tendency
to be free and easy, and who were concerned with all that
pertained to love, above all the means of obtaining it. In a
word, witches.

There were at least twenty such women at Gagliano, but,
Donna Caterina told me, they were too dirty and disorderly,
or they were unable to keep house decently, or they had land
to attend to, or they were already employed by one of the
leading families . . .

'There's only one who will do for you; she's clean and
honest and knows how to cook, and then the house where you
live is one where she feels at home. She lived there for years
with the priest, until he died, God bless him!'*

I decided to go to see her, and she accepted my offer and
entered my service. Giulia Venere, called Giulia of Sant*
Arcangelo, because she was born in that white village beyond
the Agri River, was forty-one years old, and she had had,
between normal births and abortions, seventeen pregnancies,
brought about by fifteen different men. Her first child was
born of her husband during the last war; then he had gone
to America, taking the child with him and somewhere in that
vast continent he dropped out of sight and was never heard
from again. The other children had come later; she had had
twins, stillborn, by the priest. Almost all her brood died
young; I never saw but two of them. One was a twelve-year-
old girl, who lived with a family of shepherds in a near-by
village and came occasionally to see her mother, a sort of
wild little goat with black eyes, dark skin, and unruly black
hair falling over her forehead, who maintained a shy and

104

resentful silence, not answering when she was spoken to and
looking as if she would run away any minute. The other, her
youngest, was a two-year-old boy called Nino, a fat, healthy
baby whom Giulia always carried with her under her shawl;
and who his father was I never knew.

Giulia was a tall and shapely woman with a waist as
slender as that of an amphora between her well-developed
chest and hips. In her youth she must have had a solemn and
barbaric beauty. Her face was wrinkled with age and yel-
lowed by malaria, but there were traces of former charm in
its sharp, straight lines, like those of a classical temple which
has lost the marbles that adorned it but kept its shape and
proportions. A small head, in the shape of a lengthened oval,
covered with a veil, rose above her impressively large and
erect body. Her forehead was straight and high, half hidden
by a lock of smooth black hair; her almond-shaped, opaque,
black eyes had whites with blue and brown veins In them
like those of dogs. Her nose was thin and long, slightly
hooked; her wide mouth with thin, pale lips, somewhat
turned down at the corners in bitterness, opened when she
laughed, over powerful, sparkling, wolflike teeth. Her face
as a whole had a strongly archaic character, not classical in
the Greek or Roman sense, but stemming from an antiquity
more mysterious and more cruel which had sprung always
from the same ground, and which was unrelated to man, but
linked with the soil and its everlasting animal deities. There
were mingled in it cold sensuality, hidden irony, natural
cruelty, impenetrable ill-humor and an immense passive
power, all these bound together in a stern, intelligent and
malicious expression. In billowing veils and a wide, short
skirt, firmly planted on legs as long and sturdy as the trunks
of trees, her large body moved slowly and with harmony

105

and balance, bearing proudly and erectly on its monumental
and maternal base the small, black head of a serpent.

Giulia came to my house gladly, as if she were a queen
returning, after an absence, to visit one of her favorite
provinces. She had lived so many years and borne so many
children there ; she had reigned over the priest's kitchen and
his bed, and he had given her the long gold earrings she was
wearing. She knew all the secrets of the house: the chimney
with a bad draught, the window that wouldn't open, the posi-
tion of every nail driven into the walls. In the old days the
house had been full of furniture, stocks of food, wine, pre-
serves, and every kind of abundance. Now it was empty;
there were only a bed, a few chairs and a kitchen table. There
was no stove, and food had to be cooked over the open fire.
But Giulia knew how to obtain whatever was necessary,
where to find coal and wood and the loan of a barrel to hold
water until a peddler should come through the village.

Giulia knew everyone and everything that went on; from
her nothing in Gagliano was hidden; she was acquainted with
the most intimate affairs of every man and woman in the
village, and the hidden springs of all their actions. She
seemed to be hundreds of years old and nothing escaped
her. Hers was not the proverbial kindly wisdom of an old
woman, linked to an impersonal tradition, nor the gossip of
a busybody; it was a cold, passive awareness, where life was
reflected pitilessly and without any moral judgment; there
was neither blame nor compassion in her ambiguous smile.
She was, like the beasts, a spirit of the earth; she had no
fear of time, or work, or man. Like all the women in these
parts, who do the work of men, she could carry the heaviest
weights. She took a barrel that held over seven gallons to
the fountain and brought it back full on her head, without

106

even steadying it with her hands which were busy holding
her child; clambering over the stones of the steep street with
the nimble agility of a goat. She built a fire peasant-fashion
with great economy of wood, lighting the logs at one end
and pulling them closer together as they burned. On this
fire, with the meager resources of the village, she made the
tastiest dishes. She cooked goats' heads in a covered earthen-
ware pot, over the embers, after she had dipped the brains
in a raw egg and marjoram. With the tripe she made a dish
called in dialect gnemurielli rolling it like a skein of thread
around a piece of liver or fat and a laurel leaf and roasting
it on a spit directly over the flames. The smell of burning
meat and the gray smoke spread through the house and onto
the street, heralding a barbaric treat. Giulia was a mistress
of the art of making philters, and young girls came to her
for advice on how to prepare their love potions. She could
cure illness with the repetition of spells and she could even
bring about the death of anyone she chose by uttering ter-
rible incantations.

Giulia had a house of her own, not far from mine, lower
down, near the Mound of the Madonna of the Angels. There
she slept at night with the most recent of her lovers, the
local barber, a young albino with the pink eyes of a rabbit*
Early in the morning with her baby she knocked at my door;
she went to fetch water, lit the fire, and cooked my dinner.
She left in the afternoon and I had to prepare my own sup-
per. Giulia came and went at will, but she had none of the
airs of a mistress of the house. She understood that times
had changed and that I was quite a different sort from the
old priest; perhaps I was even more mysterious to her than
she could be to me. She thought that I was endowed with
great powers and, in her passive way, she was satisfied. Cold,

107

Impassable, and earthy creature that she was, this peasant
witch was an excellent servant.

Thus came to an end the first period of my stay at Gagliano,
which I spent in the higher part of the village, in the widow's
house. Now, content with my new solitude, I stretched out on
my terrace and watched the shadow of the clouds drift over
the wastes of clay, like a ship on the sea. From the room
below I could hear Giulia's steps and the dog's barking.
These two strange beings, the witch and Barone, were from
now on to be my everyday companions.

JlT WAS September and the heat was giving way to promises
of autumn. The wind came from a different direction; it no
longer brought with it the burning breath of the desert, but
had a vague smell of the sea. The fiery streaks of the sunset
lingered for hours over the mountains of Calabria and the
air was filled with bats and crows. From my terrace the sky
seemed immense, covered with constantly changing clouds;
I felt as if I were on the roof of the world or on the deck
of a ship anchored in a petrified ocean. Toward the east the
piled-up huts of Lower Gagliano cut off the rest of the village
from view, because it was built along the crest of an irregular
ridge and the whole of it could never be seen at one time;
behind their yellowish roofs appeared the edge of a moun-
tain above the cemetery, and beyond this one could feel,
without seeing, the dip of a valley beneath the sky. At my

108

left, toward the south, there was the same view as from the
palace I had looked at when I first started my house-hunting:
endless stretches of clay, with scattered villages standing out
as white spots, as far as the invisible sea. At my left, toward
the north, the landslide tumbled into the ravine; the hills on
the opposite side were bare of vegetation and at the bottom
wound the path where I could see the peasants, no bigger
than ants, going to and from their fields. Giulia was sur-
prised that at such a distance I could tell the men of Gagliano
from those of other villages and peasants from peddlers.
For all my good eyesight I did, just as she thought, have
recourse to magic. The secret lay simply in my observation
of their ways of walking. The peasants walked quite stiffly,
without moving their arms. Whenever I saw one of the black
dots in the valley advance with a swinging or rocking mo-
tion, almost that of a dance, I knew that it was someone from
the city. Soon the trumpet of the grave-digger and town crier
would announce his arrival and call the women to buy his
wares.

In front of me, toward the west, behind the big green and
gray leaves of the fig tree in the garden and the roofs of the
last peasants' huts on the slope of the ravine, rose the Mound
of the Madonna of the Angels. It was an elevation all hol-
lows and bulges, with a little stubby grass on its most gently
rising side, like a human bone, the knob of a giant femur,
which still had clinging to it shreds of desiccated flesh. To
the left of the Mound, for a long way, until far below, toward
the Agri Valley, where the terrain flattened out in a place
called the Bog, there was a succession of hillocks, holes,
eroded cones marked with stripes, natural caves, ditches,
and pieces of rising ground, all of the same white clay, as if
the whole earth had died and all that was left under the sun

109

was a whitened skeleton washed by many waters. Behind
this desolate collection of bones, above the malaria-ridden
river, was Gaglianello and beyond this lay the banks of the
AgrL On the first line of gray hills beyond the river rose
Giulia's village, Sanf Arcangelo, and behind it were other
tiers of hills, bluer in color, with barely perceived villages
on their slopes, and still farther away the Albanian settle-
ments on the foothills of Mount Pollino, and the Calabrian
Mountains which filled in the horizon.

A little above and to the left of Sanf Arcangelo, halfway
up a hill, was a white church. Here the people of the valley
came in pilgrimage; it was the center of much devotion,
possessing a miraculous Madonna. In this church were pre-
served the horns of a dragon which in ancient times had
infested the region. Everyone in Gagliano had been to see
these horns, but unfortunately I could not fulfil my wish to
do so. The dragon, they told me, once lived in a cave near
the river; it devoured the peasants, carried off their
daughters, filled the land with its pestiferous breath, and
destroyed the crops, until life in Sant' Arcangelo became im-
possible. The peasants tried to defend themselves but they
were helpless before the beast's monstrous power. Brought
to despair and obliged to scatter among the hills like animals,
they finally decided to seek aid from the strongest lord of
the land, Prince Colonna of Stigliano.

The prince came, armed to the teeth, on horseback; he
went to the dragon's cave and challenged him to come out
and fight. But the monster's resources were great, from the
flames pouring out of his jaws to his widespread batlike
wings, and the prince's sword was of no avail. At a certain
moment the hero felt his courage weaken and he was about to
flee or fall into the clutches of the dragon, when the Madonna

110

appeared to him, clad in blue, and said with a smile: "Take
heart, Prince Colonna!" Then she drew to one side and
stayed leaning against one wall of the cave to watch the
struggle. The prince's ardor was increased a hundredfold
and he fought so well that the dragon fell dead at his feet.
He cut off the head, detached the horns and built this church
to house them forever.

When the terror was gone and the countryside was free,
the people of Sant* Arcangelo went back to their homes, and
so did those of Noepoli and Senise, who had likewise taken
refuge in the hills. The prince had then to be rewarded for
the service he had done them. In those days the nobles, for
all their chivalry and love of glory and the protection given
them by the Madonna, did not put themselves out for noth-
ing. And so the people of all the villages made safe by the
death of the dragon took counsel together. Those of Noepoli
and Senise proposed giving the prince feudal rights over
some of their land, but those of Sanf Arcangelo, who are
even today reputed to be astute to the point of avarice, made
another suggestion. 4C The dragon/ 5 they said, "came out of
the river. Let the prince take the river, then, and be the lord
of the waters." Their suggestion prevailed; the Agri was
offered to Colonna and he accepted it. The peasants of Sanf
Arcangelo thought they had made a profitable deal and
defrauded their savior, but in this they were mistaken. The
waters of the Agri served to irrigate the fields, and from that
day on they had to pay the prince and his heirs for ever and
ever for their use. This was the origin of a feudal privilege
which lasted until the second half of the last century. I do
not know whether there are still direct heirs of the medieval
knight and whether they still claim a right to the waters of
the Agri. A friend of mine, Colonna the orchestra leader, who

111

is descended from a collateral line of the princes of Stig-
liano and has a right to bear their title, when I told him this
story years later, did not even know where Stigliano was,
much less anything ahout the dragon, one of his family
glories. But the peasants, who have paid tribute for centuries
and who still make pilgrimages to gaze at the monster's
horns, remember the dragon, and the prince, and the
Madonna.

There is nothing strange in the fact that there were dragons
in these parts during the Middle Ages. (The peasants and
Giulia used to say: "A long time ago, more than a hundred
years, long before the brigands . . /') Nor would it be
strange if dragons were to appear again today before the
startled eyes of the country people. Anything is possible,
where the ancient deities of the shepherds, the ram and the
lamb, run every day over the familiar paths, and there is
no definite boundary line between the world of human beings
and that of animals or even monsters. There are many strange
creatures at Gagliano who have a dual nature. A middle-aged
peasant woman, married and having children, with nothing
out of the ordinary about her appearance, was the daughter
of a cow. So the village said, and she herself confirmed it.
The older people clearly remembered her cow mother, who
followed her everywhere when she was a child, mooing to
her and licking her with a rough tongue* This did not alter
the fact that she had also had a human mother, who had been
dead for many years. No one saw any contradiction in this
dual birth, and the woman herself, whom I knew personally,
lived quietly and happily, like both her mothers, for all her
animal heredity.

Some people take on this mixture of human and bestial
natures only on particular occasions. Sleepwalkers become

119

wolves, or werewolves, and their identity is completely lost
in that of the animal. There were some of these at Gagliano
and they went out on winter nights to join the real wolves,
their brothers. "They go out by night/' Giulia told me,
"while they are still men; then they turn into wolves and
they gather with their fellows around the fountain. You have
to be very careful w r hen they come home. When one knocks at
the door the first time his wife mustn't open. If she did she
would see her husband while he was still a wolf and he would
eat her up and run off to the woods, never to be seen again.
When he knocks for the second time she still mustn't open,
for she would see him with a man's body and a wolf's head.
Only at the third knock can she let him in; by that time the
change is complete, the wolf has disappeared and he is the
same man he was before. Never, never open the door before
they have knocked three times. They must have time to
change their shape and also to lose the fierce wolflike look
In their eyes and the memory of their visit to the animal
world. Later they remember nothing at all.**

At times the dual nature is horrible and terrifying, as in
the case of these werewolves. Yet it carries with it a mysteri-
ous attraction and creates a kind of respect, as if it had some-
thing divine about it. Everyone in the village instinctively
had a feeling of this kind for my dog. They looked on him
not as an ordinary canine, but as an unusual being, different
from the rest of his species, and worthy of particular regard.
Indeed, I myself always thought that there was something
childishly angelic or diabolical about him and that the peas-
ants were not altogether wrong to see in him a duality which
called for worship. Even his origin was mysterious. He was
found on a train going from Naples to Taranto, with a sign
hung around his neck saying: "My name is Barone. Whoever

113

finds me, take good care of me." No one ever knew where he
came from; perhaps from a big city; he might even be the
son of a king. Railway employees took him and kept him for
some time at the station at Tricarico, and the men there
handed him on to the station employees at Grassano. The
mayor of Grassano saw the dog, had the railway men turn it
over to him, and took it into his household of children. But
the dog made too much noise so he gave him to his brother,
the secretary of the Fascist peasants' union, who took him
everywhere he went in the surrounding country: Everyone at
Grassano knew Barone and considered him quite out of the
ordinary.

One day, while I was living there all alone, I happened to
say to some of my peasant and tradesmen friends that I
should like to have a dog to keep me company. The next
morning they brought me a puppy, one of the usual yellow
hunting dogs. I kept him for a while, but I didn't care for
him; I couldn't seem to housebreak him and he dirtied my
room. Finally I came to the conclusion that he didn't have
much sense and I gave him back, resolving to drop my fancy
for a dog. But when I received sudden orders to go to
Gagliano, these good people, who showed considerable fond-
ness for me and were as afflicted as if some undeserved mis-
fortune had overtaken them, wanted to give me something
that would be a constant reminder that there were good Chris-
tian souls at Grassano who wished me well- They remem-
bered the desire that I had by then forgotten and decided
to give me another dog. No dog was good enough but the
famous Barone, and Barone should be mine. They made such
a to-do that they persuaded his master to give him up; then
they washed and brushed him and got him a .collar, muzzle,
and leash. Antonino Roselli, the young barber and flute-

114

player, whose dream It was to follow me to the ends of the
earth In the capacity of a private secretary, clipped him
like a young lion, leaving his hair long in front and shaving
him behind, with a thick clump left at the tip of his tail
The wild Barone, thus civilized, immaculate, perfumed, and
completely disguised, was given to me the day before I left
as a remembrance of the fair town of Grassano.

In this beautified rig I myself could not tell what breed of
dog he was; he looked like a cross between a poodle and
a sheep dog. Perhaps he actually was a sheep dog, but of an
uncommon strain or mixture, for I never saw another like
him. He was of middling size, all white except for black
spots at the ends of his ears, which were very long and hung
down the side of his face. His face was handsome, like that
of a Chinese dragon, terrifying in his moments of anger or
when he bared his teeth, but with round almost human hazel
eyes that followed my movements without his even turning
his head. His expression ranged from tenderness to inde-
pendence to a certain childish malice. His hair hung down
almost to the ground, soft, curly and shiny as silk; his tail
which he carried curved and waving in the air like the plume
of an Oriental warrior, was as thick as that of a wolf. He was
a gay, free, wild creature, affectionate without servility and
obedient without forfeiting his liberty, a sort of hobgoblin
or familiar spirit, good-natured but elusive. He jumped
rather than walked, leaping from one point to another, his
ears and skin twitching. He chased butterflies and birds,
frightened the goats, picked fights with cats and dogs, and
ran all alone through the fields looking up at the clouds,
always on the alert, sniffing the air as if he were following
the fluttering thread of some innocent supernatural thought,
the bounding incarnation of some woodland sprite.

115

As soon as we arrived in Gagliano everyone stared at my
strange companion, and the peasants, who live immersed in
animal magic, were immediately aware of his mysterious
nature. They had never seen such a beast. In the village there
were only wretched, beaten, mongrel hunting dogs and occa-
sionally, following a shepherd and his flock, a fierce sheep-
dog from the Maremma, his collar bristling with nails to
protect him from the wolves. And then my dog was called
Barone. In these parts names have a meaning and a magic
power; they are not mere empty, conventional syllables, but
have a reality all their own and a potential influence. My dog
was to the peasants a real "baron," a gentleman, a personage
worthy of respect. I owed in no small measure to my dog the
cordial and almost admiring attitude I met among the com-
mon people. When he went by, jumping madly and barking
wildly, the peasants pointed at him and boys shouted: "Look,
look! He's half baron and half lion!" They thought of Barone
as an heraldic animal, the rampant lion on a nobleman's
coat of arms. He was, of course, only a dog, an animal like
all the rest, but at the same time he had a dual and mysterious
nature. I too loved him for his combination of simplicity and
variety. Now he is dead, like my father to whom I gave him,
and he lies buried under an almond tree overlooking the sea,
in Liguria, that land of mine where I can no longer set foot,
because those in power, in their fear of all that is sacred,
seem to have discovered that I too have a dual nature and
am, like my dog, half baron and half lion.

To the peasants everything has a double meaning. The
cow-woman, the werewolf, the lion-baron, and the goat-devil
are only notorious and striking examples. People, trees, ani-
mals, even objects and words have a double life. Only reason,
religion, and history have clear-cut meanings. But our f eel-

116

ing for life itself, for art, language, and love is complex,
infinitely so. And in the peasants* world there is no room for
reason, religion, and history. There is no room for religion,
because to them everything participates in divinity, every-
thing is actually, not merely symbolically, divine: Christ and
the goat ; the heavens above, and the beasts of the field below ;
everything is bound up in natural magic. Even the ceremo-
nies of the church become pagan rites, celebrating the exist-
ence of inanimate things, which the peasants endow with a
soul, and the innumerable earthy divinities of the village.

It was mid-September and a local feast of the Virgin Mary.
Since early morning the streets had been crowded with peas-
ants in black suits; there were strangers also, the band from
Stigliano and men from Sant' Arcangelo to set off fireworks,
with their Roman candles and mortars. The sky was clear,
the air light, and every now and then there was a volley of
gunfire, as melancholy as the sound of church bells. The
peasants, with their gleaming-barreled rifles, were starting
the festivities.

In the afternoon, when the heat of the day had subsided,
there was a procession, beginning at the church and winding
its way through the village. First it went up to the cemetery,
then down to the main square and on to the lesser square and
the Madonna of the Angels in Lower Gagliano, then back by
the same route to the church where it had begun. First in line
were boys carrying poles with white sheets and cloths at-
tached to them for banners which they waved in the breeze,
then the band-players from Stigliano with their loud and
shiny brasses. After them, on a throne supported by two long
shafts, which a dozen men at a time took turns in carrying,
came the Madonna* She was a paltry papier mache affair, a
copy of the powerful and famous Madonna of Viggiano,

117

with the same black face, and decked out with sumptuous
black robes, necklaces, and bracelets. Just behind the
Madonna walked Don Trajella with a white surplice over
his greasy cassock and his usual weary and bored expression;
then the mayor and the sergeant, the gentry, and, bringing
up the rear, the women with their fluttering veils, the chil-
dren, and the peasants. A strong cool breeze had come up,
raising clouds of dust and blowing skirts, veils, and banners
Indiscriminately; perhaps it was bringing the rain so vainly
desired and prayed for during months of drought. As
the procession went by, two rows of minature mortars lined
up along both sides of the street went off noisily. The powder
train was lighted and then the sound of the explosion joined
the rifle-fire of the peasants who stood in their doorways to
see the procession go by. The popping and crackling were
continuous, interrupted only by the sudden detonation of
same bigger firing-piece, which swelled in intensity and
echoed among the surrounding ravines.

Amid this warlike thunderingtherewas no religious happi-
ness or ecstasy in the people's eyes ; instead they seemed prey
to a sort of madness, a pagan throwing off of restraint, and a
stunned or hypnotized condition; all of them were highly
wrought up, The animals ran about wildly, goats leaped,
donkeys brayed, dogs barked, children shouted, and women
sang. Peasants with baskets of wheat in their hands threw
fistfuls of it at the Madonna, so that she might take thought
for the harvest and bring them good luck. The grains curved
through the air, fell on the paving-stones and bounced up off
them with a light noise like that of hail. The black-faced
Madonna, in the shower of wheat, among the animals, the
gunfire, and the trumpets, was no sorrowful Mother of God,
but rather a subterranean deity, black with the shadows of

118

the bowels of the earth, a peasant Persephone or lower-world
goddess of the harvest.

Before the doors of some of the houses, where the width
of the street permitted, were tables covered with white cloths,
like small rustic altars. Here the procession came to a halt,
Don Trajella mumbled a blessing or two, and the peasants
and their women came forward with offerings. They pinned
to the Madonna's robes five and ten lire notes and even
dollar bills jealously saved from their labors in America.

Most of them, however, hung garlands of dried figs around
her neck or put fruit and eggs at her feet; they ran after her
with other gifts when the procession had already moved on
and mingled with the throng amid the noise of the trumpets
and the shooting and shouting. As the procession advanced,
it became more and more crowded and uproarious, until,
after it had gone through the entire village, it went back into
the church. A few heavy drops of rain fell, but soon the wind
swept away the clouds, the storm blew over and calm re-
turned along with the first evening stars. This guaranteed
the success of the fireworks. Everyone ate a quick supper and
as soon as it was dark the entire village turned out along the
edge of the ravine. This was the occasion on which I saw
groups of young fellows climb up on the roof of the monu-
mental public toilet in order to get a better view. In honor
of the Madonna even we political prisoners were allowed
to stay out an hour later than usual.

This was a great feast day, the celebration of the harvest,
and the one occasion of the year for fireworks. Three thou-
sand lire were spent on them, and this was a lean year; often
it came to five or six thousand, and larger villages, on their
feast days, went to even greater expense. Three thousand
lire, in Gagliano, was an enormous sum, the total savings

119

of six months, but the people threw It away gladly on fire-
works and no one had the slightest regret. Expert pyrotechni-
cians all over the province had competed for the job; could
the villagers have afforded it they would have engaged those
of Montemurro or Ferrandina, but they had to content them-
selves with the men from Sant* Arcangelo, who carried it off
very well indeed. Amidst applause and shouts of terror and
admiration from the women and children the first Roman
candle shot straight up into the star-studded sky, then another
and another. There followed pinwheels, Bengal lights,
showers of gold and the rest, a splendid show.

It was ten o'clock, time for me to go home. From my ter-
race, with Barone, who sniffed the air excitedly and barked
at every burst of fire, I looked for a long time at the lights,
as they rose and fell sputtering on the Mound, and listened
to the booming of the explosions. At last twenty giant fire-
crackers went off in quick succession and there was a final
crash ending. I heard footsteps on the street and doors
opening and shutting as the crowd scattered. The peasant
holiday was over, with its fiery and frenzied excitement. The
animals slept, and silence and the empty blackness of the
sky hung once more over the darkened village.

13

JL HE rain did not come, even in the following days, in
spite of the procession, Don Trajella's prayers, and the high
hopes of the peasants. The earth was too hard to be worked

120

and the olives began to dry up on the parched trees* but the
black-faced Madonna remained impassive* pitiless and deaf
to all appeals, like indifferent Nature. Homage was paid to
her In abundance, but It was rather the homage due to power
than that offered to charity. The Black Madonna was like
the earth; It was in her power to raise up and to destroy, but
she was no respecter of persons, and appointed the seasons
according to an inscrutable plan of her own. To the peasants
the Black Madonna was beyond good and evil. She dried up
the crops and let them wither away, but at the same time she
dispensed food and protection and demanded worship. In
every household, tacked up on the wall above the bed, the
Image of the Black Madonna of Viggiano looked on with
expressionless eyes at all the acts of daily life.

The peasants* houses were all alike, consisting of only one
room that served as a kitchen, bedroom, and usually as quar-
ters for the barnyard animals as well, unless there happened
to be an outhouse, which they described with a dialect word
of Greek derivation, catoico. On one side of the room was the
stove; sticks brought In every day from the fields served as
fuel, and the walls and ceiling were blackened with smoke,
The only light was that from the door. The room was almost
entirely filled by an enormous bed, much larger than an
ordinary double bed; in it slept the whole family, father,
mother, and children. The smallest children, before they
were weaned, that is until they were three or four years old,
were kept in little reed cradles or baskets hung from the
celling just above the bed. When the mother wanted to
nurse them she did not have to get out of bed; she simply
reached out and pulled the baby down to her breast, then
put Mm back and with one motion of her hand made the
basket rock like a pendulum until he had ceased to cry.

121

Under the bed slept the animals, and so the room was
divided into three layers: animals on the floor, people in
the bed, and infants in the air. When I bent over a bed to
listen to a patient's heart or to give an injection to a woman
whose teeth were chattering with fever or who was burning
up with malaria, my head touched the hanging cradles,
while frightened pigs and chickens darted between my
legs.

But what never failed to strike me most of all and by now
I had been in almost every house were the eyes of the two
inseparable guardian angels that looked at me from the wall
over the bed. On one side was the black, scowling face, with
its large, inhuman eyes, of the Madonna of Viggiano; on the
other a colored print of the sparkling eyes, behind gleaming
glasses, and the hearty grin of President Roosevelt. I never
saw other pictures or images than these: not the King nor the
Duce, nor even Garibaldi; no famous Italian of any kind,
nor any one of the appropriate saints; only Roosevelt and
the Madonna of Viggiano never failed to be present. To see
them there, one facing the other, in cheap prints, they seemed
the two faces of the power that has divided the universe be-
tween them. But here their roles were, quite rightly, reversed.
The Madonna appeared to be a fierce, pitiless, mysterious,
ancient earth goddess, the Saturnian mistress of this world;
the President a sort of all-powerful Zeus, the benevolent and
smiling master of a higher sphere. Sometimes a third image
formed, along with these two, a trinity: a dollar bill, the
last of those brought back from across the sea, or one that
had come in the letter of a husband or relative, was tacked
up under the Madonna or the President, or else between them,
Hke the Holy Ghost or an ambassador from heaven to the
world of the dead.

122

To the peasants of Lncanla Rome means very little; it
Is the capital of the gentry, the center of a foreign and hostile
world. Naples has more right to be their capital, and In some
ways it is; it is the capital of poverty. Those who live there
have pale faces and feverish eyes; on sweltering summer
days you can see half-dressed women asleep at tables,
through the open doors of the one-story houses of the poor
along the steep alleys off the Toledo. But at Naples, for a long
time, there has been no king, and the peasants go there only
to embark for other shores. The Kingdom of Naples has
perished, and the kingdom of the hopelessly poor is not of
this world. Their other world is America. Even America, to
the peasants, has a dual nature. It is a land where a man
goes to work, where he toils and sweats for his daily bread,
where he lays aside a little money only at the cost of end-
less hardship and privation, where he can die and no one
will remember him. At the same time, and with no contradic-
tion in terms, It is an earthly paradise and the promised
land.

Yes, New York, rather than Rome or Naples, would be the
real capital of the peasants of Lucania, If these men without
a country could have a capital at all. And it is their capital,
in the only way it can be for them, that is as a myth. As a
place to work, it is indifferent to thfem; they live there as they
would live anywhere else, like animals harnessed to a wagon*
heedless of the street where they must pull it. But as an
earthly paradise, Jerusalem the golden, It Is so sacred as to
be untouchable; a man can only gaze at it, even when he Is
there on the spot, with no hope of attainment. The peasants
who emigrate to America remain just what they always were ;
many stay there and their children become Americans, but
the rest, those who come back twenty years later, are just the

123

same as when they went away. In three months they forget the
few words of English they ever learned, slough off the few
superficial new habits and are the same peasants they were
before, like stones which a rushing stream has long coursed
over but which dry out under the first warm rays of the sun. In
America they live apart, among themselves; for years they
eat nothing but bread, just as they did in Gagliano, saving
all their meager earnings. They live next door to the earthly
paradise, but they dare not enter.

Then one day they come back to Italy, with the intention
of staying only long enough to visit their family and friends.
But someone offers to sell them a parcel of land, and they
run into a girl whom they knew when they were children
and decide to marry her. Before they are aware of it, six
months have gone by, their re-entry permit has expired, and
they have to stay home. The land was sold to them at an
exorbitant price, and the savings of years of hard work in
America go to pay for it; it is a mass of clay and rocks, they
must pay taxes on it, and the harvest never makes up for
their expenses; they have children and their wife falls ill.
Soon they sink back into poverty, the same everlasting pov-
erty they lived in so many years ago, before they went away.
Along with poverty they regain their agelong patience and
resignation and all their former peasant habits; in short
these "Americans" can in no way be distinguished from the
rest, unless it be by deeper bitterness, and the regret that
from time to time haunts them for their lost riches. Gagliano
is full of these returned emigrants, who look on the day of
their return as the unluckiest of their lives.

1929 was the fateful year; they speak of it as of a cata-
clysm. This was the year of the "crash," when the dollar
tottered and banks closed their doors. The emigrants, how-

124

ever, were little hurt by these events because they had put
their savings in Italian banks and changed them into lire.
But New York was in a panic, and Fascist propaganda agents
went around saying, God knows why, that in Italy there was
work and money and security for all and that the emigrants
should return. So it was that in this fateful year many were
persuaded to give up their work and sail for their native
village, where they were trapped like flies in a spider web.
Soon they were peasants again, setting off every morning
with their donkeys and goats for the lowlands ridden with
malaria. Others tried to keep up the trade they had prac-
ticed in America, but there was not enough work for them to
make a living.

"Damn 1929 and the bastards who got me back here!"
Giovanni Pizzilli, the tailor, would say, while he measured
me in inches with a new and complicated American system
for lowering the shoulders and added finishing touches to a
hunting suit he was making for me. He was a clever crafts-
man, better at his trade than many a fashionable, big-city
tailor, and for fifty lire he made me the handsomest corduroy
suit I have ever had. In America he had earned good money,
now he was living in poverty with four or five children on
his hands. He had no hope of bettering his lot, and every bit
of energy and confidence had left his still youthful face,
leaving only a lasting expression of despair.

"Over there I had a shop of my own and four assistants, 5 *
my barber told me. "In 1929 I came here for six months,
but I got married and didn't go back. Now I've only this
miserable hole in the wall, and Fm up against it. n His hair
was already gray at the temples and there was a mournful
and solemn look about him. There were three barber shops
in Gagliano, and the "American's," at the upper end of the

125

village, near the church and just below the widow's house,
was the only one open all the time; it was patronized by the
gentry. The barber of Lower Gagliano was Giulia's albino
lover; he took care of the peasants. His shop was almost
always closed because he had land to look after, and he
rarely wielded the razor except on Sunday mornings.

The third shop was in the middle of the village, near the
main square, and it too was usually closed, because the
barber was out on other business. People crept mysteriously
into his parlor and asked for him in a low voice. He was
fair-haired, with the keen face of a wolf and bright eyes,
quick in his movements and possessed of an active and clever
mind. During the war he had been a corporal in a medical
unit and this had given him some skill at doctoring. Although
his official trade was that of a barber, Christian beards and
hair were the least of his occupations. He clipped goats,
purged donkeys, and tended sick animals in general, but
his real specialty was tooth-pulling. For two lire he would
extract a molar without too much pain. The village was
lucky to have him, for I had no notion of dentistry and the
other two doctors knew even less than L He was able to
make injections, even intravenous ones, set dislocated or
fractured bones, take blood specimens, and puncture ab-
scesses. He was versed, moreover, in herbs, pomades, and
plasters; in short, he was invaluable. The two doctors hated
him, largely because he took no pains to hide his opinion
of their ignorance and because he was sought after by the
peasants; every time either of them passed the shop, he
threatened to report him for fraudulent medical practice.

It was not a matter of idle threats; from time to time an
anonymous letter went off to the prefecture, or the sergeant
issued a solemn warning. The barber had to call on all his

126

resources in order to cover up his tracks and keep out of
trouble. At first he distrusted me too, but he soon realized
that I would not give him away and he became my friend.
He had real skill and I called on him for help in minor
operations and asked him to make injections. Little did
it matter that he had no license. He did a good job, but he
had to work under cover, because Italy is a land of degrees
and diplomas, where so-called culture is often reduced to
the chase after a profitable position and spasmodic feeble
efforts to hold onto it. Many a peasant of Gagliano, who
might have limped all his life long if the official practitioners
had handled him, is walking today, thanks to this barber and
stealthy jack-of-all-trades, this quick-witted and swift-footed
witch-doctor, at odds with the forces. of the law.

The barber shop of the "American," patronized by the
gentry, was the only one that looked like the real thing.
There was a mirror clouded with fly-tracks, some straight
chairs, and, on the walls, clippings from American news-
papers with photographs of Roosevelt and other political
leaders and screen actresses and advertisements for cos-
metics. These were the remains of his sumptuous establish-
ment in New York. When the barber thought of old times
his face grew dark and sad. What was left to him of the life
of ease he had led on the other side? A little house at the
upper end of the village, with an elaborately carved door
and geranium pots on the balcony, a sickly wife, and poverty.
"If only I hadn't come back!" You can tell these Americans
of 1929 by their whipped-dog expression and their gold
teeth.

Gold teeth were a luxury and a paradox in the wide
peasant mouth of Faccialorda (Dirty Face), a big strong
man, astute and stubborn in appearance. Faccialorda must

127

have owed this nickname to his complexion, but in reality
he was one of those who had come out on top in the fierce
struggles of the emigrants and he was now living on his
laurels. He had returned from America with a sizable bank-
roll, and although he had wasted most of it on the purchase
of a piece of barren land, he was still able to live fairly com-
fortably. The real feature of his fortune was that he had
made it not by hard work but by wile. In the evening when
he had come up from the fields, standing in the doorway of
his house or walking around the square, Faccialorda enjoyed
telling me of his American adventure and the pride he took
in his achievement. He was bom into a family of peasants
but in America he was a mason.

"One day they gave me an iron pipe to empty, the sort
they use in mines, that was packed with dirt. I drove a nail
into it, but instead of dirt there was dynamite and the pipe
shattered in my hands. One arm was scratched, and I was left
stone-deaf with one eardrum broken. Over there in America
a fellow's insured and they were supposed to pay up. They
had a doctor look me over and he told me to come back in
three months. After three months I felt quite all right, but
since I'd had an accident they owed me the money. Three
thousand dollars I was supposed to get. I pretended I was
still deaf; they yelled at me and fired guns, but I couldn't
hear them. They made me shut my eyes ; I staggered and fell
flat on the ground. The doctors said there was nothing wrong
with me and they didn't want to give me my compensation.
They examined me over and over again. I never heard a word
they said and I kept on falling down. By God, they were
going to give me my money ! Two years went by, and I stayed
away from work; in spite of what the doctors said I stuck to
my story that I was no good any more, that I was done in.

128

Finally these doctors, the best doctors In America, came to
believe me and when the two years were up they gave me my
three thousand dollars. Well, I had it coming to me. That's
when I came back to Gagliano, and here I am today, fit as
a fiddle."

Faccialorda was proud of the fact that he had fought
singlehanded against American science, and that he, a mere
peasant from Gagliano, armed only with obstinacy and
patience, had won out over the American doctors. He was
convinced, what's more, that he was in the right, that his
malingering was legitimate. If anyone had told him that
he had come by his three thousand dollars dishonestly he
would have been sincerely astonished. I never taxed him
with anything of the sort; to tell the truth, I thought there
were points in his favor. He told me his story over and over
again; at bottom he felt that he was a defender of the poor f
whom God had rewarded for his struggle against their enemy,
the State. Faccialorda reminded me of other Italians I had
seen the world over, proud of having made war on the organ-
ized forces of civilized society and of having saved them-
selves from the ridiculous clutches of bureaucracy.

At Stratf ord-on-Avon I once met an old man who had an
ice cream wagon pulled by a pony with a fancy harness and
bells. His name was Saracino (anglicized as Saracine on
the side of the wagon) and he was from Frosinone; he still
had rings in his ears and mumbled in Roman dialect. As soon
as he saw that I was Italian he told me that he had fled from
Italy fifty years before in order to evade military service for
the King of Italy, and that he had never returned. His ice
cream trade had flourished until all the wagons in the neigh-
borhood were his, and his sons were highly educated; one of
them was a doctor and the other a lawyer. When war came in

129

1914 he packed them off to Italy so that they should not have
to serve the King of England and when, a year later, the
King of Italy called them to the colors. . . . "Never fear,
we saw to it that they didn't serve him either . . ." To old
Saracino as to Faccialorda there was nothing shameful about
this; on the contrary, he was proud of it. When he had
gleefully told me his story he whipped his pony and drove
away.

Faccialorda had won out, to be sure, but then he had come
back home and soon, in spite of his gold teeth, he would be
just another peasant again. The narration of his story re-
freshed his memories, one-sided and limited as they were,
of America. His fellows forgot more quickly; soon America
came to mean to them the same thing as long ago, before they
ever went away: an earthly paradise. I saw a few in Grassano
who were slightly more alert and Americanized, more like
those who had stayed on the other side, but then they weren't
peasants and they took pains not to let themselves be reab-
sorbed into peasant life. One of them used to sit in front of
his house on the square every day, looking at the passing
throng. He was a middle-aged man, tall, thin, and strong,
with a keen face and aquiline nose, always dressed in black
and wearing a wide-brimmed panama hat. He had not only
gold teeth, but a gold tie pin, watch chain, cigarette case and
gold cuff links, rings, and good-luck charms as well. He had
made a fortune in America as a businessman and broker;
I imagine he exploited his more ignorant countrymen; in any
case he seemed accustomed to giving orders and he looked
down on the people of Grassano. Nevertheless he came back
to his house there every three or four years and delighted in
showing off his dollars, his uncouth English and even worse
Italian. But he took good care not to be sucked in.

130

"I could perfectly well stay here," he said to me; "I've
plenty of money. They might make me mayor and there's
plenty of work to be done here, building the place up,
American style. But it would be a colossal failure, a com-
plete waste. Besides, I have business interests to look after
in the states. . . /*

Every day he scanned the paper and listened to the radio;
when he felt sure that soon there would be a war with Abys-
sinia he packed his bags and left on the first boat, in order not
to be caught in Italy.

After the fateful year of 1929 few came back from New
York and few went over. The villages of Lucania, with half
their people on one side of the ocean and half on the other,
were split in two. Families were broken up and many women
were left alone. To those who were left behind America
seemed farther away than ever, and their every hope of
salvation gone. Only the mail faithfully brought remem-
brances from overseas, gifts to their families from those
blessed by fortune. Don Cosimino was kept busy with these
packages; they sent a stream of scissors, knives, razors, farm
tools, scythes, hammers, pincers in short, all the gadgets of
everyday use. Life at Gagliano was entirely American in
regard to mechanical equipment as well as weights and meas-
ures, for the peasants spoke of pounds and inches rather than
of kilograms and centimeters. The women wove on ancient
looms, but they cut their thread with shiny scissors from
Pittsburgh; the barber's razor was the best I ever saw any-
where in Italy, and the blue steel blades of the peasants'
axes were American, The peasants had no prejudice against
these modern instruments, nor did they see any contradic-
tion between them and their ancient customs. They simply
took gladly whatever came to them from New York, just as

131

they would take gladly whatever might come from Rome.
But from Rome came nothing. Nothing had ever come but
the tax collector and speeches over the radio.

JL H E R E were a great number of speeches at this time and
Don Luigi was zealous in calling public meetings. It was
October and our troops had crossed the Mareb; the war with
Abyssinia had begun. Italians, arise! America receded ever
more into the distance, lost in the mists of the Atlantic like
an island in the sky. God alone knew when it would be
visible again, perhaps never.

The peasants were not interested in the war. The radio
thundered and Don Luigi spent all the hours of the school
day, when he was not smoking on the balcony, haranguing
the children so loudly that he could be heard all over the
village and teaching them to sing "Little Black Face." Hold-
ing forth in the square he announced that Marconi had in*
vented a secret weapon, a death ray that would cause the
entire British Navy to explode. He and his chief assistant
at the school and radio collaborator went around saying that
the war was made to order for the benefit of the peasants of
Gagliano, who soon would have all the land they wanted, and
such good land that all you had to do was put seeds in it
and the crops would shoot up without further aid.

Unfortunately the two schoolteachers talked so much of
the grandeur of Rome that the peasants had no confidence in

132

anything they said; they simply shook their heads in silent
and mistrustful resignation. So the "fellows in Rome" wanted
war and had chosen to wage it against the Abyssinians? All
well and good. It couldn't be much worse to die in an Abys-
sinian desert than to perish from malaria in a pasture by the
Sauro River. It seemed that school children and their
teachers, Fascist Scouts, Red Cross ladies, the widows and
mothers of Milanese veterans, women of fashion in Florence,
grocers, shopkeepers, pensioners, journalists, policemen,
and government employees in Rome, in short, all those gen-
erally grouped together under the name of "Italian people,"
were swept off their feet by a wave of glory and enthusiasm.
Here in Gagliano I could see nothing. The peasants were
quieter, sadder, and more dour than usual. They had no
faith in a promised land which had first to be taken away
from those to whom it belonged; instinct told them that this
was wrong and could only bring ill luck. The "fellows in
Rome" didn't usually put themselves out on their behalf and
this latest undertaking, in spite of all the fuss made over it,
must have a remote purpose in which they had no part.

"If they have money enough for a war, why don't they re-
pair the bridge across the Agri which has been down for four
years without anyone moving a finger to fix it? They might
make a dam or provide us with more fountains, or plant
young trees instead of cutting down the few that are left.
We've plenty of land right here, but nothing to go with it."

War they considered just another inevitable misfortune,
like the tax on goats. They were not afraid to go: "To live
like dogs here or to die like dogs there is just the same," they
said. But no one, except Donna Caterina's husband, enlisted.
It soon became clear that not only the purpose of the war but
the way it was being conducted as well was the business of

133

that other Italy beyond the mountains, and had little to do
with the peasants. Only a few men were called up, two or
three in the whole village, besides those who had reached
the age for military service, and one other boy, Don Nicola,
a priest's son, brought up by the monks of Melfi and a regu-
lar noncommissioned officer, who was one of the first to go.
A few of the very poorest peasants, who had neither land of
their own nor food to eat, were attracted by Don Luigi's
speeches and the promise of large salaries. They applied
for manual labor as civilians but never received an answer.
"They don't know what to do with us," these wretched fellows
said to me. '"They don't even want us to work. The war is for
the benefit of those in the North. We're to stay home until we
starve. And now there's no chance of going to America."

October 3, which marked the official opening of the war,
was a miserable sort of day. Twenty or twenty-five peasants,
roped in by the carabinieri and the Fascist Scouts, stood in
the square to listen to the historical pronouncements that
came over the radio. Don Luigi had ordered flags displayed
over the town hall, the school, and the houses of the well-
to-do ; their bright colors waving in the breeze made a strange
contrast to the black death pennants on the doors of the
peasants' huts. The bell-ringer rang out the usual funereal
strains, and the war so lightheartedly set in motion from
Rome was greeted in Gagliano with stony indifference. Don
Luigi spoke from the balcony of the town hall. He enlarged
upon the eternal grandeur of Rome, the seven hills, the
wolf that suckled Romulus and Remus, Caesar's legions,
Roman civilization, and the Roman Empire which was about
to be revived. He said that the world hated us for our great-
ness, but that the enemies of Rome would bite the dust and
then we would once more triumphantly tread the Roman

134

roads, because Rome was everlasting and invincible. In Ms
falsetto voice he said a great many more things about Rome
which I no longer remember, then he opened his mouth and
started to sing Giovinezza., motioning imperiously with his
hands to the school children in the square below to accom-
pany him in chorus. Around him on the balcony were the
sergeant and everyone of importance; all of them sang
except Dr. Hilillo, who did not share their enthusiasm,
Huddled against the wall below, the peasants listened in
silence, shielding their eyes with their hands from the sun
and looking as dark and gloomy as bats in their black suits.
On the wall of the town hall, next to the balcony, was a
white marble stone with the names of all those who had died
in the World War. There were many of them for such a small
village almost fifty all the familiar names of Gagliano :
Rubilotto, Carbone, Guarini, Bonelli, Carnovale, Racioppi,
Guerrini none was missing. Directly or through the ties of
cousinship or comparaggio not a single house had been
spared; besides there were the sick and wounded and those
who came back safe and sound. How did it happen, then,
that in my talks with the peasants no one ever mentioned the
war, even to speak of his own accomplishments, the places he
had seen, and the sufferings he had undergone? The only
one who ever referred to it was the barber who pulled teeth,
and then only to tell me how he had acquired some notions
of surgery when he was a stretcher-bearer on the Carso. This
tremendous and bloody conflict in the so recent past did not
interest the peasants at all; they had endured it and now it
was as though they had forgotten it. No one boasted of his
prowess, told his children about mighty battles, displayed Ms
wounds, or complained of what he had gone through. When
I questioned them on tMs subject they answered briefly and

135

with Indifference. The whole thing had been a great misfor-
tune, and they had borne it like the rest.

That war, too, was waged from Rome; then, too, they were
called to follow the flag whose bright colors, the heraldic
symbol of another Italy, seemed so crude and out of place
the red shameless and the green absurd against this
background of gray trees and grassless clay. These and all
other colors are appendages of aristocracy; they belong on
the coat of arms of a nobleman or the banners of a city. But
what have the peasants to do with them? They have only one
color, the color of their sad, sorrowful eyes and their clothes,
and it is not a color at all, but rather the darkness of earth
and death. Their pennants are black, like the face of the
Madonna. All other flags have the motley hues of another
civilization, which does not belong to them as it moves along
the main road of History, toward progress and conquest. This
other world is stronger and better organized and they must
submit to it; they must march out to die for it, today in
Abyssinia, as yesterday on the Isonzo and the Piave and for
centuries past in every corner of the globe, behind one bright
flag or another.

At this time I was reading an old history of the town of
Melfi by Del Zio, which I had found among a heap of dusty
tomes in the house of Dr. Milillo, where I went almost every
day for a cup of coffee and a chat with the two ingenuous,
playful, and moustached girls, Margherita and Maria. The
history was written during the second half of the last century
and it mentions as an object of local pride an old peasant
with a wooden leg who had been conscripted into Napoleon's
army and had lost this leg at the crossing of the Beresina in
the Russian campaign. For more than half a century this
peasant limped through the streets of Melfi bearing before

136

the eyes of Ms fellow-citizens the absurd sign of a civilization
which had marked him forever, but of which he knew nothing.
What could Russia or the Emperor of France mean to a
peasant from Melfi? History, as Victor Hugo might have said,
baroque fashion, took his leg and left him none the wiser.

This same History, to which these villages had always been
forced to bow, had left other and deeper marks on the towns-
men of the limping peasant. Melfi, once a populous and
prosperous town, owed Its ruin to the fact that a French cap-
tain, warring in the mountains against the Spaniards of
Charles V, happened to shut himself up there with his fol-
lowers. The Spanish troops of Pietro Navarro, under orders
from Lautrec, laid siege to Melfi, took it, and killed all the
citizens they could lay their hands on, folk who knew little of
France and Spain, or Francis I and Charles V. They razed
most of the houses and gave what was left of the town to
Philbert of Orange and later, as a reward for his maritime
victories, to Andrea Doria of Genoa, with whom the citizens
were even less acquainted. Doria never troubled to visit
his vassals, nor did his successors. They simply sent agents
to collect as much tribute as they could. Thus, by the in-
scrutable will of History, with which they had no real con-
nection, the peasants of Melfi lived for centuries after in
dire poverty. How many conquerors, with motives the con-
quered could not know, have, like the French and the
Spanish, passed over this land? After thousands of years
of this same experience it was only natural that the peasants
had little enthusiasm for war, that they looked with mis-
givings on all flags, and listened in silence while Don Luigi
sang from the balcony of the grandeur of Rome.

Governments, Theocracies and Armies are, of course,
stronger than the scattered peasants. So the peasants have

137

to resign themselves to being dominated, but they cannot feel
as their own the glories and undertakings of a civilization
that is radically their enemy. The only wars that touch their
hearts are those in which they have fought to defend them-
selves against that civilization, against History and Govern-
ment, Theocracy and the Army. These wars they fought
under their own black pennants, without military leadership
or training and without hope, ill-fated wars that they were
bound to lose, fierce and desperate wars, incomprehensible
to historians.

The peasants of Gagliano were indifferent to the conquest
of Abyssinia and they neither remembered the World War
nor spoke of its dead, but one war was close to their hearts
and constantly on their tongues; it was already a fable, a
legend, a myth, an epic story. This was the war of the brig-
ands. Brigandage came to an end in 1865, seventy years
before, and only a very few of them were old enough to
remember it, either as participants or eyewitnesses. But all
of them, old and young, men and women, spoke of it with
as much passion as if it were only yesterday. When I talked
to the peasants I could be sure that, whatever was the sub-
ject of our conversation, we should in one way or another
slip into mention of the brigands. Their traces are every-
where; there is not a mountain, gully, wood, fountain, cave,
or stone that is not linked with one of their adventures or
that did not serve them as a refuge or hideout; not a dark
corner that was not their meeting-place; not a country chapel
where they did not leave threatening letters or wait for
ransom money. Many places, like the Fossa del Bersagliere,
were named for their deeds. Every family was at one time
for or against them: one of its members was an outlaw, or
they took in and hid a brigand, or a wandering band killed

138

some relative, or set fire to their crops. Then it was that the
feuds arose which were to be handed down from generation
to generation and which rage even today. The peasants, with
a few exceptions, were all on the side of the brigands and,
with the passing of time, the deeds which so struck their
fancy became bound up with the familiar sites of the village,
entered into their everyday speech with the same ease as
animals and spirits, grew into legends and took on the abso-
lute truth of a myth.

I do not mean to extol the brigands, as is the fashion
among certain aesthetes and two-faced politicians. From an
historical point of view, studied against the background of
the Italian Risorgimento, there is no defense for brigandage.
From a liberal and progressive standpoint this phenomenon
seems a last gasp of the past, which has to be ruthlessly up-
rooted, a wild and baneful movement set up against Italian
unity, a threat to liberty and civilized institutions. Such it
was, indeed, in its character of a war fomented by the Bour-
bons, Spain, and the Pope, for their own particular motives.
If we look at it from a strictly historical point of view we
shall not only find it indefensible, but we shall fail to under-
stand it at all.

But to the peasants brigandage is something quite differ-
ent. They neither judge nor defend it and, when they dwell
on it with such passion, they are not boasting. Of the his-
torical motives, the interests of the Bourbons, the Pope, and
the feudal barons, they are not conscious, although they
dimly perceive that these are sorry and unpleasant affairs.
But the myth of the brigands is close to their hearts and a
part of their lives, the only poetry in their existence, their
dark, desperate epic. Even the appearance of the peasants
today recalls that of the brigands: they are silent, lonely,

139

gloomy and frowning in their black suits and hats and, in
winter, black top coats, armed whenever they set out for the
fields with gun and axe. They have gentle hearts and patient
souls; centuries of resignation weigh on their shoulders,
together with a feeling of the vanity of all things and of
the overbearing power of fate. But when, after infinite en-
durance, they are shaken to the depths of their beings and
are driven by an instinct of self-defense or justice, their
revolt knows no bounds and no measure. It is an unhuman
revolt whose point of departure and final end alike are
death, in which ferocity is born of despair. The brigands
unreasonably and hopelessly stood up for the life and liberty
of the peasants against the encroachments of the State. By ill
luck they were unwitting instruments of History, and His-
tory, quite outside their ken, was working against them; they
were on the wrong side and they came to destruction. But
through the brigands the peasants defended themselves
against the hostile civilization that never understands but
everlastingly enslaves them; instinctively they looked on the
brigands as heroes. The peasant world has neither govern-
ment nor army ; its wars are only sporadic outbursts of revolt,
doomed to repression. Still it survives, yielding up the fruits
of the earth to the conquerors, but imposing upon them its
measurements, its earthly divinities, and its language.

I was struck by the peasants* build: they are short and
swarthy with round heads, large eyes, and thin lips; their
archaic faces do not stem from the Romans, Greeks, Etrus-
cans, Normans, or any of the other invaders who have passed
through their land, but recall the most ancient Italic types.
They have led exactly the same life since the beginning of
time, and History has swept over them without effect Of the
two Italys that share the land between them, the peasant Italy

140

is by far the older; so old that no one knows whence it came,
and It may have been here forever. Humilemque videmus
Italiam; this was the low-lying, humble Italy that first met
the eyes of the Asiatic conquerors as the ships of Aeneas
rounded the promontory of Calabria.

There should be a history of this Italy, a history outside
the framework of time, confining itself to that which is
changeless and eternal, in other words, a mythology. This
Italy has gone its way in darkness and silence, like the earth,
in a sequence of recurrent seasons and recurrent misadven-
tures. Every outside influence has broken over it like a wave,
without leaving a trace. Rarely has it risen to defend itself
from mortal danger and only on those few occasions has it
fought, in vain, a truly national war. The first of these was
the resistance to Aeneas. A mythological history must have
its root in myth and for this reason Vergil is a great historian.
The Phoenician invaders from Troy brought with them a set
of values diametrically opposed to those of the ancient peas-
ant civilization. They brought religion and the State, and
the religion of the State. The religious tradition or pietas of
Aeneas could not be understood by the ancient Italians, who
lived beside the beasts of the field. The invaders brought
also arms and an army, escutcheons, heraldry, and war.
Their religion was a violent one, demanding human sacrifice ;
on the funeral pyre of Pallas the pious Aeneas made a burnt
offering of prisoners to the gods of the State. The ancient
Italians, meanwhile, lived on the land, knowing neither sacri-
fice nor religion. The Trojans met with insuperable hostility
among the natives, and the two civilizations clashed, Aeneas
found his only allies among the Etruscans, city people, like
Mm from the Orient, perhaps of the same Semitic origin, and
similarly ruled by a military oligarchy. With these allies,

141

then, he waged war. On one side there was an army in shin-
ing armor forged by the gods; on the other, as Vergil de-
scribes them, were peasant bands, risen in self -defense, with
no god-given weapons but only axes, knives, and scythes,
the tools of their daily work in the fields. These, too, were
valorous brigands, doomed to defeat. Italy, the humble Italy,
was conquered:

Per cui morl la vergine Cammilla
Eurialo e Turno e Niso di ferute.

On whose account the maid Camilla died,
Euryalus, Turnus, Nisus of their wounds.

Then came Rome and perfected the governmental and
military theocracy of its Trojan founders, who had to accept,
however, the customs and language of the people they had
conquered. Rome, too, met with opposition among the peas-
ants, and the series of Italic Wars were the most stubborn
obstacles in its path. Here again the Italians suffered a mili-
tary defeat, but they kept their individuality and did not
mingle with their conquerors. After this second national war
the peasant world, hemmed in by Roman order, lay in wait-
ing, dormant, as it were. The feudal civilization that' came
after, with the passing of time and peoples, was not a crea-
tion of the peasants, but it was close to the earth, limited by
the boundaries of great estates, and less in opposition to the
rural way of life. This is why the Swabians are popular
even today with the peasants; they speak of Conradin as a
national hero and mourn for his death. After him, indeed,
this flourishing land fell into ruin.

The fourth national war of the peasants was brigandage
and here, too, the humble Italy was historically on the wrong
side and bound to lose. The brigands had neither the arms

142

forged by Vulcan nor the heavy artillery of the government
troops. Even their gods were powerless: of what avail was
a poor Madonna with a black face against the Ethical State
of the Neapolitan followers of Hegel? Brigandage was an
access of heroic folly and desperate savagery, a desire for
wreaking death and ruin, with no hope of final victory. "If
the world had only one enormous heart, Fd tear it out," said
Caruso, one of the most fearful brigand chiefs.

This blind urge to destruction, this bloody and suicidal will
to annihilation, has lurked for centuries beneath the patient
endurance of daily toil. Every revolt on the part of the
peasants springs out of an elementary desire for justice
deep at the dark bottom of their hearts. After the end of
brigandage this land sank into an uneasy peace. But every
now and then in some village or other, when the peasants
have no representation in the government and no defense in
the law, they rise up with death in their hearts, burn the
town hall or the barracks of the carabinieri 9 kill the gentry,
and then go off in silent resignation to prison*

Of the real brigands, those of 1860, hardly any are left/
One still lived, Giulia told me, in nearby Missanello. He
was ninety years old, with a long white beard, and he was
considered a saint. Once he was the leader of a band that
spread terror throughout the countryside. Now he lived in
the village, revered by the peasants as if he were a patriarch ;
they came to ask his counsel whenever they were in trouble.
I met another brigand one day at Grassano. I was getting a
shave from Antonino Roselli, barber, flute-player, and at odd
moments my secretary, when a robust old codger with pink
cheeks, a thick white moustache, keen blue eyes, and proud
bearing came into the shop, clad in the corduroy suit of
a hunter. 1 had never seen him before. While he was wait-

143

ing for his turn he lit a pipe and asked me who I was.

"An exile?" he said, using the common word hereabouts
for a political prisoner. "Someone in Rome has it in for
you!" I asked him his age.

"I was a boy at the time of the brigands/' he answered.
"When I was fifteen my brother and I killed a carabiniere.
Have you seen the old oak tree two hundred yards or so
outside the village? We met him there and he wanted to stop
us; that's why we had to kill him. We hid his body in a ditch
but they soon found it. They arrested my brother and he died
in prison a few years later in Naples. I hid here in the vil-
lage. For seven months I lived in a room just above this
barber shop, disguised as a woman. Finally they discovered
me, but because I was young I got off with a four-year sen-
tence." The old brigand was happy and at peace with him-
self; this ancient murder did not weigh on his conscience in
the least and he talked about it as if it were the most natural
thing in the world. To him this was a war story.

"Do you see that gentleman who is just passing? 55 the
barber asked me, pointing through the open door. "He is Don
Pasquale, a landowner. His grandfather had a big farm and
when the brigands came he refused to give up either feed or
livestock. The brigands burned his house to the ground and
he was so ill-advised as to lie in ambush for them with the
carabinierL The brigands captured him and sent word to his
wife that if she wanted to see him again alive she must pay
five thousand lire ransom within two days. The family did
not want to pay the money and hoped that the soldiers would
free him. On the third day the wife received an envelope;
in it was one of her husband 5 s ears. 55

If the brigands cut off the ears, nose, and tongue of the
gentry in order to obtain a ransom, the soldiers, in their turn,

144

cut off the heads of the brigands they caught and mounted
them on poles In the village as an example. Thus the war
of destruction went on. These clay mountains are studded
with holes and natural caves. Here the brigands lay low,
hiding in the trunks of hollow trees the money obtained from
robbery and ransom. When the brigand bands were at last
dispersed, their loot remained in the woods. At this point the
history of the brigands passes into legend and is bound up
with age-old superstitions. For the brigands hid their spoils
in the places where the peasants had always imagined there
was hidden treasure. In this way the brigands came to be
looked upon as beings with the dark powers of the nether
regions.

15

MANY peoples have passed through this land that
traces of them are constantly being dug up by the plow*
Classical vases, statuettes, and coins from some ancient tomb
are brought to light by the turn of a shovel. Don Luigi had
some of these from one of his fields down by the Sauro. There
were worn pieces of money, whether Greek or Roman I could
not tell, and plain black vases of very handsome lines. I also
saw with my own eyes a brigand's hidden treasure, of modest
size; it was shown to me by the man who had found it, Lasala
the carpenter. One evening when he had put a big log on the
fire he saw something shining in the flames. It was a handful
of Bourbon silver crowns, which had been stored away in a
tree trunk.

To the peasants such things are only crumbs of the im-

145

mense treasure sealed up in the bowels of the earth. They
believe that mountainsides, caverns, and deep woods are
teeming with bright gold, which only awaits discovery. But
the hunt for buried treasure is fraught with danger; it is a
work of the devil and involves contact with the powers of
darkness. It is no use to dig at random in the ground; treas-
ures appear only to the man who is fated to find them. There
are only two ways of going about treasure hunting : one is to
look for inspiration in dreams, the other, and more favor-
able, to obtain the guidance of one of the sprites or gnomes
that watch over them*

Treasure is wont to appear to a sleeping peasant in all its
glory. He sees a pile of gold and the exact place where it is
hidden in the woods, near a certain oak tree with a mark on
it, beneath a great stone. He has only to go and get it. He
must go by night; by day the treasure might disappear. He
must go alone and tell no one of his going; if a single word
escapes him the treasure is lost. The danger is immense, for
dead men's ghosts wander in the woods ; few men are brave
enough to run the gauntlet without fear or failing.

A peasant of Gagliano, who lived not far from me, once
dreamed of treasure buried in the Accettura Forest, just be-
low Stigliano. He screwed up his courage and set out by
night, but when he found himself surrounded by ghosts in
the black shadows he began to shake in his hoots. Through the
trees he saw a distant light; the lantern of a coal miner from
Calabria, fearless as all those of his calling are, who was
spending the night near his mine. The temptation was too
strong for the frightened peasant; he could not help telling
the miner his dream and asking for help in the search. They
started out together to look for the stone, the peasant em-
boldened by the company and the dauntless Calabrian armed

146

with a strong knife. They found the stone, exactly as it had
appeared in the dream. Luckily there were two of them, for
the stone was very heavy and they were barely able to budge
it. When they finally managed to move it and the peasant
leaned over to look underneath he saw an enormous mass of
gold gleaming at the bottom of a deep hole. Pebbles dis-
placed by the shifting of the stone were falling onto the
money with a metallic sound that warmed the cockles of his
heart. All that was left to do was to go down into the hole and
take hold of the treasure, but at this point the peasant once
more lost his nerve. He begged his companion to climb down
and hand him up the money which he would put In his sack
until they should divide It between them. The miner, who
feared neither ghosts nor devils, got down in the hole, when,
all of a sudden, the shimmering gold became opaque and
black; before his eyes the treasure turned Into coal.

The difficulties and disappointments Involved In follow-
ing a dream are done away with when a man is told the
hiding-place of a treasure and led to it by one of the tiny
gnomes that know all the secrets of the earth. These gnomes
are the spirits or ghosts of children who have died without
being baptized ; they are numerous In these parts because the
peasants often put off the baptism of their offspring for years.
When I was called to the bedside of a ten- or twelve-year-old,
the mother's first question was: "Is there any danger of his
dying? If so, I must call the priest to come baptize him.
We*ve not had it done, but if he were to die . . . God for-
bid . , ."

The gnomes are tiny, airy creatures that run hither and
yon; their greatest delight is to tease good Christian souls.
They tickle the feet of those who are sleeping, pull sheets
off the beds, throw sand into people's eyes, upset wine glasses,

147

hide in draughts of air so as to blow papers about, and make
wet clothes fall off the line into the dirt, pull chairs out from
under women, hide things in out-of-the-way places, curdle
milk, pinch, pull hair, buzz and sting like mosquitoes. But
they are innocent sprites, their mischief is never serious but
always in the guise of a joke ; however annoying they may be,
they never cause serious harm. Their character is capricious
and playful and it is almost impossible to lay hands on them.
On their heads they wear a red hood that is bigger than they
are and woe unto them if it is lost; they weep and are quite
disconsolate until they have found it. The only way to ward
off their tricks is to seize them by the hood and if you can
take it away from them, they will throw themselves at your
feet in tears and implore you to give it back. Beneath their
whimsicality and childish playfulness the gnomes are very
wise; they know everything below the surface of the earth
and, of course, the location of buried treasure. In order to
recover his red hood, without which he cannot live, a gnome
will promise to tell you where a treasure is hidden. But you
must not give him back his hood until he has led you to it;
as long as the hood is yours the gnome will serve you, but if
he can lay hands on it he will leap away, mocking and jump-
ing for joy, and he will not keep his promise.

These gnomes or sprites are often seen, but it is very hard
indeed to lay hold of them. Giulia had seen them, and her
friend La Parroccola, and many other peasants of Gagliano,
but not one of them had ever laid hands on a gnome's hood
and obliged him to lead the way to a buried treasure.-

At Grassano there was a young workman, about twenty
years old, Carmelo Coiro, a husky fellow with a square sun-
burned face, who came often in the evening to drink a glass
of wine at Frisco's inn. He was a day laborer in the fields or

148

on the roads, but his dream was to be a bicycle racer. He
had read about the two Italian cyclists, Binda and Guerra,
and they appealed to his fancy. He spent all his free time on
his old broken-down bicycle and every Sunday he practiced
on the curves and hills around Grassano ; sometimes he rode
in the dust and heat all the way to Matera and even to
Potenza. He lacked neither strength nor patience nor breath,
and he wanted to go north on his bicycle and become a racer,
When I told him that if he carried out this plan I could recom-
mend him to an acquaintance, a sports writer, who was a
personal friend and biographer of Binda, Carmelo was over-
come with joy and whenever I saw him in Frisco's kitchen his
face beamed with delight.

At this time Carmelo was one of a group of road-menders
who were repairing the road to Irsina along the Bilioso, a
malaria-ridden stream that flows past Grottole Into the
Basento River. During the hottest hours of the day, when
work was Impossible, the road-menders used to go to sleep In
a natural cave, one of many dotting the whole of the valley,
and formerly a brigand hideout. In the cave there was a
gnome, which began to play tricks on Carmelo and his com-
panions. As soon as they fell asleep, half-dead with weari-
ness and heat, he tweaked their noses, tickled them with
straws, threw pebbles at them, sprinkled them with cold
water, hid their coats and shoes, whistled, stamped about
and would not leave them in peace. They could see him dart
from one part of the cave to another under Ms red hood
and they tried their best to catch him, but he was quicker
than a cat and cleverer than a fox and they soon decided
that there was no chance of snatching the hood. In order
that they might escape his teasing and enjoy their rest, one
after another took his tarn at mounting guard, hoping to

149

stave off the gnome even If lie could not capture him. This,
too, was useless. The sly gnome played the same tricks as
before, with a mocking laugh at their impotence.

In despair they took counsel with the engineer who was
supervising the repairs; he was an educated man and per-
haps he could succeed better than they in taming the rampant
gnome. The engineer came, with his assistant, the foreman,
both of them armed with double-barreled shotguns. When
they arrived the gnome began to make faces, laugh, and leap
about like a goat at the far end of the cave where they could
all see Min. The engineer raised his loaded gun and fired a
shot. The bullet struck the gnome and bounced back at the
engineer, grazing his head with a terrifying whistle, while
the gnome leaped higher and higher, in mad joy. The en-
gineer did not fire again; he dropped his gun and, together
with the foreman, Carmelo, and the rest of the workers, he
fled in terror from the cave. After that the road-menders lay
down in the open air with their hats over their faces. The
other caves in the neighborhood, where the brigands had
taken refuge, were also full of gnomes, and they never set
foot in any of them again.

The persistent and athletic Carmelo had considerable ex-
perience of such strange encounters. A few months before,
he told me, he was going home after nightfall from the direc-
tion of the Bilioso. He was with his uncle, a customs guard
whom I had met while he was taking a vacation at Grassano.
The two of them were climbing up the steep path through the
valley, where I often went in those days to walk and paint.
It was a cold winter evening, the sky was cloudy, and it was
pitch black. They had been fishing some distance away, below
Irsina, and night had overtaken them before they were aware
of the time. The uncle had with him a Mauser automatic

150

pistol loaded with twenty-four rounds, and so their minds
were at ease in regard to the chance of any untoward meeting.
When they were halfway up, at a point where there were two
oak trees near a small farmhouse, they saw a big dog com-
ing toward them in the center of the path. They recognized
him as belonging to the peasant friend who lived there. The
dog was barking fiercely and was unwilling to let them go by.
They called him by name and tried first to coax and then to
threaten him, all to no avail. The animal seemed stricken
with madness and set upon them with bared teeth. The two
men were frightened, and seeing no other way to save their
skins, the uncle whipped out his pistol and fired all twenty-
four rounds in succession. At every shot the dog opened
wide his huge red mouth and swallowed the cartridges one by
one, as if they were rolls, all the time growing bigger and
bigger as he bore down on them wildly. The men thought
their last hour had come, but just in time they remembered
San Rocco and the Madonna of Viggiano; they implored
their aid and made the sign of the cross. The dog, which
had by this time assumed gigantic proportions and was as
big as a house, stopped short; the twenty-four cartridges in
his stomach exploded with a terrible noise one after the
other, and finally the animal burst like a soap bubble and
disappeared into thin air. The path was open and soon they
came to the house of Carmelo's mother. This old woman was
a witch and she often conversed with the souls of the dead,
met gnomes, and talked to real devils in the cemetery. She
was a thin, clean, good-natured peasant.

The air over this desolate land and among the peasant
huts is filled with spirits. Not all of them are mischievous
and capricious gnomes or evil demons. There are also good
spirits in the guise of guardian angels.

151

One day at the end of October toward dusk a peasant
came to ask me to change the bandage on an abscess. I threw
the dirty bandage and cotton on my studio floor and called
Giulia to sweep them up. Giulia had the regular Gagliano
habit of throwing sweepings out of the door and onto the
street. Everyone does it, and the pigs have a way of cleaning
the streets. But on this particular evening I saw that Giulia
swept the bandages into a little heap just inside the door and
left them there. I asked her why, since I was sure that hygiene
was not the motive.

"Evening has come," Giulia answered. "I can't throw
them out. The angel, God forbid, might take offense." Then,
surprised at my ignorance, she explained further: "At dusk
three angels come down from the sky to every house. One
stands at the door, another sits at the table, and the third
watches over the bed. They look after the house and protect
it. Neither wolves nor evil spirits can enter the whole night
long. If I threw the sweepings outside the door they might
land on the face of the angel, whom we can't see; the angel
might take offense and never come back. I'll throw them out
tomorrow, after the angel has gone, at sunrise."

1 N T H I S light and airy atmosphere the time passed, as the
angels watched over me by night and Giulia's witchcraft by
day. I attended to the sick, painted, read, and wrote, in a
solitude that was pervaded by animals and spirits. I man-

152

aged to keep out of the quarrels and intrigues of the gentry
by staying almost all day in the house. But I did meet
them every morning when I had to go to sign the register
at the town hall and walked under the balcony of the school-
house, where Don Luigi sat smoking, cane in hand, then
again after lunch when I went to Dr. Milillo's house for a
cup of coffee and above all in the evening, when everyone
waited in the square for the arrival of the mail and the news-
papers.

October, with its even temperature, had slipped away;
the weather was colder and the rains had come, but they
made the landscape no greener; it remained a dingy yellow-
ish-white color. On fine days I painted outside, but most of
the time I worked either in my studio or on the terrace. I did
a great many still lif es, and I often used the boys for models,
as they had fallen into the habit of coming to see me and
hung about the house most of the day. I should like to have
painted the peasants, but the men were away in the fields
and the women, although they were flattered by my requests,
were unwilling. Even Giulia claimed that she had no time
to pose for me, and I realized that there was some mysterious
reason for her reluctance.

Giulia considered me her master and she never said no
to anything I asked; in fact, she went out of her way, with
all the ease in the world, to do me services which I should
never have dreamed of demanding. I had procured from
Bari an enameled tub for bathing and in the morning I
took it into my bedroom to wash, closing the door into the
kitchen where she was at work with her child. These doings
seemed very strange to Giulia and one morning she opened
the door and, without the slightest display of embarrass-
ment at finding me stark naked, she asked how I managed

153

to take a bath with no one to soap my back and help me to
dry. I never knew whether the priest had broken her in to
this duty, or whether it came straight down to her from the
Homeric tradition whereby women washed the warriors and
anointed them with oil. But from this day on she never
failed to soap and rub my back with her rough, strong hands.
Giulia was surprised that I showed no desire to make love
to her.

"You're well built," she used to'say, "And there's nothing
missing." But that was as far as she went; she never said
more. She was accustomed, in this, to an animal-like sub-
missiveness, and she respected my coldness as if there must
be some mysterious reason for it. So she confined herself
to praising my good looks. "What a fine fellow you are!"
she would say. "How fine and fat!" In these parts, as in the
Orient, fatness is a mark of beauty; perhaps because the
underfed peasants can never hope to attain it and it remains
the prerogative of the well-to-do.

Giulia, then, although she was ready to render me any
service, absolutely refused to pose for her portrait. I re-
alized that magic lay behind her refusal and this she one
day corroborated. A portrait takes something away from
the sitter to be exact, an image of herself. By this means
the painter acquires complete power over anyone who poses
for him. For the same reason many people unconsciously
avoid being photographed. Giulia, who lived in a world ruled
by magic, was afraid of my painting her, not so much be-
cause I might use the portrait as a waxen image and cast an
evil spell upon her, but rather on account of the tangible
sway I should exercise over her just as, to her mind, I
undoubtedly exercised it over the people and things and
trees and villages that were the subjects of my painting. I

154

further realized that in order to overcome her scruples
I should have to make use of a magic even stronger than
fear, an irresistible power, namely violence, I threatened,
therefore, to beat her and made as if to do so; in fact I
actually started, without too much difficulty, as her arms
were no stronger than mine. As soon as she saw my raised
hand and felt the first blow, Giulia's face filled with joy and
she smiled beatifically, showing the full array of her wolf-
like teeth. Just as I had imagined, she knew no greater happi-
ness than that of being dominated by an absolute power.
All of a sudden she became as gentle as a lamb and sat
willingly for her portrait. Face to face with the unanswer-
able argument of brute force, she forgot all her natural and
justifiable fears. I painted her with a black shawl framing
her old yellow serpent face.

Again I painted her on a larger scale, lying down with her
baby in her arms. Hers was a motherliness devoid of senti-
mentality, a physical and earthly attachment made up of
bitterness, pity, and resignation; she was like a wind-beaten
flood-swept mountain out of which had grown a rolling green
hill. Giulia's baby was round, fat, and good-natured; tie
hardly knew how to talk and I understood little of what he
said as he trotted about my rooms after Barone, dividing
with the dog the dried figs, bits of bread, and candy that I
gave him. Nino would stand on the tip of his toes and raise
as high as possible the little hand that clasped his treasure,
but Barone was bigger than he was and with a frisky leap,
taking care not to hurt Mm, he would snatch it away. When
Barone stretched out on the floor, Nino lay down on top of
Mm and they played together. Then, when the baby was
tired, he fell asleep and the dog remained motionless
beneath Mm, like a cushion, hardly daring to breathe

155

lest he be awakened. They lay this way for hours in the
kitchen.

In spite of my work and all that I had to do about the
house, the days went by with the most dismal monotony, in
this deathlike existence, where there was neither time, nor
love, nor liberty. One living presence would have been more
real to me than the company of infinite numbers of bodiless
spirits, constantly staring at me and following me about:
the continual magic of animals and things weighed upon
me with a funereal enchantment, but the only way to be free
of them was to possess a magic even stronger. Giulia taught
me her philters and love spells. But what is more diametri-
cally opposed to love, which is a release, than magic, which
is a power of repression? There were spells for winning the
hearts of those nearby, others for binding those of the absent.
One, which Giulia swore was particularly effective, reached
loved ones over land and sea, and impelled them to drop
everything, heeding the call of love, and to return to the
abandoned lover. This was a verse in which lines that made
sense alternated with absurd repetitions of witchcraft:

Stella^ da lontano te vuardo e da mcino te saluto
9 N faccia te vado e 9 n vocca te sputo.
Stella, non face che ha da murl
Face che ha da turna

E con me ha da resta*

Star, that I see In the distance, I greet you;

I swagger up to you and spit in your mouth.

Star, let him not die;

Let him come back,

Come back and stay with me.

156

The verse must be recited at night, standing in the doorway
and gazing up at the star to which it is addressed. I tried
it from time to time, but it never worked. I stood leaning
against the door, with Barone at my feet, and looked at the
sky. October was gone, and in the black heavens shone the
stars that watched over my birth, the cold, brilliant stars
of Sagittarius.

J. N T H E midst of this pause from emotion, this tedious
and lonely round of the seasons, charged with words that
met no answer, came a letter out of the blue from Matera. I
was to be allowed to spend several days in Grassano to
finish some paintings that I had begun there, on condition
that I pay out of my own pocket for my trip and for that of
the carabinieri who would have to escort me. This permission
was in answer to a request that I had made long ago and
already forgotten. When I was transferred to Gagliano with
only a day's notice, I had sent a telegram to the authorities in
Matera asking for a respite of ten days because I had started
some paintings which I very much wanted to complete* In
reality this had been only a pretext, under cover of which I
hoped to linger on indefinitely. There was no reply and I
had had to pack my bags and go. Bpt artistic motives had
a tardy influence on the police, and after three months of
their meditation I was rewarded with a holiday as welcome
as it was unexpected.

157

I never knew the officials at Matera who had charge of
political prisoners, but they were apparently not a bad lot
Because the post was so undesirable it must have been filled
by old war horses, heirs to Bourbon skepticism and hide-
bound by paperwork and routine. Into these bureaucratic
old heads there had not yet, thank God, penetrated the new
schoolmasters* culture, the idealism of the night schools
which animated the hysterical zeal of the young and led them
to imagine that the State had an ethical quality, that it was a
person like themselves with a similar personal morality, and
that it should impinge upon the individual as an extension
of his own petty ambitions and paltry sadism and exhibition-
ism, while at the same time it should appear to the profane
as inscrutable, sacred, and enormous. The young Fascist
zealots derived from this identification of themselves with
their idol the same physical pleasure that they got from love-
making. Don Luigi was, in some ways, one of them. But the
officials at Matera seemed to be of the old school; they ob-
served the safe custom of letting all papers lie idle in the
files for at least three months before they even looked at
them.

Don Luigi gave me the great news with the kindly smile
of a king bestowing a favor upon one of his subjects. Because
he represented the State he felt that he had a share in the
tardy generosity of the police and he was happy that the
State he represented was a paternalistic one. But there was
a touch of wounded civic pride in his happiness and a vague
resentment that marred its completeness. Why was I so happy
at the prospect of going away for a few days? Did I like
Grassano better than Gagliano? As a representative of the
State* Don Luigi held that political prisoners deserved harsh
treatment and should not enjoy being under his jurisdiction,

158

but as a citizen of Gagliano, indeed its first citizen, he claimed
that they should be, or at least pretend to be, better off there
than in any other village of the province. This contradictory
and jealous frame of mind allowed him to indulge in the
first and oldest virtue of his land, hospitality. In the name
of hospitality the peasants are wont to open the door to a
perfect stranger and ask him to share their humble fare,
without even inquiring his name; every village strives for
the reputation of being the friendliest and most welcoming
to the passer-by, who may, after all, be a god in disguise. To
Don Luigi's way of thinking I had no right to rejoice over my
departure. I might speak ill of him to the gentry over at
Grassano, who were so much nearer to Matera, the provincial
capital. And if I got myself transferred again and never
came back to Gagliano, who would look after his imaginary
ailments? Who would take patients away from his enemy
Gibilisco until the old doctor died of sheer rage?

Don Luigi, in his own way, and within the limitations of
his arid and infantile character, had grown attached to me
and was sorry to see me go. I had to set his mind at rest by
telling him that I was excited chiefly over the idea of taking
a trip, a simple pleasure to which I was no longer accus-
tomed, that work was the only reason for my wanting to go
to Grassano and that I should be very happy indeed to return
to his territory as soon as my pictures were finished.

And so early the next morning I set out, with a bundle of
canvases, my portable easel, my paint-box, Barone, and two
carabinieri* I knew the road well, as Grassano was as
familiar to 1 me as my own bedroom* Usually I do not care
to return to a place where I have lived before, but my feel-
ings about Grassano were pleasant ones. I had arrived there
after mentis of solitary confinement and, I had there laid

159

eyes again on the sun and the stars, on growing things and
animals and human faces, so that I connected it with a sort
of liberation. Prolonged solitude leads to a detachment from
the senses that sometimes is similar to a kind of saintliness;
the return to normal life is acute and painful, like a con-
Talescence. The poverty and desolation of Grassano, set in
a monotonously sad landscape empty of softness and sen-
suousness, made it as inoffensive as possible under the cir-
cumstances and well suited to my gradual recovery. I had
been happy there and I loved it.

What a joy it was, that morning, in the "American's" little
car, to glimpse the forbidden land beyond the cemetery* the
road down to the Sauro, and the heights of Stigliano! How
gaily Barone frisked about while we waited at the cross-
roads by the river for the mail bus, full of new faces. One by
one, as in a film turning backwards, we passed through the
places I had first met going in the opposite direction:
Stigliano, Accettura, San Mauro Forte, the bus stops with
the bustling in and out of peasants and their women, the
woods, and the houses peopled with creatures of my imagina-
tion. And finally, in the distance, appeared the wide, white
river bed of the Basento and the railway station for Gras-
sano. Here the bus veered off toward Grottole and Matera,
while we waited for some vehicle to carry us the winding,
steep, dusty ten miles up to the village. We had a long wait
until a car came down to meet the train from Taranto. I spent
the time looking at the river bed where the first arch of the
bridge, swept away by a flood, for years had waited in vain
to be repaired. Before me, like a great wave on the surface
of the earth, rose the solid bare mountain of Grassano, and,
poised upon Its peak like a mirage, was the village. It
seemed even more airy and unreal than when I had last seen

it, because during my absence all the houses had been
whitewashed and now they looked like a herd of timorous
sheep huddled together on the yellowish-gray crest of the
mountain.

At last we heard from afar the honking of a horn and we
saw first a cloud of dust coming down the road and then the
car itself teetering over the boardway laid down alongside
the broken bridge and pulling up at the station. The driver*
who had taken me to Gagliano three months before, rec-
ognized Barone and myself and gave us our first welcome,
The train whistled into the station and went on its way again
without the arrival or departure of a single passenger. Now
we had to wait for the train going the other way, from Naples
and Potenza, which was due to arrive soon after but was very
late. I was in no hurry and I did not mind waiting In the
valley where I might never again return, walking in the noon-
day silence and sitting down on the white stones of the wide,
dry river bed, which disappeared on either side into the
mountains. I ate the lunch I had brought with me and bided
my time. An hour later the train from Naples came in, as
empty as was its predecessor; we got into the car and began
the ascent.

There are hundreds of curves along the ten miles of road,
which passes among caves and hillocks and fields of stubble
where the wind raises lurries of dust and there is not a single
tree to be seen. We climbed up gradually until we were a
quarter of a mile from the village, turning first one way and
then the other, with the view shut off by the raised and
rounded outlines of the parched fields. Then we came to a
great cleft, almost like a wound in the earth, around which
the road swung in a wide circle. This is called the ditch
of the carcasses, because in it are thrown the dead bodies of

161

diseased and inedible animals, whose white bones now cover
its bottom. We were close opon the village; there was the
sloping, open cemetery, looking like a white handkerchief
spread out to dry on the hillside; there the beginning of the
path running between two high hedges of rosemary where
In the early days I used to sit for hours to read until a goat
would suddenly come out and gaze at me with mysterious
eyes ; and there was the tree where, seventy years ago, the old
brigand had killed his carabiniere* One last curve and we
saw the life-size Christ on a wooden cross raised above the
road, then one more short climb and the road was closed In
between the village houses. With a loud honk of the horn,
which caused pedestrians to flatten themselves against the
walls, we drew up at the door of Frisco's inn. I was greeted
by the booming voice of the landlord, who called his wife and
children: "Capita! Guaglio! Here's Don Carlo!" Shouting
excitedly, they trooped around me.

They were a fine family. Frisco was a lean, strong man
of about fifty, vociferous and enterprising, with a round
bead, close-cropped hair and astute, darting eyes. He was
active and cheery, always making deals with traveling sales-
men and doing business with neighboring villages. His wife
was as gentle and quiet as her husband was quick and noisy,
a tall, shapely woman, dressed in black, imperturbable and
motherly in the midst of continual bustle. She was already
cooking some bread in oil for me and I could not hear her
voice among the others. The oldest son was called "Capitano"
because he was the recognized ringleader of the village boys,
lording it over them by virtue of his precocious intelligence
and acumen. He was thirteen or fourteen years old, and was
short and lame. He had sparkling, alert, and sensual eyes
set in a pale, thin face, where a few whiskers were starting

to sprout. He was quick-witted and talked very fast, leaving
half his sentences unfinished. I never saw a boy his age do
sums with such speed or grasp an idea so rapidly, especially
where business matters were concerned. He played slap-jack
at such lightning speed that the cards hardly hit the table
before he covered them. All the other boys were under his
sway and everywhere in the village you could hear the call
of "Capitano" and see his thin, agile frame and limping
gait. His younger brother was completely different, tall and
slender with enormous eyes and a mild expression on his
face; he took after his mother, as did the little girls.

I had not yet finished greeting the Frisco family when
Antonino Roselli, the barber, and Riccardo, his brother-in-
law, arrived on the scene; they had already sent word around
to my other friends, who soon put in an appearance. Antonino
was the dark young fellow with a black moustache, who
played the flute. He was anxious, like everyone else in Gras-
sano, to get away, and he still cherished the hope of follow-
ing me around Europe as my private secretary. He planned
to shave me, set up my easel, prepare my paints and brushes,
find models, sell my pictures, play the flute to me when I was
bored, care for me when I was ill, and, in general, attend to
my needs even better than the faithful Elia who trailed after
Vittorio Alfieri, the poet, over the plateaus of ancient Cas-
tile. Perhaps I should have fallen in with his wishes, but
alas, this was one of the thousand chaiice of a lifetime that
out of inertia, foolishness, or distraction I let go to waste. He
was a fine fellow, a little too much of a barber and flute-
player to suit me, but none the less, his attachment was touch-
ing. During the first days after my arrival in exile from
prison in Rome, after I had paid an almost furtive visit to
his barber shop, Antonino, thinking I might be in low spirits.

163

came with two friends to play a serenade beneath my win-
dow. His flute, a violin, and a guitar, echoed in somewhat
melancholy fashion in the silence of the night.

Riccardo was a sailor from Venice, who had been arrested,
along with his shipmates, because when their ship came back
to Trieste from Odessa, Communist propaganda leaflets were
found aboard. He was tall, fair and athletic, a 500-yard
swimming champion, with a faraway look in his blue eyes
which were set up high on his forehead like those of a bird.
The first time I saw him, I recognized his face from having
seen it in a picture by De Pisis. Riccardo liked Grassano;
he had married Maddalena, the sister of Antonino, and they
were expecting a baby. He led a family life, as if he were a
native of Grassano rather than a political prisoner. All those
in compulsory residence at Grassano, as a matter of fact,
enjoyed considerable liberty: they could walk anywhere in
the territory of the township and had to report to the town
hall only once a week, while the curfew regulations were
enforced with laxity. Riccardo was a pleasant, affable sort
and I enjoyed listening to his Venetian dialect. After these
two came a group of their friends: shopkeepers, carpenters,
one tailor, and a few peasants.

I knew fewer peasants at Grassano than at Gagliano. I
had stayed there a shorter time and had not engaged in
medical practice; moreover, they were in general far more
reticent. At Gagliano the peasants for the most part owned
their own bit of land, however small. Grassano, on the other
hand, was divided into large holdings where they were
merely tenants. They were equally poor in both places and
worse living conditions would be difficult to imagine. The
peasants of Grassano lived off advance payments for the
crops, butwhen the harvest came around they were rarely able

164

to pay back what they had borrowed. Every year their obliga-
tions grew and they were more and more entangled In a web
of squalor and debt. At Gagliano, where they worked their
own fields, they never produced enough to feed their families
and pay their taxes, and whatever money they laid aside after
a fat year went for doctors' bills and medicine for their
malaria ; hence they too were underfed and had no prospect
of moving elsewhere or of bettering their lot. The lives of
both groups, in short, amounted to about the same thing. But
while Gagliano was made up of two clearly divided classes,
the gentry and the peasants, at Grassano there was a numer-
ous middle class, consisting of tradesmen and skilled
workers, mostly carpenters. I often wondered how there
could be enough work to go around among the many car-
penters of Grassano. Actually there was not enough, and the
carpenters just managed to make a precarious living. The
existence of this middle class gave a different complexion to
the life of the village. The workers stood about all day at the
entrance to their workshops, which were inactive in spite
of their American machinery. The peasants, on the other
hand, were to be seen only at sunrise and sunset and they
seemed far away and relegated to a distant world of their
own,

Antonino, as befits a good barber, was a source of news
and gossip and he soon put me abreast of all that had been
going on at Grassano. Not much had happened: several
"Americans" had followed the example of the fellow with the
gold teeth and accessories of whom we have spoken and lit
out for New York; Lieutenant Decunto, the head of the local
Fascist Militia, had gone as the only volunteer to Abyssinia;
those who had enrolled to go as laborers had received no
satisfaction and shared the discontent of their fellows in

165

Gagliano; a new political prisoner had arrived, a Slovene
from Dalmatia who was clever with his hands and made
model ships and wax statuettes. My unexpected transfer of
three months before was still a subject of discussion; like
every other local event it had become a bone of dispute be-
tween the two factions into which the village was divided.
The opposition charged the group in power with having re-
ported me to Matera and brought about my removal because
I was friendly with some of their adversaries, such as Signor
Orlando and Lasala the carpenter. Those in power claimed,
on the contrary, that the opposition had written anonymous
letters about me to the authorities simply in order to accuse
them falsely of causing me to be transferred. To both parties
the circumstances of my departure constituted a grave breach
of hospitality. In my opinion neither of the factional theories
held water, but they had given rise to an embittered argu-
ment and served to swell the long standing hate and rivalry
between the two groups.

These things did not interest me. I wished to take advan-
tage of the remaining hours of daylight to go for a walk and
see the landmarks I was so fond of, and I set out for this
purpose with a group of my friends. Compared to Gagliano
the no less appalling poverty of Grassano seemed almost like
prosperity; the greater liveliness of the people and their
rapid Apulian patter almost made me think I was in an up-
to-the-minute city. At last I could see shops, even if they were
only holes-in-the-wall with hardly anything for sale; there
were pushcarts in the square In front of the palace of Baron
Collefusco* displaying cloth, razor blades, terra cotta jars,
and kitchen utensils. One pushcart had a load of books, the
same books I had seen in the hands of Capitano, his young
friends, and the older peasants: lives of the Kings of France

166

and brigand stories, a biography of Corradino, almanacs,
and calendars.

A little farther on there was a cafe, a real cafe that had
billiard tables in the back and old blown-glass bottles lined
up on a shelf behind the bar, of the kind sought after by
collectors, with faces of King Victor Emmanuel II, Gari-
baldi, and Queen Margherita, naked women balancing a
ball, and a hand brandishing a pistol A stroll up and down
the few hundred feet between Frisco's inn and the cafe
accounted for the social life of Grassano. To right and left,
above and below, there were only alleys, paths, and flights of
wide steps running between the peasant huts. These huts
were even poorer and dirtier than those of Gagliano. Here
there were no vegetable gardens or orchards around the
houses, but they were all huddled together as if in mortal
terror. The sheep and goats, even more numerous, ran up
and down narrow streets choked with garbage, and half-
naked, pale, puffy children chased one another among the
rubbish. In Grassano the women wore neither veils nor
peasant dress, but they had the same earthy, immobile,
animal-like expression. Here, too, patience and resignation
were written on both the faces of men and the desolation of
the landscape. Because the outside world was a little nearer,
there was in the air a stronger hankering after escape, al-
though it was doomed to equal disappointment.

I went up alone, by familiar ways, to the wind-swept
church at the summit of the village, to look once more at
the wide view extending beyond the boundaries of Lucania.
At my feet lay the houses of Grassano, below them the gray
hillside and the Basento River bed ; straight across from me
were the Accettura Mountains, rising from the foothills that
hid Ferrandina to the Dolomites of Pietra Pertosa where the

167

Basento wound Its way out of sight. On either side lay the
sea of shapeless land, stretching beyond the Bilioso River,
the caves of the brigands and gnomes, and Irsina high on its
bristling MIL Everywhere distant villages stood out like
scattered sails on this vast ocean. There were Salandra and
Banzi, on whose burning sands it is hard to imagine the poet
Horace's fountain, "more than crystal bright; none worthier
to be sued with flowers and wine," Other villages, closer by,
seemed to be setting their sails toward the home port of
Grottole straight across the way, behind St. Anthony's Chapel
with its two lonely trees amid the desert. For some years these
endless, dreary, rolling wastes had been sown with wheat of
such a poor variety that it was hardly worth the expense and
trouble of putting it in the ground. The first time I had
looked out at them was in summer, near the harvest season.
As far as the eye could see was an expanse of waving yellow
grain in the sunlight, and the sound of threshing-machines
throbbed through the silence. Now all was dull gray with no
color to break the monotony.

I stayed for a long time, until dusk came and a few drops
of rain began to fall, when I hurried down to the inn. Quite
a few people were waiting for their supper: teamsters, ped-
dlers, and Pappone. Raised above all the other voices I
could hear from the street were those of Pappone and Prisco,
the one shouting in Neapolitan and the other in Apulian
dialect, as they played their favorite game of pretending
to quarrel. Pappone was a fruit dealer from Bagnoli who
often came to buy pears at Grassano; I had already met
Mm during the summer. He and Prisco were the greatest of
friends and they swore at each other all the time to show
their devotion. 4C You old son of a . , , banker . . ."yelled
Pappone. 'That's right, with the devil's own tail, you

168

stinker!" cried Frisco. And they went on from there, cursing,
laughing, and rolling their eyes. Pappone was a former
monk, greedy, fat, and, in his way, witty. He was a first-rate
cook and he always banished Frisco's wife from the kitchen
while he prepared a Neapolitan sauce for his own spaghetti.
He invariably gave me a share of it and I can bear witness
that it was the best I ever tasted. He possessed an even greater
talent for telling the most extravagant stories, accompanied
by highly expressive gestures. But their inspiration was so
monkish and their subjects so salacious that I cannot repeat
them, not even the one he told that evening at table, which
was perhaps the most innocent of his repertory.

At last I was having a meal with other people, and this
simple pleasure made me feel like a free man again. Ever
since my stay in Gagliano 1 have hated to dine alone and
I have come to prefer even bad company to none at all. The
plain supper seemed to me a feast, and Pappone's story far
wittier than the most celebrated and boring tales of Boc-
caccio. While we ate, Frisco kept us company, with Ms shirt-
sleeves rolled up, his elbows on the table, and a glass of
wine in his hand, swearing and thundering oaths when he
was not jumping up and down. A newly arrived guest soon
joined us, a draper from Brindisi, whom I had seen at the
inn before. He was an enormous hulk of a man, with the face
of an ogre, a big nose, big eyes and ears, thick lips, and
heavy jowls that shook noisily when he ate. He ate as much
as four men together, but then this was his only meal of the
day and he had spent a number of hours talking himself
hoarse to persuade the women to buy his cloth. In spite of
Ms jowls, the perspiration that ran down the furrows of his
face, and Ms appearance of a deformed giant, he was the
kindest of fellows and almost as entertaining as Ms friend

169

Pappone. We were a lively and happy group around the
table.

Capitano, his brother, and their friend Boccia, a youth
left slightly retarded by some childhood disease, who worked
at the town hall, were in one corner of the room poring over
an old issue of the Gazzetta dello Sport. The ogre from
Brindisi looked askance at their infatuation and he lashed
out at Capitano in stentorian tones:

"Capita! Nothing but sport these days, eh? War and
sport! You've no thought for anything else! What is there to
this sport business, anyhow?" Capitano tried to defend him-
self:

"Camera/' he said, "is world heavyweight champion!"
The draper laughed so hard that the glasses on the table
trembled.

"Your Camera is just like Garibaldi/' he said. This state-
ment was so definite that Capitano could find no answer, and
the giant went on:

"They're both fakes. Camera wins because everything is
fixed in advance. Just like Garibaldi, I tell you; it's the same
old story. Of course they pass off a lot of tall tales on you
in your schoolbooks, but the truth is something else again.
When King Franceschiello had to leave Naples and went to
Gaeta, Garibaldi and his Red Shirts set out to attack him,
gay, proud and brave as lions. From the walls of Gaeta
the soldiers fired cannons at them, but the Red Shirts paid
no attention; they advanced as if they were going to a
wedding, with a flag and drums and fifes stepping out ahead
of them. When King Franceschiello saw that the cannons
were having no effect he said to himself: 'Either they're mad-
men or there's something strange about the whole thing. I'll
set off a cannon at them myself/ No sooner said than done.

170

He chose a fine cannon ball, had It loaded Into the barrel*
and fired It himself. Boom! When they saw what was happen-
ing Garibaldi and his Red Shirts turned tail and fled., without
waiting for a second shot from the King's hand. The other
shots, of course, were blanks. Garibaldi, you see, like Car-
nera, had fixed everything in advance. When the King fired
a real shot. Garibaldi said: 'Nothing doing here at Gaeta*
boys. Let's go to Teana.* And so they did. 9 *

Pappone, Frisco, the teamsters, peddlers, and the rest all
laughed. Garibaldi was not popular in these parts and that
evening the reputation of Camera was thoroughly dis-
credited. Capitano acknowledged his defeat, and only Boc-
cia, whose meningitis had left him a bit slow at catching on
to what was said around him, kept his own counsel. Because
of his affliction he had been given the job of filing away
papers and acting as a general factotum at the town hall. The
crippled were well treated hereabouts and cared for by their
own townsmen. As often happens in such cases, Boccia made
up for his slowness with a phenomenal memory, which was
limited, however, to the objects of his ruling passions: sport
and the law. He knew by heart the names of the members of
every soccer team in Italy for several years past, and he
used to recite them to me like litanies, his eyes shining with
joy. His other passion was even stronger. Law, lawyers, and
lawsuits filled, him with delight. He knew the names of all
the lawyers in the province and extracts from their most
famous pleadings. In this he was not unique, for there is a
widespread admiration for legal eloquence in this part of the
country. An event of two or three years before was the most
important and blissful of his existence. A provincial court
had held hearings in Grassano for some petty lawsuit con-
nected with fences and the boundary line between two pieces

171

of property, and Latronico, a famous lawyer from Matera,
the best known of the region, came to plead it. Boccia knew
the whole of Latronico's peroration by heart and never a day
went by that he did not repeat it, fired with admiration for
its purple patches* "Wolves of Accettura, dogs of San Mauro,
crows of Tricarico, foxes of Grottole, and toads of Gara-
guso !" Latronico had exclaimed, and to Boccia these appel-
latives were the highest flight of oratory ever achieved by
man. "Toads of Garaguso!" he would mutter to himself, in
a tone of triumph or pity, depending on the mood of the
moment. "Yes, toads, because Garaguso is in a swamp, sur-
rounded by water. What a speech that was!"

For supper, besides spaghetti with Pappone's sauce, we
had some ham, lean, tasty, and cut in thick slices, of a flavor
quite different from what we have in the North, and in my
opinion delicious. I sang its praises to Frisco and he told me
that it was mountain ham which he bought himself from
peasants living in the highest and most remote villages. The
hams were very small and they cost two lire a pound. When
I told Frisco that in the city they would be at least five times
as expensive, his lively mind immediately conceived the
idea of our going into business together. He proposed that
we should form a company, and while he went about the
mountains buying up hams, I should appoint sales agents
among my city friends. He could guarantee quite a supply
and perhaps in future years production could be stepped up.

Probably because I have no business head, his proposal
seemed to me to be a very fine one. I observed that, apropos
of Garibaldi, I should be following in his footsteps, because
in a condition similar to mine he took to selling candles, a
commodity not far removed from hams. Having accepted
Frisco's offer I wrote in a flush of enthusiasm to a friend

172

who traded in a variety of things with the strangest countries
imaginable. Some time later he wrote back that the hams
did not interest him because the public was not accustomed
to their flavor and the small production did not justify the
setting up of a sales organization. He advised me to see if
I could lay my hands on broom, for making dyes, a product
much sought after in this period of attempted economic self-
sufficiency. Broom is practically the only flower that blooms
in this desert; it grows everywhere among the bushes and is
the favorite food of the goats. But by this time my enthusiasm
for promoting business in Lucania had died down, and noth-
ing further came of it.

This first evening in company slipped away swiftly, with
business schemes, jokes, and the debunking of Garibaldi.
The ogre from Brindisi went out to sleep in his truck, in
order to be sure that no one stole his cloth during the night,
and the teamsters set out in the dark for Tricarico. Pappone
and I were Frisco's only overnight guests, and so each of
us had a room to himself. I wanted to get up early the next
morning. My plan was to go down almost to the Basento and
to paint Grassano as I had seen it in the afternoon from the
railway station, high up like a castle in the air. Antonino had
offered to go with me and at dawn he was waiting at the
door, with a mule to carry my easel and canvases, and a
group of friends who wanted to go along. There were Ric-
cardo, Carmelo, the road-mender and cyclist who had seen
the gnomes, a carpenter, a tailor, two peasants, and several
boys.

The weather was gray and windy, but there was hope that
no rain would fall. In the vague, cold light of the clouds the
landscape stood out more clearly and its monotony appeared
somewhat less mournful than under the blazing rays of the

173

sun. It was just the weather that I wanted for my picture.
Frisco's younger son joined us, while Capitano waved good-
bye to us from the door, for the way was too long for his
lame leg. With Barone in the lead, a frolicking standard-
bearer, we started down a steep path which cuts out the curves
of the winding road and makes the distance to the bottom
of the valley only about five miles. I had gone by the same
route and in almost exactly the same company one August
day to swim in a lonely stagnant pond formed by the Basento
River, surrounded by a few poplars, anomalous in these sur-
roundings, as if they had taken root by some strange error.
We had plunged quite naked into the river in the hot air of
the midsummer afternoon. Using only their bare hands, my
companions had tried to catch the fish lurking in the mud
along the banks, and with these primitive tactics they had
actually caught quite a few. Fishing was forbidden in these
rivers, because the fish were supposed to destroy mosquito
eggs, but no one paid any attention to the law. The poor
people of Grassano had so little to eat all the year around
that a plate of fish was a gift from the gods. Later we dried
ourselves to the singing of grasshoppers and the buzzing of
mosquitoes, under the hot sun reflected by the clay earth
around us. Today the air was cool, but the landscape was
unchanged except that it was gray instead of yellow. When
we reached a spot 1 thought good to work in, we made a halt.
Antonino stayed with me for the privilege of handing
me my tubes of paint, and a boy kept watch over the mule
which was browsing on stubble. The others went down
to the river, hoping for a miraculous catch, and I began to
paint.

The view from where we stood was as little picturesque
as possible, which was why I liked it. There was not a single

174

tree or hedge or rock upon which to center a painting. In this
landscape there was no rhetoric of mother nature or of man
and the soil, only a monotonous expanse of waste land and,
above, the white village. In the gray sky a little white cloud
hanging low above the houses, had somewhat the shape of
an angel.

My companions came back from the river empty-handed.
They stood around my canvas, surprised to see Grassano
where there had been nothing before. I had often noticed
that because the peasants have not the preconceived ideas of
the half-educated they have a good eye for painting, and
I usually asked their opinion of my work. While I went
on with my picture, my friends lit a fire to heat the food
we had brought with us, and then we sat down on the ground
to eat it, looking at the canvas on my easel which we had
tied to stones so that the wind should not blow it away. After
we had eaten it began to rain and there was nothing to do but
go home. My picture was nearly finished. We wrapped it in
a blanket, loaded it on the mule, and started to walk back
under a gentle drizzle.

THE village a great surprise awaited us. A small
troupe of actors had just arrived in a wagon pulled by a
thin white horse. They planned to stay several days and to
give performances. Their wagon, with a waterproof cover
draped over it, stood in the square, and in it were their 1

175

scenery and curtain packed In long rolls. The actors them-
selves were bustling about in search of lodgings in the peas-
ants* houses, so as not to have to pay for rooms at the inn.
The troupe was a family one: the father, a comedian; the
mother, his leading lady; two daughters under twenty with
their husbands and a few other relatives, all of them Sicilian.
The head of the family came to Frisco for something hot to
give his wife, who was laid low with a fever* She could not
perform that evening, and perhaps not even the next day,
but they would surely stay on longer. He was a middle-aged
man, somewhat stout, with pendulous cheeks and exaggerated
gestures patterned after the great actor Zacconi. When he
heard that I was a painter, he asked if I would make him
some badly-needed scenery, as his equipment was in very
poor shape after jogging about in all kinds of weather in the
wagon. He told me that he had belonged to high-class stock
companies before he came with his talented wife and
daughters to this wandering existence. Usually they traveled
around Sicily, and this was the first time they had been in
Lucania; they stopped in the largest and most prosperous
villages, the length of their stay depending on their box-
office receipts. But they were not making much money and
were having a hard time of it; one of his daughters was
pregnant and could not appear on the stage much longer. I
was quite willing to paint scenery for him, but nowhere in
the village were we able to find canvas or paper or the right
sort of paint, and so unfortunately there was nothing I could
do about it. He then invited me to attend the performance to
be given two days hence and introduced to me the members
of his company. The father was the only one of the family
who looked like an old actor. The women were not actresses
but goddesses in human guise. The mother and her two

176

daughters closely resembled each other; they seemed to
have issued forth from the earth or to have stepped down
from a cloud. They had enormous black eyes, opaque, and
empty like those of statues; immobile, marble-like faces,
accented by thick black eyebrows and full red lips; and their
necks were white and sturdy. The mother was full blown
and opulent, with the lazy sensuality of a Juno ; the slender
and graceful daughters were like woodland nymphs
strangely rigged out In fancy dress.

I hastened to go to the local office of the carabinieri to
obtain permission to stay out late on the evening of the
performance. Dr. Zagarella, the mayor of Grassano, unlike
Don Luigi, had no taste for the role of a policeman and he
left the carabinieri in full charge of political prisoners. He
was an able and cultivated man and thanks to him and
another physician, Dr. Garaguso, of excellent reputation,
Grassano was the only place in the province where successful
efforts were made to fight malaria. The two were exceptions
for these parts, where most medical men were on the order
of the two specimens at Gagliano. In fact, one of the objects
of my visit was to ask their advice and to profit by their long
experience. The advice they gave me was very precious and
they showed me their statistics to boot. For some years pre-
ventive measures and land reclamation had been undertaken
at Grassano, even without encouragement or financial assist-
ance from the provincial authorities. Now there were very
few deaths from malaria and in the last two years the num-
ber of new cases had greatly diminished.

In this region malaria is a scourge of truly alarming pro-
portions; it spares no one and when it Is not properly cared
for it can last a lifetime. Productive capacity Is lowered, the
race Is weakened, ihe savings of the poor are devoured; die

177

result Is a poverty so dismal and abject that it amounts to
slavery without hope of emancipation. Malaria arises from
the impoverishment of the deforested clayey land, from
neglected water, and inefficient tilling of the soil; in its turn
it generates in a vicious circle the poverty of the peasants.
Puhlic works on a large scale are necessary to uproot it.
The four main rivers of Lucania: the Bradano, the Basento,
the Agri, and the Sinni, besides a host of lesser streams,
should be dammed up; trees should be planted on the moun-
tainsides; good doctors, hospitals, visiting nurses, medicines,
and preventive measures should be made available to all.
Even improvements on a limited scale would have some
effect, as was proved to me by Zagarella and Garaguso. But
a general apathy prevails and the peasants continue to sicken
and die.

Autumn was in the air. It rained during the three days
before the theatrical performance and I could not paint
out of doors. I walked about the village, went to see my
friends, and worked a bit in my room. Frisco went hunting
and came back with three red foxes and a river bird. I
painted these and did a portrait of Capitano. One day, while
I was painting the foxes, I stopped work for a moment and
looked out through my window over the street. It was early
afternoon, everyone in the inn was taking a siesta, and there
was complete silence. I heard a scurry of bare feet on the
staircase and saw Frisco, in his shirtsleeves and without his
shoes, leap into the street, burst into a doorway across the
street and come out again, still silent, with a knife in his
hand. I threw open iny window and heard loud voices. Across
the way was a. bam where teamsters put up. Frisco had been
asleep in his own room, but with one eye open and on the
alert for the slightest sound, and he realized that all was not

178

well on the other side of the street, where the teamsters were
playing the game of passatella* He saw something shiny,
and quick as a flash, without pausing to slip on his shoes, he
noiselessly entered the barn, just in time to snatch a knife
from the hand of a fellow who had drawn it with murder
in his eyes.

Passatella is the most popular game in this part of the
country, and a particular favorite among the peasants. On
long winter evenings and holidays they play it for hours in
the taverns. It often ends in violence; if not with drawn
knives, as on the occasion I have just described, at least with
quarrels and scuffling. Passatella is not so much a game as
it is a peasant tournament of oratory, where interminable
speeches reveal in veiled terms a vast amount of repressed
rancor, hate, and rivalry. A brief session with the cards
determines a winner, who is then the King of the passaella 9
and his assistant. The King holds sway over the wine, for
which all the players have paid their share, and he fills the
glasses or leaves them empty according to his fancy. His
assistant holds the glasses out to be filled and has veto powers,
that is, he can prevent the would-be drinker from downing
his wine. The King and his assistant alike must justify both
their choices and their vetoes, and this they do in the form
of a cross-examination carried out in long speeches, replete
with irony and concealed passion. Sometimes the game has
an innocent character and does not extend beyond the pleas-
antry of piling up all the drinks on one man who is notori-
ously unable to hold them, or denying them to the keenest
drinker at the table. But more often the arguments proffered
by the King and Ms assistant reflect the feuds and conflicting
interests of the players, expressed with all the slowness,
roundabout ways, astuteness, inistaist, and deep conviction

179

characteristic of the peasants. Cards and bottles of wine al-
ternate for hours on end, until tempers boil from the effect of
drink and heat and the rekindling of smouldering passions,
which are in turn sharpened by vindictive words and yet
lulled by drunkenness. Even if a fight does not develop, all
those present are aware of the bitterness latent in what has
been said during the exchange of veiled insults. Frisco knew
well this sole diversion of the peasants and was on the
alert.

After the episode of the knife and when I had finished
painting the foxes, I went out for a short walk. The rain was
over and the air was filled with the odor of burned meat,
coming from tripe broiled on braziers set out on the street
and sold in sandwiches at a penny apiece. I climbed up a
series of wide steps toward the higher part of the town
until I came to the house where I had lived in the days just
before my departure for Gagliano, when I had left Frisco's
inn with the hope of settling down to stay. I had rented from
a Neapolitan widow a large room with two windows on the
second floor. Below me, on the ground floor, there was a car-
penter shop. The carpenter's wife, Margherita, who did my
washing and cleaning, was a good friend. When she saw
me coming now she ran to meet me and welcome me with
joy. "Have you come back? Are you going to stay here
with us?" She was sorry to hear that I had to go away
again.

Margherita was an old woman with an enormous gnarled
goiter and a kind face. She was considered one of the best
educated women in the village because she had gone through
the fifth grade of school and remembered everything she
had ever learned. When she came to clean my room she re-
cited to me the poems she had memorized at school, the

180

"Expedition to Sapri" and the "Death of Ermengarda." She
said them in a singsong voice, standing erect in the middle
of the room with her arms hanging down at her sides. Every
now and then she stopped in order to explain to me the
meaning of some difficult word. Margherita was of a mild
and affectionate nature. Often she said to me; "Don't be sad
because your mother is far away. You've lost one mother
and found another, for 111 be a mother to you.**

With her goiter and all, Margherita had a truly maternal
instinct. She had two sons, now grown up 9 one of them in
America. She spoke of them often with tenderness and
showed me photographs of her grandchildren. When I asked
her one day if she had had any other children she began to
cry for the loss of her third and favorite boy, and told me Ms
story. Of her three boys he was the handsomest; when he was
eighteen months old he talked well, understood everything
that was said to him and had beautiful dark curls and
sparkling eyes. One winter day when there was snow on the
ground, Margherita gave him to a friend and neighbor to
look after, who took him with her while she went to gather
some firewood in the country. That evening the neighbor
came home alone and beside herself. She had left the child*
who was barely able to walk, for a few minutes while she
picked up some sticks along a woodland path, and when she
returned he was gone. She had searched everywhere without
finding the slightest trace. A wolf or some other wild animal
must have carried Mm off and he would never be found.
Margherita and her husband, with a group of peasants and
carabinieri, searched every square foot of the countryside
all night long and during the following days with no success,
and after three days they gave up.

On the morning of the fourth day Margherita, wh.0 was

181

wandering alone and disconsolate through the country, met
at a turn in the path a tall handsome woman with a black
face. It was the Madonna of Viggiano, who said to her:
"Margherita, you mustn't cry. Your child is alive. He is there
In the woods in a wolf's lair. Go home and get someone to
go with you and you'll find him." Margherita ran off and
later, followed hy the peasants and carabinieri, she came to
the spot described by the Madonna. In the wolf's lair, amid
the snow, her child lay asleep, warm and pink-cheeked in
spite of the cold. His mother embraced him and woke him up
while the others all wept, even the carabinierL The child told
her that a woman with a black face had come for him and
kept him with her for four days in the wolf's lair, nursing
Mm and keeping him warm. When they came home Mar-
gherita said to her husband: "This is no ordinary boy. The
Madonna of Viggiano gave him her own milk in the wolfs
lair. Who knows what he may become? Let us go see the
fortuneteller at Grottole."

"At Grottole," Margherita told me, "There was a fortune-
teller who had made a name for himself. We went to him,
paid him a lira and he told us all that had just happened, as
if he had seen it with his own eyes. Then his face darkened
and he said the child would fall on a stairway and break his
neck when he was six years old. Alas, this turned out to be
true. When he was six my poor boy died as the result of a
fall . * ." And Margherita burst into tears.

Other children were known to have vanished into thin
air and to have been found again through the merit of the
' Blade Madonna. A lost baby a few months old was found
OD top of one of two trees flanking Saint Anthony's chapel,
five miles or so from Grassano, about halfway to Grottole.
A 'devil had carried him there, and Saint Anthony took him

182

under his protection. But the only case where I personally
knew the family concerned was that of Margherita's
child.

At last the evening of the play arrived. The rains had
blown over and the stars were shining when I made my way
to the improvised theater. No public hall existed and choice
fell upon a sort of cellar or grotto, partly underground, with
benches from the school set on the hard earth ioor. At one
end a small stage had been erected, closed from view by an
old curtain. The place was full of peasants, waiting with
wonderment for the show to begin. The play was La Fiaccola
sotto il Moggio, The Light Under the Bushel, by Gabriel
d'Annunzio. I expected to be bored to tears by this romantic
drama, played by second-rate actors. I had come to see it
because under the present circumstances an evening at the
theater was an unaccustomed diversion. But I was agreeably
surprised. The female divinities, with their large, empty
black eyes and attitudes charged with motionless but pas-
sionate intensity, played their parts to perfection and, on
the stage not more than four yards wide, they stood out most
impressively. All the rhetoric, affectation, and pomposity
of the tragedy vanished, leaving just what d*Annunzio*s
drama should have been in the first place: a bare tale of
immutable passions against the background of a land that
knows no time. At last one of his works seemed to me good,
and free of sham aesthetics.

Soon 1 realized that this sort of purification was due not
so much to the actresses as to the audience. The peasants took
part in the play with the liveliest interest. Its villages, moun-
tains and streams were not far from Grassano; they knew
exactly what they were like, and every time the names came
up they murmured assent. The spirits and devils that eater

183

info the story were the same spirits and devils that lived in
the clay caves of this region. The plot was true to life, for
tie audience endowed it with its real atmosphere, that of
the closed, hopeless, and mute world of the peasants. This
performance, stripped by actors and audience together of its
"dannunzianism," had a rough and elementary content
which the peasants felt to be a part of their own experience.
The whole thing was an illusion, but it demonstrated a
truth. D'Annunzio was of peasant origin, but when he be-
came a lilerary figure he was bound to betray them. His
beginnings were in a mute world like this one, among the
Abrazzi Mountains, but he sought to superimpose on it the
many-colored coat of contemporary verse, which is primarily
wordy, sensual, and haunted with a sense of time. In so doing
he degraded this world to a mere instrument of rhetoric
and its poetry to futile verbal acrostics. His efforts could
only result in betrayal and failure; from such a hybrid
combination only a monstrosity could be born. The Sicilian
actresses and the peasants of Grassano reversed this: they
tore away the layers of counterfeit and grasped in their own
fashion the peasant core of the drama. It was this that moved
them and fired their enthusiasm. The two worlds which
d'Annunzio had vainly tried to weld into an empty aesthet-
icism flew apart, as if aware that they could not fit together,
and beneath the fiow of superfluous words there stood forth
to the view of the peasants the images of Fate and Death.

The next day I was asked to lunch by a certain Signor
Orlando, brother of a well-known journalist who lived in
New York. He was a tall, melancholy man who lived very
quietly in a large house of his own in an isolated part of the
village. As he was an adversary of the clique in power he
took as little part as possible in local affairs. We had come

184

to know each other because I had designed the jacket for a
book his brother had written about America, and he had
been most hospitable. In his house the old Lucanian customs
were observed: his wife did not come to the table with us,
but left us to ourselves.

We spoke of the peasants, malaria, agriculture, and vari-
ous problems of the South. That morning I had talked with
a political prisoner, an accountant from Turin, who had
formerly been employed by the Fascist trade unions. He
had been arrested, according to his story, as a scapegoat for
his superiors, who had pilfered the funds entrusted to them.
Here in Grassano he had found a job keeping the books of
a large landed estate, and he let me examine them. By govern-
ment order nothing was raised on this estate but wheat. In
the fat years, with hard work and quantities of fertilizer,
the wheat harvested came to only nine times the cost of the
seed; in the lean ones it amounted to much less, sometimes
as little as three or four times the cost. In other words, it
was folly to insist on raising wheat. This land was better
suited to almond and olive trees and the best thing of all
would be to turn it back into forests and pastures. The peas-
ants received starvation wages. I remember seeing, on the
day I first arrived in Grassano, endless lines of women
coming up from the fields along the Basento with sacks of
wheat balanced on their heads, sweating like the damned in
hell under the pitiless noon sun. For every sack they brought
up to the village they got one lira. And in the fields where
they worked malaria was rampant. Orlando and I agreed
on the fallacy of the common theory that the root of all these
evils was the existence of large estates and that the only cure
would be to divide them up among the peasants. The small
landowners at Gagliano were no better off than the tenants

185

here; In some respects they had an even harder time of it.
What, then, was to be done?

"Nothing/* said Orlando, with his profound Southern
melancholy, echoing the hopeless slogan of Giustino For-
tunato, one of the best and most humane thinkers of the
region, who was wont to call himself a "do-nothing politi-
cian." I could not help thinking how many times every day
I heard this same word on the tongues of the peasants.
**Nmte y 99 as they say at Gagliano for Niente. "What did you
eat today?" "Niertfe." "What are your prospects for tomor-
row?" 6 *Niente." "Well, what shall we do?" "Niente: 9 Al-
ways the same answer, and they roll their eyes back toward
heaven in a gesture of negation. The other word that recurg
most often among them is "crai" from the Latin eras, tomor-
row. Everything that they are waiting for, that is due to
come, that should be remedied or attended to is "crai." But

means "never."

Orlando's despair, so widespread among those men of
the South who give serious thought to the problems of their
country, stemmed from a deep-seated sense of inferiority.
Because of it they can never fully understand their own
country and its problems. Their point of departure is, quite
unconsciously, a comparison that should never be made, or
at least should not be made until the problems have found a
solution. Because they consider the peasant world inferior
to the world outside, they are bogged down by a feeling of
either impotence or revenge. And impotence and revenge
have never created anything living.

My few days at Grassano were occupied in painting, the
theater, and good company, and went by like a flash. The
time came for me to go. Early one gray morning the car
waited for me in front of the door. With loud and hearty

186

farewells from Frisco and Ms family, Antonino, and Rio
cardo, I left this village to which I have never since re-
turned.

\jrAGLIANO soon absorbed and closed around me
again as the green waters of a swamp overtake a frog that
has lingered to sun himself on the bank. The village struck
me as more remote and lonely than ever; no echo of the
outside world penetrated so far; no strolling players or ped-
dlers came to break the monotony. The witch was waiting
for me on my doorstep, just as I had left her, with her tall,
dark, ageless body; Don Luigi was waiting for me in the
square, happy to have me once more in his clutches, and my
patients lay waiting in their huts, more numerous than ever
after my week's absence. Once more the days passed by in
endless procession.

The weather was turning cold. The wind came up in cold
spirals from the ravines; it blew continuously from every
direction, went straight through a man's bones, and roared
away down the tunnel-like paths. Alone in my house at night
I listened: it was a ceaseless cry, a wail, as if all the spirits
of the earth were joined in chorus to lament their dire im-
prisonment. There were long, heavy rains; the village was
covered with a white mist that lay as though stagnant in the
valleys below, and the mountain tops stuck out of this weary
pallor like islands in a shapeless ocean of vapidity. The
clay was beginning to break up and slide slowly down the

187

hillsides, a gray torrent of earth in a liquefied world. The
metallic sound of the raindrops beating on the terrace above
my room as if it were a drumhead, joined with the whistling
and howling of the wind, made me feel as if I were in a tent
in the desert. A gloomy, unsteady light came in through the
windows; the surrounding hills appeared to lie in a sorrow-
ful, uneasy sleep. But Barone frolicked happily outdoors
in the dampness, sniffing the wet ground and shaking the
water out of his soaked coat of hair when he leaped back
into the house. The violence of the wind blew smoke back
down into the chimney, spreading through every room the
fragrant, bitter smell of the juniper and pine branches which
an old peasant woman brought to me from the woods on her
donkey. I had a choice between freezing and weeping; hours
went by while my eyes watered and grew red, and the world
just beyond my door melted away in the rain. Then came the
snow; the women's hands were red with frostbite and they
draped heavy black wool shawls over their white veils. A
stillness and a silence thicker than before settled down
around the lonely mountain wastes.

One evening after a raging wind had momentarily cleared
the sky, I heard the rumble of the town crier's drum and the
sound of his trumpet, while his strangely pitched voice re-
peated on one high, prolonged note: "Women, hear: the pig
doctor is here. Come to the Mound by the Fountain tomorrow
morning at seven o'clock with your pigs! Women, hear, the
pig doctor!"

The next day the weather was unsettled but there were
scraps of blue sky among the low clouds. The snow was
almost all melted; there were only clumps of it here and
there where it had been piled up by the wind. I got up early
to see what was happening.

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The Mound by the Fountain was a large, almost flat,
clearing amid the rolling clay near the old spring just out-
side the village, to the right of the church. It was not yet
daylight when I arrived, but the place was already crowded.
Almost all the women, old and young, were there, most of
them leading a pig on a leash as if it were a dog. Those who
had no pigs came along for the adventure. White veils and
black shawls fluttered in the wind and a loud murmur of
talk, shouts, and laughter, together with grunts on the part
of the pigs, resounded in the icy air. The women were in
great agitation, red in the face and filled with mingled fear
and expectation. Children were running about and dogs were
barking; everything was in motion.

In the center of the Mound stood the pig doctor, a well-
built man about six feet tall, with a ruddy complexion, red
hair, blue eyes, and a thick, droopy moustache, which made
him look like an ancient Gaul, a Vercingetorix who had
stumbled by chance upon this land of a swarthy race. His
mission was to castrate the young sows, or such of them as
were not needed for the perpetuation of the species, thereby
making them fatter and more tender to eat. In the males this
operation is not difficult and the peasants perform it them-
selves while the animals are still young. But in the females
the ovaries have to be removed and surgical skill is required.
The pig doctors, who carry out this rite, are a cross between
priests and surgeons; there are few versed in this art and it
is handed down from father to son. The pig doctor whom I
saw upon this occasion was famous in his profession; he
made the rounds of all the villages of the region twice a year.
In spite of his reputed ability and the fact that very few pigs
died under his knife, the women, who were attached to their
own beasts, could not but tremble at the risk involved.

189

The red-headed man stood stalwartly in the center of the
clearing, sharpening his knife. In order to leave his hands
free he held In his mouth a heavy upholsterer's needle; the
string looped through its eye hung down over his chest. He
was waiting for the next victim, while each of the hesitant
women around him pushed her friends and neighbors ahead
of her with loud expostulations and a sudden respect for
formality. The sows, too, seemed aware of what lay in store
for them; they dug their feet into the ground or pulled at
the ropes around their necks in a vain effort to escape, squeal-
ing all the while in their almost human voices like panicky
girls. A young woman stepped forward with her animal, and
two peasant assistants of the pig doctor took hold of the
pink young sow, which struggled and gasped with fright.
They tied its four legs to stakes driven into the ground and
laid It down on Its hack. While the sow screamed with terror
the woman made the sign of the cross and said a prayer to
the Madonna of Viggiano, to which the other bystanders
murmured assent.

Then the operation began. The pig doctor, with a sure
swift stroke of his curved knife made a deep incision down
to the abdomen. Blood spurted out over the surrounding mud
and snow, but the red-headed man did not pause for a single
second. He thrust his hand up to the wrist into the opening,
seized one ovary, and pulled it out A sow's ovaries are
attached by a ligament to the intestine; when he had pulled
out the left one he still had to go after the right one without
making a second incision. He did not cut the ovary he had
already extracted but stitched it with his heavy needle to
the skin of the sow's stomach. When he had anchored it there
securely, he took hold of the intestine with both hands and
pulled it out, unraveling it as if It were a ball of wool. Yard

190

upon yard of intestine emerged from the wound, rose, purple
and gray, with blue veins and clusters of yellow fat at the
conjunction with the omentum. And still it came, as if there
were no end to it, until finally the right ovary appeared,
attached to the intestine like the left one. Then, without
making use of his knife, with one powerful tug the man tore
both of them away, and without turning around he threw
them over one shoulder to his dogs. These were four enor-
mous white sheep dogs, with thick tails, fierce red eyes, and
collars bristling with nails to protect them from the wolves.
The dogs were poised, ready for his gesture; they caught the
bloody ovaries on the wing and then licked up the blood
strewn on the ground. The pig doctor did not pause. When
he had disposed of the ovaries he began to push the intestine
back into place with his fingers, using considerable force
when, inflated like a rubber tire, it entered with difficulty.
When everything was back in place he took the threaded
needle out from under his thick moustache and with a few
stitches and a surgical knot he deftly closed the incision. The
sow, released from the stakes, lay for a moment uncertainly,
then got up, shook itself and ran squealing across the
clearing, followed by the women, while its owner, freed
from anxiety, dug the two lire fee for the pig doctor out
of a pocket beneath her skirt. The whole operation lasted
only three or four minutes; already the assistants had tied
another victim to the stakes and stretched it out on the ground,
ready for the sacrifice.

One after another, the whole morning long, the sows were
castrated. Daylight came and a cold wind blew ragged bits
of cloud about the sky. A smell of blood lay heavy in the
air; the dogs had had enough of the raw meat. The snow ran
red with blood; the women's voices were shriller and the

191

sows, operated and unoperated alike, squealed in unison
whenever one of them was laid out on the ground, sympa-
thetically answering each other's laments like a chorus of
mourners. But the onlookers were happy; it seemed as if
not a single animal would die. When twelve o'clock came
the miracle man stood up straight and announced that he
would finish with the few remaining sows in the afternoon.
The women drifted away, chattering, with their sows on their
leashes. The pig doctor counted his earnings and went off,
followed by his dogs, to the widow's house for his dinner,
and I left after him. For several days there was talk of little
else in the village.The women were still afraid that some post-
operative complication might bring about the death of one of
the sows, but all went well, they were reassured, and in the
end all their fears were dispelled. The pig doctor with the
red whiskers of a Druid priest and the sacrificial knife went
away the same evening, showered with the blessings of the
village, to Stigliano.

The days were now short, and I spent long, melancholy
evenings by the crackling, smoky fire while Barone pricked
up his ears at the howling of the wind and the baying of
wolves in the distance. The peasants had less and less to do;
in bad weather there was no use going to the fields, so they
stayed at home beside their meager fires or met in the wine-
cellars where they played endless games of passatella. Even
Don Luigi was a devotee of these oratorical tournaments. He
spent entire afternoons at them, with his fellow schoolteacher,
P., the lawyer and perennial student, four or five other land-
owners, and, to make a show of democracy, the local con-
stable or the a Ainericaii*' barber. He would not emerge until
late in the day, with bleary eyes, barely able to stay on his
feet, and there was little danger of meeting him in the

192

square. He had lost his boon companion and strong right
arm, the inseparable and irreplaceable partner in his
political power. The sergeant of the carabinieri, having
squeezed some forty thousand lire, according to local
gossip, out of the impoverished citizenry of Gagliano,
had succeeded in being transferred to new and greener
pastures.

His successor was a diametrically opposite type, a boyish,
fair-haired, blue-eyed young fellow from Bari. He was just
out of training school and this was his first post; he brought
to it zeal, conviction, and a real desire to serve the cause of
justice. Idealistic and shrinking from venality, he felt him-
self to be the appointed guardian of widows and orphans,
and it was not long before he realized that he had fallen into
a den of wolves. After a few days of acquaintance with the
village gentry, with their feuds and rivalries, and the scorn
they displayed toward the poor benighted peasants, he under-
stood that there was little he could do to combat the network
of established interests built up on the impunity of one class
and the passivity of the other. When we met in the square he
looked embittered and disconsolate. "Merciful God, Doctor,
what a place this is!" he said. "There are only two honest
men in the village you and myself." I cheered him up as
best I could: "There are more than two, Sergeant. Besides,
two just men would have sufficed to save Sodom and Gomor-
rah from the wrath of heaven. A lot of the peasants are
honest; you'll see. And there's Don Cosimino."

Don Cosimino stood behind the window at the post office
in a long black linen smock that covered his hump. He lis-
tened to what everyone had to say, looked out at the world
with keen, sorrowful eyes, and smiled with disillusioned
kindliness. On his own initiative he had begun secretly to

193

give out Incoming letters addressed to political prisoners
before they were censored.

"There's a letter for you, Doctor," he would whisper
from behind the window; "Come for it later when there's
no one about." And he would slip It to me concealed in a
newspaper* He was supposed to forward all our mail to
Matera, whence It returned to Gagliano after a week's delay.
But as things were I scanned postcards on the spot and gave
them straight back to Don Cosimino; my letters I took home
and opened with care. If the envelopes were still intact I took
them back to the post office the following day in order that
the censors should not be alarmed by a sudden dearth of
correspondence. No one ever asked the kindly hunchback
for this favor; he did it from natural kindness and of his
own free will. At first I hesitated to take the letters for fear
of compromising him; he thrust them Into my hands and
forced them upon me with an authoritative smile. Outgoing
letters, too, had to go by way of Matera, with the same
unfortunate delay, but here, in spite of his good will, Don
Cosimino could be of no assistance.

At about this time the censorship rules were changed. The
police in Matera, perhaps because they had too much to do,
authorized the mayor to censor the outgoing mail, a step
which vastly Increased the power and prestige of his office.
Letters were no longer given to Don Cosimino to be for-
warded to Matera, but they were taken to the mayor, who
first read them and then sent them on their way. The new
rules were supposed to speed up the mail, but this gain was
outweighed by the annoyance of having to submit to local
tyranny, of confiding one's most private and intimate affairs
to an Inquisitive and childlike individual whom one ran into
on the street a dozen times a day. There was scant hope that

194

Don Luigl would be content with merely glancing at the
letters before he sent them on. His duties as a censor were
a real honor, a new and unhoped for means of satisfying his
sadistic tendencies and his detective-story imagination. A
new prisoner had just arrived, an important oil merchant
from Genoa, who had been arrested on account of a run-in
with business competitors rather than for political reasons.
He was an old man, with a serious disturbance of the heart,
accustomed to comfort, practical and sentimental at the same
time. Homesickness and the inconveniences of Gagliano at
first caused him considerable anguish. He had been forced to
leave his very complicated business at a moment's notice
and hence he sent instructions by mail to those who were left
in charge. His letters were full of conventional business
terms and abbreviations, such as: "In ans. to yrs. of the 7th
inst., etc.," and of dates, check numbers, payments due and
so on. They were the most innocent letters possible, but Don
Luigi did not know the jargon of business, and the mantle
of his new authority sat heavily upon his shoulders. He imme-
diately imagined that these elliptical phrases and numbers
made up a secret code and he thought that he was on the
verge of uncovering a very important conspiracy. He did
not mail the letters for a number of days while he tried in
vain to decipher them. Finally he sent them to Matera and
kept close watch on the old man in the meanwhile. One day
he could contain himself no longer and he indulged In a
violent outburst of temper against his prisoner, threatening
him in a most mysterious way. It took a long time for him
to calm down and I am sure he was never fully persuaded
that his suspicions were groundless.

In my case things were quite different. Don Luigi took my
outgoing letters home and read them attentively. For several

195

days afterwards, whenever I met him in the street, he praised
my style to high heaven: "How well you express yourself,
Don Carlo. You're a real writer. I read your letters very
slowly and enjoy every word of them. The one you wrote
three days ago is a masterpiece; Fm making a copy of it
now." Don Luigi made a practice of copying all that I
wrote; I never knew whether his motive was literary admira-
tion or official zeal or a combination of both. The fact was
that it took up a great deal of his time, and my letters never
seemed to get off.

W E W E R E well into December and the snow lay thick
on the deserted fields. The peasants were all in the village
and the streets were unusually crowded. In the evenings,
amid the smoke from the chimneys which swirled through
the dark alleys, there was a hum of voices and a patter of
footsteps. Bands of children darted about sounding the first
strident notes on their cupi-cupi.

The cupo-cupo is a crude instrument made of a saucepan
and a tin can with a top opening covered by a stretched skin
like that of a drumhead. A wooden stick is set into this skin
and when it Is stroked vertically with one hand th"ere issues
forth a low-pitched, tremulous rumble. During the fortnight
before Christmas all the boys and girls made themselves
cupi-cupi and banded together to intone a repeated singsong
motive to this single-note accompaniment. They sang long
meaningless refrains, not without a certain charm, but their

196

chief activity was the singing of serenades interspersed with
improvised complimentary verses at the doors of the gentry.
Those whom they thus honored were supposed, in return, to
give them presents: dried figs, eggs, cakes, or small change.
Every day as soon as it was dark, the same verses could be
heard over and over again. The air was filled with the pro-
longed lament of childish voices to the grotesque rhythm of
the cupi-cupi. I could hear them from far away:

Aggio cantato alia lucente Stella:
Donna Caterina e una donna bella;
Sona cupille si voi suna.

Aggio cantato dal fondo del core:
II dottor Milillo e 9 nu professore;
Sona cupille si voi suna"

By the light of the stars I sing:
Donna Caterina is a beauty;
Ring, bells, ring.

From out of my heart I sing:
Dr. Milillo is a learned man;
Ring, bells, ring.

And so they went on, from door to door, with a melancholy
clamor. They came to my house as well and sang an in-
terminable string of verses ending with:

Aggio cantato sovra *nu varcone;
E Don Carlo e 9 nu varone;
Sona cupille si voi sund.

From a balcony I sing:
Don Carlo is a baron;
Ring, bells, ring.

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These primitive verses accompanied by the cupi-cupi
resounded in the dark streets like the roar of the ocean in a
seashelL They rose up under the cold winter stars and were
lost in the Christmas air laden with the smell of hot buns
and a sort of mournful festivity. "Once upon a time shep-
herds came to the village with their bagpipes," Giulia told
me. "Every Christmas they played The Christ Child Is
Born 9 in the church. But for some years now they have not
come this way."

Just before Christmas one shepherd did come with his
bagpipes and a boy, but he stayed only long enough to see
some old friends and went away the same evening without
playing in the church. I met him in the house of old Maria
Rosano, the mason's mother, who had screwed up her cour-
age to come pay me a visit alone. She was entertaining that
evening and as I passed by she asked me to come in for cakes
and wine. The furniture had been cleared away, and twenty
or more young peasants, in some way related to their
hostess, were dancing to the plaintive sound of the bagpipes.
Their dance was a sort of tarantella; the dancers circled
around each other, barely touching fingers, as if in a sort of
harmonious courtship. Then they all stopped while one
young peasant and his betrothed, Maria Rosano*s daughter,
came hand in hand to the center of the room. She was a strong,
tall, rosy-cheeked girl, who worked for her brother the
mason. I often saw her in the street balancing enormous
weights on her head: bags of cement, buckets of bricks, and
even big ceiling-boards which she carried as if they were
twigs, not even steadying them with her hands. While the
others looked on in silence, the piper struck up a new, nasal,
Heating, wild tarantella. The two lovers had an instinctive
feeling for the dance as a sort of religious rite: they stepped

198

out cautiously at first, sidling up and then turning their backs
to each other, wheeling about without ever meeting, beating
their feet in time to the music with looks and gestures indica-
tive of reluctance and refusal. Then they quickened their
steps, brushed against each other, took hands and spun
around like tops; they danced faster and faster in ever
smaller circles until they collided and finally they stood
face to face, dancing with their hands on their hips, as if the
pantomime of amorous skirmish and simulated hesitation
were over and a love dance were to follow. Instead, the
onlookers clapped their hands, the bagpipes ceased playing,
and the two dancers, red-cheeked, bright-eyed, and short of
breath, sat down with the rest of the company. Wine passed
around, there was talk by the flickering light of the fire, and
then the bagpiper went his way. This was, as far as I know,
the only dance given in Gagliano during the year I spent
there.

It was Christmas Eve and the forsaken land was piled
high with snow. The wind carried the funereal tolling of the
church bell, which seemed to come down from the sky. From
every doorway good wishes and blessings were called down
upon my head as I went by. Bands of children made their
last rounds with the cupi-cupi, and the peasants and their
women took gifts to the gentry. Here the ancient custom pre-
vails that the poor pay homage to the wealthy; their gifts
are received as a matter of course and are not reciprocated,
I, too, on Christmas Eve, had to accept bottles of oil and wine,
eggs and baskets of dried figs; the donors were surprised that
I did not treat them as well-deserved tributes* but tried to
evade them or at least to make some simple return. What
strange sort of gentleman was I, not to countenance the re-
versal of the story of the Three Wise Men, but rather to

199

welcome those who came to his house empty-handed? If the
Wise Men's wealthy successors among the gentry had fol-
lowed a star in order to lay their riches at the feet of a
carpenter's son, it would have been a sign that the end of the
world was near. Here, where Christ had not come, the Wise
Men, too, had never been seen.

Don Luigi generously sent word that because of the holi-
day we could stay out late and, if we wished, attend midnight
mass. On the dot of midnight I was in front of the church,
amid the crowd of villagers, all of us stamping our feet in
the powdery snow. The sky was clear, with a few stars, and
the Christ Child was about to be born. But the bell failed to
ring, the church door was padlocked, and of Don Trajella
there was no sign. We waited half an hour in front of the
locked door with mounting impatience. What was the mat-
ter? Was the priest ill or, as Don Luigi loudly insisted,
drunk? Finally the mayor decided to send a boy to the priesf s
house to call him. A few minutes later Don Trajella ap-
peared, coming down the path in high snow-boots with a big
key in his hand. He went up to the church door, muttering
some excuse or other for his lateness, turned the key in the
padlock, and hastened to light the candles on the altar. We
all poured into the church and the mass began, a poor, hur-
ried mass, without music or singing. At the end of the mass,
after the he missa est, Don Trajella came down from the
altar, walked in front of the benches where we were sitting,
and went up into the pulpit to preach the sermon.

'^Beloved brethren!" he began. "Beloved brethren!
Brethren ! M Here he stopped and began to search in his
pockets, while incomprehensible mumblings issued from his
lips. He put on his spectacles, took them off, put them on
again, pulled out a handkerchief, wiped the perspiration

200

from his face, raised his eyes to heaven, let them rest on his
hearers, sighed, scratched his head in an agony of embarrass-
ment, exclaimed "Oh!" and "Ah!", clasped and unclasped
his hands, murmured a pater, and at last remained silent,
with a look of despair. A murmuring rustled through the
crowd. What was happening? Don Luigi turned red in the
face and began to shout:

"He's drunk! And on Christmas Eve!"

"Beloved brethren!" said Don Trajello again. a l came
here, as your pastor, to talk to you, my beloved flock, on the
occasion of this holy day, to bring you the message of a de-
voted shepherd, solliciti et studiosi pastoris* I had prepared
if I may say it in all humility, a fine sermon. I meant to read
it to you because my memory is poor. I put it in my pocket,
and now, alas, I can't find it; it's lost and I can't remember
a single word of it. What can I do? What can I say to you,
iny faithful flock, you who are waiting to hear me? Alas,
I have no words at all to say." At this point Don Trajella
relapsed into silence, with his eyes fixed dreamily on the
ceiling. The peasants waited, uncertain and curious.

Don Luigi could no longer control himself; he got up
angrily.

"It's a scandal! A desecration of the house of God!
Fascists, come here!" The peasants did not know which way
to look.

Don Trajella, as if awakened from a trance, knelt down
in front of a wooden crucifix set on the edge of the pulpit
and prayed with folded hands:

"Jesus, my Jesus, see into what a plight my sins have
led me! Help me, Lord! Jesus, come to the rescue of Thy
servant!" Then suddenly, as if he were touched by grace,
the priest leaped to his feet, snatched up a piece of paper

201

hidden at the foot of the crucifix and shouted: "A miracle!
A miracle! Jesus has heard me; Jesus has succored me! I
lost my sermon and He has helped me to find something
better. What value could there have been in my poor words?
Listen, rather, to words from afar!" And he began to read
from the paper he had just found by the crucifix. But Don
Luigi was not listening. He had let himself go in a tempest
of icy anger and outraged religiosity.

"Fascists, come here! It's a sacrilege! Drunk in church,
on Christmas Eve! Here, to me!" And beckoning to the seven
or eight Fascist Scouts from the school among the congrega-
tion he began to sing "Little Black Face."

The mayor and his boys sang, but Don Trajella appeared
not to hear them and went on reading. The miraculous paper
was a letter from Abyssinia, written by the conscript from
Gagliano, who had been raised by the monks and was
known to all the village,

"These are the words of one of you, a son of this village,
the dearest of all my sheep. My poor sermon was nothing
in comparison. Jesus performed a miracle when He sent me
this letter. Listen to what it says: 'Christmas is coming and
my thoughts travel back to Gagliano and to all my friends
there. I can imagine them at mass in our little church. Out
here we are fighting to bring our holy religion to the savages,
to convert these heathen souls to the true faith, to bring them
peace and eternal happiness ...*** The letter went on in-
terminably in this vein and ended up with messages to all
and sundry, naming many of those present in the church.
The peasants listened with satisfaction to the heaven-sent
epistle from Africa. Don Trajella took the letter as his text
and preached a sermon on war and peace* "Christmas is a
day of peace and we are at war. But as the letter we have

202

just read says so well, the war we are fighting is a harbinger
of peace, a war waged for the Cross, which is the symbol of
the only true peace men can find here below. . . ." The
sermon was drowned out by a veritable pandemonium. Don
Luigi and his boys went from "Little Black Face" to the
Fascist anthem, Giovinezza and from Giovinezza back to
"Little Black Face." When the peasants failed to follow him
and the priest went on talking as if he were oblivious of what
was going on, the mayor made for the door, shouting:

"Out of the church, every one of you ! The church has been
desecrated! Fascists, come with me!" Followed by the Scouts
and a few of his friends he went out and led his followers
around and around the church singing "Little Black Face"
and Giovinezza in turn. This they kept up until the end of
the sermon. Don Trajella, meanwhile* went on and on; lie
seemed to be the only person in the church quite at his ease;
the only unusual thing about him was the presence of two
bright red spots on his wan cheeks.

"Pax in terra hominibus bonae voluntatis, beloved
brethren. Pax in terra, this is the divine message, to which we
must listen with particular contrition and devotion in this
year of war. The Christ Child was born at this very hour in
order to bring us this message of peace. Pax in terra komini-
bus; we must cleanse ourselves, if we are to be worthy,
we must examine our consciences and find out whether we
have fulfilled our duty, if we are to listen to the word of
God with pure hearts. You have done evil, you are all sinners,
you never come to church, you never say your prayers, you
sing wicked songs, you blaspheme the name of the Lord,
you don't baptize your children, you don't come to confes-
sion or communion, you have no respect for the Lord y s
ministers, you do not render unto God that which is His due,

203

and there is no peace In you. Pax in terra hominibus. You
don't know Latin; what then do these words mean? Pax in
terra hominibus means that on this Christmas Eve you should
have observed the custom of bringing a young kid to your
pastor. Because you are unbelievers you did not do your
duty, you are not bonae voluntatis or men of good will and
there is no peace on earth for you and no blessing of the
Lord upon your heads. Take heed of what I have said and
bring a young kid to your pastor, pay off the mortgage on
ids land which you owe him from last year. Do these things
if you wish God to look mercifully upon you, to pour his
blessings upon you and send peace to your hearts, if you
wish for peace on earth and an end to the war which makes
you tremble for the fate of your dear ones and our be-
loved country . . ."

And so he went on, with a medley of witticisms, threats,
and Latin quotations. The strains of "Little Black Face"
drifted in through the door, underlining phrases of the ser-
mon, while the boy bell-ringer, obeying a sign from the
priest, tried to override the mayor's singing with the death-
like tolling of the bell. Amid this noise and general conster-
nation the sermon came to an end. Don Trajella came down
from the pulpit and without looking either to the right or to
the left he went out of the church, followed by the congrega-
tion. Outside Don Luigi was still singing. A peasant in a
black coat waited in front of the church, holding the halter
of a mule with a saddle on its back. He had come to take
the priest to Gaglianello, where he had another midnight
mass to say. Don Trajella locked the door of the church, put
the key in his pocket, and, with a hand from the peasant, he
mounted the mule and went his way. He had a two hours*
ride ahead of him on the snowy path through the ravines,

204

and this year the Christ Child must have come to Gaglianello
about four o'clock in the morning. There Don Trajella re-
peated his miracle, and because in this lonely settlement
there was neither mayor nor gentry, all went well. The peas-
ants were delighted with his sermon and for once the poor
priest was treated with the honor due him. He had all the
wine he wanted and got drunk in earnest, with the result that
he did not come back to Gagliano until three days later.

I made haste to leave the gathering in front of the church
where there was a buzz of comment on the happenings of
the night. All the gentry, with the exception of Dr. Milillo,
who shook his head in disapproval of his nephew's behavior,
were on the mayor's side and they agreed to report the priest
to the authorities. "At last we can get rid of him," shouted
Don LuigL "This is the chance we've been looking for." No
one will ever know whether Don Trajella planned the entire
miracle, starting with his theatrical late arrival in the
Stendhal tradition and going on to the loss of his prepared
sermon and his apparent embarrassment in the pulpit merely
in order to produce a more edifying effect upon his hearers
with his oratorical virtuosity, or whether at the same time
he did not intend to ridicule both himself and the enemies
who had so long persecuted him. It is quite certain that he
was not drunk; if he had imbibed a little more than usual,
his wits were all the sharper as a result. But Don Luigi was
convinced that the drunkenness and the loss of the sermon
were genuine and a cause for scandal, and his anger brought
about the poor old priest's downfall. Although the next day
was Christmas and a holiday, anonymous letters were des-
patched to the prefect, the police, and the bishop. Soon after-
wards two priests arrived from Tricarieo to make an investi-
gation. Probably I was the only one among all those they

205

questioned to stand up for the old man, but my words carried
little weight. The bishop sentenced Don Trajella to take up
residence in Gaglianello, which was his real parish, and
forbade him to present himself as a candidate for the church
at Gagliano. But all this happened later.

Christmas Day was cold and gray and the peasants slept
late in the morning. A greater volume of smoke than usual
came out of the chimneys; perhaps goat meat was cooking
in the pots swung between the andirons. This was the chief
holiday of the year, a day for the simulation of peace and
prosperity. Above all it was a day when things could be said
and done that were impossible on any other day of the year.
Giulia arrived at my house with her face clean and shining,
her shawl spotless, her veil freshly ironed, and her child less
ragged than usual and wearing a pair of shoes several sizes
too large for him. I waited for her impatiently; a consider-
able part of her witchcraft could be imparted to me on this
day and this day alone. Although she had taught me all sorts
of spells and incantations for the inspiration of love and the
cure of disease she had steadfastly refused to acquaint me
with death magic, or the art of bringing about the illness
and death of an enemy. "Such things can be told only on
Christmas Day and then in strict secrecy. He who receives
enlightenment must swear never to communicate what he
has learned except on the feast of Christmas. On any other
day of the year it is a mortal sin." Yet I had to coax and
beguile her into telling me the secret; even on Christmas Day
Its communication was not entirely sinless, and I had to
bind myself to discretion with a solemn oath if we were to
escape the mockery of the devil. At last she made up her
mind to reveal to me the awesome spells whose mere pro-
nouncement ravages a man in his vitals and gradually dries

206

Mm up until he is ready for the grave. Shall I, then, In turn
reveal some of these fearful exorcisms, which might be so
useful to my readers in the times in which we are living?
Alas, no. It is not Christmas and I am bound by a solemn
oath.

The end of the year was at hand. I wished to wait for
midnight according to the time-honored custom, so I sat
alone in front of my sputtering kitchen fire while a storm of
wind and snow raged outside. I had a glass of wine, but
what toast could I make? My clock had stopped and no bells
rang in the new year in this land where time did not pass.
Thus, at an indeterminate moment, ended the truly tiresome
year of 1935, and 1936, its successor, started to repeat the
familiar, impersonal, indifferent cycle of things past and
things to come. It began most inauspiciously, with an eclipse
of the sun.

JL H E eclipse was a portent in the heavens. A plague-ridden
sun looked through half-closed eyes at a world that had
entered upon a war of dissolution. A sin lay beneath it all,
and not merely the sin, committed in these very days, of
massacre by poison gas, something the peasants shook their
heads over because they knew that no sin goes unpunished.
No, the sin was deeper yet and of the kind that all pay for
alike, the innocent along with the guilty. The face of the
sun was darkened in warning: "The future holds only sor-
row/* the peasants said.

207

The days were cold and bleak; the sun was pale and
seemed to rise with difficulty over the white mountains.
Driven by hunger and cold, wolves closed in on the village.
Barone smelled them from far away, instinctively, and fell
into a state of unusual restlessness and excitement. He ran
through the house growling with his hair standing on end,
and clawed at the door to go out. When I let him go he dis-
appeared into the night and didn't turn up again until morn-
ing. I never knew whether his excitement over the wolves
was based on hate and terror or on love and desire, whether
his midnight outings were hunts or appointments with old,
old friends in the heart of the forest. This much is certain;
on the nights he went out the north wind swept echoes of
tumult and loud baying through the valleys. Barone came
back in the morning worn out with his wanderings, wet
and caked with mud. He stretched out near the fire and
looked up at me from one half -open eye*

A few wolves came through the village, leaving their
tracks in the snow. One evening I saw one myself from the
terrace, a great, lean, doglike creature, emerging from the
darkness to stand for a moment in the light of a lamp swing-
ing in the wind and to sniff the surrounding air, then slowly
fading away into the shadows.

This was a good season for hunting. Some of the men went
off to hunt boars beyond Accettura, where they were said to
abound, although none came near Gagliano this year. The
peasants took advantage of their vacation from the fields to
go out in their corduroy jackets with their shiny guns after
rabbits and foxes, and often they brought back a consider-
able bag. The bone of the right hindleg of a buck rabbit,
after the marrow had been burned out with a red-hot iron,
was made into a cigar-holder. The old men used these holders

208

with religious care not to let the cold air crack them, until
they took on a fine black gloss. One old peasant whom I
cured of some affliction or other insisted on presenting me
with his cigar-holder, endowed by age with a splendid patina.
When it became known in the village that I appreciated this
gift the peasants began to vie with each other in offering me
both finished holders and rabbit bones, and I, too, by dint
of perserverance, blackened them by smoking cheap cigars
as I strolled up and down the main street.

The mail stopped coming because the roads were piled
high with snow, and the island among the ravines lost all
contact with the rest of the planet. One day differed from
another only in its cloud formations and the quantity of
sunshine; the new year did not appear to progress, but lay
dormant like the fallen trunk of a tree. In the monotony of
the passing hours there was place for neither memory nor
hope; the past and the future were two separate unrippled
pools. The entire future, as far as the end of the world, was
merging for me too into the vague crai of the peasants, with
its implications of futile endurance, remote from history
and time. How deceiving are the contradictions of language!
In this timeless land the dialect was richer in words with
which to measure time than any other language; beyond the
motionless and everlasting crai every day in the future had
a name of its own. Crai meant tomorrow and forever; the
day after tomorrow was prescrai and the day after that
pescrille; then came pescruflo, marufto, maruflone; the
seventh day was marujiicchio. But these precise terms had an
undertone of irony. They were used less often to indicate
this or that day than they were said all together in a string,
one after the other; their very sound was grotesque and they
were like a reflection of the futility of trying to make anything

209

clear out of the cloudiness of crai . I, too, began to lose hope
that anything new might come forth from maruflo or marw-
flone or marufLicchio. Nothing broke the solitude of my eve-
nings in the smoky kitchen except an occasional visit from
the carabiniere on duty, who stopped in for the sake of
routine and stayed to drink a glass of wine. The landlord had
warned me that I should often be disturbed by the noise of
the oil press just below my ground floor; it was set up in a
cellar to which there was access through a little door beside
the steps leading into the house. The press, he told me, would
work at night. When the old millstone was drawn around in
a circle by a blindfolded donkey the whole house shook and
a continuous roar came from below. But this year the olive
crop was so meager that the millstone operated for only two
or three days; then it was still and silent as before and my
evenings were totally undisturbed.

Once, after supper, the new sergeant and P., the lawyer,
came to play cards with me. They said that they knew I was
alone and thought I might enjoy a bit of company; in fact,
they proposed to come often to while away the hours. I
trembled at the idea that their visit might come to be a daily
event and oblige me to waste my time at stupid card games,
for I much preferred to work or read alone.

To rede and dryve the night away
For me thoughte it better play
Than plyen either at chesse or tables.

However, In appreciation of their good intentions, I made
the best of it and we spent the evening over an endless game
of rummy. But they never came back. Don Luigi heard
almost immediately from one of his acolytes of their visit
To me he said nothing hut he made a scene with the sergeant

210

in the public square, accusing him of fraternizing with
political prisoners and threatening to report him to his
superiors and have him transferred to another post. After
this no one except my patients, and the peasants, who were
free to come and see me because they were not considered
human beings, dared to cross my door. The only exception
was Dr. Milillo, who had a taste for independence and, as
an elderly uncle, did not stand In awe of his nephew, the
mayor.

And so I was free to dispose of my time and my person.
If I did not have the company of the gentry I had that of the
children. There were many of them of all ages and they
knocked at my door at every hour of the day. At first they
were attracted by that childlike and marvelous creature
Barone. Then my painting struck their fancy; they never
ceased to marvel at the images that appeared, as if by
magic, on my canvas, of the houses and hills and faces they
knew so well. We became good friends, and they went in
and out of the house freely; they posed for me and were
proud to see themselves in paint. They would find out when
I was going to work beyond the village, and a band of twenty
or more would call for me. They came to blows over the
honor of carrying my paint box, easel, and canvas, until I
made a distribution from which there was no appeal. First
place went to the paint box, whose weight made it an object
of value and desire; its chosen bearer stepped out with it
as gaily and proudly as a squire of old.

One ten-year-old boy, Giovanni Fanelli, a pale little fel-
low with big, black eyes, a long, slender neck and an almost
girlish complexion, had a particular enthusiasm for paint-
ing. All the children begged for my discarded tubes and
brashes to play with, and Giovanni got his share of these,

211

but lie put them to a better use. Without so much as a hint
to me he made secret attempts to become a painter. He
watched very carefully everything I did, from sizing the
canvas to stretching it on a frame. Just because I did these
simple things they seemed to him no less fundamental than
the actual laying on of color. He picked up sticks and made
them into irregular frames; then on these he stretched odd
bits of old shirting and covered them with some sort of
sticky substance in lieu of size. When he had done this
much he thought that the worst was over. With what was left
in my used tubes of paint, an old palette, and worn brushes
he tried to imitate my exact strokes. He was a timid, blushing
boy and he would never have summoned up the courage to
show me his work. I happened to see it only at the prompting
of his young friends. His would-be painting was not the usual
sort of childish thing, nor was it a mere imitation. He made
shapeless masses of color, which were not altogether with-
out charin. I do not know if Giovanni Fanelli had it in him
to become a painter, but I have never seen another boy with
his faith that a spontaneous revelation would come out of his
labor, that the practice of a technique would work like
magic, and that his efforts would bear fruit as certainly as
a field that has been plowed and sown.

These boys, who had made the rounds at Christmas with
their cupi-cupi and who ran through the streets like a bevy
of birds ready to take flight, had no leader such as Capitano
at Grassano. They were lively, wide-awake, and sad* Most
of them were clothed in badly patched rags, wearing jackets
handed down by their older brothers with the cuffs turned
up; they had bare feet or wore heavy men's shoes with holes
in them. They were thin and pale, often yellow from malaria,
with deep-set, empty black eyes that had an expression of

212

fixed intensity. There were all sorts among them naive
and quick-witted, sincere and hypocritical, all of them en-
dowed with a precocious vivacity, which was doomed to de-
cline with the passing of the years in the monotonous im-
prisonment of time. I saw them move silently all around me,
full of mute loyalty and unexpressed desires. Everything 1
owned or did filled them with ecstatic admiration. The
merest trifles that I threw away, such as empty boxes or
scraps of paper, were treasures whose possession they fought
over. They ran to do me unsolicited favors of every kind.
They gathered for me from the fields bunches of wild
asparagus or fibrous and tasteless mushrooms, which are
eaten in those parts for want of anything better. They went
as far as Gaglianello to fetch me bitter wild oranges, the only
ones in the neighborhood, for a still life. Friendly as we
were, they remained shy and diffident, given to silence and
the concealment of what was in their minds, immersed in
the elusive, mysterious animal world in which they had
their being, like timorous and swift-footed little goats.

One of them, Giovannino, who had round black eyes,
white skin, and a look of perpetual astonishment under the
man's hat that tumbled over his forehead, was inseparable
from a tawny, yellow-eyed nanny goat that followed him
like a dog everywhere he went. When he came to my house
with the other children, Nennella the goat traipsed after
him into the kitchen, sniffing about for salt, of which she was
inordinately fond. Barone learned to respect her, and when
we went on a painting expedition Nennella leaped after the
line of children, while Barone ran on ahead, barking with
joy over his unrestricted liberty. When we came to a halt
Giovannino watched me work with one of his arms around
Nennella's neck until she suddenly cut loose and wait off

213

to nibble at a tuft of broom. Eventually I would send the
children away to prevent them from disturbing me. They
wandered off reluctantly and came back toward evening
when swarms of mosquitoes had begun to buzz around me
and the last rosy rays of the sun fell upon my finished canvas,
which they bore triumphantly back to the village.

Now that the ground was covered with snow, our proces-
sions were over, but the children came to see me at home;
they warmed their hands at the kitchen fire or asked if they
might go up to play on my terrace. Three or four of them
hung about me continually. The littlest of them was the son
of La Parroccola, who lived in a hut a few yards from the
house. He was five years old, with a large, round head, a
short nose, thick lips, and a frail body. His mother, who
owed her name to the fact that the size of her head made her
look like the knobbed walking stick of the parish priest, was
one of the local witches, the ugliest, kindest, and least pre-
tentious of them. Her enormous face, with its wide, flat nose,
crooked mouth, and rough, yellowish skin, and her sparse,
stringy hair made her quite monstrous-looking; her body
was short and squat, bundled up in rags beneath her flow-
ing veil. She was a good soul who earned her living as a
laundress and was not averse, if need be, to granting her
favors, in a bed as large as the public square, to one of
the carabinieri or young peasants. I saw her every day in
the doorway almost across the street and for a joke I used to
say that I had taken a fancy to her and hoped she would not
refuse me. La Parroccola blushed to the extent that her thick
rind of a skin permitted, and answered: "I shouldn't do
for you, Don Carlo ; Fm just a rough countrywoman ! " Rough
as she was, and in spite of her ogress' face, she was known
for her kindness. The little boy, who looked like his mother,

214

was the only one left of her children; the others were all
dead or far away.

Another one of my faithful followers was Michelino, a boy
of about ten, who was alert, greedy, and melancholy. His
opaque black eyes seemed to be the heritage of generations
of tears and to mirror the desolate land in which he lived.
My closest hangers-on, however, were the tailor's children,
especially the youngest, Tonino. He was a wee slip of a boy,
quick of mind and body in spite of his shyness, with dark
close-shaven hair and keen eyes like black pinheads. The
father, who was devoted to his children, tried to bring them
up better than the rest; he was proud of his trade and of the
fact that he had practiced it in New York. But what was he
to do, now that he had come home again and everything had
gone wrong and he was no richer than the peasants? His boys
were growing up no different from their playmates and he
thought bitterly as he plied his needle that there was no hope
of raising their station in life; he had not even the means
to take care of their swollen tonsils and adenoids. And
Tonino, although he was as lively as a gnome, already
seemed to share his father's disappointment.

There was something unusual about all these children, a
mixture of young animal spirits and precocious maturity,
as if they had received as soon as they were born a conscious-
ness of sorrow and the patience to bear it. Their games were
not those of city tenement children, which are the same the
world over; they had only the animals for company. They
were self-contained and knew how to be silent. Beneath their
childish ingenuousness there was something of the impene-
trability of the peasant who scorns trivial consolations and
something, too, of the reserve with which he manages to de-
fend his inner self against a hostile world. As a general rule

215

they were further advanced, both mentally and physically,
than city children of the same age. They were gifted with
insight, a thirst for learning, and ready appreciation of all
the wonders of the outside world. One day when a group of
them saw me writing they asked me to teach them the art.
They learned precious little at school with the inspiration of
Don Luigi's cane, cigars, and patriotic speeches; although
attendance was obligatory they came out as illiterate as
when they went in. Of their own free will some of them came
in the evening to practice writing in my kitchen. I am sorry,
as I look back, that my aversion for all that smacks of the
didactic prevented me from giving them more time and atten-
tion. No teacher could have asked for more eager pupils.
The carnival season, just preceding Lent, came around
quite unexpectedly in these strange surroundings. There
were no particular festivities at Gagliano in its honor and I
had forgotten its existence. One day when I was walking
beyond the square I saw three white-robed ghosts appear at
the lower end of the village and dash up the main street.
They were jumping and shouting like maddened beasts,
drunk with their own hue and cry. These were peasant mas-
gueraders. Their carnival fancy dress consisted of these
white robes, on their heads white knitted caps, or stockings
with white feathers stuck in them, and whitened shoes.
Their faces were covered with flour and they carried dried
sheepskins in their hands, rolled up like sticks, which they
brandished threateningly and brought down about the head
and shoulders of anyone who failed to get out of their way.
They seemed like devils let loose, bursting with savage joy
at this brief moment of folly and impunity so different from
their usual humdrum and browbeaten existence. I thought of
the feast of San Giovanni in Rome when boys go around

216

knocking passers-by over the head with enormous cloves of
garlic. But that night is one of collective phallic pleasure,
celebrated with plates of steaming snails, songs, fireworks,
dancing, and love-making under the kindly warmth of the
midsummer sky. The masqueraders of Gagliano were alone
and lonely in their forced and gloomy folly; they were trying
to make up for hardship and enslavement with a parody of
freedom, exaggerated, but reflecting their repressed ferocity.
The three ghosts beat without mercy anyone that came into
their grasp, no matter who he might be; on this occasion the
barriers between gentry and peasants were down. They
leaped diagonally from one side of the street to the other,
shouting as if they were possessed by evil spirits, their white
feathers shaking in the air, like savages run amuck or the
performers of a sacred dance of terror. Almost as quickly as
they had appeared they disappeared again behind the
church.

In the following days the children began to run about with
blackened faces and moustaches made with burnt cork. One
day twenty or more of them in this array came to see me,
and when I said that it would be easy to make them real
masks, they begged me to do so. I set to work and made every
one of them a cylinder of white paper with holes to see out
of, big enough so that the whole face was covered. The mem-
ory of the peasant ghost masqueraders or else the genius loci
of Gagliano unconsciously inspired me to make the masks
all alike, in black and white. They came out as skulls, with
black holes for the eyes and nose and bared teeth. The chil-
dren were not in the least frightened; they gaily hurried to
put them on, slipped one onto Barone and ran back to their
houses. When evening caine, these apparitions charged shout-
ing into dim kitchens lit by a fire or a swinging kerosene

217

lamp. Their mothers fled from them in terror, because here
every symbol is a reality and to them the masked children
stood for a triumph of death.

JL HE days were slowly beginning to grow longer; the
season had changed and the snow gave way to rain and sun-
shine. Spring was not far away and I thought it a good time
to take every possible measure to stave off the dread malaria
before the return of the mosquitoes. Even with the limited
means available in the village there was a great deal that
could be done. We could ask the Red Cross for some Paris
green to disinfect the few pools of stagnant water near by,
pipe off the drippings from the old fountain, and lay in a
stock of quinine, atabrine, and plasmochin with some
candy for the children in order to be ready for the hot
weather. These were simple precautions and, according to
law, they were compulsory. I mentioned them over and
over again to Don Luigi, but I soon realized that although
he approved of my plans he took care to do nothing at all
about them. In order to hold him to his responsibility I
decided to write a memorandum of twenty pages or so with
a detailed list of everything to be done, including both the
requirements that could be met locally and the items that
would have to be requested from Rome. The mayor read the
memorandum, expressed satisfaction, praised my efforts,
and informed me with a broad smile that on the following

218

day, when he went to Matera, he would show it to the prefect,
who was in a position to help us. As soon as he came back
from Matera he hastened to tell me that His Excellency was
enthusiastic about my suggestions, that everything I had
asked for to fight malaria would be forthcoming and that,
incidentally, the other political prisoners, as well as I, would
benefit from the project. Don Luigi was glowing with pride
that I should be under his jurisdiction and everything seemed
for the best.

Three or four days after the mayor's return a telegram
came from the police in Matera to the effect that I was for-
bidden to practice medicine in Gagliano, under penalty of
prison. Whether or not this sudden ban was a direct result
of the excess of zeal betrayed by my memorandum I never
found out. As the peasants would have it: "We're saddled
with our malaria and if you try to do anything about it
they'll drive you away." Others were of the opinion that the
local doctors had conspired against me, and in my own
mind there was a suspicion that the police were afraid I
might become too popular, because my reputation as a
miracle man was growing by leaps and bounds, and patients
came from remote villages to consult me.

The telegram from Matera was delivered to me by the
carabinieri one evening. The next morning at dawn, when no
one in the village yet knew of the ban, a man on horseback
knocked at my door.

"Come quickly, Doctor," he said. "My brother's ill. We
live down near the Bog, three hours away. Fve brought this
horse for you to ride."

The Bog was a distant and lonely district near the Agri
River, There was one big farm in it and the peasants lived
there on the spot, far from any settlement I told the man that

219

I couldn't possibly come, first, because I was not allowed to
go beyond the village limits and second, because I had been
forbidden to practice medicine. I advised him to consult
Dr. Milillo or Dr. Gibilisco.

"Those tenth-rate fellows? Better have no one at all.**
With which he shook his head and went away.

There was a mixture of rain and sleet in the air. I stayed
home all morning to write a letter to the police, objecting to
the ban and requesting its annulment. I asked them in the
meantime, until they should receive new orders, to authorize
me at least to continue the cases at present under my care and
to pursue, for the welfare of the population, my plans for
the drive against malaria. To this letter I never received a
reply.

I was just getting up from my dinner at about two o'clock
in the afternoon when the man on horseback returned. He
had been down to the Bog again; his brother was much worse
and I must try at any cost to save him. I told him to come
with me to ask the mayor for a special permission. Don Luigi
was not at home, he had gone to have a cup of coffee at his
sister's, where we found him stretched out in an armchair.
I set my case before him.

"Impossible. Orders from Matera have to be obeyed. I
can't take any such responsibility. Stay here, Doctor, and
have a cup of coffee."

The peasant, who was an intelligent and determined fel-
low, would not take no for an answer and Donna Caterina,
my protectress, took our part. The edict from Matera threat-
ened to upset all her plans by clearing the way for her enemy,
Gibilisco. She deplored it loudly and finally exclaimed:

4 ThIs comes of anonymous letters! Who knows how many
they've written? Gibilisco himself went to Matera last week.

220

The police don't know that you're a godsend to us here. But
leave it all to me; we have some Influence ourselves in the
office of the prefect and the ban will be lifted. What a perfect
shame!" And she tried to console me with cakes and coffee.

But the problem was an immediate one, and in spite of
the fact that Donna Caterina was on our side, Don Luigi
could not be budged.

"I can't do it; I have too many enemies. If the thing were
to be known I'd lose my job. I have to keep in line with the
police."

Don Andrea, the old schoolteacher, agreed with him, be-
tween a cat-nap and a mouthful of cakes, and our discussion
dragged on without coming to any conclusion. The mayor,
who liked to pose as a friend of the people, was reluctant to
refuse the peasant's plea, but fear won the day.

"After all, there are other doctors. Try them."

"They're worthless," said the peasant.

"He's quite right there," shouted Donna Caterina. "Your
uncle is too old, and as for the other, well, let's not even
mention him. And then in this weather, with the roads wet,
neither of them would want to go."

The peasant got up.

"I'll go to look for them," he said and went away.

He stayed away almost two hours, while the family council
continued the discussion without any concrete result. In spite
of Donna Caterina's backing I could not overcome the
mayor's fears; there was no precedent for the case, and too
much responsibility was involved. At last the peasant came
back with two sheets of paper in his hand and on his face
the satisfied look of a man who has succeeded after a long
struggle.

"Neither doctor can come; they're both sick. I have signed

statements from both of them. Now you'll have to let Don
Carlo come. Just look at these . . ." And he thrust the
papers in front of Don LuigL

After tremendous efforts of persuasion, with possibly a
few threats thrown in for good measure, the peasant had
got both doctors to state in writing that because of the bad
weather and their age and health they simply could not go
to the Bog. In the case of Dr. MiliUo, this was indeed true.
Now it seemed as if there could he no further obstacle to my
going, but the mayor was not won over, and he went on de-
bating the pros and cons. He sent for the village clerk, the
brother-in-law of the widow with whom I had lodged, a good
fellow who thought I should be allowed to go. Dr. Milillo
himself came, somewhat out of sorts because he was
spurned in his professional capacity, but not opposed to my
going.

64 Just make sure you're paid in advance. All the way to the
Bog? No, I shouldn't dream of it, even for two hundred
lire."

Time was passing, fresh cakes and coffee were brought in,
and still we were making no progress. Then I suggested call-
ing in the sergeant; if he were willing to take upon himself
the responsibility for my trip the mayor might consent to
it without compromising himself too seriously. And so it
came about. As soon as he heard the story the sergeant told
me to go, saying that he trusted me and would not send any
of his men along to escort me. A human life, he added, should
be above every other consideration. There was relief on
every side; even Don Luigi appeared to be pleased by the
decision, and to show his good will he sent for a heavy-
coat and boots which he said I should need down in the
valley. Meanwhile, darkness had come; they had to authorize

222

me to spend the night at the farm and to return the following
morning. Finally, with advice and good wishes all around, I
set out with the peasant and his horse and Barone.

The weather had cleared; the rain and sleet had stopped.
A brisk wind was sweeping the sky and a bright, round moon
peered out among the broken masses of scurrying clouds. As
soon as we had left the steep paved village street, near the
Mound of the Madonna of the Angels* my companion, who
had been leading his horse by the bridle, stopped and sig-
naled to me to mount. I had not ridden horseback for a
number of years and among these ravines in the dead of
night I preferred my own two legs. I told him that he should
ride his own horse while I walked along at a good clip. He
looked at me with astonishment, as if the whole world were
topsy-turvy : a peasant on horseback and a gentleman on
foot? perish the thought! I had quite a time to convince
him, but at last he reluctantly took my advice. Then we be-
gan a real race toward the Bog. I strode down the steep
path with the horse right at my heels; I could feel his hot
breath and hear his hoof-beats in the mud just behind me.
I coursed over the unfamiliar ground like a man pursued,
buoyed up by the night air, the silence around me and my
own motion. The moon filled the entire sky and seemed
as if it would overflow onto the earth. The terrain we were
covering might., indeed* have been the surface of the moon^
as it lay white in the silent moonlight without any vegetation,
not even a blade of grass, belabored by the everlasting flow
of the waters which had wrinkled, pierced, and roughened
it. The stretches of clay slanted steeply down to the Agri in
a series of cones, caves, mounds, and other irregularities
which stood out in varying degrees of light and shadow. We
wound our way without speaking through this labyrinth made

223

by time and earthquakes. I felt as If I were floating over the
ghostly landscape like a bird.

After more than two hours of our race the barking of a
dog from below broke the silence around us. We came out
of the clay and found ourselves in a sloping meadow; in the
background., behind a rise in the ground, appeared the out-
lines of the white farmhouse. Here, far from any human
habitation, lived my companion and his brother with their
wives and children. At the door we were greeted by three
hunters from Pisticci, who had come the previous day to
hunt foxes down by the river and had stayed out of sym-
pathy for their friend. The two wives, sisters, also from
Pisticci, were tall with large black eyes and noble faces.
Their beauty was set off by the peasant dress of their vil-
lage: long skirts with black and white flounces and black
and white ribbons among the veils on their heads, which
made them look like some strange sort of butterflies. They
had prepared the best foodstuffs at their disposal: fresh milk
and cheese, which they offered me as soon as I arrived with
that old-style hospitality, devoid of servility, which puts all
men on the same footing. They had waited for me all day
long, as for a savior, but I soon discovered that there was
nothing I could do. The man had a ruptured appendix; he
was in his death agony and not even an operation, had I been
able to perform one, would have been of any avail. There
was nothing I could do but soothe the patient's pain with
injections of morphine and wait for the end.

The house was made up of two rooms, which were joined
by a wide door. In the farther room were the sick man, his
brother, and the women who were watching over him. In
the first room a fire was lit in the fireplace and around it sat
the three hunters; a high bed with a soft mattress had

224

been made ready for me in the opposite comer. Every
now and then I went to see the dying man, then I came
back and talked in a low voice to the hunters beside the
fire.

About midnight I climbed into the bed for a rest, without
taking off my clothes, but I could not sleep. I lay in the high
bed, which was like a theater box suspended in mid-air.
Hung on the walls all around me were the bodies of newly
killed foxes; I could smell their gamey odor and see their
sharp muzzles outlined against the flickering red flames. I
had only to stretch out my hand to touch their skins, which
had something of woods and caves about them. Through the
door I could hear the dying man's continuous wailing, like
an endless litany of pain: "Jesus, help me; Doctor, help
me; Jesus, help me; Doctor, help me," and the whispered
prayers of the women. I looked at the dancing flames, the
long, wavering shadows, and the dark figures of the three
hunters with their hats on their heads, motionless in front
of the fire.

Death was in the house: I loved these peasants and I was
sad and humiliated by my powerlessness against it. Why,
then, at the same time, did a great feeling of peace pervade
me? I felt detached from every earthly thing and place, lost
in a no man's land far from time and reality. I was hidden*
like a shoot under the bark of a tree, beyond the reach of
man. I listened to the silence of the night and I felt as if I
had all of a sudden penetrated the very heart of the universe.
An immense happiness, such as I had never known, swept
over me with a flow of fulfilment

Toward dawn the sick man's end was very near. His
muffled calls for help changed into a death rattle and tins in
turn became weaker and weaker in the final straggle until it

225

ceased altogether. He had hardly finished dying when the
women pulled the lids down over his staring eyes and began
their lament. Those two gentle, reserved butterflies with
their black and white ribbons were suddenly transformed
into furies. They tore their veils, pulled their clothing out
of place, scratched their faces until blood came and began
to dance with long steps around the room, beating their heads
against the wall and singing on one high note the death
story. From time to time they put their heads out the win-
dows, still crying out on the same single note, as if to an-
nounce the death to the countryside and to the world; then
they drew back into the room and went on with the wailing
and dancing, which were to last forty-eight hours without
stopping, until the funeral. This single note was long drawn-
out, repetitious and agonizing. It was impossible to listen
to it without being overcome by an irresistible feeling of
physical anguish; it brought a lump to the throat of the
hearer and made its way straight to the pit of his stomach.
To avoid bursting into tears I hurriedly took leave and went
out with Barone into the light of the early morning.

The weather was calm. The meadows and the ghostly
stretches of clay of the previous evening lay before me bare
and lonely in the still gray light. I was my own master
among these silent wastes and I still felt some of the happi-
ness of the night just past. Of course I had to go back to the
village, but meanwhile I wandered through the fields, twirl-
ing my stick and whistling to my dog, who was highly ex-
cited, perhaps by the presence of some invisible game. I
decided to go home by a roundabout way, passing through
Gaglianello, which I had not yet been able to visit.

Gaglianello is a group of houses, without even a street
connecting them, on a low, barren hill near the malaria-

226

ridden river. Four hundred people live there without a doc-
tor, a midwife, a carabiniere y or any other representative
of the State. Even so, the tax collector with the flaming
initials on his cap passes time and again their way. To my
astonishment I saw that I was expected. The people knew
that I had heen to the Bog and hoped that I might stop by
on my way back. The peasants and their women stood outside
to welcome me and persons afflicted with the strangest kinds
of diseases had themselves carried to the doorways so that
I should see them as I went by. The scene was reminiscent
of a medieval court of miracles. No doctor had set foot in
the place for who knows how many years. Old afflictions
which had received no treatment except incantations had
piled up in the peasants' bodies, spreading in strange forms
like mushrooms on rotten timber. I spent most of the morn-
ing going from hut to hut among emaciated victims of
malaria, ancient ulcers, and gangrene, giving what advice
I could, since I was no longer allowed to write prescriptions,
and drinking the wine offered me as a token of hospitality.
They wanted me to stay all day, but I had to go on, and so
they walked with me for a piece of the road, imploring me
to return. "Who knows?" I said to them, "I'll come if I can."
But I never did. I left my new friends from Gaglianello by
the wayside and began to climb up the path among the
ravines toward home.

The dazzling sun stood high in the sky; the irregular ter-
rain through which the path wound its tortuous way shut
off my view. All of a sudden the sergeant, with one of Ms
men, came around a curve on his way to meet me, and I
joined forces with them on the homeward climb. Big black-
birds, perching on clumps of broom, took off into the air as
we passed by. 'Would you care to take a shot, Doctor?" said

227

the sergeant, holding out his rifle. The feathers of the bird
I hit fluttered down to the ground, but the large shot must
have shattered the body into a thousand pieces and we did
not linger to look for it.

As soon as we reached Gagliano the expression on the
peasants* faces told me that something was brewing. During
my absence everyone had heard about the ban upon my prac-
tice of medicine and about the time wasted the previous day
before I could obtain permission to go down to the Bog.
News of the sick man's death had already arrived by some
mysterious underground wireless. The villagers all knew
and cared for him, and he was the first one of those I had
attended in all these months to die. For this reason they were
convinced that if I had been able to reach him earlier I could
surely have saved his life. When I told them that in all likeli-
hood, even if I had arrived a few hours sooner, my restricted
knowledge of abdominal surgery, the lack of instruments,
and the difficulties of transportation even to Sant' Arcangelo,
would have kept me from doing very much, they shook their
heads incredulously. In their opinion I was a miracle man
and nothing would have been beyond my powers if only I
had reached the spot on time. The whole incident was proof
to them of the evil intent back of the ban, which from now on
would stand in the way of my helping them. The expression
on the peasants' faces was one I had never seen before.
Despair mingled with grim determination made their eyes
look blacker than usual, and they came out of their houses
with guns and axes on their shoulders.

"We're dogs/' they said to me, "and in Rome they want
us to die like dogs. One Christian soul took pity on us, and
no^r they want to take him away. We'll burn the town hall
and kill the mayor/'

228

Revolt was in the air. The peasants' deep sense of justice
had been outraged and, gentle, passive, and resigned as they
were, impervious to political reasoning and party slogans,
they felt stirring in them the old spirit of the brigands. These
downtrodden folk have always been given to wilful and
ephemeral explosions. Some human mischance arouses
their age-old repressed resentment and they may set fire to
a tax office or a barracks or cut the throats of their over-
lords. For a brief moment a sort of Spanish ferocity is
awakened in them, and they break loose in search of a free-
dom to be bought only with bloodshed and violence. Then
they are led off to jail in stony indifference, like men who
have released themselves in a single second from the burden
of centuries.

That day, if I had wished, I might have put myself at the
head of several hundred brigands and have either laid siege
to the village or fled to the wilds. For a moment I was sorely
tempted, but in 1936 the time was not yet ripe. Instead, after
considerable effort, I managed to calm the peasants. They
took home their guns and axes, but the anxious look did not
leave their faces. Rome and the State had wounded them
to the core; one of their own had been struck down.
Under the heavy weight of death they had felt the hand of
the faraway government and they rebelled against its iron
vise. Their first impulse was to wreak immediate vengeance
upon the symbols and the emissaries of Rome. If I
dissuaded them from taking this course, what was left
for them to do? As always, nothing. But to this eternal
"nothing" for once they were of no mind to resign them-
selves.

The next day the peasants came in small groups to see
me. Their anger and bloodthirstiness had somewhat sub-

229

sided; they had refrained from staging a massacre and when
the moment for release through vengeance has gone by with-
out fulfilment, its red-hot temperature goes with it. Now
their only wish was that I should be allowed to carry on my
medical practice lawfully among them, and they had decided
to circulate a petition on my behalf. Their enmity toward
a foreign and hostile government went hand in hand (para-
doxical as it may seem) with a natural respect for justice,
a spontaneous understanding of what Government and the
State should be, namely the will of the people expressed in
terms of law. "Lawful" is one of the words they most com-
monly use, not in the meaning of something sanctioned and
codified but rather in the sense of genuine or authentic. A
man is "lawful" if he behaves as he should; a wine is "law-
ful" if it is not watered. A petition which they all signed
seemed to them truly lawful, and as such possessed real
effectiveness. They were quite right, but I had to explain to
them something of which they were already better aware than
I: namely, that they were up against a strictly unlawful
power against which legal arms were of no avail, that not
only were they too weak to prevail by violence but that
the undermined and disarmed state of legal justice blocked
their way, and that, in short, the only result of their petition
would be my removal to some other place of confinement. Let
them go ahead with the petition, I said, if they were con-
vinced of its efficacy, but let them cherish no illusions that
it would lead to anything but my departure. They understood
my argument all too well.

"Just as long as Rome controls our local affairs and wields
the power of life and death over us we shall go on like dumb
animals," they said. And so the petition was given up. But
the incident had touched them too deeply to go by without

230

protest. Where violence and law had failed them, they had
recourse to art.

One day two young men came to see me and asked very
mysteriously for the loan of my white doctor's jacket. I was
not to ask them what they wanted with it, for their purpose
was a secret; the following day everything would be made
clear to me and they would bring it back that evening. The
next day, while I was strolling through the square I saw peo-
ple hurrying toward the mayor's house where already a small
crowd had gathered. I went along with them and the on-
lookers made way for me. Right in the middle of the street
a play, without benefit of stage or scenery, was going on,
surrounded by an eager circle of men, women, and children.
Every year at the beginning of Lent, as I was later to learn,
tie peasants put on an unrehearsed comedy of their own de-
vising. Occasionally they chose a religious subject, some-
times they told the deeds of knights or brigands, but usually
they parodied scenes of everyday life. This year, while they
were still upset by the incident I have just described,
they gave poetic vent to their feelings with a piece of
satire.

The actors were men, even those who took the part of
women, all of them peasant friends of mine, but I could not
recognize them under their extraordinary make-up. The play
consisted of one simple scene, and the players made up their
parts as they went along. A chorus of men and women an-
nounced the arrival of a sick man, and in he came on a
stretcher, his face painted white with dark circles under his
eyes and black spots to hollow out his cheeks as if he were
already dead. The sick man was accompanied by his weeping
mother, who said nothing but: "My son! My son!" over and
over again as a monotonous, sad accompaniment to the en-

231

tire drama. Summoned by the chorus, there appeared beside
the sick man a fellow in my white jacket who was just about
to heal him when he was interrupted by an old codger in a
black suit and wearing a goatee. The two medical men, one
white and one black, representing the spirits of good and
evil, fought like an angel and a devil over the sick man on
the stretcher, exchanging volleys of witty and bitter words.
The angel seemed about to bear away the victory when sud-
denly an emissary from Rome, with a fierce and monstrous
face, appeared on the scene and chased him away. The man
in black, Dr. Bestianelli (named for the famous surgeon
Bastianelli, who was known even in these parts), was left
master of the situation. Pulling a knife out of a bag, he
began to operate. He pretended to cut through the sick man's
clothing and with a rapid motion of his hand drew out of
the wound a pig's bladder which was hidden there. Then
he turned triumphantly toward the chorus, which was mur-
muring words of horror and indignation, brandished the
bladder and shouted: "Here is his heart!" He pierced the
heart with a big needle until blood spurted out, while the
mother and the chorus began to intone a dirge, and the drama
came to an end.

I never found out who wrote the play; perhaps these was
no single author but all the participants thought it up to-
gether. The improvised dialogue centered about the burning
question of the day, but peasant cunning saw to it that the
references were not too direct; they were both pertinent and
pointed without crossing the danger line. The peasant actors
were carried away less by the satirical voicing of their griev-
ance than by genuine artistic fervor. Every one of them lived
his part: the weeping mother seemed the desperate heroine
of a Greek tragedy or Madonna by Jacopone da Todi; the

232

sick man had a truly deathlike countenance; the charlatan
in black drew blood from the heart with savage joy; the
Roman was a horrible monster representing the State itself
in the form of a dragon, and the chorus made its commentary
and interpretation with the patience of despair* Was this
classical form the reminiscence of an ancient art, descended
to a popular level, or was it an original and spontaneous
re-creation in a language natural to -this land, where the
whole of life is a tragedy without a stage?

As soon as the play was done the dead man got up from
his stretcher and the actors hurried down a lane toward the
house of Dr. Gibilisco, where they acted out the play again.
In the course of the day it was given many times, at Dr.
Milillo's house, the church, the barracks, the town hall, In
the square, and here and there in the narrow streets of Upper
and Lower Gagliano. When evening came the angel's white
jacket was brought back to me in triumph and all returned to
their homes.

1 H I S poetical release of their feelings did not entirely
calm the peasants' spirits nor do away with their resentment.
They saw no sense in the ban and so they ignored it. They
came to me for treatment just as before; the only difference
was that they came after dark and looked cautiously up and
down the street before knocking at my door, to make sure that
no spies were about. So great were their' needs and so press-

233

ing their insistence that I simply could not turn them away.
I had complete faith in their loyalty and discretion; they
would have died rather than betray me. Nevertheless my
activity was curtailed; all I could do was to give advice and
dole out such medicines as I had in stock. I wrote out pre-
scriptions only for those of my patients who had relatives in
Naples and could get them filled there and sent by mail. I
could not put on bandages or perform minor operations
whose traces would be visible to the public eye and reveal
what I was doing.

This need of secrecy kept up the general agitation. The
village was temporarily freed from boredom, for the ban
came like a stone thrown into the stagnant waters of the
tedious existence of the gentry. Dr. Gibilisco was triumphant.
Whether or not he was the deus ex machina of the whole
affair, he was radiantly happy. Old Dr. Milillo's feelings
were complex and contradictory. The loss of my competi-
tion gratified his professional pride and added to his earn-
ings, but as an old liberal and former admirer of Nitti he
could not but disapprove of the police's high-handed be-
havior. His position was rather a happy one and afforded
him double satisfaction. On the one hand he gained finan-
cially, while on the other he indulged in the expression of
sincere moral indignation over the misdeeds of the govern-
ment and in friendliness toward me. For Donna Caterina
the incident was a serious defeat; her plans were thwarted
and she was humiliated in her ruling passion before her
enemies. She was highly incensed and went so far as to
say:

"If that weak-kneed, silly brother of mine doesn't do
something I'll go to Matera myself and speak to the pre-
fect/'

234

While Donna Caterina remained my chief ally, Don Luigi
was uncertain as to what attitude he should take. The influ-
ence of his sister and of public opinion inclined him to take
action and bring what pressure he could to bear for "the
good of the village/* but he feared that by taking my side
he might antagonize the authorities and this fear confined
him to purely verbal support of Donna Caterina and her
friends. The gentry, then, came to be divided into two fac-
tions, like the Guelphs and the Ghibellines; one of them
took up the cause of the common people while the other stood
alone, but upheld by the Holy Roman Empire of Matera. Don
Luigi steered a prudent course among conflicting opinions.
He was the mayor and the appointed guardian of whatever
passed for law, but Ms conception of the law was a strange
one.

One evening he sent a maidservant to summon me to his
house; his little girl had a sore throat and he was afraid
that she had diphtheria. I sent word that I could not come
because I was forbidden to. He sent the girl back with a mes-
sage to the effect that it was permissible for me to come to
him because he was the mayor and hence above the law. I
said that I would look at his child on condition that he
authorize me to give the same care to any peasant who might
call upon me. To which he replied that I was first to look
after his child and then we should see; he could not give me
an outright authorization but he might close an eye. The
little girFs diphtheria, of course, turned out to be just an-
other of her father's imaginary ailments. Thus there came to
be established a permanent modus vivendi by virtue of which
I carried on a halfway medical practice under a halfway and
far from explicit dispensation which was to last only as long
as I kept everything secret. I should have preferred to give

235

up the whole thing and to concentrate on my painting, hut
this was impossible for the length of my stay in Gagliano.
Naturally the illegality and secrecy of this situation had vari-
ous disadvantages, and other incidents took place which
threatened to rekindle the public fury which had been so
difficult to contain.

One evening a young peasant with a bandaged arm came
up from Gaglianello with several companions. He had hurt
himself with a scythe and when I took off the bandage, blood
spurted out against the wall. He had cut an artery and the
stump had to be located with a pair of pincers and tied up*
I could not perform the operation because its traces would
be too apparent. I therefore sent the fellow to Dr. Milillo
with a note in which I offered my services as an assistant;
my intention was that he should give me the protection of
his name and let me do something I feared was beyond his
powers. But the old man took offense and answered that
he could handle the case without my help. Early the next
day the young peasant came back on a donkey, along with
his older brother. He was pale as wax, having lost blood all
during the night. When I looked at his hand I saw that the
old man had simply taken a stitch or two without making any
effort to locate the stump of the artery. An operation which
would have been comparatively simple the previous evening
was now difficult, and with the ban hanging over my head I
could not interfere with the case of another practitioner.
Since the peasants were unwilling to go back to Milillo or to
consult Gibilisco there was nothing for them to do but to
take the "American's" rattling car and look for a better
doctor in Stigliano or beyond. Before they set .out, the
older brother, a man of daring and resolution, called to-
gether a crowd of peasants in the square in front of the

236

town hall and held forth loudly upon the subject of his
grievances, hurling defiance at the gentry, the mayor, and
the authorities in Rome, to the applause of his audience. The
scene was memorable and the day another very troubled
one.

Giulia attached little importance to the ban.

"Just do as you like/' she said. "What can they do to
you in return? If they won't let you be a doctor, you can heal
the sick all the same. You can be a sorcerer. You now know
all the secrets of the trade. And there's nothing they can do
to stop you."

During the past months, thanks to the teachings of Giulia
and the other women who came to the house and the things I
saw with my own eyes at my patients' bedsides and in the
homes of the peasants, I had, indeed, become a master of
magic and its applications to medicine. I could easily have
followed Giulia's advice, which she gave quite seriously^
resting her malicious, listless, cold eyes upon me as she said:
"You ought to be a sorcerer." Just as seriously, whenever
she heard me sing, Giulia would say: "Too bad you're not
a priest; you've such a fine voice." To her a priest was an
actor worthy of magnifying God by virtue of his singing.
As a combination of priest, physician, and sorcerer, I might
in Giulia's mind have possessed all the powers of Rofe,
the Oriental medicine man.

Magic can cure almost any ill, and usually by the mere
pronouncement of a spell or incantation. There were formu-
las for specific ailments and others for general application.
Some of them were, I believe, of local origin; others be-
longed to the corpus of classical lore which came to these
parts who knows when and how. The most common of all
was the abracadabra. When I went to visit the sick I often

237

found hung around their necks a tiny roll of paper or a metal
plate bearing the triangular inscription:

A

A B

A B R

A B R A

A B R A C

A B R A C A

A B R A C A D

ABRACADA

ABRACADAB

ABRACADABR

ABRACADABRA

At first the peasants tried to hide their amulets or apol-
ogized for wearing them, because they knew that doctors
despise such superstitions and deplore them in the name of
reason and science. This is all very well where reason and
science can take over the role of magic, but in this remote
region they are not yet, and perhaps never may be, deities
which enjoy popular worship and adoration. I respected
the amulets, paying tribute to their ancient origin and mys-
terious simplicity, and preferring to be their ally rather than
their enemy. The peasants were grateful for my respect, and
perhaps the abracadabra really did them some good. Any-
how, magic as it was practiced in Gagliano was harmless
enough and the peasants considered it in no way in conflict
with official medicine. The custom of prescribing some medi-
cine for every illness, even when it is not necessary, is equiva-
lent to magic, anyhow, especially when the prescription is
written, as it once was, in Latin or in indecipherable hand-
writing. Most prescriptions would be just as effective if they

238

were not taken to the druggist, but were simply hung on a
string around the patient's neck like an abracadabra.

Besides the abracadabra, there were many other different
objects with general curative properties: cabalistic and
astrological signs, images of the saints and of the Madonna
of Viggiano, old coins, wolves' teeth, the bones of toads,
and so on. The cures for specific ailments were more pic-
turesque. Children were freed from worms with the follow-
ing incantation:

Holy Monday
Holy Tuesday
Holy Wednesday
Maundy Thursday
Good Friday
Holy Saturday
Easter Sunday
Worms-on-the-run-day.

Then backwards:

Holy Saturday
Good Friday
Maundy Thursday
Holy Wednesday
Holy Tuesday
Holy Monday
Easter Sunday
Worms-on-the-run-day.

This incantation was pronounced three times in succession,
forwards and backwards, in front of the child. The worms
were exorcized and died, and the child was cured. This is
certainly a very old formula, a degeneration of a late Roman

239

exorcism, one of the first Latin texts with Christian symbols.

The peasants called jaundice male dell* arco or rainbow
sickness, because it makes a man change his color to that
which is strongest in the spectrum of the sun, namely, yel-
low* And how does a man catch jaundice? The rainbow
walks across the sky with its feet on the ground. If the rain-
bow's feet step on clothes hung out to dry, whoever puts
them on will take on the colors of the rainbow, with which
they have been impregnated, and fall ill. They say, too (but
the first theory is better founded and enjoys wider belief)
that one must be careful not to urinate in the direction of
the rainbow, because the curved jet of the urine resembles
and reflects the curved bow in the sky and the whole man
may be turned into an image of the rainbow. The cure for
jaundice was to carry the sick man at dawn to a hilltop out-
side the village. A knife with a black handle was applied to
his forehead, first vertically, then horizontally, making a
sort of cross. The knife was then applied with slightly dif-
ferent gestures, but still in the sign of the cross, to every
joint of the body. This operation was repeated three times
over, without skipping a single joint, for three consecutive
mornings. Then the rainbow faded away, one color at a
time, and the sick man's skin was white again.

The spell to cure erysipelas required the accompaniment
of a piece of silver. The peasants kept an old silver crown in
their houses for this particular purpose, and I never saw a
man stricken with this rather common affliction who did not
have a thick coin applied to his swollen red skin.

There were spells for mending, broken bones, for curing
toothaches, stomach-aches, and headaches, for throwing off
the influence of the evil eye or of a bewitchment. At this
point there was less concern with the art of healing than with

240

its opposite, the art of causing a man to sicken and die.
Another very important branch of magic was, of course, the
inspiration of love or liberation from it. I often witnessed the
practice of this magic and perhaps even more often I was
its object or victim. Even if at the time I noticed nothing out
of the way it may well be that the spells that were cast over
me and the potions I was given to drink brought about my
later unfortunate capacity for passion. Meanwhile I had to
defend myself from the direct attack of witches like Maria
C. She used to call me to look after her supposedly sick child
when her husband (who had already been in jail for murder
motivated by jealousy) was in the fields. This was the woman
who had caused the death of my widow-landlady's husband,
and he was said to be the father of her child, a pretty, in-
nocent little thing. The mother, on the other hand, was a
truly fearsome creature. She was short and stubby, with a
forehead so low that her smooth blue-black hair, which she
wore parted in the middle and wound about her head in
two bands, came down almost to her thick dark eyebrows.
The pale face that peered out from this jungle was filled
by her enormous, wide-open, faraway, blue-green, mad
eyes, which looked like lakes surrounded by dangerous
quicksands in a setting of rotten tropical foliage.

"You ought to be a sorcerer; you know our way of heal-
ing ..." I secretly went on with my doctoring, taking care
not to run afoul of magic. Here where magic and magnetism
underlie every relation of one thing to another, medicine,
too, derives its power from magic, no matter how orthodox
and rigorously scientific the physician may be, without the
least bit of mystery about him. Quinine, alas, has lost its
efficacy, because in the eyes of the peasants it belongs to
a discredited, incomprehensible, and pretentious body of

241

science. Severe orders had to be given them to take it and
because of their reluctance it did them little good. I pre-
ferred to prescribe newer drugs, more powerful and pos-
sessed of greater magic, such as atabrine and plasmochin.
These were doubly effective, both because of their chemical
composition and the sway they exerted over the imagination.
All medicines except quinine were gladly received by the
peasants, but they were usually out of stock or too costly,
and often doctors and druggists exploited the needs of the
sick. In the few dust-covered pharmacies of these villages
one could never be sure whether a prescription would be
accurately compounded or whether it would come out, with
good luck, as a mixture of harmless powders. It was gen-
erally better to make use of prepared or patent medicines
and these had the disadvantage of being expensive.

La Parroccola's little boy had a malignant pustule. An-
thrax is frequent in the proximity of so many animals, and I
saw many cases of it. I went to see him toward evening. As
my small stock of serum was exhausted and there was none
to be had in the village, I told the mother to hurry by short-
cut to the pharmacy in Sanf Arcangelo for more. "Have
you money?" I asked her. "Thirty lire. The carabinieri have
just paid me for the week's wash." I knew that the vials
cost eight and a half lire each; so she had enough to buy
them. "Get three, just for safety." Anthrax is an ugly thing
and only generous hypodermics will cure it. It was dark
and La Parroccola did not dare set out by night. "There are
spirits along the path and they wouldn't let me by." She did
go, none the less, long before dawn, and anxiety lent wings
to her stocky, misshapen legs. Five miles there and five miles
back; when morning came she was home again. But she
brought with her only two vials. I expressed my surprise and

242

then she told me that the druggist had asked her how much
money she had. "Thirty lire." "Then you can have two. Can
you read? They're fifteen lire each; It's printed on the
label." On the label was printed eight lire and a half. This
is how the middle class perpetuates its feudal rights! Fortu-
nately the two vials were sufficient.

La Parroccola was very poor; she had no earthly posses-
sions other than her enormous bed and her peasant charms.
She should have had free medicines and the services of a
doctor, and she should have been on a list of persons of her
condition. Such a list did exist, tucked away on a shelf
somewhere in the town hall, but in spite of the widespread
poverty, it contained no more than four or five names. A
multitude of excuses were found for ruling ineligible all
those that applied for a dole of any kind. Otherwise who
would have been left to pay tribute to the doctors and drug-
gists, who were among those who drew up the list? This was
another one of the ancient evils of this land, sanctioned by
custom until it seemed inevitable that it should be tied up
with the authority of the State, to which there was no appeal.
"If we knew how to read and write they couldn't rob us like
this. Now they've built schools, but they teach us nothing.
Rome wants us to remain like dumb animals."

These over-taxed peasants would make a day's journey on
foot from Senise to sell two lire worth of celery or to carry
all the way from Metaponto a basket of fine oranges which
had cost the lives of some of those who grew them down near
the sea, where a fatal form of malaria prevails. Yet, when
the government asked for the donation of wedding rings and
all other objects in gold to supply funds for the prosecution
of the war with Abyssinia, they responded in full measure.
There was not very much gold left in the region. Every year

243

gold merchants went all over the countryside, usually in
May or June just before the harvest, when the peasants were
short of food, in debt, and at the end of their rope. When
the government's gold collection took place they were given
to believe that contributions were obligatory, that severe
punishment awaited evaders, and that the Pope himself had
ordained the sacrifice of all the gold in the churches. And so,
resigned to this new imposition, they gave all they had to
their country. Even Giulia and La Parroccola stripped them-
selves of their wedding rings, reminders of their marriages
long ago and of the husbands who had disappeared across
the sea.

Giulia's husband had gone with their son, the first of her
seventeen children, to Argentina, and nothing more was ever
heard of them. But one day Giulia received a letter and
brought it to me to read to her. It was written in a mixture of
Italian and Spanish and mailed from the port of Civitavec-
chia. The boy who had been lost to her for twenty years
while he was growing up in Buenos Aires, wrote that he had
volunteered for service with the Italian army in Abyssinia.
He did not speak of the father, but said that he hoped to
have a furlough before leaving Italy so that he could come
to visit his mother. The furlough did not materialize, but
the boy sent a photograph of himself and every now and
then he wrote to her from Africa and I answered him, at
Giulia*s dictation.

At last a letter came in which he said that the war would
soon be over and he begged his mother to find him a wife in
Gagliano. The choice was up to her, and as soon as he came
he would marry the girl. As in so many cases America had
tad no effect upon this boy, although he had left the village
when he was far too young to preserve any memory of it.

244

And he intended to return to a place he had never seen and
to marry a strange girl chosen for him by his witch-mother,
of whom he remembered only her name. Giulia, who knew
all there was to know about every girl in Gagliano, chose for
her son a peasant bride, healthy and shy rather than beauti-
ful, who lived almost across the street from me, and the two
of them settled down to await the boy's arrival and the
wedding day.

jflL P R I L was a capricious month with sun and rain and
wandering clouds. In the air there was a faint tremor which
perhaps in faraway places was a harbinger of Spring. But
here there was none of the stir of renewed life, none of the
budding and tumescence of the happy lands of the North,
when they shake off their burden of snow and breathe in the
warm sunshine and new vegetation. The cold was over and
there were fresh breezes, but no grass grew on the hillsides,
nor violets, nor any other flowers. Nothing in the landscape
was changed, and the wastes of clay were the same gray as
before. A vital part of the revolving year was missing and its
absence saddened the heart. As the weather improved the
village streets were once more empty, for the men were away
all day long in the distant fields. The children splashed in
puddles with the goats. I walked about in my corduroy suit
or painted from my terrace. From the peasants' houses came
alternately the sound of women's voices and the squeals of
the piglets as they were lathered and washed and curried*

245

according to local custom, while they protested just like
rosy babies shrinking from the water.

Late one afternoon I was going home up "and down the
familiar way between Upper and Lower Gagliano, stopping
every now and then to gaze mechanically at the mountains,
whose every wrinkle and blemish I knew as well as we know
the faces of those close to us, which we hardly see any more
at all because we have looked at them so long. I was gazing
thus, without seeing anything in particular, into the wind-
swept grayness, as if I had lost all my senses and slipped
out of time into the waters of eternity from which there was
no return. I had sat down for a moment near the fountain,
which was deserted at the moment, and was listening to the
echo of this ocean, when I was overtaken by the letter-car-
rier. This was a sickly, old, emaciated woman, racked with
coughing, who struggled around the narrow village alleys
with the mail pouch on her head. She had a telegram, which
had been held up by the censors, telling me of the death of
a close relative. I went on home and a little later I was in-
formed that, at the urgent request of my family, the police
would allow me to return for a few days under strict guard
to my native city, I was to leave at dawn to catch the bus and
Don Gennaro, the local constable, would take me as far
as Matera.

Thus I was torn away from a succession of listless days
and found myself once more in motion, on a road, in a train,
among green fields. The trip was such a sad one that I have
almost completely forgotten it. From a distance I saw the
barren crest of Grassano and the prosaic village so near to
heaven; then we went through a part of the country which
was new to me, between the Basento, the Bradano, and the
Gravina rivers, beyond Grottole and Miglionico, in the direc-

|1';M 1 ,! ! ' I ' '

246

tion of Matera. At Matera there was a wait of several hours
while arrangements were made for my police escort. I had
time to see the town and then I understood my sister's horror,
although at the same time I was struck by its tragic beauty.
Finally I boarded the train, along with a guard, and traveled
night and day the whole length of Italy. I stayed for only
a few days in Turin, shadowed by two policemen, who were
supposed to watch over me even when I was in bed, but who,
instead, slept in a small room which I put in order for them
in my house.

My visit was a melancholy one, quite apart from its mourn-
ful motive. I had expected tremendous enjoyment from
seeing the city again, talking with my old friends, and taking
part, if for only a moment, in the busy and complex life with
which I was once so familiar. But when I got there I felt
isolated, faraway, and unable to adapt myself to the places
and persons I had longed to see. Many of my acquaintances
avoided me for the sake of their own safety, others I myself
kept away from in order not to compromise them. Some,
braver or less exposed to risk than the rest, did come to see
me without fear of the daily report drawn up by my guards,
but even with them I found relations difficult. Part of me
seemed by now foreign to their interests, ambitions, activi-
ties, and hopes; their life was no longer mine and it no
Iqnger touched me. After a few days, which passed in a
flash, I set out again, with no regret, in the company of two
new guards. These two had gone to some pains to get the job
of escorting me because they hoped by shortening our travel-
ing time to squeeze in a visit to their families. One of them,
a lean Sicilian, had a wife in Rome, where we had to wait
several hours for a train connection. He asked me not to
tell on him if he stopped over to see her instead of going the

tr*"

247

rest of the way. I told him to go ahead and enjoy himself as
his companion was quite able to watch over me alone. He
said goodbye and disappeared.

The other guard, De Luca, went with me as far as Gagli-
ano. He was a dark, well-dressed young fellow, who was
already beginning to be bald. He expressed considerable
shame for his present occupation and told me that he came
from a good family of Montemurro In the Agri Valley. I
heard later in Gagliano that all he had said was true. His
father had been a very rich blind man who was known all
over the province. He had land in various remote parts of
Lucania and everyone recognized him when he rode alone,
with his famous horse as a guide, to visit his scattered prop-
erties, which were often twenty-five or more miles apart. He
had eight sons and all the older ones had university degrees.
When the father died, the family affairs immediately went to
pieces. Young De Luca's brothers all had good positions but
he was still in school. He had had to give this up, and all that
custom allowed him to do was to join the police. He hated
his job and was anxious to go back for a high school diploma
and then find a better one. In the course of this confession of
his troubles he asked if I could recommend him. His brothers
and his uncles were all employed in government offices in
Rome and he wanted to go and see them; since he could not
leave me alone he asked me to go with him. Thus it came
about that I called upon several government employees and
was introduced to them as his friend; in every house where
we went we had coffee and I had to give evasive answers to
questions about my personal history. DeLuca was so ashamed
of his profession that he did not want even his family to
know about it. He told them that he had a good job in the
North and that I worked in the same office with him.

248

Soon the train carried us beyond Rome toward the South.
It was night and I could not sleep. As I sat on the hard seat
I meditated upon the past few days. I thought of my feeling
of strangeness, and of the complete lack of understanding
among those of my friends who concerned themselves with
political questions, of the country to which I was now hurry-
ing back. They had all asked about conditions in the South
and I had told them what I knew. But although they listened
with apparent interest, very few of them seemed really to
follow what I was saying. They were men of various tempera-
ments and shades of opinion, from stiff-necked conservatives
to fiery radicals. Many of them were very able, and they all
claimed to have meditated upon the "problem of the South"
and to have formulated plans for its solution. But just as
their schemes and the very language in which they were
couched would have been incomprehensible to the peasants,
so were the life and needs of the peasants a closed book to
them, and one which they did not even bother to open.

At bottom, as I now perceived, they were all unconscious
worshipers of the State. Whether the State they worshiped
was the Fascist State or the incarnation of quite another
dream, they thought of it as something that transcended both
its citizens and their lives. Whether it was tyrannical or
paternalistic, dictatorial or democratic, it remained to them
monolithic, centralized, and remote. This was why the po-
litical leaders and my peasants could never understand one
another. The politicians oversimplified things, even while
they clothed them in philosophical expressions. Their solu-
tions were abstract and far removed from reality; they were
schematic halfway measures, which were already out of
date. Fifteen years of Fascism had erased the problem of
die South from their minds and if now they thought of it

249

again they saw it only as a part of some other difficulty,
through the fictitious generalities of party and class and
even race. Some saw it as a purely technical and economic
matter. They spoke of public works, industrialization, and
domestic absorption of the plethora of would-be emigrants,
or else they resurrected the old Socialist slogan of "making
Italy over." Others saw the South burdened with an unfortu-
nate historical heredity, a tradition of enslavement to the
Bourbons which liberal democracy might little by little re-
lieve. Some said that the question of the South was just one
more case of capitalist oppression, which only rule by the
proletariat could supplant. Others spoke of inherent racial
inferiority, considering the South a dead weight on the eco-
nomy of the North, and studied possible measures to be
taken by the government to remedy this sad state of things.
All of them agreed that the State should do something about
it, something concretely useful, and beneficent, and legisla-
tive, and they were shocked when I told them that the State,
as they conceived it, was the greatest obstacle to the accom-
plishment of anything. The State, I said, cannot solve the
problem of the South, because the problem which we call by
this name is none other than the problem of the State itself.
There will always be an abyss between the State and the
peasants, whether the State be Fascist, Liberal, Socialist or
take on some new form in which the middle-class bureauc-
racy still survives. We can bridge the abyss only when we
succeed in creating a government in which the peasants feel
tibey have some share. Public works and land reclamation
are all very fine, but they are not the answer. Domestic ab-
sorption of the emigrants might yield some results, but it
would make the whole of Italy, instead of just the South,
into one huge colony. Plans laid by a central government,

250

however much good they may do, still leave two hostile
Italys on either side of the abyss. The difficulties we were
discussing, I explained to them, were far more complex than
they realized.

There are three distinct sides to it, which are three aspects
of one central reality; they can neither be understood nor
resolved separately. First of all, we are faced with two very
different civilizations, neither of which can absorb the other.
Country and city, a pre-Christian civilization and one that
is no longer Christian, stand face to face. As long as the
second imposes its deification of the State upon the first,
they will be in conflict. The war in Africa and the wars that
are yet to come are in part the result of this age-old quarrel,
which has now reached an acute point, and not in Italy alone.
Peasant civilization will always be the loser but it will not
be entirely crushed. It will perservere under a cover of
patience, interrupted by sporadic explosions, and the spiri-
tual crisis will continue. Brigandage, the peasant war, is a
symptom of what I mean, and this upheaval of the last cen-
tury is not the last of its kind. Just as long as Rome rules
over Matera, Matera will be lawless and despairing, and
Rome despairing and tyrannical.

The second aspect of the trouble is economic, the dilemma
of poverty. The land has been gradually impoverished: the
forests have been cut down, the rivers have been reduced to
mountain streams that often run dry, and livestock has be-
come scarce. Instead of cultivating trees and pasture lands
there has been an unfortunate attempt to raise wheat in soil
that does not favor it. There is no capital, no industry, no
savings, no schools; emigration is no longer possible, taxes
are unduly heavy, and malaria is everywhere. All this is in
large part due to the ill-advised intentions and efforts of the

State, a State in which the peasants cannot feel they have a
share, and which has brought them only poverty and deserts.

Finally, there is the social side of the problem. It is gen-
erally held that the big landed estates and their owners are
at fault, and it is true that these estates are not charitable
institutions. But if the absentee owner, who lives in Naples,
or Rome, or Palermo, is an enemy of the peasants, he is
not the worst of the enemies they have to cope with. He, at
least, is far away and does not interfere with their daily life.
Their real enemies, those who cut them off from any hope of
freedom and a decent existence, are to be found among the
middle-class village tyrants. This class is physically and
morally degenerate and no longer able to fill its original
function. It lives off petty thievery and the bastardized tradi-
tion of feudal rights. Only with the suppression of this class
and the substitution of something better can the difficulties
of the South find a solution.

The problem, in all of its three aspects, existed before
the advent of Fascism. But Fascism, while hushing it up and
denying its existence, aggravated it to the breaking point,
because under Fascism the middle class took over and
identified itself with the power of the State. We cannot fore-
see the political forms of the future, but in a middle-class
country like Italy, where middle-class ideology has infected
the masses of workers in the city, it is probable, alas, that
the new institutions arising after Fascism, through either
gradual evolution or violence, no matter how extreme and
revolutionary they may be in appearance, will maintain the
same ideology under different forms and create a new State
equally far removed from real life, equally idolatrous and
abstract, a perpetuation under new slogans and new flags
of the worst features of the eternal tendency toward Fascism.

252

Unless there is a peasant revolution we shall never have a
true Italian revolution, for the two are identical.

The problem of the South cannot he solved within the
framework of the Fascist State nor of that which may follow
it, under a different label. It will solve itself if we can create
new political ideals and a new kind of State which will be-
long also to the peasants and draw them away from their
inevitable anarchy and indifference. Nor can the South solve
its difficulties with its own efforts alone. In this case we
should have a civil war, a new horrible form of brigandage
which would end, as usual, with the defeat of the peasants
and a general disaster. All of Italy must join in and, in
order to do so, must be renewed from top to bottom. We
must make ourselves capable of inventing a new form of
government, neither Fascist, nor Communist, nor even
Liberal, for all three of these are forms of the religion of the
State. We must rebuild the foundations of our concept of
the State with the concept of the individual, which is its basis.
For the juridical and abstract concept of the individual we
must substitute a new concept, more expressive of reality,
one that will do away with the now unbridgeable gulf be-
tween the individual and the State. The individual is not a
separate unit, but a link, a meeting place of relationships of
every kind. This concept of relationship, without which the
individual has no life, is at the same time the basis of the
State, The individual and the State coincide in theory and
they must be made to coincide in practice as well, if they are
to survive.

This reversal of the concept of political life, which is
gradually and unconsciously ripening among us, is implicit
in the peasant civilization. And it is the only path which will
lead us out of the vicious circle of Fascism and anti-Fascism.

253

The name of this way out is autonomy. The State can only
be a group of autonomies, an organic federation. The unit or
cell through which the peasants can take part in the complex
life of the nation must be the autonojnous or self-governing
rural community. This is the only form of government which
can solve in our time the three interdependent aspects of the
problem of the South; which can allow the co-existence of
two different civilizations, without one lording it over the
other or weighing the other down; which can furnish. a good
chance for escape from poverty; and which, finally, by the
abolition of the powers and functions of the landowners
and the local middle class, can assure the peasants a life
of their own, for the benefit of all. But the autonomy or self-
government of the community cannot exist without the
autonomy of the factory, the school, and the city, of every
form of social life. This is what I learned from a year of
life underground.

All this I said to my friends, and I was still thinking it
over as the train slipped by night into Lucania. Thus began
a series of ideas which I developed further in later years,
after the experience of exile abroad and of war. And with
such thoughts I fell asleep.

JL H E sun was high overhead when I awoke, and we were
already past Potenza, among the steep slopes of Brindisi-
in-the-Mountains. Something unusual was in the air which

254

I had not yet fully taken into account. We entered the
Basento Valley, went past the lonely stations of Pietra Per-
tosa, Garaguso, and Tricarico and soon reached our destina-
tion, Grassano. Here we got off to wait a few hours, as usual,
for the bus. The station was deserted and I walked up and
down on the road outside, talking with my guard. Grassano
greeted me from its pinnacle, a friendly apparition with
which I was periodically blessed, but there was a change in
its appearance. Then I understood the strange aspect of the
landscape which had struck me earlier in the day from the
train window. The mountain rose up as before, with its
gradual rises and irregular crags, to the cemetery and the
village, but the earth which I had always seen gray and
yellow, was now an unexpected and unnatural green. Spring
had suddenly burst forth during my brief absence, but the
green, which elsewhere is a symbol of harmony and hope,
here seemed artificial and violent; it was out of key, like
rouge on the sunburned cheeks of a peasant girL This same
metallic green extended all the way along the mountain
road to Stigliano; it was like the false notes of a trumpet in
a funeral march. The mountains closed in after me like
prison gates as we went down toward the Sauro Valley and
up again toward Gagliano. In the sunshine little patches of
green that were scattered over the white clay stood out even
more intensely and strangely than before, like expostula-
tions. They seemed the torn pieces of a mask, thrown down
at random.

It was nearly evening when we reached the village. My
guard, De Luca, was recognized by everyone. All that he
had told me about himself and his family was true; the vil-
lagers welcomed the son of the blind man with the trusty
horse as one of their own and many of them askedjbtim to

255

share their supper before he went his way. But he was in a
hurry; he managed to borrow a horse and trotted off toward
Montemurro, where he would arrive after a night of riding.

After my short stay in the city, Gagliano seemed smaller
and sadder than ever in its changeless Bourbon atmosphere.
Two more years here! The tedious, monotonous days of the
future suddenly bore down upon me. I walked towards my
house, among greetings and calls of "Glad to see you back!"
from the doorways. Barone, whom I had left with Giulia,
was in the center of the square like one of the gentry and
ran to meet me, barking with joy.

I had expected to find Giulia waiting for me ? but the house
was empty, the fire was out, and there was no supper ready.
I sent a boy to call her, but he came back with the message
that she could not come and that I should not expect her the
next day either. She vouchsafed no explanation. I learned
later from Donna Caterina that during my absence the
albino barber, Giulia's lover, had had a fit of jealousy
God knows how groundless and had threatened to cut my
witch's throat with a razor if she went back to me. He had
terrified her to such an extent that she did not dare see me
or even nod to me on the street. Only after some time had
gone by and her terror had subsided did Giulia speak to me
when we met, with a mysterious smile on her face and a re-
served and almost smug expression. Even then she said noth-
ing of her reason for leaving me.

Dorma Caterina went to great trouble to find me another
servant. "There's one even better than Giulia. Just now she's
busy, but I hope to get her for you/ 5 In the meantime the few
village witches came to see me, but I decided to wait for
Donna Caterina's protegee. Among those whom I sent away
was an old woman, in appearance about sixty years old, who

256

was particularly insistent. I found out later, to my astonish-
ment, that she was almost ninety, that she was the mistress
of Don Luigi's eighty-two-year-old father and that she had
taken quite a fancy to me. Without my ever realizing it, I
had run the risk of being devoured by one of the oldest
crones of my acquaintance.

Finally the mayor's sister sent Maria to see me. She was
even more of a witch than Giulia, in fact she was exactly the
sort one might expect to see fly away on a broomstick at any
moment, but she had none of Giulia's animal dignity. She
was about forty, thin, and of medium height, with a dry-
wrinkled face, a long, sharp nose, and a prominent pointed
chin. She was very agile and both able and quick at her
work. She seemed to be consumed by an inner fire, by an
insatiable greed and a nervous and diabolical sensuality.
She threw dark, flaming looks at me and I saw immediately
that she had none of Giulia's ancient passivity and that I
should have to keep her at a distance. In all the time that
she was with me I was never in the least familiar with her.
But she was an excellent servant.

Besides the flight of Giulia other events had taken place
in the village during my absence. Don Giuseppe Trajella
had been banished and sent to die among the malaria-ridden
hovels of Gaglianello. The affair of Christmas Eve had
borne fruit and Don Luigi had triumphed. The bishop had
held a competition for the vacant parish of Gagliano and
forbidden Trajella to take part in it His successor, Don
Pietro Liguari, had already arrived from Miglionico. He
found a comfortable house on the main street, near the
square, and had settled down there with his housekeeper and
an extraordinary stock of provisions. I met him in the square
the day after my return and he came up to me with a cordial

257

smile. He said he had heard a great deal about me and was
very happy to make my acquaintance; he invited me to
come to his house for a cup of coffee. Don Pietro Liguari
was the exact opposite, in both manner and spirit, of the
old misanthrope who had been relegated to Gaglianello, He
was a man of about fifty or so, fairly tall, thick-set and
heavy, with a pale, yellowish fiabbiness about him. His eyes
were black and Spanish and full of cunning; he had a large
face, a slightly hooked nose, thin lips, and black hair. I felt
that I had seen him before or that he closely resembled
someone I knew and, upon closer study, this impression grew
stronger. The fact is that the new priest had a face typical of
his generation of Italians. The type was that of an actor, a
prelate, and a barber rolled into one, a cross between Mus-
solini and the stage figure, Ruggero Ruggeri. Don Pietro
Liguari was from this part of the country and probably of
a peasant family; he had a crafty expression on his face
and his manner was devious. He walked with a certain
dignity, his habit was clean, the red tassel on his biretta
was bright and new, and on one finger he wore a ruby ring.
When I went into his house I was struck by the quantity
of sausages, hams, cheeses, strings of dried figs, peppers,
onions, and garlic hanging from the beams of the ceiling,
the number of jars of jams and jellies and bottles of oil and
wine on the cupboard shelves. No house of the well-to-do in
Gagliano was stocked so abundantly. The door was opened
by the housekeeper. She was a tall, thin woman of about
forty, with a severe, impenetrable face, dressed in black with
a white collar around her neck and no veil over her head.
This austere creature, I was later informed, was a peasant
from Montemurro, an excellent cook and the mother of four

sons (fathered by various priests, so rumor had it) who

t

258

were now scattered about in the religious schools of the
province. Don Liguari showed me his house and his larder.

"You must come sometimes to do penance with me/* he
said, pointing to some fresh butter, a thing which did not
exist in Gagliano and which I had not laid eyes on since
I came there. "My housekeeper makes first-rate spaghetti.
You'll see. But now let's sit down and have some coffee.'*

When we had emptied our cups the priest began to talk
about the village, and drew me into an exchange of views.

'There's a great deal of work to be done here," he said,
"a great deal; yes, everything, from the ground up. The
church is in bad shape and the bell-tower has yet to be built.
The tithes due to the clergy are forgotten or in arrears*
Above all, there's very little religion. Many of the children
are not even baptized and no one does anything about it
unless they are ill and about to die. Only a few old women
come to church at all; even on Sunday it's almost empty. No
one comes to confession or communion* All this must change
and it will change very soon, you'll see. The authorities
don't move a finger; in fact, they do what they can to make
things worse. They are materialists and all they talk of is
war. They think they run the whole country with their
Fascism, poor idiots! They don't realize that ever since the
reconciliation between Church and State their power has
passed to us, by virtue of our spiritual authority. That's the
whole meaning of the Concordat, that we priests have taken
over. If the mayor thinks he's the strong man of the village,
he's mistaken."

Don Pietro Liguari stopped, as if he had said too much.
But he knew that he could be as outspoken with me as he
chose and there was no danger of my reporting him. More-
over he wished to be in my good graces. He began to talk about

259

political prisoners and said that lie felt it his duty to aid
and comfort them, regardless of their religious beliefs and
political opinions. This was all very fine, but his insinuating
ways and unctuous tone of voice betrayed self-interest rather
than charity. After this long preamble he finally came around
to the real reason for his desire to see me:

"We must lead the people back to religion or else they'll
fall into the hands of the atheistic pretenders to power.
This much even those who are of a different faith must
admit. . ." And here he shot me a meaningful glance.
"Besides, anyone may be touched by divine grace. . . . But
to bring the peasants back to the Church we must make the
services more attractive and see to it that they appeal to
the imagination. The church here is poor and bare, and
preaching is not enough to draw them. If the peasants are to
return to the House of God we must have music. I had a
harmonium brought over here from Miglionico and yester-
day it was installed in the church. It's just the thing we need,
but there's one difficulty: who's to play it? No one in the vil-
lage knows how. Of course I thought of you; you're so edu-
cated and you can do so many things. . . . We're all God's
children, you know, . . ."

The reasons for which he had feared a refusal on my
part had never even crossed my mind. I told him that I had
studied the piano, but that I hadn't touched a keyboard for
years. I was willing to try, and to help him out once or twice,
but I couldn't promise to be a regular organist. If there was
anyone to sing I should be glad to act as accompanist, but
first of all I should have to send for some music. We walked
up to the church to look at the instrument, which had been
placed in plain sight at one side of the altar and had already
aroused considerable curiosity among the children. The

260

priest was happy; he had been afraid I would refuse, and
my unexpected consent emboldened him to ask more. He
pointed to the bare, peeling walls of the church:

"Here there's a real need for some painting/'

The idea was not altogether displeasing.

"Perhaps some day 111 cover the walls with frescoes,"
I told him. "I've two years more to stay here and plenty of
time to think it over. Too bad they're in such bad condition.
But I shouldn't like to antagonize Mornaschi, who's such a
very nice fellow/*

The ceiling of the church had already been frescoed with
gold stars on a blue background and decorative bands that
separated it from the walls below. The work had been done
several years before by Mornaschi, a fair-haired young
painter from Milan, who used to go from village to village,
carrying out church decorations and staying in one place
until he finished his job there and went on to another. Here
at Gagliano his vagabond life had come to an end. He had
come only to do the ceiling, but he had been offered a lowly
clerical position in the assessor's office. Leaving uncertainty
for security and art for bureaucracy, he had laid down his
paintbrushes and never gone away. He was a modest, re-
served, courteous man, the only stranger who had ever
settled down in Gagliano. I saw him from time to time and
he was always very agreeable.

"Mornaschi can lend you a hand," said the priest, who
was evidently already well up on local affairs and enthusi-
astic about the prospects of leading his wandering flock back
to the fold. I, too, was a lost sheep and the good man let his
imagination run away with him. He made allusions to an-
other prospect, a solemn ceremony of adult baptism, in
which the bishop himself why not? might take part. He

261

did not state this hope in such clear terms to start with,
although I could guess at his eagerness. Don Liguari was an
astute diplomat, and he merely let drop a discreet hint that
it was a shame for me to live in such a solitary fashion, that
although I was still young it was time for me to think of
marriage. Then, as we left the church he invited me to have
dinner with him the following Sunday: "Come do penance,
Doctor, with a poor priest."

The foodstuffs I had seen piled up in the kitchen gave
me a notion that the penance would not be too arduous. The
austere and maternal housekeeper from Montemurro proved
herself to be no mean cook; indeed, I had not dined so well
for a whole year. The greatest delicacy consisted of home-
made sausages filled, according to local custom, with
Spanish red peppers.

From this time on, the priest was inseparable from me. He
came to my house and sat for a portrait which he hoped I
would give him. Don Luigi was jealous of the priest's atten-
tions, but Don Liguari had persuasive ways and probably
quieted him with some evangelical pretext or other. One day
lie saw on my bedside table a Protestant edition of the Bible,
and he started back in horror, as if it were a serpent. "Such
books as you read, Doctor! Throw it away, I beg of you!"
His manner with me was quite intimate, and every time he
saw me he said with fatherly solicitude: "First a baptism
and then a wedding. Just leave it all to me!"

One Sunday I returned his dinner invitation, straining to
the utmost the ability of my witch, Maria, in order to keep
the "penance" from being on this occasion a real one. It
happened that Poerio, the white-bearded old man who had
been ill for many months but could not consult me because
he was a compare di San Giovanni of Dr. Gibilisco, had died

262

two days before, on Friday. The funeral took place on Sun-
day, with two priests from Stigliano participating in the
ceremony, and I had to include them in my invitation. One
was big and fat, the other short and scrawny, but both of
them were of the same general type as Don Liguari: wily,
used to good living, and thoroughly versed in peasant ways.
I quite enjoyed myself in the company of these three strange
creatures, who deplored the -fact that the majority of those
who died were poor and a really fine funeral such as the
one we had just attended took place only once every year
or so.

Meanwhile I had got hold of some church music and had
practiced on the harmonium. As soon as I felt up to render-
ing the mass without too many errors and dared to face a
not overly critical public, I arranged with Don Liguari to
assist him for just one Sunday. I had found out that the
barber who extracted teeth knew how to play the piano by
ear, and I was sure that he would make a better permanent
organist than I. Although he was not very keen to set foot
in the church, I intended to leave the job to him after the
one mass I had promised.

That Sunday the church was full. The priest had spread
the news that I was to play and no one wanted to miss this
unaccustomed spectacle. The women in their white veils were
packed in all the way back to the doors and many could not
get in at all. People came who had not been to church since
time immemorial. Among them, with her sister, was Donna
Concetta, the elder daughter of S. the lawyer, whom I often
met in the square in the evening. Donna Concetta bad been
cloistered for almost a year on account of the death of her
brother; in all this time she did not leave the house and I
had never laid eyes on her. She had decided to end her vow

with this Sunday's mass and she sat in the first row of
benches. Donna Concetta was said to be the most beautiful
girl in Gagllano and this reputation was entirely justified.
She was about eighteen years old, very small, with the per-
fect round face of a Madonna, large, languorous eyes, thick,
smooth black hair, a small red mouth, a slender neck, and an
agreeable air of shyness.

This was the only time I ever saw Donna Concetta, amid
the throng of veiled women, and I never heard her voice.
But the peasants had their plans. "You are one of us now,"
they used to say. "You should marry Donna Concetta. She's
the wealthiest and prettiest marriageable girl in the village,
and just the one for you. That way you'll not leave us, but
stay here always." This is why I was curious to see the
cloistered bride whom they had chosen for me.

The women were enthusiastic about the service. "What
a fine fellow you are," they shouted after me as I left the
church. But the priest's confidence in the drawing power
of music was mistaken. Although the barber was a better
organist than I, the church was soon nearly deserted again.
Don Liguari did not lose heart; he spent his days going from
house to house and baptizing the children. Little by little lie
may have obtained 'some results.

The strange, ephemeral spring had gone by. The vivid
greenery had lasted no more than ten days, like a pre-
posterous apparition. Then it had shriveled up under the
burning wind and sun of May, which brought summer sud-
denly upon us. The landscape returned to its usual monot-
onous, white, chalky appearance. Just as when I had arrived,
long months before, the air vibrated with heat over the silent
stretches of clay, and it seemed as if the gray shadow of the
same clouds had forever hung above that desolate white

264

sea. I knew every color, every fold and irregularity of the-
land.

With the return of the heat, life in Gagliano crawled at
a slower pace than ever. The peasants were in the fields, the
shadows of the houses stretched lazily across the street, and
the goats stood still in the sun. The eternal idleness of the
Bourbons lay upon this village that was built of the bones of
the dead. I could make out every voice, every whisper, every
sound, as if I had known it always, and had heard it end-
lessly repeated, just as it would be repeated endlessly in
the future. I worked at my painting and the care of the
sick, but my mood was one of complete indifference; I felt
like a worm enclosed in a nutshell. Far away from those I
loved, hemmed in by an almost religious monotony, I waited
for the years to pass. My life had no base but was hung
ridiculously in the air, and the sound of my own voice
startled me.

The war was drawing to a close. Addis Ababa had fallen,
the Empire had ascended the hills of Rome, and Don Luigi
attempted to bring it to the hills of Gagliano as well, with
one of the usual sparsely attended and depressing public
meetings. There would be no more battle casualties and soon
the few local men who were in the army would return.
Giulia's son wrote that he was coming soon and that he hoped
to find his bride ready for him. Don Luigi felt more impor-
tant than before, as if the imperial crown had passed over
his head. As for the peasants, in spite of all that was prom-
ised, they saw no openings for themselves in the mythical
and ill-gotten new land. The thought of Africa did not even
cross their minds as they went down to the banks of the
Agri

One day at noon I walked through the square* The sun

was blazing, the wind raised clouds of dust, and from the
steps of the post office Don Cosimino waved his hand urgently
in my direction. As I came closer I saw a look of affection
and happiness in his eyes.

"Good news, Don Carlo!" he said, *I don't want to give
you false hopes, but a telegram has just come from Matera
authorizing the release of the prisoner from Genoa. Fve
just sent for him. The message tells me to stand by this after-
noon for more names. I hope yours is among them. It seems
that there's an amnesty to celebrate the fall of Addis Ababa."

A group of us stood about the post office all day. Every
now and then we heard the click of the telegraph receiver,
then Don Cosimino's face appeared at the window, wreathed
in smiles, and he shouted a new name. Mine was the very
last; it did not come in until nearly evening. All of us were
freed except the two Communists: the student from Pisa and
the worker from Ancona. The gentry gathered around to con-
gratulate me upon the liberation accorded me without my
having lifted a finger to obtain it. My unexpected joy soon
turned to melancholy, and I called Barone and went home.

Everyone else left the next morning, but I could not bring
myself to hurry. I was sorry to leave and I found a dozen
pretexts for lingering on. There were patients I could not
abandon, paintings I wanted to finish, and others I had to
pack up, along with the rest of my belongings. I had to have
packing-cases made and a box for Barone, because he could
slip away from a leash and he was too wild to send loose
in the baggage car. Thus I stayed on for another ten days.

The peasants came to see me and said :

"Don't go away. Stay here. Marry Concetta. They'll make
you the mayor. You must stay with us."

When the day of my departure drew nearer, they said they

266

were going to puncture the tires of the car that was to take
me away.

'Til come hack, 5 ' I said.

But they shook their heads.

"If you go, you'll never come back. You're a Christian, a
real human being. Stay here with us."

They wanted me to make a solemn promise to return and
I made it in all sincerity, but I have not yet been able to
keep it.

Finally I took leave of one and all: the^widow, the grave-
digger and town crier, Donna Caterina, Giulia, Don Luigi,
La Parroccola, Dr. Milillo, Dr. Gibilisco, the priest, the
gentry, the peasants, the women, the goats, the gnomes and
the spirits. I left one of my paintings to the village as a
memento. Then I saw my baggage loaded, turned the big key
in the lock of my house door and gave a last look at the moun-
tains of Calabria, the cemetery, the Bog, and the surrounding
wastes of clay.

It was dawn, and the peasants were going down with their
donkeys to the fields when I climbed with Barone into the
"American's" car and went away. After we had rounded
the curve below the sports field, Gagliano disappeared from
view and I have never seen it since.

I had a pass for the railway and had to travel by slow
trains; this prolonged my trip considerably. I saw again the
rocky heights and the museum of Matera. Then we went
across the plains of Apulia, studded with white stones like
a graveyard, and through Bari and Foggia in the mysterious
night. After this I proceeded northward by short stages. I
went up to the cathedral of Ancona and looked out at long
last upon the sea. It was a quiet day and from this height
there was a wide view over the water. A fresh breeze was

267

Mowing from Dalmatia, making tiny whitecaps on the
smooth surface of the waves. Vague notions floated throLgh
my head: the life of this sea was like man's fate, cast for all
eternity in a series of equal waves, moving through t *e
without change. I thought with affectionate sorrow of i-ie
motionless time and the dark civilization which I had 1 ft
behind me.

Already the train was carrying me far away, through the
checkerboard fields of Romagna, toward the vineyards of
Piedmont and the mysterious future of exile, of war t ad
death, which I could then but barely perceive, like an uncer-
tain cloud in the boundless sky.

THE END

Florence, December 1943-July 1944

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