Thither we started, next day, at about 3 p.m.
The road climbs upwards through bare country till it reaches a dusky
pinnacle of rock, a conspicuous landmark, which looks volcanic but is
nothing of the kind. It bears the name of Pietra-Sasso - the explanation
of this odd pleonasm being, I suppose, that here the whole mass of rock,
generally decked with grass or shrubs, is as bare as any single stone.
There followed a pleasant march through pastoral country of streamlets
and lush grass, with noble views downwards on our right, over
many-folded hills into the distant valley of the Sinno. To the left is
the forest region. But the fir trees are generally mutilated - their
lower branches lopped off; and the tree resents this treatment and often
dies, remaining a melancholy stump among the beeches. They take these
branches not for fuel, but as fodder for the cows. A curious kind of
fodder, one thinks; but Calabrian cows will eat anything, and their milk
tastes accordingly. No wonder the natives prefer even the greasy fluid
of their goats to that of cows.
"How?" they will ask, "You Englishmen, with all your money - you drink
the milk of cows?"
Goats are over-plentiful here, and the hollies, oaks and thorns along
the path have been gnawed by them into quaint patterns like the
topiarian work in old-fashioned gardens. If they find nothing to their
taste on the ground, they actually climb trees; I have seen them
browsing thus, at six feet above the ground. These miserable beasts are
the ruin of south Italy, as they are of the whole Mediterranean basin.
What malaria and the Barbary pirates have done to the sea-board, the
goats have accomplished for the regions further inland; and it is really
time that sterner legislation were introduced to limit their
grazing-places and incidentally reduce their numbers, as has been done
in parts of the Abruzzi, to the great credit of the authorities. But the
subject is a well-worn one.
The solitary little house which now appeared before us is called
"Vitiello," presumably from its owner or builder, a proprietor of the
village of Noepoli. It stands in a charming site, with a background of
woodland whence rivulets trickle down - the immediate surroundings are
covered with pasture and bracken and wild pear trees smothered in
flowering dog-roses. I strolled about in the sunset amid tinkling herds
of sheep and goats that were presently milked and driven into their
enclosure of thorns for the night, guarded by four or five of those
savage white dogs of the Campagna breed. Despite these protectors, the
wolf carried off two sheep yesterday, in broad daylight. The flocks come
to these heights in the middle of June, and descend again in October.
The shepherds offered us the only fare they possessed - the much-belauded
Pollino cheeses, the same that were made, long ago, by Polyphemus
himself. You can get them down at a pinch, on the principle of the
German proverb, "When the devil is hungry, he eats flies." Fortunately
our bags still contained a varied assortment, though my man had
developed an appetite and a thirst that did credit to his Berserker
ancestry.
We retired early. But long after the rest of them were snoring hard I
continued awake, shivering under my blanket and choking with the acrid
smoke of a fire of green timber. The door had been left ajar to allow it
to escape, but the only result of this arrangement was that a glacial
blast of wind swept into the chamber from outside. The night was
bitterly cold, and the wooden floor on which I was reposing seemed to be
harder than the majority of its kind. I thought with regret of the tepid
nights of Taranto and Castrovillari, and cursed my folly for climbing
into these Arctic regions; wondering, as I have often done, what demon
of restlessness or perversity drives one to undertake such insane
excursions.
XX
A MOUNTAIN FESTIVAL
Leaving the hospitable shepherds in the morning, we arrived after
midday, by devious woodland paths, at the Madonna di Pollino. This
solitary fane is perched, like an eagle's nest, on the edge of a cliff
overhanging the Frida torrent. Owing to this fact, and to its great
elevation, the views inland are wonderful; especially towards evening,
when crude daylight tints fade away and range after range of mountains
reveal themselves, their crests outlined against each other in tender
gradations of mauve and grey. The prospect is closed, at last, by the
lofty groups of Sirino and Alburno, many long leagues away. On all other
sides are forests, interspersed with rock. But near at hand lies a
spacious green meadow, at the foot of a precipice. This is now covered
with encampments in anticipation of to-morrow's festival, and the
bacchanal is already in full swing.
Very few foreigners, they say, have attended this annual feast, which
takes place on the first Saturday and Sunday of July, and is worth
coming a long way to see. Here the old types, uncon-taminated by
modernism and emigration, are still gathered together. The whole
country-side is represented; the peasants have climbed up with their
entire households from thirty or forty villages of this thinly populated
land, some of them marching a two days' journey; the greater the
distance, the greater the "divozione" to the Mother of God. Piety
conquers rough tracks, as old Bishop Paulinus sang, nearly fifteen
hundred years ago.
It is a vast picnic in honour of the Virgin. Two thousand persons are
encamped about the chapel, amid a formidable army of donkeys and mules
whose braying mingles with the pastoral music of reeds and
bagpipes - bagpipes of two kinds, the common Calabrian variety and that
of Basilicata, much larger and with a resounding base key, which will
soon cease to exist.
